New research suggests that athletes may see a decline in performance in the afternoon if they skip breakfast.
“Whilst we know that consuming breakfast is likely to be the best dietary strategy in most situations to maximize exercise performance in the morning, we did not know how or if breakfast skipping/consumption influenced evening exercise performance in a situation where the exerciser ate lunch,” said senior author Dr. Lewis J. James of the School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences at Loughborough University in the U.K.
Although the study was small in size, the researchers were intrigued by the findings. For their study, researchers asked 10 regular breakfast eaters to participate in two evening athletic activities, once after eating breakfast that day, and once after skipping the meal. All parties ate lunch prior to the afternoon activity, but they had yet to eat dinner, and their calorie intakes were measured during the study.
The participants were asked to ride a stationary bike for 30 minutes at 60 percent of their top performance, followed by 30 minutes at the maximum effort. After comparing the cycling data, researchers uncovered:
- The average heart rate and fat oxidation while cycling was greater when the participants skipped breakfast.
- The participants pedaled harder and expended more calories on the days they ate breakfast.
- On the days the group skipped breakfast, they consumed an average of almost 200 more calories at lunch, but total calorie intake still tended to be lower when they skipped breakfast.
“Skipping breakfast reduces the amount of available energy for muscular activity and therefore it would be important to know if this had a functional consequence – i.e. reduced performance,” Dr. David Levitsky, a professor of nutrition at Cornell University.
Researchers concluded that the overall difference in performance was pretty small, and it may be dependent on the type of activity. Dr. Levitsky said he hopes to re-create the study in other activities and populations.
“Certainly more work is needed to see whether the effects persist in other populations.”
Dr. Silverman Comments
Breakfast truly is the most important meal of the day, and eating more at lunch doesn’t make up the difference. If you’re a high school athlete looking to improve your performance, start with a healthy meal when you wake up!
Related source: Reuters, Medscape