Return to: Getting In Shape - Exercise

Early Bird or Night Owl?

We are wired differently. There is a time that may be best for you to exercise. What is good for you might not be good for your friend.

Here is an example to drive home this point. I used to play hockey on Monday nights in pickup games at the local rink. The only ice time we could get was late at night, after the figure skating and youth hockey programs were done (which makes a lot of sense). We normally would get on about 10:30 PM and play until midnight.

What were interesting were the reactions afterwards the next day.

Many players were pretty wired and had a hard time getting to sleep. Some could not fall asleep until 3 or 4 AM in the morning after hockey. If they had to catch an early train downtown that morning, they were pretty wiped out by the afternoon.

I had a different reaction. Once I hit the pillow, I was out. The exercise did not interfere with my sleep at all.

When I sometimes pass by a health club early in the morning, say around 6 AM, I usually see that it is pretty crowded. What would happen if I decided to join them for an early morning workout? I would be tired by mid morning and it would be a rough day.

In other words, I realize that my body is wired to work out late at night, so I plan my workouts accordingly. You won’t find me waiting for the health club to open in the morning. You will find me closing it at night though. I will be one of the last ones out the door.

Mentally it works just the opposite for me. I am sharpest in the morning, but wind down by later in the evening. Rather than tying up my morning time exercising, I am better off getting a jump on the affairs of the day. Instead of trying to fight it late at night and get a little more work done, I am better off doing my exercise then, and give my mind the rest of the night off.

See what works for you. Perhaps try different extremes with your workouts.

Perhaps the key test is- do you feel tired or energized after a workout? If tired, then you might be better late at night. If energized, early morning could be the best for you.

Based on the traffic at the health clubs, there seem to be more early birds. That is fine with me. It keeps the machines free for me late at night and some good material to watch on TV during the late night workouts. I wonder though, if some of those early morning people might do better in the evening.

A side benefit for the night owls. You will burn off more calories at night while you sleep than the early birds will. It could have been one factor that was important to my reducing my weight as timely as I did.