Should You Eat Breakfast Before Or After A Workout?

It’s the age old debate – Should you eat breakfast before or or after you workout?

I was always told that you want to workout on an empty stomach. Various reasons were given for this: Speeding up your metabolism, burning fat instead of the food you just ate, etc. I just accepted this as fact, and told all of my clients to act accordingly.

You’d always get some resistance. “If I don’t eat breakfast, I’m going to pass out!” or “I’ve got low blood sugar!” I’ve heard it all before.

But then a funny thing would happen. They’d take my advice, and they wouldn’t pass out. Better yet, they’d experience the weight loss I promised them!

But you don’t have to take my word for it – Researchers in Belgium set up a six-week study to determine if the order of men’s morning routines would make a difference in terms of weight loss and other health aspects. And guess what the results were?

The group that exercised before breakfast did the best!

“I recommend exercising before breakfast, of course,” says the study’s lead author Karen Van Proeyen, Ph.D. But she can’t recommend an ideal breakfast menu: “Based on our findings we cannot say what the best breakfast is. However, a healthy, well-balanced fiber-rich breakfast—mainly consisting of carbohydrates—is the most optimal breakfast to maintain a good health in normal fit individuals.”

So there you have it.. If you’re someone that typically eats before their morning workout, try switching things up and see if it helps with your progress!