Pre-exercise carbs for resistance training: does it matter? 🏋️
You might be wasting carbohydrate intake.
Isoenergetic Pre-Exercise Meals Varying in Carbohydrate Similarly Affect Resistance Training Volume Performance Compared to Placebo: A Crossover Trial
Background
Carbohydrate intake is often promoted pre-exercise to maximise performance, but does it affect resistance-training exercise? 🧐
Study Details
This new study recruited 16 resistance-trained participants (13 males + 3 females) to complete three resistance-training sessions consisting of 3 sets of…
👉 Back squats
👉 Bench press
👉 Prone row
👉 Shoulder press
…at 80% 1-RM for reps until failure (~90 mins) 📈
Two hours prior to each session, participants consumed a liquid breakfast of either…
1️⃣ High-carb (1.2 g/kg)
2️⃣ Low-carb (0.3 g/kg)
3️⃣ Low-calorie placebo
The carb conditions were matched for both total calorie (~580 kcal) and protein (~20 g) content🥤
Key Findings
There were no differences between conditions for…
💪 Reps complete per session
💪 Reps complete per exercise
📈 Total training volume
🧠 Hunger (pre- or post-exercise)
🩸 Blood lactate (pre- or post-exercise)
🩸 Post-exercise blood glucose
Although satiation and fullness was greater after both carb conditions vs placebo 🍽️
Conclusion
You do not need to have carbohydrates in your pre-exercise meal before resistance-training ✅
An interesting study, for sure. I see multiple holes in the design and methods, and therefore your conclusion. The one that stands out most to me is the use of <125g maltodextrin (a very high glycemic index carbohydrate) 2 hours prior to each session for the high carbohydrate pre-workout group. Considering that participants were instructed to consume between 275-690g of carbohydrates each day for at least three days prior and avoid exercise at least 48 hours prior to each session, I doubt 125g, of essentially sugar, could have been circulating as blood glucose or even stored as muscle or liver glycogen by the time the resistance training was performed.