how much protein/carbs should be had after steady state cardio?
what about HIIT?
what about HIIT?
You want about 250 calories consisting of roughly a 4:1 ratio of carbs: protein. The ratio isn't nearly as important as a lot of people would have you believe. You want the carbs to be simple sugars (this is really the only time you want simple sugars) and it is important that you get this within 30 minutes of finishing your workout. Recent studies have shown that getting it within ten minutes of completing your workout is most effective. This is the same for steady state or HIIT.
But if you provide your body with fast carbs i.e simple sugars, wouldn't the body switch off from the fat-burning mode and use the fast carbs as nutrients?
As far as I know while doing the cardio your body goes in fat-burning mode which continues for some time after the cardio is done and simple carbs post cardio stop that process. Is this true?
Well, you don't really care which substrate you are burning as your liver can convert any of them to fat. Thus, your body being in "fat-burning mode" doesn't mean that you will actually become any leaner. Additionally, since it is only 250 calories, it will only be used to replenish your intra-muscular glycogen stores, rather than using it as excess calories. What you are referring to is that your body's metabolism is raised as your body recovers from the workout. This will not be stopped regardless of what you eat, but if you aren't smart you can eat too many calories and wind up having an excess of calories regardless of your metabolism being raised, which will then be stored as fat (regardless of the form these calories take on the way intot he body). Hope that helps. Let me know if you have any more questions and feel free to email me at pkington@gmail.com
But if you provide your body with fast carbs i.e simple sugars, wouldn't the body switch off from the fat-burning mode and use the fast carbs as nutrients?
Further to what pkington said.
First of all, you're taking this nutrition after your workout, so your body certainly isn't using any of it as ' nutrients ' to fuel any further exercise. And, it seems to me that any insulin bump you may get from your post workout is a good thing - the nutrition is simply going to optimize the ability of your body to take in the nutrients ( i.e glucose , amino acids ) it needs to refuel / repair muscles. In many cases, as far as I understand it, the energy your body needs to recreate things like glycogen is actually obtained by breaking down fat stores...so fat burning does continue after post workout nutrition IMO.
Well this isn't really post workout though, it's post cardio, and if the cardio isn't HIIT, then there's a difference
Further to what pkington said.
First of all, you're taking this nutrition after your workout, so your body certainly isn't using any of it as ' nutrients ' to fuel any further exercise. And, it seems to me that any insulin bump you may get from your post workout is a good thing - the nutrition is simply going to optimize the ability of your body to take in the nutrients ( i.e glucose , amino acids ) it needs to refuel / repair muscles. In many cases, as far as I understand it, the energy your body needs to recreate things like glycogen is actually obtained by breaking down fat stores...so fat burning does continue after post workout nutrition IMO.