Do I have to work out in the morning to lose fat?

I can't get my butt up in the morning and I LOVE to sleep in but everything I've been reading says it's nearly worthless to workout in the evening.

Well I am losing weight and I work out mid-afternoon (After 1 or 2 meals).

It might be BETTER to work out 1st thing in the morning but its just not possible for me

So my take on this is that yes, it still works My pants tell me so!

Tidey

Hey Jess

IMO the important thing is to DO the workout - whatever time works for you. I wouldn't call working out in the evening worthless - after all my gym is PACKED after work (one of the main reasons I DON'T work out in the evening - too many dern people!).

I used to like sleeping in too - now I am most definitely a morning person. I find now that once Seinfeld is over (8:00 pm) I start nodding off...

Actually there is quite a lot of research done on this - boring to read through but the results are comforting.

There is no significant difference in kcals expended on workouts at different times of the day. Fat utilisation changes only in response to your nutritional levels, ie you should always have enough glycogen available, and should never workout when carb depleted.

If you work out in the early morning without eating then you are NOT burning fat as you don't have the right nutritional balance to do so and your body uses its secondary source of fuel - your muscles!!! So you may notice weight loss if you workout like this, but it is the good bits of your body that you are losing, not the fatty bits!

The only differences in exercise times were psychological. Statistically those who workout in the early morning do more work and are more likely to maintain their programme long term. But this has more to do with personality type than it does timing!

If anyone wants some source material I could look up some basic physiology references for you.

Don't stress about it - I have lost loads of fat and have rarely worked out in the morning ever.

JC

It's really all about what works for the individual.

Personally for me - eating my last meal right before bedtime (around 9:00 pm or so) is what works. If I ate before my workout - well, I would either have to wake up at 2 am to eat so the food would be digested enough for me not to barf all over the place, or work out at a later time - which actually is not a really viable option for me at this time (Hubby and I leave for work together at 7:30 am).

Of course the hardest part of eating my last meal just before hitting the sack was getting over the old diet mantra of "no food two or three hours before bedtime".

I have had AWESOME workouts in the morning - after work I want to kick it with Jim and kitties, watch a little TV and take a nice hot bath before bedtime...not go to the gym and fight over equipment. Besides, I'm one of the early AM regulars!

For me - if it ain't broke, no need to fix it Bottom line - to make this doable, you have to be able to fit your workout into your normal life - whether it be morning, afternoon or evening.

Hmmm ... "nearly worthless to work out in the evening"? I lost all my weight only working out in the afternoon or evening, so I guess I'd have to disagree!

I frequently do cardio in the AM, but due to having to send DS off to school, end up eating a few hours before I go to the gym. I try to time it so that it's meal time when I get back home -- whether from working out or cardio -- because I am always starving when I walk in the door. Sometimes that drive home is the biggest challenge of the day -- driving past donuts, the grocery store, Dairy Queen etc.

Probably because I don't eat after 6:30 at night, I'm always ready to eat when I wake up. Like Karen, you'd certainly need to eat before bed if you did plan to work out first thing in the AM.

Bottom line is -- do what feels comfortable to YOU. In the end, this is about you and no one else and it's for life, so you might as well enjoy it.

Meg

Jessica -

I ALWAYS work out in the afternoon, and am getting great results. I'm following BFL and Bill's advice is to not eat three hours prior, or 1 hour after to max out the benefits. So I end up eating at 7 am, 10 am, dropping my kids at school at 12:30 and working out from 12:45 - 2:00 (I'm slow...), then eating again at about 2:30.

I agree with everyone else - do what feels right for your body.

BethO

The whole "workout in the moring fo best fat loss" is nothing more than a theory. Thank God! I'm not a moring person either, besides I notice I have better workouts in the afternoon or evening. I actually make a point not to do weights in the morning even when I have time. I sometimes do cardio in the morning if I have the time, but I don't get enough sleep as it is so there's no way I'm going to get up for a pre-dawn workout.

The bottom line is to do it. When isn't important.

Meg, you don't eat after 6:30? So you go to bed at 7:00 or something? I eat 2 meals after you've stopped eating!

Deb

About the not eating in the evening -- I originally stopped eating after dinner for a couple of reasons: first, the idea that the calories that you eat before bed are stored as fat (I know this is controversial and I'm not looking to start a debate ) and second -- and more important -- my "problem eating" time always was late at night. The better strategy for me to combat that evening eating was just not to do it at all. So I brush my teeth after dinner and stay out of the kitchen.

It's interesting to me how we have natural body rythmns to our hunger. If you never let yourself get hungry, like when I was heavy, then you don't experience the differences in hunger throughout the day. Now I've discovered that I am most hungry in the mornings and after the gym, and become less and less hungry as the day goes on. In the AM, sometimes I only can go 2 - 2.5 hours between meals, but in the afternoons and evenings, I can stretch further. My DH, on the other hand, barely eats throughout the day but has a huge dinner (he's always been normal weight). I guess we are all different.

Meg

Isn't that the truth? About us being individual I mean.

Before I started working out, I was never hungry in the am or too hungry though most of the day. I often didn't eat all day, feeling virtuous and righteous, lol, and then at night I'd eat like an animal. 'sigh'

Now I'm rather like you Meg, in my hunger, but since I work out night too, I'm always pretty hungry about an hour after, even if I have a shake, so I eat. But not crap like before. That's the big difference here I think, what we eat now vs. before.

I work out at 8pm each night.. I lost 30lbs. I can't for the life of me get up any earlier than I have to. Do what works for you.