Early or Late??

jellybellywmb

I have been doing alot of running lately(sorry I know this is bike forum) to try and reduce my weight and stay in shape through the bad weather.
I tend to run first thing in the morning as I am able to find too many excuses not to go after work.
This tends to be the same with cycling aswell, I will be up and off by 0500 in the summer and back before the wife can moan about me always being on my bike.
My question is, in terms of weight loss is it best to run in the morning or in the evening.

P.S Doing about 7-8 miles a day for 4 days and filling other days with swimming, again early in the morning

Slow Downcp

I think mornings are better, particularly if you exercise before eating as it encourages fat burning.

pbt150

You can't perform at your best in the mornings, especially before breakfast. However, before breakfast is the best time to exercise (long, slow UT2 exercise) if you're looking to lose weight, as you'll burn predominantly fat. You'll even continue to burn fat after you get home, right up to the point where you have a carb-rich breakfast.

N.b. this is not good practice for improving fitness/stamina/strength.

ugo.santalucia

morning

jellybellywmb

pbt150 wrote:

You can't perform at your best in the mornings, especially before breakfast. However, before breakfast is the best time to exercise (long, slow UT2 exercise) if you're looking to lose weight, as you'll burn predominantly fat. You'll even continue to burn fat after you get home, right up to the point where you have a carb-rich breakfast.

N.b. this is not good practice for improving fitness/stamina/strength.

I have to go before breakfast as I cant exercise within 3-4 hours of eating without throwing up.

Can you elaborate on UT2 exercise?? As I am trying to burn fat I am not going mad just sort of an easy jog, is this right??

dennisn

I'm an afternoon / evening guy. I'm just not that into it in the morning although I have given it a shot. Seems like I just end up being injured. However by the time I get off work in the
afternoon I'm chomping at the bit to go and my body feels loose and ready.

Dennis Noward

ride_whenever

Me experience of coaching for a couple of years shows that performance is noticably better in the evenings, even when condititioned to it.

As for UT2, 60-70% of your max heartrate. (to determine it properly you need to do a lactate test but tbh it's more faff and the heartrate thing works pretty well for most people)

Hell below zero !

It doesn't matter what time of day you exercise, to lose weight you have to burn more calories than you consume. Exercising slowly or explosively the only thing that matters in the long term is that there is a SMALL deficit in the amount of calories you eat to what you body uses (burns) throughout the day in total........If this inbalance is kept up over a period of time you will lose weight, mostly or entirely fat. So exercising when it suits you best is the best time to exercise.

phreak

I usually prefer mornings but in the dark winter months I've been going out whenever I can.