Post Workout Nutrition

If you are someone that is putting work into the gym its essential to start looking at what you are consuming post workout to help maximize that effort you are putting in!

Your body is looking to do a few things after that workout, which include:

rebuild its glycogen storage
and rebuild those muscle proteins

This is why what you eat is essential to achieving your body's goals. By having the right mix of carbs, proteins, and fats after your training session your body will be able to:

decrease muscle protein breakdown
increase muscle protein synthesis (growth)
restore glycogen stores
enhance recovery

Protein

When exercising, especially resistance training your body is breaking down muscle proteins. When you eat protein after a workout you are providing your body with amino acids to help build and repair the breakdown of those proteins as well as providing the building blocks to help build a foundation for new muscle as well.

Consuming around 20-40 grams of protein after your workout is a safe place to be when trying to maximize recovery from a workout.

Carbs

Carbohydrates aid in recovery.

Carbs act for our body as fuel acts for your car. As with a car, we have limited stores of carbs in our bodies, and since they help to sustain you through workouts or sports, it is important to consume adequate carbs through your training.

While it is very common in sports to see athletes only consume protein after a workout, the combination of protein plus carbs is actually the key to recovery.

Fats

Many people think that eating fat after a workout slows down digestion and limits the absorption of nutrients. While fat might slow down the absorption of your post-workout meal, it will not reduce its benefits.

While it might be a good idea to limit the amount of fat you eat after exercise, having some fat in your post-workout meal will not affect your recovery.

A Note on Meal Timing

This is something that has always been up for debate. Some feel it is essential for recovery and to be able to maximize your results from your workout to eat within a 1 hour window after training.

Research has shown that as long as you have eaten prior to your training session the window of post workout nutrition can be slightly longer than that.

Eat your post-workout meal soon after exercising, ideally within a few hours. However, you can extend this period a little longer, depending on the timing of your pre-workout meal.

The one time that a post workout meal is essential and should be eaten within that 1 hour window is if you are someone that likes to train fasted. Meaning, you do not eat before your workout which can be very common for people who like to have an early morning workout. In this case you do really want to put a larger emphasis on getting a meal that contains both carbs and protein shortly after your training session.

What should I eat?

Post-workout recovery smoothie (or post-workout smoothie made with protein, milk of choice and fruit)
Lean Protein source with rice
Turkey on a whole-grain wrap
Low-fat yogurt with berries
Tuna and Crackers

Note: