Currently after either a weight training session or cardio, I consume 50g Whey Isolate + 25g Dextrose.

I'm on a cutting plan, but I've been curious as to whether the PWO drink after my morning, fasted cardio is helping or hindering my goals.

Maybe I'm being naive here, but I've been drinking it after 45 mins LISS under the pretense that it would replenish my depleted glycogen stores and return blood sugar levels to normal - stabalizing energy levels.

But is it making my morning cardio less effective by supplying instant nutrition? I remember reading a long time ago that even after you stop doing cardiovascular exercise, your body continues to burn calories at a slightly accelerated rate for a short period afterwards.

Should I save the PWO for weight training solely? (it would be lighter on my pocket anyways)

You're drinking dextrose after cardio?????

I would not advise doing that.

As well, for pwo weight training nutrition, your shake should be 2 to 1 dextrose to protein, not protein to dextrose as glycogen replinishment is the first priority pwo and carbs should comprise the majority of the shake. Aminos (protein) are secondary in importance during this time, hence them being 1/2 of what the carbs are.

~SC~

You're drinking dextrose after cardio?????

I would not advise doing that.

As well, for pwo weight training nutrition, your shake should be 2 to 1 dextrose to protein, not protein to dextrose as glycogen replinishment is the first priority pwo and carbs should comprise the majority of the shake. Aminos (protein) are secondary in importance during this time, hence them being 1/2 of what the carbs are.

~SC~



Thanks for replying SC. I'm going to change the ratio around 2:1 carbs to protein.

I did a little digging and read a few articles, but I'm getting a little confused now.

According to this article (http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/berardi4.htm), written by John Berardi, he says PWO is essential to any form of exercise whether it be endurance or strength training. This would put my cardio PWO as essential by what he's saying. I'm pretty confused :confused: . Are there any other articles you can direct me towards?

Also, in his article he gives out a formula to calculate how many grams of protein/carbs are 'optimal' in a PWO.

Carbs = 0.8g x 1kg of body weight
Prot = 0.2-0.4g x 1kg of body weight

I'm sitting at roughly 100kg right now, so he's suggesting 80 grams of dextrose to 20-40 grams of protein. That's quite a bit more than what I've been taking. :confused:

According to this article (http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/berardi4.htm), written by John Berardi, he says PWO is essential to any form of exercise whether it be endurance or strength training. This would put my cardio PWO as essential by what he's saying.

Berardi is a pretty smart guy. He knows what he's talking about but you may have misunderstood him, as I doubt 45 mins of LISS cardio is "endurance training"

Anyway, i agree with swolecat on this one. Dex + whey isolate probably isn't the best thing to have after cardio. Leave it for the weights!:bb:

dont drink a pwo shake after liss.
however i think u should do pwo shake after HIIT depending on how long you do it. (if u ever plan on doing it in the future)

Berardi is a pretty smart guy. He knows what he's talking about but you may have misunderstood him, as I doubt 45 mins of LISS cardio is "endurance training"

Anyway, i agree with swolecat on this one. Dex + whey isolate probably isn't the best thing to have after cardio. Leave it for the weights!:bb:

I'm getting the impression that I'm probably very wrong, but I don't understand it really. Why wouldn't 45 mins of LISS cardio be considered endurance training? Wouldn't my leg muscles gradually become depleted of glycogen after putting them to work for almost an hour? Or are you saying they aren't depleted enough to warrant the incredilous amount of sugar I'd be consuming say after weight lifting?

Thanks for replying SC. I'm going to change the ratio around 2:1 carbs to protein.

I did a little digging and read a few articles, but I'm getting a little confused now.

According to this article (http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/berardi4.htm), written by John Berardi, he says PWO is essential to any form of exercise whether it be endurance or strength training. This would put my cardio PWO as essential by what he's saying. I'm pretty confused :confused: . Are there any other articles you can direct me towards?

Also, in his article he gives out a formula to calculate how many grams of protein/carbs are 'optimal' in a PWO.

