Morning vs Afternoon cardio? 1 hour or 2 30 minute sessions

What do you all think has worked best for fat loss? Read a lot of articles on line it wondering what wls patients have seen themselves?

Are two shorter workouts better?

Does working out before breakfast really help?

I'd be curious to see what a real professional (like an exercise physiologist or PT) would say, but what I've read about timing of cardio often just has to do with your timing - the best time to work out is whatever works for your schedule! I've also read (mostly in Runner's World) that there are advantages to doing 2-a-days but not necessarily about fat burning, mostly about time management. I've also read in RW that timing your cardio before the meal that you tend to overdo can help suppress your appetite and you can use your meal as recovery.

I do 2 a day about 35 minutes each. Mostly due to time constraints and that I try to get four miles a day. The first is my combo resistance and cardio. Second is usually walking. Thanks for the reply. Hope to see more.

Whatever you'll do. When they do these studies and find a difference, it's not enough of a difference to matter in the real world. Not enough to make a morning person change to working out at night anyway, not when the risk of that is that they'll hate it and stop.

I do best working out after work on the way home because I'll do it. Once I get home, that's it. I'm done. And forget walking up early to do it though I can make myself do that maybe once a week. And I can do it on the weekends if it's not too early. Basically I get up on Sat/Sun the same time I get up to get to work and that is okay. But not any earlier!

Oh and I lost more than 100% of my excess weight and got down to 18% body fat doing my workouts whenever I felt like it. 

If you really want to maximize fat loss, do a lot of HIIT and a lot of strength training and don't fall for the Fat Burning Zone Myth.

I was working out in the afternoon/evening and literally laid in bed-WIRED. It was miserable. So now I typically have my workout done by 9a, but since I work from home, if I have really early calls (like 5a) then I will take a one hour break at 10 or 10:30 and do it then. But I do NOT go later than that. Gotta be 100% done by 11:30 or I have trouble falling asleep easily at night.

Personally, I don't have the time to get all hot and sweaty, shower and then get all hot and sweaty again. I do a full hour at once. 45-50 on the elliptical and the rest of the time in floor exercises OR a 75 minute yoga class. But regardless, all at once.

Btw, I've read the studies about this and in all of them they only measure fat loss DURING the workout. Why is this important? Because our bodies constantly burn fat and carbs, all that changes in the percentages. And every night while we sleep, our body re-balances our fat stores. So, if you don't measure fat loss over a 24 hours period, there is no way to know if the overall fat loss is any different. It's quite possible that exercising in the AM causes more fat loss in the AM but less fat loss in the PM while sleeping ending up with a big net zero.

However, if you are an endurance athlete, studies have shown that working out on an empty stomach does increases your body's ability to get energy from fat during exercise and that's important if you are going to do an Ironman or something like that.  It may not maximize your fat loss for weight loss but it could maximize your race performance.

The Fat Burning zone refers to your bodies ability to oxidize fat and utilize them as an efficient fuel source rather than Glycogen and Carbs sources.  Your avg person carries a larger fat store that glycogen store.  This does not mean that if you go so a 3500 calorie workout that you will have burned a pound of fat though.

In order to utilize the Fat burning as a fuel source you need to have the metabolic ability to do this and understand how it works.  There is a specific point in each person where your body goes from fat to glycogen and it is the matter of a single heartbeat.

 

Read Metabolic Efficiency Training by Bob Seebohar.  It is a not a Starvation while working out plan I know numerous people that have completed Long Distance events using this method with minimal calorie intake.  Personally my Best was a 4 hour Cycle on a 1/4 of nuts.