Should you train before or after breakfast??

A question I get asked frequently by new clients is “will training fasted burn more body fat?” (Fasted could be before you have breakfast and fed could be after you have had breakfast).

In every activity we do we use a combination of CHO (carbohydrates) and fat stores. This includes hoovering and other physical movements not just the gym.

Before breakfast (fasted) : You will use predominately fat stores during, but then throughout the day that will switch over to CHO. Making it 50:50, roughly.

After breakfast (fed) : You will use predominately CHO during, but then throughout the day that will switch over to fat stores. Again, making it 50:50, roughly.

So out of context fasted will burn more fat. But over the course of any given day you will burn/use almost exactly the same amount of CHO as you do fat.

Back to the question, should you train before or after breakfast? – This is completely individual. If you are the sort of person who likes to get up early and straight to it with a run or home workout then fasted is probably going to work better for you, otherwise you will find yourself having to get up earlier to eat your breakfast and then let it digestive.

Then on the other hand we have people (myself included) who prefer to sit and eat breakfast first, do some work and then exercise. Personally, I enjoy to have breakfast and a coffee then train because that works best for me. You could then push further down the timeline to people who enjoy training of an evening once they’ve done everything they need to.

If it fits your lifestyle it works.