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Menopause Fasted Exercise Pros and Cons

Release Date: 11/15/2024

Exercise Timing Improves Exercise Benefits in Menopause

The Flipping 50 Show

The timing of your exercise hurts or improves exercise benefits in menopause. If this is new stay with me! If this is like a review or you’re a trainer and you’re unsure of how to relate these things to your clients, you stay with me too! This is a great refresher and for some trainers the first time they’re ever hearing it! If you’re a trainer or health pro, don’t miss the , and be sure if you’re not getting results for your midlife and beyond clients you’re aware of our sponsor of this show, the . Since 2018 we’ve been providing the course and CECs, and now, this is not a...

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The Flipping 50 Show

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Increase Longevity and create a life you look forward to without Heavy Lifting

The Flipping 50 Show

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The Flipping 50 Show

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Building Muscle During Menopause: A Protein and Exercise Review

The Flipping 50 Show

Building muscle during menopause takes a unique stimulus compared to PRE menopause and is also unique during peri and post menopause. Of course there’s more. Are you trying to lose weight, gain muscle, prevent osteoporosis, reduce or avoid medication, do you have adrenal fatigue or long haul? In this episode I’ll discuss the research on protein and call back to a recent episode about exercise volume for building muscle during menopause. Questions I answer in this episode: How have protein recommendations changed over time (then and now)? [00:08:00] What are women’s protein needs during...

Connection Between the Sex Hormones and Bone Density

The Flipping 50 Show

Today’s episode is a refresher course or your introduction if you’re new to Flipping 50 and not quite sure you can make the connection between sex hormones and bone density. Share this with younger women to understand “more than seen and felt symptoms” of perimenopause. Many women aren’t aware of the options, pros and cons of hormone health. The more we know, the more we can make our own informed decisions. Bone density declines at menopause, and postmenopausal increases fracture risks. But do you know the importance of estrogen and testosterone in your bone health? Stay tuned to...

Exercise for Menopause Brain Fog, Memory, Depression and Anxiety

The Flipping 50 Show

If you deal with menopause brain fog, mild depression or anxiety any time of year, this is for you. It’s also for anyone who wants the latest science on exercise and brain health. The evidence around how movement affects mental well-being is growing, and I want to share some of the most impactful insights with you. Almost all types of exercise seem to show benefits on mental well-being. Activities like resistance training, yoga, other mind-body activities, aerobic exercise, and high-intensity interval training (HIIT) can support brain health to some extent. In this episode I’ll share which...

Fitness Then and Now: A Look at Fitness Routines as You Age

The Flipping 50 Show

Let’s have a quick flashback on fitness then and now, a look at fitness routines as you age. We're going to talk about how we exercised through the years with my guest Linda Malone who is 65. She’s been in the fitness industry as a personal training and fitness expert. She’s doing some marketing and helping fitness and health pros develop their copy. My Guest: Linda Melone is the founder of The Copy Worx, a copywriting business targeting health and fitness businesses. She’s a seasoned copywriter, former personal trainer, and a fitness specialist for women over 50. She once ran an...

My Morning Routine and How It’s Changed Over Time

The Flipping 50 Show

In my 20s, I would go for a run within an hour of waking. But as the years went by, I would linger over coffee and my studies or work. Even though I still wanted to move in the morning, I realized the best quality creativity and focus were accessible to me in the first hours of the morning. It wasn’t the same later. Eventually, I realized that if I focus on studying or work on a project and delay my workout until later, I could get another boost of focus when I return, refreshed and showered from exercise. Even when I was training for Iron -distance triathlons, 3 to 4-hour long sessions of...

What You Do and Don’t Know About GLP-1

The Flipping 50 Show

What you don’t know about GPL-1 drugs may hurt you, or your opportunity to improve your health. Misconceptions could limit your ability to make an informed decision about whether they’re right for you. Whether you’re someone considering these medications for your own health or a fitness professional trying to better understand how they fit into the broader health landscape, this episode will offer valuable insights on what you don’t know about GPL-1. We’re not having a persuasive argument here. Instead, we want to provide a balanced and nuanced discussion, offering you the...

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Our stance:

Flipping 50 believes each woman is unique.

That said, we favor fed exercise over fasted exercise when it is intense. That is, high intensity interval training, or strength training with the intent of preserving lean muscle mass and avoiding frailty or fragility occur within the eating window and ideally bookended by protein consumption if for muscle or bone mass.

We do acknowledge that exercise may “feel hard” when exercise is performed fasted giving the perception of “working hard.”

However, we suggest based on research and 4 decades of primary observation, women actually exercise harder related to their capacity for exercise when fueled. That is, they will go faster if being timed, go further within a timed test, lift more weight or perform more reps to muscular fatigue.

