Five Postworkout Nutrition Strategies to Boost Muscle Growth and Improve Recovery
Post workout nutrition is important, but many people overcomplicate it by micromanaging macronutrients and obsessing over the timing.
When your goal is to burn fat and sustain muscle, there are five easy guidelines:
1. Eat as soon as possible after resistance training. The 45 to 90 minutes after intense training is an important window when proper nutrition makes the biggest difference.
2. Eat carbs and proteins in the postworkout meal. Protein is an important part of your postworkout meal.
3. Eat some of your carb calories in your postworkout meal. Eating carbs after training helps restore blood sugar, suppresses cortisol, causes a beneficial spike in insulin (which helps amino acids into your muscles when insulin sensitivity is high), and stimulates protein synthesis. The carbs you eat after training are used to replenish muscle glycogen and rarely get stored as body fat.
4. Drink your carbs and protein postworkout if you want. Liquids are often recommended for postworkout nutrition because they’re absorbed more quickly than whole foods.
5. Eat simple carbs or high glycemic carbs if you want. The postworkout period is a time when quickly absorbing carbs are okay. Normally, you’ll keep simple sugars low, but if you’re going to eat them, right after intense and exhaustive workouts is a good time to do it.
If your primary goal is fat loss and you have the endomorphic body type or carb-intolerant metabolic type, you may want to be more cautious about high-sugar postworkout drinks and stick with natural food. Whole food gives you micronutrients and fiber, not just calories and carbs, while satisfying your appetite better, and these are decided advantages over liquids.
