What to Eat Before You Train
Alex asked what she should be eating before a session.
The two things that decide it: how long you've got, and how long the session is.
How long you've got.
Two to three hours out, eat a normal meal. Protein and carbohydrate, the plate method, nothing clever. Chicken and rice, eggs on toast, whatever you were going to eat anyway.
Sixty to ninety minutes out, eat something smaller and simpler. Yoghurt and fruit. Toast and a banana. Two eggs.
Under thirty minutes out, eat something small or eat nothing. A banana. A slice of toast with honey. Don't force a meal into a stomach that's about to be bounced around for forty-five minutes — you'll spend the session regretting it.
How long the session is.
If you're mainly lifting — a heavy five-by-three, a strength piece, a skill session — you need remarkably little fuel. Heavy lifting is short, and it burns very little stored carbohydrate. Training a 5:30am strength session on an empty stomach is fine for most people. Some prefer it. If you feel flat, half a banana ten minutes before is enough to fix it.
If you're mainly breathing — anything sustained and hard for fifteen minutes or more — carbohydrate matters. Aim for roughly 30 to 60 grams of carbohydrate in the one to two hours beforehand. Examples: a banana and two slices of toast is about 50 grams. A bowl of porridge is about 30.
Afterwards, don't panic about a thirty-minute window. What matters is that you get a decent hit of protein at some point in the next couple of hours — 30 to 40 grams, a chicken breast, a large tin of tuna, a scoop and a half of whey, at least 4 eggs or Greek yoghurt. And what matters far more than any of it is your total protein across the day: 1.6 to 2.2 grams per kilo of bodyweight. For an 80kg adult, that's 130 to 175 grams a day. Most people reading this aren't achieving half of it.
My suggestion is to pick a default and stop rethinking it. Decide right now what your 5am looks like — black coffee and nothing, or coffee and half a banana. Decide what your 5:30pm looks like — a real lunch and a piece of fruit at 4pm. Remove the decisions.
Our Nutrition and Lifestyle Programme, with Dr Amy George, GP, covers food, habits and the long game in a supported, no-pressure way. Book a free, no-obligation 15-minute chat with Jeremy or Beth at crossfitchiltern.com.