Carbs = 0.8g x 1kg of body weight
Prot = 0.2-0.4g x 1kg of body weight

I'm sitting at roughly 100kg right now, so he's suggesting 80 grams of dextrose to 20-40 grams of protein. That's quite a bit more than what I've been taking. :confused:
i do agree with upping the amount of carbs you're used to in a pwo shake, but if the equations are based on body weight, they are far from optimal by anymeans.
It should be based on your lean mass only.

But just go by what it says.
...except PWO shake after liss - very not nessessary.

I'm getting the impression that I'm probably very wrong, but I don't understand it really. Why wouldn't 45 mins of LISS cardio be considered endurance training? Wouldn't my leg muscles gradually become depleted of glycogen after putting them to work for almost an hour? Or are you saying they aren't depleted enough to warrant the incredilous amount of sugar I'd be consuming say after weight lifting?
that would depend on your diet.
are you on a low carb diet?

and just because you're using your muscles in the LISS, doesnt mean your body is taking energy from stored glycogen - that depends on where your heartrate is.
If it's an areobic workout (liss) your body is going to use more/equivilant stored fat than your glycogen stores.

and even lifting probably doesnt consume as much glycogen as you think it does.
you would need a very very very intense workout session to deplete your stores, but that would of course depend on how many carbs you consume per day.

I'm getting the impression that I'm probably very wrong, but I don't understand it really. Why wouldn't 45 mins of LISS cardio be considered endurance training? Wouldn't my leg muscles gradually become depleted of glycogen after putting them to work for almost an hour? Or are you saying they aren't depleted enough to warrant the incredilous amount of sugar I'd be consuming say after weight lifting?

Not if you are truly doing LISS. You're legs aren't getting all that much of a workout, your heart is, and even that, not much.

Now, if you did an hour at 170, that WOULD be a different matter.

Ahh. Ok.

Thanks for clearing some things up everyone.

I guess it would be safe to say, that for myself, with approximately 60-65kg of LBM, 50g of dextrose and 25g of whey isolate would be a good option PWO after weight training or 20+ mins of HIIT only?

Try it and see. Personally, Dex after HIIT would just get me fat. I respond best to simple sugars pwo only after intense lifting sessions, and total-body sessions at that.

Try it and see. Personally, Dex after HIIT would just get me fat. I respond best to simple sugars pwo only after intense lifting sessions, and total-body sessions at that.



Hmm, well I think I found the reason why my cut isn't going as well as planned. Time to cut out the PWO shakes on cardio days. :bang:

Try it and see. Personally, Dex after HIIT would just get me fat.
then you're not doing HIIT right.

I'm getting the impression that I'm probably very wrong, but I don't understand it really. Why wouldn't 45 mins of LISS cardio be considered endurance training? Wouldn't my leg muscles gradually become depleted of glycogen after putting them to work for almost an hour? Or are you saying they aren't depleted enough to warrant the incredilous amount of sugar I'd be consuming say after weight lifting?

LISS draws more energy from fat reserves than glycogen stores.

LISS draws more energy from fat reserves than glycogen stores.
iv seen some references say it's equal, but who knows

then you're not doing HIIT right.

Oh yeah.. right, how could I be so dense? After 25 years of working out I still totally don't know what works and what doesn't for my body. :doh:

then you're not doing HIIT right.
:confused:

Oh yeah.. right, how could I be so dense? After 25 years of working out I still totally don't know what works and what doesn't for my body. :doh:

:confused:

Then maybe i'm misunderstanding.
Hort said he'll only use PWO simple sugars after intense lifting sessions, but after HIIT they'll make him fat.

Why do we use pwo shakes after lifting?
I've always been under the assumption it's because lifting is an anaerobic exercise, which by definition will rely mainly on carbs as energy.
These carbs will come in form of glycogen, stored in muscles/liver, as well as anything in your bloodstream if you had just eaten, and we do the PWO nutrition to replenish some of these sources.

But you're really not anaerobic for that long during lifting.... you have short bursts of it... but unless you're doing 20rep sets of squats or deadlifts, as far as your heart goes - you wont be in anaerobic mode for very long, if at all....


