“But I’m not hungry after I exercise…”
I can not insist on how important it is to eat after you exercise…
One of my most recent favourite results with a group learning participant was this exact point “eat a good source of protein asap after finishing a bout of effortful exercise, even though you may not feel hungry”. They came back to the next week of learning to discuss what they’d focused on and what they’d gained and she exclaimed “I felt AWAKE and ALIVE… I can’t believe the difference!”
Why do we need convincing?? I think the answer could be at least two fold.
Exercise mechanisms suppress hunger.
We’ve been taught to value exercise and not eating as a way of controlling our bodies…
So in one part we have no signal to eat until we are half way through our first meeting and struggling not to be short with people, and on the other side we are doing well at the bullshit ideas we’ve been sold. We are torn, NOT a fan.
AND on an aside, is this another way we fall away from exercise - because we make ourselves moody and stressed out by not recovering well. Then the cycle begins - poor time management, reduced concentration …. and suddenly we “don’t have time to exercise” because we’ve sabotaged ourselves.
Away from hypothesising the human-ness of it and back to why do I need commit this to the way I organise my scheduling and planning, well the reason includes the brain; if you want to be sharp when you get to work or not being snappy to other humans.
Our muscles don’t get hungry our brain does… well it drives the signals.
During exercise energy (nutritional currency = glucose, free fatty acids, ketones) migrate into the blood to travel the muscles, as their metabolic needs jump up enormously.
But with regards to hunger, muscles have a reasonable store of energy and they are being fed through the blood flow, it is the brain that signals hunger. Our brains use glucose and ketones for energy. When glucose is scarce, the brain can move to using ketones but if you are not practiced this metabolic shift can be very tough on productivity.
A strong theory of what is happening is that just after exercise the blood flow to the brain and around the body is still quite high, so the brain is still quite satisfied.
Another player, is the hormone ghrelin. This hormone communicates one of the most important and potent hunger signals. When ghrelin is elevated, hunger is high; when ghrelin drops, hunger is low. During and following exercise, ghrelin drops, which certainly has an effect on the hunger appetite suppression of exercise.
So at this stage it all seems quite natural to not eat after exercise. So why should we refuel after exercise?
To keep it simple it becomes a zoom out experience of what comes next…. when we finally register the low blood glucose level and the shift in our nervous system state, we usually make bad choices in nutrition. Then we start the roller coaster ride of highs and lows in blood glucose levels.
We experience this as low cognitive behaviour, brain fog, moodiness. We either hold it in at work or let it out, or maybe its in traffic later or to our loved ones by the end of the day when we feel deeply unsatisfied by our productivity at work.
So my message is - if you are truly exercising to benefit your relationship with yourself and others, your body and mind resilience and want to benefit from the time and effort you put into exercise -
Recover with protein and carbs asap after finishing training.
HERE IS YOUR GUIDE TO GET IT RIGHT
ATM there is divided conversation on a gender difference for protein kinetics timing. If you lean into the research that indicates a difference the recommendation is:
Females ideally consume 30g of protein with in 30 mins of finishing, with a protein that is leucine and lysine rich.
If we look through the nervous system window of recovery principles - I personally think this timing for females switches a safety signal in our nervous system, which helps support wholistic recovery.
Males the muscle protein synthesis peaks at 24hrs & declines to baseline approx 36 hours.
If you want to go middle of the road on these ideas, still the encouragement is to focus on protein rich meals with in 24hours of completing a strenuous exercise bout, especially if it’s been endurance based.
References:
Adams OP. The impact of brief high-intensity exercise on blood glucose levels. Diabetes Metab Syndr Obes. 2013;6:113-22. doi: 10.2147/DMSO.S29222. Epub 2013 Feb 27. PMID: 23467903; PMCID: PMC3587394.
Azizi F. Islamic fasting and health. Ann Nutr Metab. 2010;56(4):273–282. doi: 10.1159/000295848
Bassareo PP, Crisafulli A. Gender Differences in Hemodynamic Regulation and Cardiovascular Adaptations to Dynamic Exercise. Curr Cardiol Rev. 2020;16(1):65-72. doi: 10.2174/1573403X15666190321141856. PMID: 30907327; PMCID: PMC7393595.
Erdmann J et al. Plasma ghrelin levels during exercise — Effects of intensity and duration, Regulatory Peptides, Volume 143, Issues 1–3,
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Paul P, Holmes WL. Free fatty acid and glucose metabolism during increased energy expenditure and after training. Med Sci Sports. 1975 Fall;7(3):176-83. PMID: 1207430.