Fasted Exercise Pros and Cons During Perimenopause

A 27% muscle loss has been reported between early and late stage perimenopause. This is most likely due to multifactors: insomnia disrupting anabolic hormones and together with other signs and symptoms of menopause interfering with desire to workout, as well as a drop in estrogen, testosterone and growth hormone levels, and an increase in cortisol levels.

This is an important consideration when looking at fat loss vs lean muscle gain and priorities. Mitigating potential loss of muscle is a critical factor in aging well and overall metabolic health.

What Science Says

Some studies (review of literature) suggest that before prolonged exercise, fueling provides more benefit but before short exercise, results are inconclusive. A 2013 study on sumo wrestlers eating a ultra high calorie, 50% fat diet burned more fat after exercise done fasted. However, we’ve got to consider…. How like you are that? Extremely high calorie and 50% fat? In almost the same time frame, college women were fed vs fasted in exercise and showed no difference. Their diets probably reflected at least a little closer to yours and their hormone profiles also at least slightly more like you.

The problem is, few studies about fasting and exercise exist on midlife or postmenopausal women.

Women who are at risk for accelerated muscle and strength losses.

In studies for the last 10 years, fasted vs fed with the same hypocaloric diet there was no difference in increased fat loss due to fasted vs fed.

I hear comments from women who believe they are burning fat for fuel when they’ve fat-adapted, however, without measuring this, we don’t know it to be true. The crossover is only visible when you’re measuring in a lab. It would mean that at the same speed and intensity previously (watts) you were burning fat vs carbs for fuel. We can see that in clinical lab testing during progressive exercise testing using stages. Your cardiovascular fitness level may also improve meaning for the same speed your heart rate isn’t as elevated. That’s another way to hypothesize you’re burning more fat for fuel at higher levels.

I want to remind you that at a certain point we all cross over. If you’re “working hard” in high intensity interval training you are NOT burning fat during. You’re burning a lower percent of fat for fuel during. Because you’re burning calories - that is your energy expenditure is higher - you are still burning more fat.

Your goal is not to burn a high percent of fat for fuel during.. Or you’re doing that best at rest.

The data is not there to support higher fat burning during HIIT fasted. It’s not there to support higher fat burning after HIIT if fasted.

What seems most important is a hypocaloric diet, performing optimal exercise intensity for energy expenditure. And resistance training improves post workout FFA circulation most compared to HIIT.

To support anabolic response to strength training, especially for women when more prone to anabolic resistance, fed exercise makes the most sense.

Fasted Exercise Pros and Cons with Obese Women

For women who can’t seem to lose fat weight, and are in good adrenal health, after employing a foundation of high protein, 3 meals no snacks, fasting at least 12 hours overnight, extending the fast and testing can help shake a plateau.

The approach needs to be unique to individual needs and goals to lose fat weight and gain lean muscle mass. It may need to be addressed step by step to first improve metabolic health (blood lipids, blood pressure, insulin, glucose), with close observations on skeletal muscle to determine success.

For other women though, recomposition is best addressed by focus on gaining lean muscle mass and not slowing progress. We do know strength can be gained during fasting, at least in the beginning. Muscle mass doesn’t improve during fasted exercise.

Again, important to remember, the research featuring women in menopause and post, with anabolic resistance is minimal. Anabolic resistance is the resistance to gaining lean muscle mass. Basically, the older we get the more you have to work for it.

So, if you focus on losing fat, you may also lose lean muscle if you’re doing it by fasting. Like many things including exercise, the solution may be cycling fasting duration with alternating periods of time (weeks/months) with primary focus on muscle gains vs fat loss.

But the one constant should be monitoring your personal results. Is your lean muscle mass going up or down? Is your body fat going up or down? Is your gut health/digestion/elimination improving?

To Unpack Your Personal Fasted Exercise Pros and Cons, Prioritize

Prioritize goals:

Longevity (autophagy)

Avoidance of frailty, fragility

Improvement of balance and stability

Increase in bone density

Gut health

Emotional eating/relationship with food

Consuming inadequate fuel can make women store more fat. It may depend on whether you are in perimenopause vs postmenopause. According to Stacy Sims, it’s the hypothalamus related to the kisspeptin hormone. Thyroid hormone gets down-regulated within a short period of a few days.

You feel like you’re exercising “hard.” But you’re not necessarily exercising to your capacity. You’re simply struggling. It’s not the same as a quality intensity workout.

If you’re more athletic, you want to do more endurance or more peak performance, the more you have low calories while taxing your system.

Increasing protein without changing anything, even without exercise, body fat loss will be facilitated within 3 months.

For women who struggle with dieting or a history restrictive eating or binge-purging, using a time restricted eating window can be complicated by the desire to also restrict calories. The low fuel intake means low micronutrient intake. Frequent testing would be extremely beneficial for women who also ideally will monitor their skeletal muscle mass, body fat percent and blood glucose levels on a daily/weekly basis.

For extremely active women, fasted exercise reflects poorer performance: