Nutrient timing involves eating at specific times to achieve a desired outcome. The goal helps dictate the timing strategy. Nutrient timing to increase muscle mass looks different than if the goal is weight loss, for example.

Generally, the timing of nutrition is centered around the training session. It breaks down what should be consumed before or even during the workout. It also guides post workout nutrition.

Together, this is known as peri-exercise nutrient timing. Nutrient timing even provides advice about what to eat.

It gives insight into when carb intake might be the most important. Are pre workout carbs better than post workout carbs? It also breaks down how to time protein intake.

In an editorial published by Nutrition , it explains that nutrition timing is based on three phases:. Energy phase : This is when the muscle releases enough energy to contract during exercise.

Carbohydrate consumption at this time helps keep muscle glycogen stores from depleting. It also helps keep blood sugar from crashing. This reduces fatigue. Add protein to the mix and muscle can exert more effort. It also stunts the rise of cortisol, aiding in muscle recovery.

Anabolic phase : The 45 minutes after a workout is the anabolic phase. This is when damaged muscle protein starts to repair. Muscle glycogen stores are starting to restore. During this phase, insulin sensitivity initially increases, then drops rapidly. Several hours after exercise, insulin resistance can occur.

This can slow muscle recovery and repair. Growth phase : The growth phase starts after the anabolic stage ends and continues until a new workout begins. Muscle hypertrophy occurs during this phase. Muscle glycogen is also fully replenished. While timing nutrition may seem like a lot of work, it does get easier with practice.

Plus, there are quite a few benefits in timing your meal or snack. Nutrient timing can help maximize muscle growth. A study reported that consuming whey protein after lower-body resistance training contributed to greater rectus femoris muscle size.

Timing your nutrition can also aid in fat loss. One study found that consuming a 1;1. Another study reports that nutrient timing also affects metabolism. If the goal is improved performance, nutrition timing can help with this too.

Research supports pre-exercise carbohydrate consumption for endurance athletes. It may be even more critical when resistance training according to an article in the Journal of Athletic Performance and Nutrition.

This article explains that it works by reducing protein degradation and increasing protein synthesis. Some research even suggests that the timing of other substances may offer more benefits. A study looked at the timing of ergogenic aids and micronutrients.

It noted that timing caffeine, nitrates, and creatine affect exercise performance. This timing also impacts the ability to gain strength and for the body to adapt to exercise. The strategy you use when timing nutrition will vary based on your desired goal.

Protein is key to helping muscle grow. It is also critical for boosting muscle strength. Consuming protein during the anabolic phase can help muscle repair after resistance exercise. It can even help reduce muscle protein breakdown the next morning according to one study. Consuming 20 grams of protein after exercise helps support muscle protein synthesis.

While it may be tempting to aim for more, one study found that this provides no additional benefit. Protein needs vary based on level of physical activity. An athlete engaged in moderate-intensity exercise needs 0. An athlete engaging in more intense exercise needs more, or between 1.

Those engaging in resistance exercise also need this higher amount. What does nutrient timing look like if the goal is weight loss?

Much of the research in this area involves eating habits, in general, as opposed to eating before, during, or after exercise. One study that addresses this topic focuses on endurance athletes.

It notes that fat loss can be achieved for this type of athlete by:. The path to fat loss without losing muscle changes depends on exercise intensity.

If the intensity is high, increased carbohydrate consumption can help meet this demand. If the workout is low intensity, focus more on protein. Performance nutrition is gaining in popularity.

Some suggest that access to a sports dietitian can improve performance for pro athletes. This is the basis of an April article published in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. The strategy for nutrition timing varies based on the sport.

If the athlete runs marathons, fueling up a few hours before the run provides energy for the event. Carbohydrate foods are best.

A good calorie count is calories or less. After the race, refuel with a light meal. If the sport relies on muscle strength, refuel with protein within a few hours. This helps the body as it repairs muscle damage. Approximately 20 grams is a good place to start.

