I have been testing some techniques on myself regarding this topic, working out in Ramadan.  I have managed to not only preserve my weight as is, I rather lost 2 Kilograms!

For more information about Ramadan and Islamic fasting please check this Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramadan

So, what have I been doing for the past 12 days of this holy month?

As we all know, Ramadan this year (2010) occurs in August, which means the daytime is long (in reference to my current location, which is Amman – Jordan).  We fast from Dawn till sunset, and that’s around 15 hours.   The main obstacle I am facing is how to preserve the metabolism rate which I worked on achieving in previous months, during this holy month we do not drink or eat for 15 hours!  (Note: in order to know what is the plan I was following for achieving the metabolism rate I just mentioned, please refer to my previous post “My Experimental Diet“).

Having 5 meals a day, which are 3 main meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), and having 2 snacks, split in between the main meals, is the basic idea of my experimental diet, along with exercising 5 days a week.  This cannot be done during Ramadan since I am fasting!  The solution was to split 3 to 4 meals during the non fasting time, that’s from sunset till dawn.

Currently I am having 3 meals a day, and they are:

• “Iftar” the main meal, at sunset, when we break the fasting around 7:30 PM.  I am not going by the book regarding this meal, in regards to what do I eat in my usual diet, but I try to be moderate and not over eat in this meal (over eating is not even of the Islamic habits in Ramadan or any other day, it is a bad human nature “habit” which we Arabs have! At least in Jordan, i cannot generalize!)
• A snack at 12:00AM (midnight), this could be Salad or anything light.  During my weight lifting days, I have a protein shake after workout as snack to preserve lean muscle and make sure that fat is burned from other places other than killing my muscle tissues.
• Sohoor (Arabic: سحور) which is a blessed meal in Islamic religion, we have it right before dawn, and it empowers the body with some energy to be able to go through the day.  In this meal, I eat stuff similar to what you have in a normal breakfast.

For more information regarding what you can eat, you can check some examples from my previous post “My Experimental Diet“.

As for working out, the frequency of going to the gym, working out at home, or a jog in a park, is sometimes not easy to be scheduled, since we tend as a tradition to invite and get invited by close friends and family, for having the Iftar main “breakfast” meal.  Which means you can pretty much get stuck at someones place or at your place for long hours afterward, and thus not having the time for working out! 

I have been going every other day to the gym, for the past 12 days I went only 5 times, and I tend to go after having the main meal by at least 2 hours, that’s in between 9:30 and 10:30 PM.  The schedule I’m using is similar to the one in my My Experimental Diet“.

If you can stand working out before Iftar (the main meal “breakfast”), you can do Cardio exercises  since your body will have high levels of glycogen which will aid in burning fat faster, and you can go one to two hours max before Iftar.  Beware of extreme dehydration if your body cannot handle it, and stop immediately if you feel light headed.

A note worth mentioning: Eating dates , and then drinking water at Iftar, have been proven scientifically to be very good in re-hydration, since dates contains phosphate which when consumed and then followed by water helps in faster re-hydration.

This was just another experiment on myself, it suits my body, and I am happy with the results.  Feel free to try it, but I hold no responsibility if anything happens to you!  Bodies differ, and you might not find it suitable for you.

I hope you find my post helpful =)

Tags: Metabolism, Ramadan, Working out