How To Use Nutrition To Get The Most Out Of HIIT

By Russ Hollywood


If you are trying to learn how to build muscle with HIIT then you may have noticed how much confusion surrounds this popular training method. Despite it's huge popularity, many people make some crucial mistakes when designing their high intensity interval program.

Of course, we are talking about nutrition. In fact it is the pre-workout period of nutrition which we will be discussing in more depth today because this is the area which many people don't pay any attention to at all.

Before you workout you need to ensure that your body has been supplied with the best nutrients to perform the tough session ahead. If you do this then you can potentially increase your results by up to 30%, so it is worth taking a few moments to look into the latest science on the subject. []

The first thing you must do to get the right nutrients before a hard workout is look at which energy source you'll be using in your session. While long, steady-state cardiovascular workouts tend to slowly chip away at your body's fat storage, intervals do not do this. Instead, they mainly use your glycogen (carb) stores.

If you have done your research you will already know that the major benefits of high intensity interval training take place outside of the gym, during the recovery period after your workout. This process, known as EPOC, is where your body tries to protect what's left of it's carbohydrate reserves and focuses on burning body fat for the fuel it needs in order to function properly. Carbs are your body's primary energy source, so when you have burnt through most of your body's reserves it's going to work hard to protect what little it has left, switching the focus on other nutrients instead. This magical post-workout effect can last a whopping 14 hours if you get it right.

So, the key thing we want to achieve is to help you burn through your body's excess carbohydrate stores while you are working out in the gym. For this very reason, consuming a high carbohydrate meal before a workout would make very little sense.

Does this mean all of those people who insist on training first thing in the morning on an empty stomach are actually onto something?

Not quite. While you should look to avoid heavy carbohydrate sources before you train, you can actually increase your results if you use protein as this will work to protect your lean muscle tissue from being burnt off during an intense training. This means not only will you lose fat, you'll also hang onto and maybe even build more lean muscle tissue!

Furthermore, many people like to add a BCAA supplement to their post-workout nutrition. Not only is it more beneficial to take it before you train, but it's actually recommended that you swap out the BCAA's for EAA's. The BCAA products you see on the market only contain the three main branched chain amino acids. However, BCAA's are like a car, they need all parts in order to function properly. Essential Amino Acids contain everything your body cannot produce by itself and have been shown to increase uptake into the muscles by 30%.

Furthermore, consuming your serving pre-workout as opposed to post-workout has been shown to increase muscle uptake by around 27%. Combined with a whey protein shake, you'll be able to protect your body from any lean tissue breakdown and fight off any feelings of hunger while performing high intensity training and burning through those carbohydrate reserves.

The topic of HIIT is as popular now as it has ever been in the past, but learning how to build muscle or lose weight with this approach often comes down to your nutrition plan surrounding those tough workouts. Now you have the key scientific research on the crucial pre-workout period, you'll be able to take your own results one step further.




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