Two studies on exercise and a review on meal timing.
Single-session exercise studies show better performance in the afternoon, although this is trainable – consistent AM training improves performance in the AM and PM whereas consistent PM training does not improve AM performance.
Chronotype effects? Circadian rhythms?
But that’s neither here nor there. Exercise is better than no exercise, and if you have the luxury to choose, evidence favors AM.
Comparison between the effect of 6 weeks of morning or evening aerobic exercise on appetite and anthropometric indices: a randomized controlled trial (Alizadeh et al., 2017).
Good study – main outcomes were body weight, appetite, and ad lib food intake.
Exercise doesn’t burn a whole lot of calories but it’s very good for you. A goal of this study was to see if exercise timing influenced appetite and ad lib food intake, which have a greater role in regulating body composition.
The exercise intervention was modest, ~30 minutes of cardio in the morning or afternoon. Main findings: significantly greater reduction in body weight, BMI, waist circumference, abdominal circumference, and abdominal skin fold thickness in the morning exercise group.
The morning group also spontaneously ate less throughout the day despite no difference in appetite/hunger scores or exercise intensity between the groups. Boom.
Does AM exercise and skewing kcals earlier in the day work for you? Will you try it?
For the rest of this blog post, head over to Patreon! Five bucks a month for access to this and all previous articles. It’s ad-free and you can cancel if it sucks
These pork rinds are the bomb. Seriously! And if you like spicy…
For personalized health consulting services: drlagakos@gmail.com.
Affiliate links: Still looking for a pair of hot blue blockers? TrueDark is offering 10% off HERE and Spectra479 is offering 15% off HERE. Use discount code LAGAKOS for a deal on CarbonShades. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, read this then this.