Pre and post cardio nutrition?

[PurpleOnes]

Hello, how should my pre and post cardio nutrition look like?

My stats:
18 years old
184 cm
90 kg
16-17 bf %
Natural currently

I'm doing 45 mins moderate intensity cardio 4 times a week. My main goal is to cut down bodyfat % while saving muscle

Mostly I'm not sure how much protein and carbs I should consume before and after cardio?

How much I should wait after eating to do cardio and how much I have to wait after cardio to eat?

Should I intake those nutrients thru shake or food? Like carbs from vegetables?

[spywizard]

wow, you have like 3 main questions

if fat loss is your primary goal with muscle sparing, you never want to create a situation where you have depleted your glycogen stores in the liver.. 3-400 cals..

to do this you need to only do low intensity cardio, without knowing more about you i'd suggest the max heart rate being 125 for 40-60 minutes in a fasted state..

In the ideal world you will do anaerobic weight training hr 140-165 for 30-40 minutes, then refeed with amino acids (pill form) and then do 40 minutes of low intensity cardio 30-40 max hr 125..

then within 30 minutes of cardio you would do a post workout meal.. since we are not doing heavy weighted resistance, but have depleted the muscle stored glycogen it is very important to intake a protein (no milk here) that is quickly absorbed, many will take dextrose with this shake..

then 1 hour later you will have your post post workout meal, 40g protein and complex carbs, lentils (my biased favorite)

hope that puts you one your way..

[PurpleOnes]

Thanks, for some reason I was told to do 45 mins of moderate intensity cardio 60-70 % max hr.

So I should consume 4-300 cals pre cardio?

Also 1st post cardio meal is in form of shake 30 minutes after cardio? After that 1 hour later a real meal , with vegetables as carbs?

[baseline_9]

Where is your cardio in relation to your weight training....

I believe that when dieting you should split your daily carb intake into 3...

Breakfast, pre workout, PWO

You could go 4 ways and have an Intra WO drink with dextrose but that's up to you...


As far as carbs around cardio... Unless your doin hit I would keep them fairly low and especially low GI to prevent the presence of insulin

[cmdace18]

just to give you an idea, i'm cutting and do the following for cardio/nutrition

If AM;

AM cardio, fasted (only water) 45-60 minutes, no food before. Post cardio, I have shake; 1 to 2scoops of protien, 1/4cup oats, and 1 cup berries or mixed berries; i then have my solid meal about 2 hours later. I sometimes can't eat the solid food right away because i'm rushing to work, so I'll have my egg whites for my mid-morning meal.

If PM;

If JUST cardio, I am assuming you've had your meals during the day. This meals that you need HIIT or high intensity caridio, in which case a preworkout meal (a little carb (15g?), and protein/fat).
If weights AND cardio (cardio always after weights), I have carbs/protien/fat before my workout session to fuel my workout i have a typical meal chicken/veggies/sweet potato.
Post Workout, shake w/ some carbs (oats) then your meal.

Keep in mind if you are working out very late (after work like 8pm), just have your post workout nutrition (protien/carbs) and no carbs with dinner as it's too late in the day.

This has worked for me and have been cutting for a 6 months now and lost 25lbs, mainly fat.

[PurpleOnes]

I kno that I should devide my carbs into 3 meals mainly to pwo and breakfast.

So eating like vegetables before and after cardio is okay?( I'm talking about meal after pwo shake)

Like under 60 grams of carbs pre cardio.

I usually do my cardio after workout , because my gym opens only at mid day.

This week my gym isn't open full week , so I just do only cardio this week.

So when it is time for cardio I should have consumed most of my calories?

[gbrice75]

You've been given solid advice above. When I am doing cardio only, I consume BCAA's preworkout, and usually a shake and small amount of complex carbs PWO. This is what I prefer. When I do cardio immediately PWO (this is typically what i do) I do the same thing, but with the obvious addition of a pre-workout meal.