What Happens if You Lift at Night vs Day

Daytime or nighttime workouts? Will you be stronger, have more energy, and be able to work out harder first thing in the morning or at the end of the day? Which one is better? And does it even matter? Well, the answer is yes. The time of the day that you choose to work out can make a big difference in your progress with burning fat, getting stronger, and building lean muscle. Some people swear by early morning workouts, claiming that they boost metabolism, set a positive tone for the rest of the day, and create consistency. Others argue that evening workouts allow for better performance, higher energy levels, and muscle recovery advantages. So, who's right? And more importantly, what's best for you? That's exactly what we'll look into in this video by comparing key areas like performance, fat loss, muscle growth, hormone levels, sleep quality, and overall consistency. First, let's look at fat loss. Many people that are trying to lose fat, believe that morning workouts, especially on an empty stomach, such as fasted cardio, burn more fat. The reasoning behind this is that when you wake up, your glycogen stores are lower because your body depletes liver glycogen overnight to maintain stable blood sugar levels while you sleep. Glycogen is your body's preferred fuel source and it comes mostly from consuming carbohydrates. But when your body does not have as much glycogen available, it turns to fat oxidation. So fasting overnight while you sleep, combined with elevated morning cortisol levels, forces your body to rely more on fat for fuel. And yes, some studies support this idea. For example, a study published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism found that people who performed fasted cardio in the morning burn more fat during exercise compared to those who ate before working out. But there's a catch. Just because you burn more fat during the workout doesn't mean you'll burn more fat overall. You see, your body constantly adjusts its energy balance throughout the day. That's why a systematic review and metaanalysis found that while fasted exercise increases fat oxidation during the workout, your body will compensate later in the day by using more carbohydrates for energy. This means that in the long run, total fat loss is not significantly different between fasted and fed workouts. To simplify all this, while you may burn more fat in the morning session itself, your body balances things out later, making the overall fat loss over 24 hours about the same. On the other hand, evening workouts may offer a definitive boost to a very important performance metric for both fat loss and muscle growth, and that's strength. That means if you're trying to build muscle, workouts in the late afternoon and evening can have a slight edge because strength and muscle performance are naturally higher later on in the day. One of the reasons for this is that as the day goes on, your core body temperature rises, peaking in the late afternoon or early evening hours. This has a direct impact on strength, flexibility, and endurance. Warmer muscles will perform better, which is where the whole idea of a warm-up comes from. Having a higher body temperature also increases blood flow and oxygen delivery. Although there's no conclusive exact time, we do have a study that compares morning versus evening workouts that found that strength, power, and endurance are often at their best between roughly 4 and 8:00 p. m. Another factor that influences your strength positively later on in the day is that your body has had more time to fuel up and store more glycogen as well as other nutrients from your meals. However, that won't be the case if you work out first thing in the morning, especially on an empty stomach. Glycogen is the primary fuel source for anorobic activities like heavy weightlifting. So, it can directly translate to an increase in strength. After a full day of eating, your blood sugar levels tend to be more stable when compared to morning workouts where lower blood sugar levels can potentially lead to early fatigue for some people, especially if those people are not used to training in a fasted state. You'll also experience a more favorable testosterone to cortisol ratio during the evening rather than the morning. Think of testosterone as the hormone that helps you build muscle, while cortisol is the hormone that breaks muscle down. So, yes, it's true that your testosterone levels are actually highest first thing in the morning. But your cortisol levels are also very high. As the day progresses, your testosterone levels will slightly drop, but cortisol drops more significantly, making your testosterone to cortisol ratio higher, creating a more friendly anabolic environment for muscle growth. This is why the same meta analysis from earlier found that evening workouts result in a more favorable testosterone to cortisol ratio which can support better muscle recovery and hypertrophy. And the benefits don't just stop there. For example, evening workouts will enhance neuromuscular efficiency and coordination. Your central nervous system will actually become more active as the day progresses, meaning your ability to activate more motor units and fire muscle fibers efficiently is greater later in the day. Studies also show that the brain's motor cortex, which controls movement, is more sensitive later in the day, which should enhance muscle activation and strength output. Your reaction time will also be improved. All of this combined will make your movements faster, smoother, and more precise compared to morning workouts when your body is still adjusting to being awake. Now, all of

