Exercise is an essential part of a healthy lifestyle. But are you eating the right nutrients to support your workouts? This week we’re reviewing proper nutrition to support your workouts.
You work so hard to find the time and energy to work out. Did you know that the food you eat before and after you exercise can do a lot to either help or hurt your fitness? Choosing the right foods can help increase fat burning, boost your energy, and aid in post-workout recovery. Here are some tips on nutrition to support your workouts.
Don’t Skip the Carbs
Carbohydrates are fuel for your body. The harder your body is working, the more carbs you will need to keep going. The pre-workout meal should be focused on protein and complex carbohydrates. It is important that both of these macronutrients be present. Carbs are the fuel. Protein is what rebuilds and repairs, as well as makes the right amino acids available for your muscles.
The meal should be consumed about 60-90 minutes before exercise begins to allow the body time to digest and make the nutrients available to the body during exercise.
Complex carbohydrates in your pre-workout meal will help ensure you have adequate energy levels for your workout.
Top Pre-Workout Snacks:
- A small bowl of cereal, or oatmeal, with milk and a banana
- 1 bagel spread with cottage spread
- Greek Yogurt with berries
- Apple and peanut butter or almond butter
- Peanut butter and banana sandwich
A Pre-Workout Recipe:
Fruit Chews
- 2 medium ripe bananas
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup chopped or ground dates
- 1 ½ cup rolled oats
- 3/4 cup walnuts
What to Do:
- In a bowl, mash bananas and leave small chunks. Mix in eggs and dates
- Stir in oats and nuts, set aside for 10 min once mixed.
- Pre heat oven to 350 F, place spoonfuls of dough onto cookie sheet.
- Bake for 18 min or until edges are golden, store in fridge or freezer.
Post Workout Nutrition
It’s absolutely necessary that you consume a post workout meal following your workout session to compensate for lost energy and nutrition.
This meal should be consumed within 20-30 minutes of your workout.
This will maximize potential muscle gains. In order to speed up the results of your regular workout, choosing the right foods is essential. Post workout nutrition, therefore, has to become an integral part of your daily workout regime.
The muscle tissue tends to break down after an intense workout session. To counter this, you should have a quick and easily-digested meal immediately post-workout to help the muscles recover as quickly as possible.
People often tend to skip the post-workout meal. This meal however is most important when it comes to recouping the muscles and achieving the desired results in the shortest period of time.
The meal should be easily digestible, containing carbohydrates and proteins in the ratio 3:1. This is important because the nutrients are quickly absorbed into the body. This is one of the only times I advocate a low fat meal as fat slows down the absorption of carbs and in this case you want them absorbed as quickly as possible.
The ultimate post workout meal is a fruit and protein smoothie. It is low in fat and fruit is a fast acting carb which will replenish your body as quickly as possible.
What are some of your favourite pre- and post- workout meals and nutrition to support your workouts?
Our Power Up Mission is simply to educate our customers on the importance of using quality food as fuel. For all your Power Up news make sure you check out Vince’s Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Make sure you follow @VincesMarket and #powerupwithvinces, sign up for our Power Up Newsletter and keep an eye out for nutrition tips and tricks from me, our in-house nutrition expert!
To our health & wellbeing,
Danielle
