A Meal Schedule To Get Fit

It's not a surprise that what we eat and the amount we eat has a lot to do with whether we have a great body or not. But a lot of people don't know that the time you eat and how often you eat matter a lot too. If you're going to succeed in getting fit, you need to pay attention. This is a true secret of getting the body you want.

When you eat has a major effect on your results. Let's start from the very beginning. When you first wake up, your body has been without food for many hours. Your blood sugar level first thing in the morning is low, and your body is running on stored energy. Once those reserves are used up, your body will turn to its next available source of fuel, your muscles! It's very difficult to get in shape when you're weak from lack of food, and your body is breaking down your muscles for energy. You need to eat your first meal as soon as possible after waking up. This gives your body the fuel it needs to start the day, and preserves your muscles.

So now you know how important it is to have a healthy meal as soon as possible after you get up. Doing so gets your blood sugar into the right zone (assuming you are eating healthy stuff) for you to function effectively and protects your hard-earned muscles. You'll feel better, function better, work out harder, and preserve your muscles while shedding fat.

The quest to keep your blood sugar level in the right zone also tells us how often you should eat. Within 3 to 4 hours after a meal, your body digests whatever you ate and your blood sugar level will start heading down again. That means you really shouldn't go much more than 3 hours between meals (except when you are sleeping at night).

If you think about this for a minute, it's clear that you need to eat a lot of meals in a day. To gain the benefits of keeping your blood sugar stable, you need to eat 5 or 6 times a day, instead of three times like most people. If you wake up at say 6:00 AM, all you need to do is eat every 3 to 3.5 hours and your blood sugar should should be good throughout the day.

When you eat more meals you need to reduce their size. One common way to do this without drastically reworking the way you eat is to have somewhat smaller meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, along with two nutritious snacks of around 100 calories. Those snacks are then eaten during the biggest gaps between meals, typically between each of the main meals or one between lunch and dinner and the other in the evening.

Eat this way for a few weeks and see what you think. Chances are you'll be one step closer to getting as fit as you desire.