Best exercise tips, avoid these 7 foods before your workout to get maximum results

Best exercise tips: Food you eat before your workout determines whether you’ll be able to make the most of those 60 minutes in the gym. Here are some foods that you must avoid before heading for a workout.

What to eat before a workout is essential to getting a good routine going. It’s the fuel you need to keep your body going through a gruelling, yet rewarding workout. However, have you thought about the foods that you should be avoiding before a workout? While some may have a solid stomach and can eat anything before a workout, most of us should absolutely avoid these 7 foods before a workout and reap maximum benefits of our weight loss plan.

Best exercise tips: Avoid these 7 foods before a workout.(Shutterstock)

Baked goods

If you are used to grabbing a blueberry muffin before a workout, please stop this habit right away. High glycemic foods that are made with white sugar and refined flour causes insulin to spike and also cause a drop in blood sugar levels. This can make you feel sluggish and tired during your workout.

Kale

This one might feel like a surprising entry, since how can something healthy be wrong right? While kale is the ultimate health food out there, it is not a great pre-workout food. Since fibrous cruciferous veggies like kale require extra digestion, your stomach may not be able to process it. During workout, our digestion process shuts down. Eating heavy foods can lead to bloating, gas and discomfort. And for this same reason, you should avoid cauliflower too.

Milk

Like a bit of coffee with milk before hitting the gym? Skip the milk in your coffee and opt for just plain black coffee. Milk can make you feel bloated and lethargic. It’s best to avoid milk and milk-based products right before a workout. Some people also suffer from lactose intolerance, which may cause bloating, gas and diarrhoea from bacterial fermentation of lactose.

Alcohol

This one’s a no brainer. When you’re working out you are already losing water in the form of sweat. So when you add alcohol to this mix, it can cause further dehydration. At the same time, exercising under the influence of alcohol is not safe.

Soda

Caffeine is great for a workout, but not when it comes in the form of soda. Carbonated beverages contain gas bubbles that can easily fill you up. Feeling full during a workout can hamper your performance and make you feel tired too.

Junk food

Whether it is a slice of pizza, French fries or burgers, save these for your cheat days. Eating these right before a workout is a bad idea as they are high sources of saturated fat. This will slow down your digestion, which would cause your body to slow down your system.

Fruit juice

What can be the problem, you ask? Fruit juice is liquid fructose, which can overwhelm the liver and cause rapid rise in blood sugar. The liquid fructose will reach your small and large intestines quickly causing quick fermentation and influx of water in the colon could lead to bloating and diarrhoea.

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