The Pros and Cons of exercising when hungry?

There are many benefits of fasting. Three months ago I started following OMAD protocol(One Meal A Day, you are allowed to eat for 1 hour and than you fast for 23 hours) and my results in the gym are great. Even tho I workout after not eating for 20+ hours, I'm feeling stronger than ever. Managed to deadlift 155kg for the first time in my life. So there are many misconceptions about fasted workout, and many debates about getting the carbs before or after workout, same thing with protein, and many more stupid debates... At the end of the day eating healthy and exercising is the only thing that matters, please don't listen to those "gym bros" that are promoting "bro splits" and "bro diet and supplements". And I'm not calling you to follow OMAD protocol, it's actually pretty extreme even in my eyes, but don't worry too much about the details such as time when you workout or what you're eating before and after. It really doesn't matter that much. Unless you are professional bodybuilder or powerlifter, it won't matter to you at all. Hunger might be slight problem when you start, but your body will adapt after few days so you won't feel it anymore.

 

Intermittent fasting - Highly recommended.

I started 16:8 intermittent fasting last summer for weight loss purposes, and I've never felt better in my life. Eating now is so much easier because I basically eat 2 meals a day (2pm and 10pm) and fast rest of the day. No breakfast hassle in the morning and since I cook all my meals myself, I know exactly what and how much I'm eating.
It takes somewhere 2-3 weeks for body to get used to do fasted exercises, but after that you notice enhanced mind clarity and more stable energy levels through out the day.

And what comes to fat burning... I've lost almost 100 pounds since last summer just by eating clean and fasting, so I must be doing something right

 

Your body can only store around 2400 calories worth of quick access glucous/carb reserves in your muscles and liver. Which is why most runners hit a low energy point around mile 20 of aa marathon (runners burn around 100ish cal/mile) The second wind comes from rest of you energy which is stored in your fat cells. To be able to break this fat down your body goes through the process of ketosis.
The one issue workong out hungry is you may deplete your carb stores then have a low point in your workout where your body is trying to switch over to ketosis mode. This may mean a poor workout. However I will do a dry fast each week, which puts me in full keto and since the body is already switched over I have some of my best workouts the day after a fast day. I do an hour of kickboxing as one of my workouts, which for my size and intensity is probably on the level of 900 cal burn in an hour. If work out in the morning with low glucose stores I stall near the middle to end of the workout, but after fast days I've been able to do two sessions one after the other at high intensity, while only hydrating

 

Just make sure your body gets protein which helps build muscle quickly after a workout and eat enough to keep your metabolism going. Ive been lead to understand your body will only be going into starvation mode where it breaks down muscles when you are consistently staving yourself. Probably because your body recognizes its being starved so it breaks down muscles to help lower metabolic burden.

 

I'm 17 too, but I've been into sports and healthy diet for my whole life. It's up to you to choose whether you'll try intermittent fasting or not, but I don't think there can be any bad effects for you.

 

To @gottagetback

First of all disclaimer; I'm not a doctor or dietitian, so please take my words with a grain of salt and consult physician before making any dietary choices.

Having said that... I'm speaking from my own experience, and what I described before works for me (and couple of my buddies) very well. The reasoning for fasting is that your body can't really burn stored fat (aka. love handles) before your insulin levels come down to zero. It takes 6-12 hours after your last meal to get your insulin level to zero, and at that point your body starts to utilize stored fats from your waist. If you want to lose fat fast, that's why you should be fasting over that 12-hour mark.
When your 8-hour feeding window opens, it boils down to clean and proper nutrition. You should only eat home cook food which is made from scratch and contains single ingredient foods (vegetables, fruits, eggs, chicken and fish for example). Don't eat anything processed foods and if you can, ditch the sugar and grains. And as you're 17, I assume you don't use alcohol. But if you do, that's first thing to let go if you really want to look as good as human possibly can.
That's what I did and as I said, I've lost huge amounts of body weight AND even gained some muscle at the same time

I could literally give you three hour lecture about this stuff, but I'm way too lazy to write it all down. Sorry Bro...
If you want to lose some fat and same time gain some muscle, I suggest you watch some Youtube videos on topics like "Intermittent fasting" and "Body re-composition". That should give you some new information and motivation to search more information.

And remember; You can't compensate poor diet by exercising. If you wan't to look amazing, you got to eat amazing, train amazing and you got to sleep amazing. Make your body your temple and take good care of it.
It's worth it...

- Mike

 

Fasting isn't all about loosing weight. Plato once said-"I fast for greater physical and mental efficiency." I never had problem with being overweight, I was actually very skinny before I started working out, but still decided to do fasting. It's not good only for fitness goals, but for your health as well. When you're fasting, autophagy is increased, your HGH and T reaches the sky limits... Mental clarity that you get from fasting is insane, because your body don't have to use all of its energy to digest food, and your brain can use it instead. Today everybody is teaching us that we should eat 5 times a day, in that way we are keeping our body always busy digesting food, which isn't normal. We are also spending way more money and time on food, and that's what industry wants. I have one friend that used to wake up at 3am every night just to eat his protein bar and get his protein shake in order to "bulk up", which in my opinion is completely mental...