Now HIIT.... everyone does it differently.
How i do it is - i warm up for about 5-10 minutes...
(aerobic - mostly fat burned, but still needs some glycogen present in order to be efficient at fat burning)

Then i'll go all out for about 2 minutes. and i mean 95-100% maxhr.
So during these 2 minutes (120 sec), i'm going to be all anaerobic, as compared to my 10 quick reps of squats, which lets say would be 30 seconds of total anaerobic effort over a total of 2 minutes.
I would then rest for 1-2 minutes (which during half of this my heart rate is still blasting in anaerobic mode and slowly coming down) ...then go all out for 3 minutes straight, rest 1-2 minutes, repeat...

So if you think about a 45 minute session of HIIT vs Lifting... you're going to be in an anaerobic mode (judging by heart rate) much much much more than you will be during a lifting session, which MEANS, i would think, that your glycogen will be more depleted/used during HIIT vs lifting, which means you would need that PWO shake more after HIIT than lifting. (unless you're doing mastover's leg workout - where your heartrate would probably be in the anaerobic zone between reps, in which case i would think you would use/deplete the same amount of glycogen during the sessions (hiit vs lifting) )


I have no idea what hort did in his 25 years of experience of hiit/lifting.
I think it's more a case where he probably psychologically feels like he needs the PWO more after lifting because his muscles are sore, when that's probably not the case.
I said he probably wasnt doing it right because if he was doing HIIT correctly, that PWO shake would be far less likely to make him fat vs taking it after a lifting session.


edit: If i'm wrong about anything i said, please explain cuz i likes to learn.

I said he probably wasnt doing it right because if he was doing HIIT correctly, that PWO shake would be far less likely to make him fat vs taking it after a lifting session.
That sounds logical to me.

edit: If i'm wrong about anything i said, please explain cuz i likes to learn.

I'm beginning to think that nobody knows the real answer, and everyone just keeps passing on the erroneous information they've learned.

I looked at some sports performance sites:
Bodybreak (http://www.bodybreak.com/sprtnut.html)
Thrifty Foods Sports Nutrition (http://www.thriftyfoods.com/nutrition/topics_sprtsn.html?THRIFTY=9e913c89522ac11b71e52f5 3c2cfdfd6)
Indoor climbing (http://www.indoorclimbing.com/carbohydrates.html)

They all said the same thing. Replacing glycogen stores after cardiovascular activity is essential for good performance.

However, nutrition to enhance performance is a little bit different than nutrition for maximizing fat loss.

As I understand it, the whole point of doing cardio is to decrease the glycogen stores so that the body will start to burn stored fat.

However, if that's the case, I don't see why the importance of replacing glycogen stores after a heavy lifting session is stressed so adamantly when a person is following a cutting program. :confused:

I looked at some sports performance sites:
Bodybreak (http://www.bodybreak.com/sprtnut.html)
Thrifty Foods Sports Nutrition (http://www.thriftyfoods.com/nutrition/topics_sprtsn.html?THRIFTY=9e913c89522ac11b71e52f5 3c2cfdfd6)
Indoor climbing (http://www.indoorclimbing.com/carbohydrates.html)
:sleep:


They all said the same thing. Replacing glycogen stores after cardiovascular activity is essential for good performance.

What they mean by good performance is being able to have the energy nessessary to do the same thing just as well the next day, and they associate carbs with energy


As I understand it, the whole point of doing cardio is to decrease the glycogen stores so that the body will start to burn stored fat.


NO!!!! (http://www.dvdfuture.com/images/upload/barkergilmore.jpg):spank:
I think you're thinking of the benifits of a low carb diet...

The point of cardio is to burn fat.

- Lets say 45minutes of LISS burns 8.5 points of fat out of a total of 10, the other 1.5 coming from stored glycogen nessessary for the body to burn that 8.5 as energy.
1.5 is not alot of glycogen, so it'd be pointless to consume a pwo shake afterwards.

- 45 minutes of HIIT will ALSO burn 8.5 fat but will also burn 72 carb/glycogen.
The thing about HIIT is you also have an elevated heartrate for a few hours afterward which will be aerobic-like, and your body will burn all fat during this time as well.

