What to Eat Before Boot Camp

Ok, so many of you have asked about whether or not to eat before coming to workout in the morning and if so, what to eat. Well just as you put fuel in your car before you take it for a drive, you want to put fuel in your body before you exercise. This pre-exercise meal or snack will help energize your workout. Pre-exercise fuel has four main functions:

1. It helps prevent hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) and its symptoms of light-headedness, needless fatigue, blurred vision, and indecisiveness----all of which interfere with performance.

2. It helps settle your stomach, absorb some of the gastric juices, and ward off your hunger.

3. It fuels your muscles, with both carbohydrate that you eat far enough in advance to get stored as glycogen and carbohydrate that you eat within an hour of exercise, which enters the bloodstream and feeds your brain.

4. It gives you the peace of mind that comes with knowing your body is well fueled.

You'll be able to exercise harder and burn more calories if you eat a pre-exercise snack.

Many people are afraid that pre-exercise food will result in an upset stomach or sluggish performance. Of course, eating too much of the wrong kinds of foods can cause intestinal problems, but starting an exercise session when you are underfueled will result in a sluggish performance. So make sure you fuel yourselves adequately before working out. If you roll out of bed and eat nothing, you may be running on fumes. During the night, you can deplete your liver glycogen (the source of carbohydrate that maintains normal blood sugar levels). When you start a workout with low blood sugar, you fatigue earlier than you would have if you had eaten something. If you had a large snack the night before, you'll be less needy of early morning food. But if you've eaten nothing since a 6:00 p.m. dinner the night before, your blood sugar will definitely need a boost. Most people get good results from 0.5 gram of carbohydrate per pound of body weight one hour before moderately hard exercise.

Choices of what to eat before exercising vary from person to person. Toast, English muffins, crackers, oatmeal, an average bowl of cereal, and granola bars are a few of the most popular high-carbohydrate, low-fat pre-exercise choices. Find what's comfortable for you, and learn what is the right amount of of food to fuel your workouts but still settle well.

You can try to eat a small (100- to 200-calorie) snack about 30 minutes before you work out. This snack should include fast-digesting (high glycemic index) carbohydrates and very little fat (which digests slowly), so that you digest the meal quickly and the fuel is available during your exercise session. And try to keep a 3 to 1 carbs to protein ratio. Here are some ideas:

Fruit smoothie

High-glycemic fruits like pineapple, apricots, banana, mango, and watermelon

1/2 bagel (but not whole grain varieties, which digest slowly)

Energy bars (look for 3-5 grams of protein, at least 15 grams of carbs, and very little fat)