More may be needed if the sport is intense. A carbohydrate rich meal a few hours before aerobic exercise helps provide the energy needed. Adding a little protein can help keep the energy going.

Have a banana carbohydrate with some peanut butter protein. Or eat a couple of wheat crackers carbohydrate with cubes of cheese protein. When lifting weights, post exercise protein is important. This will help the muscle tissue recover. Still, I offer a pattern similar to this with clients because it breaks the monotony of dieting.

The majority of clients choose to do this but it is their choice, not my demand. My advice: try it, see if you like it. Why include them? They provide a helpful break from the monotony of dieting by introducing some variety in possible food options across the week.

Will they be beneficial beyond that? Probably not for beginners and early intermediates, possibly for those more advanced. So only implement these strategies if they help improve your adherence, not hinder it due to the added complication.

Calorie cycling is the name given when different days of the week have different calorie targets. If you find yourself keeping to your diet during the week but struggling at the weekends, consider building more flexibility into your plan to allow that. So for example, to maintain the daily average calorie intake, you could eat calories fewer on the weekdays so that you can eat calories extra on the weekends:.

I recommend avoiding fluctuations much greater than this as it will make adherence harder and likely compromise results. Cheat days are the name given to days where people eat whatever they want.

They have no place in a diet and I strongly suggest you avoid them. The most common pattern of people screwing up their diets or getting fat when they bulk is staying tight during the weekdays and blowing it all on the weekend.

It is perfectly possible to do this over one day as well. This means that over the weekdays you will have built up a kcal deficit. But if you eat or drink kcal extra over the weekend, you are back where you started. Macro cycling is the name given when different days of the week have different macros targets.

I recommend you avoid extreme splits in macro intake as that could also compromise recovery and hamper adherence. As carbs balance the calorie budget, this means the training days have more carbs than the rest days. See examples at the end of this section.

Refeeds are the name given to days where more calories and carbs are eaten. The idea is to replenish muscle glycogen and help boost performance during cutting phases.

Some people do this every training day like with Leangains , but when most people talk of refeeds they are referring to a once per week, carb-heavy day, which is often above caloric maintenance.

Often fat intake will be limited on these days in a bid to minimize storage, though whether this has any effect is unclear. Note : I will purposefully spare you the math in this section.

But if you wish to see the formulas used, hover or click for the calorie cycling math 1 and the macro cycling math 2. Note how personal preference is the reason behind the choice for all of these examples.

He decides that he wishes to sacrifice some flexibility on the weekdays so that he has a calorie buffer on the weekend. He chooses to split the kcal additional budget between fats and carbs evenly, so he adds 20 g of fat and 55 g of carbs to these days.

Thelma wants to make her life easier, not more difficult by adding a layer of complication, so she decides against calorie or macro cycling. As she prefers a little more fat in her diet, she chooses to swap 20 g of carbs for an additional 10 g of fat. She wants to do both calorie and macro cycling, as she feels it will add variety in her diet each day which will make things easier to adhere to.

Got a question? Ask me below. Please keep questions on topic, write clearly, concisely, and don't post diet calculations. Privacy policy. Skip to content A Nutrient Timing Guide To Maximize Fat Loss and Muscle Growth. In this chapter the key principles you will learn about nutrient timing are: Doing nothing stupid or extreme that could compromise the rest of your efforts, Optimizing things in a way that helps you adhere, Avoiding complicated strategies unless you need them for your sport.

When Should We Eat? Suggestions For When To Eat, Relative To When You Train Should You Try Intermittent Fasting? Refeeds, Calorie Cycling, Macro Cycling, and Cheat Days Example Calorie, Macro Cycling, and Refeed Calculations For Our Four Amigos As with this series as a whole, this article is written in the order of importance that each addition will likely benefit you.

