hey guys, i was thinking about starting this…i wanna wake up in the mornings for the next week and run for 30 minutes on an empty stomach to lose some stored body fat, but will i lose muscle if i do this?
I know others can speak more on this but I beleive that is a good way to burn fat because of the the state your metabolism is in the morning on an empty stomach.
anyone else?
I agree Quikazhell however personally - I feeel in the overall scheme of things it is not as beneficial as the science leads us tyo believe.
There is alot of mixed advice on this area but the following should be borne in mind …
- I would if possible eat some protein pre-WO to prevent catabolism
- eat protein pwo to maintain LBM and again prevent catabolism
Regarding Fat loss in general:
- Steady state running is not a good idea for a basketball player trying to improve vertical height ie. power out
- personally I don’t think time of day is as or more importnat than overall diet, nutrition and training. … what I mean is - essentially you would lose more fat and improve your performance on the court by tidying up your diet and improving your training rather than getting up earlier than usual to train.
The size of my thighs shrank from running first thing in the mornings in the past. 
Aerobic exercise first thing in the day is considered a reasonable way to lose weight in the endurance community. You have lower energy reserves in the bloodstream at this time of day and so burn more stored reserves - stored glycogen and stored fat.
However there are downsides, the body is less warmed up and so you are more likely to get injured, the training will never be such good quality as when you are fully up, awake etc.
I personally prefer to do a harder and longer session later in the day.
ok, that explain it. You have lower energy reserves in the bloodstream in the in the A.M. and so you burn more stored reserves.
I dont think however you are more likely to get injured by doing aerobic/tempo work.
I do tempo first thing in the morning!
This way I can do some kind of curcuit later in the day
Isn’t the body in somewhat of a catabolic state in the morning? Wont you be jeapordizing LBM?
Good idea to do tempo / endurance early morning as a way of getting in 2 sessions per day.
Just start easy to avoid injuring cold muscles.
RandyG - I assume by LBM you mean Lean Body Mass ? Don`t see why early day tempo should jeopardise that, it will just work on burning stored glycogen and fat. You would need to do massive endurance work before muscles were used as an energy source.
I agree. Especially the part about overall diet. I don’t beleive that morning/depleted glycogen state cardio is any more effective than doing cardio after say, a regular workout, or even later on in the day. I also don’t believe that sleeping for 8 hours allows your body to be so selective that it doesn’t use protein from the muscles as fuel. If it was, you could also make a case for doing cardio immediately before going to sleep in place of your pre-bed shake.
Cortisol levels are higher in the morning- and cortisol breaks down not only fat, but muscle as well, so there is definitely a risk of losing LBM over the long term by performing cardio at this time.
I think as long as your blood sugar levels remain low enough, you can consume a protein meal along with some glutamine or any other non-insulin spiking supplements/food when you wake up, peform your cardio and still gain most of the benefits of doing fasted cardio (ie: increased RMR).
Also I am convinced the overall stress of early rising and lack of sleep increases overall cortisol even further encouraging more fat gain to the abdomen - the very reason you’re getting up early in the first place.
No evidence to prove this only personal anecdotal experience.
Cardio etc. after strength training IMO could be very catabolic too - no?
All this above is without even discussing T Levels which - while high in the morning could be increased later in the day while naturally starting to fall.
Anyone following a CF template, has a decent diet and is doing good tempo work will find they will have a decent bodyfat.
Now - - If they are following all the above I would then - and only then - suggest carb manipulation - but this is not to be messed around with for performance sake.
I doubt that there’d be any advantage to running in the morning… but then again, my bodyfat% probably hasn’t been over 8% my whole life so, what would I know about losing large amounts of fat…
I’d definitely work on your nutrition and incorporate a few high intensity running workouts in per week.