How to Exercise While on a Ketogenic Diet

Now that you’ve made the best decision regarding your health, that decision being your keto diet, you are probably wondering how it will work alongside with a balanced exercise regime. Not to worry, as there are several ways for you to improve your workouts while staying in ketosis.

The most important thing in your exercise regime won’t be the training from now on, it will be your diet plan! Using any of the three ketogenic diets, you will be able to seriously improve your physical activity and overall health.

Another great feature all ketogenic diets have to offer is that your main concern will actually be eating more, rather than less — like you would on the majority of other diets.  

According to Alex Reed, “your fat intake is definitely something to pay extra attention because you deplete your body of its glycogen stores while you work out.” This means that you will have to make sure to make up for this loss, and eat enough protein and fats for your metabolism to use as its primary fuel source.

 

image source

Another thing to keep in mind is that not every ketogenic diet will be up for the challenge of high-intensity exercises. If this is the kind of physical activity you are looking for, you may want to give the cyclical ketogenic diet (CKD) a chance. This particular type of diet allows you to eat meals that are high in carbs about two days a week, allowing your body to stack up on carbs in order to sustain an optimal amount of energy.

If you would rather not start eating carbs again, you can try out the targeted ketogenic diet (TKD), which will allow you to eat up to 50 grams of net carbs before and after your workout. This type of diet has become quite commonly used by athletes because it provides them with enough energy to keep them going through their demanding exercise regime, while still allowing their muscles to recover.

On the other hand, if you are not that serious about your exercise regime, and you are planning on starting a recreational low-intensity regime, you should be just fine following the standard ketogenic diet(SKD). This type allows you to eat anywhere from 20-30 grams of net carbs a day. It is the perfect choice if you plan on hiking, jogging or yoga. It will help provide you with optimal energy levels, while effortlessly losing weight.

If you are still a beginner in both dieting and exercising, you should know that, due to its moderate intensity, cardio may be the best choice of physical activity to combine with ketogenic diets.

Some of the exercises you may want to take up from now on can be swimming, cycling, aerobic or recreational sports of your choice. The best thing about combining cardio and keto diets is that being in ketosis will help improve your physical performance, so you will be able to swim or run a lot longer than before, without getting tired. 

However, we know that cardio is not everyone’s first choice, so you can take up lifting weights. This type of physical activity may require a higher carb intake, so make sure to either supply your metabolism with fast-burning carbs before you work out or to stack up on carbs about two days a week.

Keep in mind that, when lifting weights, less can actually be more. You may want to set your workout goals to five or more sets of five reps per exercise, making sure that the number of reps stays at five. Why, you ask?

Well, it is actually scientifically proven that this approach to lifting weights while in ketosis will help you build muscle and increase your power and energy levels more than if you were to do a higher number of reps. But not to worry — if you have set your mind to doing more sets of more reps than previously mentioned, you can do so by increasing your carb intake even more.

As you can see, it all comes back to your diet! The most important thing to do is to maintain a proper balance between your daily carb intake and the type of physical activity you want your exercise regime to revolve around.

You can also include some keto-friendly supplements from KonsciousKeto.com into your diet, to help you improve your physical performance even more! You may want to get creatine, MCT-based supplements, or exogenous ketones. They will definitely help you boost up your energy levels, and provide you with an optimal amount of ketones in order to stay healthy and fit.

Now that you know how easy it is to exercise while on a ketogenic diet, there is nothing stopping you from taking on anything you want. Your body is a temple, and now is the time to start building it!