this ties back to fat loss as well, because if you're able to have better quality workouts where you have more energy and lift heavier weights, you're likely to burn a few extra calories. Again, both morning and nighttime workouts will burn a relatively similar amount of fat. But you can see here how the edge for fat loss can go to evening workouts if it helps you perform better. But what about sleep? Sleep is extremely important for both fat loss and muscle growth. In fact, it's right up there alongside with exercise and nutrition as the third major pillar that influences your results. At first glance, it would seem that evening workouts can potentially cut into your sleep schedule. And sure enough, some studies suggest that intense workouts late at night can elevate heart rate and adrenaline, making it harder to fall asleep. However, this largely depends on the individual and how close to bedtime you train. It also is very highly connected to pre-workout stimulants you might be taking. Obviously, if you're working out at 8:00 at night and you take a pre-workout supplement or you even slam down a coffee to get yourself more in an exercise mood, well, that could definitely make it much harder to fall asleep after your workout. Ideally, you would want to stop consuming caffeine at least 6 hours before bed to minimize its impact on sleep quality. Caffeine has a half-life of about 5 to 6 hours, meaning half of the caffeine you consume remains in your system after this period. So, you'll still have caffeine in your system even if you wait 6 hours. But anything less than that and you're asking for trouble. With all that said, everybody's different, not only with their sleep schedule, but their ease of getting to sleep. For many people, working out at night actually helps improve sleep quality. A study in experimental physiology found that those who exercise in the evening experience deeper sleep cycles. So, many people find it generally easy to fall asleep and stay asleep even if they worked out later in the night. or even a more extreme example, there are plenty of people that can have a cup of coffee directly before going to bed. So, you might experience better quality sleep working out at night or worse quality sleep. It really depends on you as an individual and how your body reacts to caffeine, especially if you take it right before your workout. Now, finally, I want to look at one last thing, and that's consistency. Even though up to now I've basically given a slight advantage in almost every category to evening workouts from fat burning to strength gains to muscle growth to speed, endurance coordination, you name it. Even though evening workouts have a very slight edge in these categories, ultimately this one factor of consistency is what makes me personally lean heavily towards morning workouts being the better time of the day to exercise. I would say that's not just the case for me, but also for most people. And here's why. Most people have busy schedules and they tend to get really tired throughout the day. Whether it's from work, school, or other activities, by the end of a busy day, there's a high chance you're not going to feel like going to the gym. There can also be a million things that pop up as the day goes on that can lead many people who have genuine plans on exercising later in the day to cancel those plans and skip their workouts in order to take care of whatever came up in the middle of the day. On the other hand, if you wake up and exercise before you even begin your day, it gives you a massive energy boost along with positive motivation for the rest of the day. Nobody can take that workout away from you either if things come up later on. Many people hate working out, too, which is actually fine. It's fine to hate working out, but if you spend all day torturing yourself, contemplating this burden of a workout that you'll have to handle later in the day, it can actually drain your willpower, leading you to skip. Getting it done first thing in the morning gets it done and off your mind. So for the rest of the day, the things you do will feel easier in contrast to the workout that you started your day with. Of course, there's a big caveat with this and that could be that you're not really a morning person or working out first thing in the morning before work might require you to wake up so early and you may not be okay with that. That's why ultimately it comes down to a person byperson decision. And to make this decision, I wouldn't start first with what time of the day will I perform best at. I would start with what time of the day will I be most consistent. Any workout that you actually complete will get you way better results than workouts that you don't complete because you skip them. So start there. If, let's say, you know, it doesn't make a difference for you and you can be equally consistent with both morning and evening workouts, well, if your goal happens to also be to build muscle faster and get stronger faster, I would recommend trying evening workouts in that case. But if you always find excuses to skip workouts later in the day, then morning workouts would be way better. Same thing vice versa. If you're hitting your snooze button every morning, nighttime workouts will be better. So start with consistency and choose whatever time allows you to stay on track long term and then you can consider other things like the effects on your strength or your quality of sleep. So that about wraps it up. I really hope this video has helped you understand a little more about the advantages of daytime and nighttime workouts. If you also want to learn how to lose a substantial amount of body fat or you want to build muscle faster without all the typical trial and error that most people go through, you can try

my free 6 week shred. You'll get a workout plan, a six week meal plan that'll come with a 42 recipe cookbook and will be entirely based on your preferences. And you'll also get a coach to guide you through the entire process and answer any questions that might come up. To find out more, you can click the link below in the description or you can head straight on over to my website at gravitytrformation. com. I'll see you guys soon. Hey, hey.