Meal Timing: How Many Meals Should We Eat? The sweet spot for meal frequency is 2—3 meals when cutting and 3—4 meals when recomping or bulking. Why I Recommend You Avoid Extreme Meal Frequencies Eating one meal a day may be the simplest choice, but it is not going to be optimal for lean mass retention when dieting, nor muscle growth when bulking.

Meal Frequency Recommendations For Those Cutting and Bulking For those cutting, it can be beneficial to have fewer meals because you can eat more at each meal.

those who ate three or four. Meal Timing: When Should We Eat? Avoid fat as this could cause stomach upset. Personally, I feel completely fine without this, but I want to state it here as an option. Spread Your Meals evenly Across the day If you eat twice per day, make that lunch and dinner, and roughly hours apart.

Spread your macros evenly As long as meals are evenly spaced, there is likely very little benefit to worrying about more specific protein or carbohydrate timing. Avoid skewing your fat, protein, or carb intake across the course of a day too heavily.

You may still find some people saying that eating fats and avoiding carbs at the start of the day and vice versa at the end of the day is beneficial. Nutrient Timing: When To Eat, Relative To When You Train Here are some detailed meal timing examples of when to eat, relative to when you train.

Early Morning fasted training This setup is the most popular with clients. IF SKIPPING BREAKFAST IF EATING BREAKFAST 25 g Whey Light Breakfast Training Training Lunch Lunch Dinner Dinner Lunchtime Training This is popular with folks who can take a slightly longer lunch than the typical hour and have a gym close to their office or in the same building.

IF SKIPPING BREAKFAST IF EATING BREAKFAST 25 g Whey Breakfast Training Training Lunch Lunch Dinner Dinner Early-Afternoon Training Fewer clients do this, but it works equally well. IF SKIPPING BREAKFAST IF EATING BREAKFAST — Breakfast Lunch Lunch ~ Training ~ Training Dinner Dinner Late-Evening Training This type of setup is best avoided if it impacts the duration or quality of sleep.

The idea that eating before bed makes you fat is a myth. Should You Try Intermittent Fasting? As consistent meal times can help with hunger regulation, I do not recommend I. The majority of those clients you see on the results page have done this. Leangains-Style Intermittent Fasting Leangains is a style of intermittent fasting developed by Swedish nutritionist Martin Berkhan.

Leangains combines breakfast skipping with calorie and macro cycling. So where does the 8-hour window come from and why is this not 7 or 9 hours? Why did Martin choose to fluctuate calorie, carb, and fat intake? Does this make a difference?

Leangains Benefits Meal prep is less time-consuming. Fewer meals mean larger meals for the same calorie budget, which is more psychologically satisfying. There is a lack of hunger in the mornings after an initial adjustment phase, which is usually 5—7 days. People also report an increased focus in the mornings.

I am one of these people and this is when I like to get my hardest cognitive tasks for the day done. Leangains Drawbacks There is a higher risk of muscle loss when dieting. The scientific literature suggests that it is likely better to space meals out further. Some examples of clients I have worked with who skipped breakfast.

None of them did any cardio. Refeeds, Calorie Cycling, Macro Cycling, and Cheat Days Calorie and macronutrient intake do not have to be the same each day of the week. Calorie cycling And How To Implement It Calorie cycling is the name given when different days of the week have different calorie targets.

Most people intend their diets to look like this: An isocaloric diet. I call this unintentional calorie cycling. Four-day training week.

Calorie Cycling Gone Wrong Cheat days are the name given to days where people eat whatever they want. Macro Cycling and How To Implement It Macro cycling is the name given when different days of the week have different macros targets.

People do this with a goal to improve body composition, training effect, or performance. What Are Refeeds? Example Calorie, Macro Cycling, and Refeed Calculations Note : I will purposefully spare you the math in this section. As Freddie has had trouble on the weekends in the past, he chooses to be stricter on the weekdays to allow more calories on the weekends.

Sam never smiles. Serious Shredded Sam.