Should I allow myself extra calories if I am working out regularly?

Just because you are exercising does not mean you can eat whatever you want. While exercise can make us feel hungrier, or at least as if we should be able to eat more, we often overcompensate by consuming too many calories. The Obesity Society recently published a study that followed more than 300 overweight women who were prescribed different amounts of exercise but told not to diet. After six months, and as anticipated, they found that women who averaged 73 minutes of physical activity a week lost about 3 pounds, and women who averaged 136 minutes lost just over 4. However, what they were not expecting was that the women who exercised the most, about 190 minutes a week, lost only about 3 pounds.5 The most intense exercisers were therefore making up for their calorie burns by unconsciously increasing their calorie intake.

It does not take very much food to overcompensate for calories burned during exercise. Think about it this way-it takes about 30 minutes on the elliptical machine to burn one Luna bar worth of calories. So, the bottom line is this: Don't subtract the calories you burn working out from your daily calorie budget, and don't add more food to your daily intake just because you have worked out.

How do I know how many calories I've burned?

Don't trust the calorie counts on your favorite aerobic machines at the gym! Makers of this equipment want you to feel good about yourself (and keep using their machines), so they inflate the calorie burn rate. Further, it is very difficult for an exercise machine to tell you exactly how many calories you are burning, especially because most machines don't account for body fat versus muscle mass. If two people weigh the same, the one with more muscle will burn more calories than the person with more fat. I typically divide the estimate the machine gives me in half to get a vague idea of how many calories I have burned.

Should I drink sports drinks or water?

You should always be hydrated prior to working out. Observe the color of your urine-if it's pale (the color of straw), you are hydrated and you can stop drinking about an hour before exercise to allow your bladder to empty and avoid disrupting your workout. Then, drink water to quench your thirst throughout your workout. You don't need a sports drink unless you are working out for more than an hour or in excessive heat. At that point, you will need a source of electrolytes and some carbohydrate with your fluid. Try Gatorade's G2-it has the same quantity of electrolytes as regular Gatorade and half of the carbohydrates (and calories). Or, you can dilute full-calorie sports drinks with water (1 part sports drink to 1 part water).

What are some good power snacks I can grab before hitting the gym?

Ten minutes prior to working out, a good snack would be high in carbohydrates and low in fat and protein. Carbohydrates fuel your muscles to work out at a high intensity. Try some fruit, like melon, a banana, or an orange-all are high in potassium and deliver carbohydrate (energy) to your bloodstream quickly.

An hour before working out, you could have one of the snacks I recommend in Chapter 9 for your midafternoon fix. Or try a packet of instant oatmeal, a small container of fat-free yogurt, a 100-calorie Balance bar, or 1 half cup cereal with skim milk. Also, go for your coffee fix. Caffeine can increase your alertness while working out so you can ramp up your intensity. A 12-ounce latte with soy milk is a great power snack to give you the caffeine boost and some carbohydrate from the milk.

Three hours prior to exercise, try to eat a meal similar to one of the lunch options in Chapter 8. This meal should include lean protein to keep you satisfied, and include that carbohydrate to keep your energy stores high. It should also be lower in fat. A high-fat meal (think fried food or regular ground beef) can take 9 to 12 hours to empty out of the stomach and may make you feel sick after working out. Go for turkey, canned salmon, or natural peanut butter on whole grain bread and a Greek-style yogurt on the side.

When and what should I eat after working out?

After working out, you have a 30- to 60-minute window to eat. If you wait longer, your body will go into starvation mode and you will not burn calories as efficiently. Also, if you wait too long, you will likely get overly hungry and may make a bad decision about what to eat. Use the plate method discussed in Chapter 11 to create a satisfying post-workout meal: Fill a quarter of your plate with lean protein, a quarter with starch, and half with veggies. If the recovery meal is breakfast, try 2 eggs, 2 pieces of whole grain toast, and 1 half cup low-fat yogurt. After exercising, your body is trying to bring itself back to homeostasis and needs some protein and carbohydrate to do so.