All about Anabolic Window- Truth or Myth?

Have you ever heard bodybuilders and some fitness influencers talking about getting your nutrients, in less than a 60 minutes after your workout? They refer it as the ‘Post Workout Anabolic Window’. Some bodybuilders even take things to extreme to claim that if you don’t get your nutrients in between the 60 minutes period after the workout, the workout is a waste. We are going to discuss all about it, is it correct information or is it some myth and bro science in the fitness industry.

To understand this, we need to understand why did the term even exist. Before that I want you to know two terms: anabolic, the muscle protein synthesis state or the muscle repair process in layman’s terms and catabolic, the muscle breakdown state or the muscle damage state.

In our workout, specifically strength training, we bring in some stimuli that results in micro tears in the muscles. So, basically workouts are catabolic. After the workout is over, once we get the required nutrients for our recovery, we go in an anabolic state and muscle protein synthesis starts to repair the muscle and prepare it to face similar stimuli from workout with minimal damage, the next time. Now, the term, ‘Post Workout Anabolic State’ exists because of the claims of better nutrition absorption immediately after the workout.

Is higher nutrition absorption claims in the Anabolic Window even real?, this is where we are actually stuck. Well, according to studies conducted regarding the same, it was found that the ‘Anabolic Window’ does exist, however it is significant for competitive athletes in bodybuilding and not for average person like us.

These studies also show that the total daily intake of protein gives the similar results as the protein intake done during the Anabolic Window and the total daily protein intake is actually more important than the amount of protein consumed during the Anabolic Window. Now, to understand this, we need another conclusion from these studies, the muscle protein synthesis is elevated upto 48 hours from the training session. The body can actually absorb an certain amount of protein at a time, not more that 30 grams from a meal for an average person. So, even if you eat a load of protein during the Anabolic Window, most of the protein isn’t available for the body at the first place. However, if you provide the body with constant protein rich meals spread throughout the day, the body will use more protein for muscle repair because of the elevated muscle protein synthesis from the workout itself. This is why, the total daily protein intake becomes more significant than the anabolic window protein intake.

Now, slightly deviated from the claims made by the bodybuilders, the Anabolic Window is not actually as short as 60 minutes but last for 3-4 hours after the workout. However, it can actually increase depending on the pre-workout meal. If the pre workout meal already had descent amount of protein in it, then the body will have some aminos reserved from the pre-workout meal for muscle repair after the workout and it can also use it for muscle repair during the workout (however, workout is still a catabolic process, because rate of damage is higher than rate of repair) and in this case, the anabolic window can even extend to nearly 6 hours after the workout, depending on the available amino acid quantity.