JJ121591

Hi all,

For several reasons, over the last two years I have fallen into a rather unconventional eating pattern and I was wondering if there are any inherent cons to such a schedule for reasons that I'm not privy to at the moment. Just looking for some feedback from those with more expertise. Here's my schedule as is:

2:00 am - wake up, have 1000 calorie pre-breakfast, go back to bed
5:00 am - actually wake up, ride/train (avg 1400-2000 kJ workout)
8:00 am - 500 calorie recovery meal
6:00 pm - 1500-2000 calorie dinner
9:00 pm - 500 calorie pre-bed snack

As you can see, most of my nutrition occurs within a ~8hr window before my training with little during the day when I'm sitting at my desk. Thoughts? Am I impacting my energy/recovery with this at all?

10 Wheels

You Forgot a snack or real food for lunch

JJ121591

True, true. But my question is, assuming I am getting all the calories that I need, is there anything inherently bad about spacing my meals as I have done rather than the traditional breakfast/lunch/dinner?

Seattle Forrest

Probably not. There's some evidence that what you're doing may have some health benefits, like improving your sensitivity to insulin. Look up "intermittent fasting."

sprince

The interrupted sleep doesn't do you much good. I'd just combine the 9pm with the 2am (at 9pm) and get some decent sleep.

Machka 

Personally, I would have absolutely no desire to wake up and eat at 2 am. Especially not a huge 1000 calorie breakfast. Can I ask why you do that?

And you've mixed units. What you're saying is that you consume 4000 calories a day, but you burn 350-500 cal in exercise, leaving 3500 cal left over. Most people's BMR's are quite a bit lower than that, like maybe 2000 tops if you're a big guy. So that's approx. 1500 cal/day over and above what you need. Using the 3500 cal = 1 lb thing, doing what you're doing, you should be gaining 3 lbs a week.

Carbonfiberboy 

No, he's burning 1400-2000 per workout so he comes out about even. Eating 3 hours before your workout is optimal if it works for you. I've often done that with event rides, but not as a daily practice. When I do that, my early breakfast is 400 cal. not 1000. That seems like a lot, but you need to get the calories sometime. You might try shifting some of those breakfast calories to your recovery meal. You have a long time after that when you're sitting, which is an excellent window for replacing glycogen.

jsk

From a recovery standpoint, you might benefit from shifting some of your calories from 6:00PM to 8:00AM, simply because glycogen stores will be replenished more quickly/fully if you get enough carbs (and some protein) post-workout.

Other than that, if this schedule works for you I don't see an issue. As somebody else mentioned, this is basically a variation on intermittent fasting, which works well for a lot of people.

JJ121591

Thanks for the replies all. That's super-useful info, I'll give it a conscious effort. Fwiw, I used to work a job where I had to get up at 2am and I got so used to it that it became part of my schedule even after I moved on haha.

sprince

Where does this idea come from that everyone requires the exact same amount of resting calories and burns the same amount during exercise? I've never had less than 4k calories a day, typically spend less than one hour a day exercising and am pretty average sized.

wolfchild

The idea comes from various internet forums and blogs and it's based on broscience.