sanity check: gourmet nutrition and pw meals

[AF-Temp]

Alright, so from what I've read you want to use some kind of surge or similar mixture while working out, and then within an hour or two after working out you want to eat a meal that falls into the PW category. Here's my question:

How many PW meals does one want to eat in a day? Is the answer different if you're bulking or cutting? A normal day for me looks like this for the next few weeks:

Normal meal for breakfast
Work, snack before lunch
normal meal at lunch time
afternoon snack
hit the gym around 3pm (use the surge type mixture here)
about an hour after getting home from the gym - PW dinner?
Snack later before bed

That seems like the obvious setup right? Well what happens if you decide you want to start running in the morning (I'm considering doing it then because of how hot its been in the afternoons)? For the next month I'm also going to have ice hockey games in the evenings, and sometimes basketball at lunch time. On days like that you're looking at multiple 'working out' periods - do you adjust the pw meals to keep up, or is that just intended for after the weight lifting itself?

I've probably managed to confuse myself unnecessarily here, but feel free to fire your opinions at me!

[Lost Dog]

If you're talking about the meals labeled PW in the ebook, then you could eat them after workouts, as, according to the "habits," you should only eat starchy/grain based carbs within about 3 hours of a workout. That's merely when they're "safest" to eat, if you know what I mean. You can have ANY type of meal after a workout, not just those PW ones.

If you're talking post workout nutrition (like PWO drinks), then more depends on your goals and athletic "efforts." If you're really working out in a sport or endurance activity, then you may need special workout or post-workout nutrition. Depending on how long each session is will help to dictate whether you need something to boost your energy during the activity. Generally, a decent meal before and after will do the trick for most people (athletes and aspiring athletes to the contrary).

Berardi has an article on workout nutrition for endurance athletes. You might read that from his site.

http://www.johnberardi.com/articles/.../endeating.htm

If I remember correcty, the recommendation was for something like a sports drink during and a protein/carb drink afterward. I'm not an endurance guy, so I don't remember the details...

[Johnka]

AF, LostDog did a great job of answering your questions, so there's not much I can add.

My only comment is not to get too caught up in the postworkout window/ protein-carb/ protein-fat details. Once you get the hang of it, it's just common sense.

If you're running in the morning, then have some grains before or after your run. Of course, it depends on the length and intensity of the run. You can't expect to have optimal body composition if you jog for a half mile and then come home and slam a 800 calorie shake.

In the past when I've done a morning and an evening workout, I would typically have oatmeal before or after my morning workout (cardio), and Surge after my evening workout (weights). That doesn't mean that surge should only be associated with weights, but in my case, I used the Surge after the more intense workout.