Just look at this guy, he is vegan powerlifter who eats one meal a day, and he holds a world record in deadlift in his weight class.

 

You're absolutely right Brother.
I was speaking only on my behalf and as OP:s goal is also weight loss, I wanted to encourage him.
I've tried also OMAD routine for like 2 months with quite good success, and what ever route you want to go, I know that combining intermittent fasting with Nofap (and ditching sugar), gives you such a mental clarity you have experienced never before.

 

Yeah I'm experiencing it right now, it's like you're living in a different world, your mind gets so clear... And I can feel the difference after I eat, it's not like I get stupider but still not as smart as after 15+ hours of fasting.

 

Hey do you have any more info on this guy mainly in terms of his meal plan (i prefer to read rather than watch the entire vid).

Dont ever plan to go vegan but would love to find balanced vegan diet that gets you enough healthy fats and proteins and also micros like iron and other mineral levels, to add to my rotation.

 

First he mentions that he drinks a lot of teas throughout the day. Green tea, black tea, oolong tea, honeybush tea, red tea and many more... He uses stevia as sweetener.

This is what typical Amen meal looks like:
1. Amino elixir-3 main ingredients: soy, spirulina, brewer's yeast; he also adds some isolated amino acids(I guess it's protein powder, probably from vegan source, not whey). He also mentioned that he adds his supplement that contains vitamins and minerals.
2. Main meal - Beans(cannellini beans(his favorite)/the red kidney beans), rice, roots, grain, nuts, seeds. Fresh fruits is high on water content so it's not the best for this kind of diet, he recommends dry fruits instead.
3. Desert - It can contain some of these: Nuts, dry fruits, peanut butter(crushed peanuts) and jelly sandwich, roasted peanuts, dark chocolate...

I don't drink teas(only water, at least 5 litres a day), and I don't use any kind of supplements(protein powder or vitamin/mineral supplement). But I've been doing this for over a 3 months now and I feel great. I got stronger and smarter and I want to recommend this to anybody. Anybody should at least try doing this for some time, only good things can happen.

 

when im running i always eat a snack before, but a bottle of water is essential laura x

 

I've noticed that caloric deficit lowers (and in my case absolutely kills) sex drive quite a lot, so it makes doing NoFap much easier same time as you're getting your six pack.
Pretty sweet Win - Win situation

 

Awesome thanks bud...actually be looking protein shake recipes that dont use protein powder too as its heavily processed, but will incorporate this to some extent

 

Weird im opposite when it comes to sex drive...though may be a little prediabetic or insulin sensitive so if I have excesaive carbs i get really lazy and very tired

 

I'm on a cut phase so I try to keep my carbs as low as possible, and it seems to kill my sex drive completely. It's body's natural reaction from cave man days; When food is scarce your mind focuses on finding food and postpone reproducing to later days when there's enough food to support your offspring.
That's 10000 years of evolution. You can try to fight against it, but as Star Treks Borgs say; Resistance is futile

But as I said... I'm not complaining.

 

Though I’m currently not fasting and just getting back to a schedule that accommodates my regular workouts, I would workout fasted. Result? I got rid of that sticky “Dad weight” (damn belly fat). I would eat immediately after my workout.

 

Whether fasted or fed, it doesn't matter. It's all personal preference.

It has been hypothesized that performing aerobic exercise after an overnight fast accelerates the loss of body fat. The purpose of this study was to investigate changes in fat mass and fat-free mass following four weeks of volume-equated fasted versus fed aerobic exercise in young women adhering to a hypocaloric diet. Twenty healthy young female volunteers were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 experimental groups: a fasted training (FASTED) group that performed exercise after an overnight fast (n = 10) or a post-prandial training (FED) group that consumed a meal prior to exercise (n = 10). Training consisted of 1 hour of steady-state aerobic exercise performed 3 days per week. Subjects were provided with customized dietary plans designed to induce a caloric deficit. Nutritional counseling was provided throughout the study period to help ensure dietary adherence and self-reported food intake was monitored on a regular basis. A meal replacement shake was provided either immediately prior to exercise for the FED group or immediately following exercise for the FASTED group, with this nutritional provision carried out under the supervision of a research assistant. Both groups showed a significant loss of weight (P = 0.0005) and fat mass (P = 0.02) from baseline, but no significant between-group differences were noted in any outcome measure. These findings indicate that body composition changes associated with aerobic exercise in conjunction with a hypocaloric diet are similar regardless whether or not an individual is fasted prior to training.

Sauce: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25429252