How to Align Your Nutrition Goals With Your Exercise Routine

As we start to embark on new exercise routines, it’s easy to get caught up in the act of exercise itself. While undoubtedly important, what is equally – if not even more – important is how you fuel yourself and how you rest. 

This post explores the impacts of timing, getting the right kinds of nutrients, and how important it is that you’re giving yourself enough fuel for your workouts.

Timing

An important aspect of nutrition in the context of exercise is timing. We need to make sure that we’re fueling ourselves sufficiently both before and during exercise, and then giving ourselves the right foods to repair our bodies afterwards. 

In most cases, this means having slow-release carbs a few hours before exercise, faster release sugars during (especially if you’re exercising for more than 30 minutes – an hour) and lots of vegetables, proteins, carbs and fats afterwards.

Sufficient macro-nutrients

When exercising a lot, you need to make sure that you’re getting all of your macronutrients in sufficient quantities. The macronutrients are fat, carbs and protein, and you need a certain amount of each of these in order to live a healthy, active lifestyle.

Of course, not all fats, carbs and proteins are born equal. For example, protein in fish from somewhere like John West will often be a lot more useful to your body than protein in a legume or bean. 

Likewise, carbs in a sweet potato will be a lot more useful to your body in most cases than the carbs you’ll get in a pack of crisps. You need to look beyond the numbers on the front of the packet – also try to consider whether it’s a whole food or highly processed, to properly assess whether it’s going to be good for you.

Getting enough calories

If you’ve just recently started exercising, it’s possible that you’re still trying to keep your daily calorie intake within the recommended daily allowance – around 2000 kcal. The bad news is that even if you’re only exercising for 30 minutes a day, this allowance won’t be nearly enough to keep you fueled and healthy.

If you’re an average-sized man, for example, and you swim for an hour and then pump some weights, you could easily be adding another 1000 kcal to that. Combined with other activities – like walking to work or walking to the gym – you could need 3500 kcal or more on days like these.

In general, though, you don’t typically need to count calories – you just need to make sure that you’re eating enough to give you sufficient energy to do the things you’re doing. If you feel hungry and have low energy, then eat something!

Aligning your nutrition with your exercise can take some trial and error, but you’ll get there in the end. Just make sure that you’re getting enough fuel to give yourself sufficient energy, and that you’re providing your body with the right building blocks to repair itself after intense activity.  

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