Best workout times for both larks and owls

Any exercise is better than none, but the ideal time to go to the gym or for a run depends on whether you are a morning or night person

Exercise is most effective when done at a time that matches an individual’s biological rhythm. Pictures: iStock

Getting up early to squeeze in a workout before heading to the office or stopping off at the gym on the way home? Which is best for your health? Whether there really is a right and wrong time to exercise was a question posed by Dr Arsalan Tariq, a physical therapy researcher at the University of Lahore, for a recent study in Open Heart journal.

Tariq and his team discovered that by synchronising your daily workout with your chronotype — your genetic predisposition to sleep or wake at certain times — you could significantly boost your heart health. They also found that aligning at least some of your workouts with your chronotype could help lower risk factors for heart attacks and strokes, such as high blood pressure, fasting glucose, and ‘bad’ cholesterol. It also boosted sleep quality.

“Morning-type individuals responded best to exercise sessions between 8am and 11am, while evening-type individuals showed greater improvements when exercising between 6pm and 9pm,” says Tariq. “The key message is not that morning or evening exercise is universally better, but that exercise is most effective when it matches an individual’s biological rhythm.”

The simplest way to assess whether you are a morning or evening chronotype, Tariq says, is to ask whether you still have to drag yourself out of bed each morning during, or after, a holiday of two weeks or longer. If you do still hate mornings, you are probably a late chronotype. Another option is to complete the morning-eveningness questionnaire (MEQ), developed by QxMD.

Describing himself as a lark, Tariq tries to stick to a morning fitness habit. “Over time, I’ve found that exercising at this time feels easier, more consistent, and more in tune with my daily rhythm,” he says. “Ideally, we shouldn’t force ourselves into rigid schedules, but, instead, work with our biology as much as possible.”

Here’s how to match your workouts to your chronotype:

Is there an ideal time of day to exercise?

Another recent study, in the Journal of Sports Sciences, looked at the best time of day to exercise for heart health. Dr Conor McClean, an exercise physiologist at the University of Ulster, and his team, found that afternoon and evening exercise were slightly better for improving aspects of cardiometabolic health. But McClean concluded that “exercise at any time of day is most likely better than none”.

In other words, there is not a universally “worst” time of day to exercise, but you should pay attention to how you feel and how well you recover at different times of the day.

“Broader circadian research suggests that very early or very late exercise may influence performance or sleep,” Tariq says. “But our study specifically demonstrates that alignment with biological preference is more important than the exact clock time within reasonable limits.”

Pushing to extremes just to fit in a gym session can be counterproductive to health if it causes you stress and anxiety, adds McClean.

Larks: Go for a run between 7am and 8am

If you are someone who wakes at 6am ready to run, then it’s a good thing, according to findings from a study of over 14,000 people presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session earlier this year.

Prem Patel, lead researcher from the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, found that morning exercisers were 30% less likely to have type 2 diabetes and 31% less likely to have coronary artery disease than those who hit the gym or trails later on.

He even pinpointed a sweet spot: Exercising between 7am and 8am is linked to the lowest odds of having blocked arteries. “In the past, researchers have mainly looked at how much physical activity to do, the number of minutes or the intensity of physical activity,” Patel said. “Now… we’re gaining the ability to look at exercise at the minute-by-minute level.”

Owls: Save strength training for the evening

Handgrip strength, bench press, and squat performance have all been shown to be significantly better in evening strength tests than those done in the morning. It seems to parallel the circadian peak of some hormones and body temperature in the afternoon, which helps your muscle temperature to warm up, so that you are ready to lift against a resistance.

Larks: Try resistance training snacks in the evening

Rather than attempting a full evening weight session, a study in BMJ Open Sport and Exercise Medicine found that early risers can add tiny resistance “activity breaks” to their routines, comprising three rounds of chair squats, calf raises, and standing knee raises with straight-leg hip extensions for 20 seconds each as you watch TV.

Participants who did these three-minute workouts every 30 minutes, starting at 5-5.30pm for four hours, slept for an average 7hr 12min, compared with the 6hr and 45m for those who just sat on the sofa.

Owls: You still need to get outside in the morning.

Even if you don’t have the inclination to exercise first thing, try to take a short morning walk, even if it is only five minutes outside. Exposure to morning daylight advances our internal body clock and can help to reset our natural circadian rhythm.

Yoga brings benefits, whatever your chronotype

Research has shown that doing yoga poses for three to four evenings a week can significantly improve sleep quality and duration, which is great news for night owls. But if you are a morning person, a yoga session first thing can also have a positive impact on your sleep patterns, according to a recent study in the Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine.