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THE BEST TIME TO EXERCISE IS...

I OFTEN get asked what is the best time of day to do exercise. The glib answer is: ‘Whenever you can fit it in.’ A less glib answer is: ‘It depends what you want to achieve.’ Are you mainly looking to burn through fat, or are you looking to improve your metabolic health (in other words, things such as your blood sugar levels)?

One study published in the International Journal of Obesity in 2019 found that a group of volunteers who mainly exercised in the morning (between 7am and 11.59am) lost more weight than those who did their workouts later in the day (between 3pm and 7pm), despite minimal differences in the amount of effort they put in.

The researchers suggested that one reason for the extra weight loss is because the people exercising in the mornings burnt more calories across the day than those exercising in the afternoon. But before you abandon your afternoon workout, there are advantages to getting active later on. In another study, published in 2020, researchers from Maastricht University Medical Center in the Netherlands discovered that middle-aged men with raised blood sugar levels who exercised in the afternoon (3pm to 6pm) got the most benefit, in terms of their blood sugar control and insulin sensitivity, compared with those who exercised in the morning (8am to 10am). So why do you get these different effects at different times of day? No one really knows, but it is almost certainly tied in with your body clock rhythms. Whatever the explanation, if you have the time, do try to do a bit of both.

HEALTH++DIET++HAPPINESS

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2022-01-29T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-01-29T08:00:00.0000000Z

https://mailonline.pressreader.com/article/282256668886857

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