So in that 4-5 hr period (cardio + after), HIIT would burn more fat than LISS.
...but that doesnt mean it's better, because HIIT depends on you having a good tank of glycogen in order to have enough energy for it.
So to have a good tank of glycogen to be able to do HIIT and lifting during the week, your diet needs to be rich in carbs, which means all the other hours of the day you're not at your optimal fat burning capabilities, which means LISS + low carb might be better, or the same, or slightly worse - just do whatever makes you happy.
Low carb does not make me happy, but then again HIIT isnt everyone's dream vacation, either...




However, if that's the case, I don't see why the importance of replacing glycogen stores after a heavy lifting session is stressed so adamantly when a person is following a cutting program. :confused:

that's not the case, but - the importance of replacing glycogen stores after heavy lifting (PWO shake) is most important if you're on a low carb, calorie deficit diet. (the benifits of carbs after lifting are discussed elsewhere)
If you're bulking and/or taking in a good amount of carbs, pwo nutrition isnt as important as eating slower burning carbs during the 24-36 hrs after you lift, plus of course eating good protein sources.


sorry if i spelled stuffs wrong

What people need to do is read as many sources on a topic as they can, as well as pull in from their own experiences to make the best guess possible.
We need better stickies.

(the benifits of carbs after lifting are discussed elsewhere)
I've probably seen it before, but, if I did, it didn't make sense to me. I'll keep looking.

I know that fasted HIIT is not recommended for those reasons you mentioned, but I've never noticed a higher carb diet being recommended in those cases.

I know that fasted HIIT is not recommended for those reasons you mentioned, but I've never noticed a higher carb diet being recommended in those cases.


The minimum amount of carbs you need in your diet for HIIT/lifting depends on how long you plan on staying in the anaerobic zone during said exercises.
Unfortunately i dont know exactly what that equation would be, so i just make sure i'm eating plenty.
...But then again im not cutting.

Plus there's actually nothing wrong with fasted HIIT (that i'm aware) - just as long as you have a full tank of glycogen from your regular diet enough to fuel the exercise.

dont drink a pwo shake after liss.

what would u eat or drink after liss?

what would u eat or drink after liss?
water unless it's time for a meal, then i'll eat whatever meal i usually eat at that time.

water unless it's time for a meal, then i'll eat whatever meal i usually eat at that time.

how long after liss morning cardio would u have ur first meal? and can u have a shake.

how long after liss morning cardio would u have ur first meal? and can u have a shake.
Oh, you're talking fasted?
then ya, i would get home and cook my breakfast.

I've seen swolecat recommend protein/fat meal right after liss - doesnt matter how long you wait.
I guess the idea is that any sort of insulin release will stop the after burn affect.

But i dunno if that's true.
I would think any food in your blood stream (protein/fat... doesnt matter) your body would choose it over stored fat during any time of elevated heartrate, but i have no idea.

And yes, you can have a shake.
When i did fasted liss i would have a peanutbutter + chocolate whey shake afterwards, just because i was too lazy to make breakfast.

Oh, you're talking fasted?
then ya, i would get home and cook my breakfast.

I've seen swolecat recommend protein/fat meal right after liss - doesnt matter how long you wait.
I guess the idea is that any sort of insulin release will stop the after burn affect.

But i dunno if that's true.
I would think any food in your blood stream (protein/fat... doesnt matter) your body would choose it over stored fat during any time of elevated heartrate, but i have no idea.

And yes, you can have a shake.
When i did fasted liss i would have a peanutbutter + chocolate whey shake afterwards, just because i was too lazy to make breakfast.


that's what i do, 45 min liss, 15 min after i have my 46g shake

so i guess that's ok

While cutting, I do a 1/2 dose of aminos, glutamine/peptide/CEE immediately pre cardio (only ~25 calories) and 1/2 immediately after, then eat my breakfast when I get home, proteins and fats. Leans me out pretty quickly and I've had good success with the aminos both in terms of developing/preserving muscle.