Early morning workouts

I do that when I commute to work and just eat breakfast at work. No coffee though before the ride. But from what I remember, Andy Hampsten does that routine to burn off his fat (whatever is left of it). What he does is take long slow rides to gt his body to use fat rather than glycogen as fuel. You do not want to exert too much effort where your body has to tap into glycogen for quick energy so ride slow and do a long one.

"Breakfast" the meaning of this word is "breaking the fast"...
overnight your body has no nourishment therefore has been "fasting".
When you wake, your blood sugar is seriously low :o and you really should not do any exertion on an empty stomach.
It's crazy. I've heard of people fainting and collapsing...
the best thing I've found is one or two bananas, they don't fill you up, they contain fibre, potassium, all sorts of good stuff...

If you want to burn fat, I agree long slow rides do this. Your muscles want to use glucose for fuel...which is contained within your liver and (I believe) in your large muscles, like quads.
Our bodies have a lot more fat stored than glucose but fat is not as energy efficient or whatever the phrase is...
If you do over 2 hours at not-race-pace, your body will react to this steady loading by switching to "fat" for energy.
I know some riders who do lots of short (one-hour) high intensity rides and can't understand why they can't lose any weight...

A one hour "sober" ride outside or on the rollers in low end zone two (read, way, way easy) seems to do wonders for me. Loosens up the legs and lets you actually eat a good breakfast to get ready for a longer ride in the afternoon.

J

I aways train in the morning before eating, whether that be running, cycling, boxercise, weight lifting etc and it doesn't bother me in the slightest. Just try it for a while and see how it goes, you may be the same as me or different.

Just curious what time you all start your morning rides. I usually shoot for 5:15am and put in quick 20miles before work. Unless its raining then I'm on the rollers or wait to see if it clears up later in the afternoon. The air seems som much cleaner in the early morning.

I have also heard the flouride level in the body(due to the brushing of teeth) is a little higher assisting in the metabolic process of fat burning. Also people who take a shower before leaving for work elevate the heart rate due to the warm shower and it provides greate aerobic fitness.

Andy...hitting the bottle today? 😉

There are those who believe that its good to do aerobic exercise before eating in the morning, it does make sense, as once you run out of energy, fat is usually the next cab of the rank. Muscle building is the opposite, best done at night, so the body can repair while you are asleep.

Having said this the most important thing is that you actually did the exercise. Early morning is good because you get out of bed, do the deed and then continue on with your day. If you late to later, your exercise is competing with your busy schedule and may get bumped off the list.

I believe that early morning riding can boost metabolism through out the day too

I've been planning on using the same method that I use for lifting first thing in the morning. I wake up, and have a small cereal bar, a half cup of oatmeal, even an energy bar. Just have something small which will give you some blood sugar. Its not your breakfast meal, its just something to get a little sugar into your body so you don't over exert yourself.

Then, go work out. Your should use the sugar from your food pretty quickly, and then start burning fat. Afterwards, I normally have a bit healthier meal (if I'm exercising for awhile and I get in to the cafe around brunch, a tuna sandwich is always the way to go for me - a heavy tuna sandwich can equal a pound or more of muscle due to the protein content according to Men's Health).

Cup of coffee and a piece of whole wheat toast with peanut butter and fruit jelly (no added sugar). Then after about every hour of my ride either cliff bar or Carb Boom Gel. I'm sure everyone's different, but, this works for me.

Jim
age 68
rode 251 miles this week (5 days)

I'm with you. Most rides during the week start at 5:30 AM. I like to see the sunrise and hear the birds, and the air is cleaner, cooler, less ozone and humidity -- and of course less traffic. I'll usually just drink some juice and maybe 1 slice of bread with butter and honey first.

robsurge said:

Just curious what time you all start your morning rides. I usually shoot for 5:15am and put in quick 20miles before work. Unless its raining then I'm on the rollers or wait to see if it clears up later in the afternoon. The air seems som much cleaner in the early morning.

mikesbytes said:

I aways train in the morning before eating,

Same here. Works just fine for me: I have always done it that way, in order to fit things into my schedule. Never once fainted, or even come close to fainting, in the last 25 years or so. 😉

There's no need to worry about depleting your glycogen stores. Those are for short term emergency needs, and to smooth out peaks in energy demands. If you deplete them, you'll know it, and they will be filled up quickly once you recover. You will not lose muscle mass (as in muscle fibers) at all, but you will be forcing your body to burn fat, because it has no other way to get the energy it needs, at least on anything other than a very short effort

From what I've read it seems that many of these posts are somewhat misleading in one regard:

While it is true that you burn a higher percentage of your calories from fat while riding slow, you'll actually burn more fat if you ride faster because the higher number of calories burned more than compensates for the lower percentage that comes from fat.

So, if burning fat is your goal, eat a high-carb breakfast and go anaerobic! 🙂
I've lost weight, and got myself down to under 6% body fat, by riding fewer miles but at a higher intensity. Also faster in the races.

That said, if you're not in a hurry, and don't race, then by all means do the long slow rides if you enjoy that more. It will certainly burn plenty of fat too.

It depends on you level of fitness. If your trying to lose weight and don't have the fitness to burn the carbs you recommend(high carb breakfast) ingesting before you ride, you'll never deplete those carbs and thus make minimal use of fat as an energy source. Lipolysis workouts have proved to be very beneficial in training the body to use fat as an energy source, especially for the "not so fit" rider that can easily ride at 60% of max heart rate for an hour on an empty stomach. The only thing I see as misleading is someone at 6% bodyfat performing lipolysis workouts😄.

bikerjoe said:

What's your thoughts on early morning workouts without breakfast. You hear that many reports on taping into your fat stores, as your glycogen levels are low and taking black coffee promoting this even more...etc.Not talking about intervals or anything like that, but more of an aeorbic ride. Are you actually taping into your fat stores due to the low glycogen levels or into your muscles, and basically losing muscle mass?

I get up at 5am and am riding at 5.30 - cannot contemplate any food but just a strong cup of coffee. Then have a carbo drink while riding - I do not seem to suffer any loss of performance and mostly do interval sessions at present.

I rode with one of the Serria Leonne riders who escaped from the Commonwealth Games yesterday and he bonked badly, but I'm not affected by not eating. So I guess it depends a lot on how your body functions. This guy would be heaps fitter than me, but yet he couldn't keep up. Next time we'll make sure he eats.