Should I eat carbohydrates before working out?

Most people don’t understand the value of carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are essentially the nutrients which deliver energy to the human body. If you just ate protein before training or participating in a intense sport, you would easily run out of energy in a matter of 10 to 20 minutes. Many people mistakenly think that protein is the nutrient that gives you strength – it’s not. Protein is the nutrient that builds muscle. As a matter of fact, that’s what protein is – muscle.

If you are preparing for an intense workout or sport, your ticket to victory is a carbohydrate meal. Carbohydrates, besides supplying blood sugar to the muscles, is the delivery mechanism that carries protein to the muscle tissue, to begin the process of rebuilding muscles from a heavy workout. One of my most important pieces of advice is to never, ever work out without a very large portion of carbohydrates. That means don’t run, jog, cycle, or perform anything physically intense without consuming carbohydrates. If you have a long stretch in front of you, for instance long-distance cycling or running, find a store along the way where you can get some form of carbohydrate, such as French fries with possibly fruit juice. If you just eat straight protein, it will lower your blood sugar, thereby making you extremely hypoglycemic.

So again, the rule before training or any intense sport is to always eat some form of carbohydrate, and the best scenario is to buffer it with a protein so that it burns longer. A good example of this would be a large bowl of oatmeal with 1 to 2 bananas and 2 to 3 eggs unless you are dieting, in which case you would just have the egg white. This combination of protein and carbohydrate is set up to allow your body to metabolize the food at a much slower rate, delivering a great workout with lots of energy. You can actually purchase carbohydrate powders. Mix them with fruit juice and you will not only get a much harder workout, but a great boost, and, of course, include some protein with it.