During your workouts you burn a lot of fuel, so your post workout eating is important. Ideally, you want to eat within 30 minutes to 2 hours after your workout. In addition, you need to also replenish water that you lose during a workout.
You definitely need protein, but you also need carbohydrates. Generally, people think more is better but you don’t want to over do it.
First, you should drink water. During a moderate workout, you will lose about one quart of water….that’s four cups of fluid. So you should try to drink at least 16 – 20oz of water shortly after your workout. If you sweat a lot, or if the weather is hot/humid, you need to drink more water. Also, heavy sweating also causes you to lose minerals and electrolytes. If you sweat a lot, you may want to consider a sports drink.
Now for the food. You need to get protein and carbohydrates into your body after working out. You body is in recovery mode, so you need food that is rich in nutrients. Eggs are a great way to get protein. Chocolate milk is also a great way to replenish lost nutrients. Also, whey protein shakes are good.
Eggs: Eggs are a great source of protein. They also help aid muscle recovery and growth. Add items to your scrambled eggs or omelet to make it nutrient rich. Avocados pack in fiber and mono-saturated fats.
Fish is a good way to recover. Salmon is a great source of protein and it has bioactive peptides. Add a complex carbohydras, such as a sweet potatoes, which will help you restore glycogen levels, which are depleted after a workout.
A sandwich with lean protein and vegetables is a for sure choice – make sure you get the whole grain bread. Forgo the mayonnaise and use hummus instead.
And my favorite: Chocolate milk. It’s recently become the craze because it has everything you need in one glass: carbs and protein for muscle recovery, water content to replace the fluids lost as sweat and calcium, sodium and sugar — all ingredients that help you recover faster, retain water and regain energy.
A word to the wise is: Don’t overeat. If you eat too much, it will cause your body to store that food as fat instead of using it as fuel and repair of your muscles. Here are a few guidelines I recommend following:
You should try to eat about 50% of the calories that you burned during your workout. Don’t think that if you eat after your workout, you will destroy the benefits of fat loss. It doesn’t work that way –
you need to refuel.
What you eat after makes a difference, try to get:
60% of the calories in carbohydrates. Carbohydrates will refuel the glycogen you lost during your workout. You need about 30 – 60 gams of carbohydrates, depending upon if you’re a moderate or high-intensity athlete.
Protein should comprise about 25% of the calories that you eat after a workout. That is less than 10 grams.
Fat is less important and should only be 15% or less of your post-workout calories; that’s less than 10 grams.
In addition, to the above list of foods, here is a list of quick items, for those of you on the run, that will tide you over until your next meal:
Whole-grain bread with cheese or almond butter
Dried fruit and nuts
Full fat yogurt, with some fruit
Chocolate milk (my favorite)
Cereal with whole milk
Hard boiled eggs with whole grain bread or a side of fruit
A smoothie (with milk, yogurt and added protein powder)
