Eating breakfast burns more carbs during exercise and accelerates metabolism for next meal

Eating breakfast burns more carbs during exercise and accelerates metabolism for next meal
New research published in the American Journal of Physiology suggests that eating breakfast could 'prime' the body to burn carbohydrates during exercise and more rapidly metabolise foods after working out. Credit: Javier Gonzalez

Eating breakfast before exercise may "prime" the body to burn carbohydrates during exercise and more rapidly digest food after working out, University of Bath researchers have found.

Scientists from the University's Department for Health, working with colleagues at the universities of Birmingham, Newcastle and Stirling, were studying the effect of eating breakfast versus fasting overnight before an hour's cycling. In a control test breakfast was followed by three hours' rest. The volunteers ate a breakfast of porridge made with milk two hours before exercise.

Post exercise or rest, the researchers tested the and muscle glycogen levels of the 12 healthy male volunteers who took part.

They discovered that eating breakfast increased the rate at which the body burned carbohydrates during exercise, as well as increasing the rate the body digested and metabolised food eaten after exercise too.

Dr. Javier Gonzalez, senior lecturer in the Department of Health who co-led the study, said: "This is the first study to examine the ways in which breakfast before exercise influences our responses to meals after exercise. We found that, compared to skipping breakfast, eating breakfast before exercise increases the speed at which we digest, absorb and metabolise carbohydrate that we may eat after exercise."

Rob Edinburgh, Ph.D. student in the Department for Health who co-led the study, said: "We also found that breakfast before exercise increases carbohydrate burning during exercise, and that this carbohydrate wasn't just coming from the breakfast that was just eaten, but also from stored in our muscles as glycogen. This increase in the use of muscle glycogen may explain why there was more rapid clearance of blood sugar after 'lunch' when breakfast had been consumed before exercise.

"This study suggests that, at least after a single bout of exercise, eating breakfast before exercise may 'prime' our body, ready for rapid storage of nutrition when we eat meals after exercise."

The study is published in American Journal of Physiology: Endocrinology and Metabolism.

An interesting aspect of this research is that it shows that extrapolating from other studies conducted on people who are fasted, which is common in metabolism experiments, may not be reliable, as being fed alters metabolism.

Dr. Gonzalez added: "Whilst fasting prior to laboratory trials is common in order to control for baseline metabolic status, these conditions may preclude the application of findings to situations most representative of daily living, because most people are not fasted during the day."

Rob Edinburgh said: "As this study only assessed the short-term responses to breakfast and exercise, the longer-term implications of this work are unclear, and we have ongoing studies looking at whether eating before or after exercise on a regular basis influences health.

"In particular there is a clear need for more research looking at the effect of what we eat before on health outcomes, but with overweight participants who might be at an increased risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. These are some of the questions we will now try to answer."

More information: Robert M. Edinburgh et al, Pre-Exercise Breakfast Ingestion versus Extended Overnight Fasting Increases Postprandial Glucose Flux after Exercise in Healthy Men, American Journal of Physiology-Endocrinology and Metabolism (2018). DOI: 10.1152/ajpendo.00163.2018

Journal information: American Journal of Physiology
Provided by University of Bath
Citation: Eating breakfast burns more carbs during exercise and accelerates metabolism for next meal (2018, August 15) retrieved 19 March 2024 from https://medicalxpress.com/news/2018-08-breakfast-carbs-metabolism-meal.html
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

Explore further

Exercise more beneficial on an empty stomach, research shows

1465 shares

Feedback to editors