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A BBC article, with very reasonable sources and good studies, tells us that the optimal time to train is late afternoon-early evening. It boils down to many factors: how sharp is your nervous system, your body temperature, how pliable and ready to fire are your muscles etc.
They’ve looked at great athletes and come to the conclusion, the most optimal training session is likely to happen in the late-afternoon or early-evening.
This is terrific advice. But also absolutely useless for 99 percent of humanity.
Most people have to train before work or after work.
Unless it is an option to train during the work day. But these folks are few and far between.
You need to train at whatever time is sustainable for you.
And for some, that’s 5 AM in the morning. For others that’s 11 AM. For others, it’s 7:30 PM in the evening.
And if you are on a half decent plan, training consistently, chosen your exercises wisely, eat well enough and rest adequately, the progress will happen. You will also consistently clock progress and better performance. And the best part, PR’s come when you least expect it.
I went in last Friday feeling slightly under-rested at the end of a long week. I wound up getting a personal best of 8 one arm deficit floor push ups per arm. I did not plan for it or see it coming. I realised I had it only as I did the set. It happened at 5:38 AM in the morning. Could I have gotten 10 reps/arm if it was 5:12 PM as the science recommends? Maybe, but I am chilling with my daughter between coaching sessions then. Training when I am in an ‘optimal’ state is not an option. You have to make the time you have work for you.
And that’s something you learn to do as you train consistently and with some semblance of a plan.
Train whenever you can. I sometimes chunk my training into three 20 minute chunks of push-joint prep and lower body. Others might get it done in an hour at 5 AM in the morning. The best time to train is the time you can consistently find in your schedule to train without interruptions. As the BBC article astutely puts it: Routine appears to be key – our body adapts better to training when it is performed regularly at the same time of day.
The science will always throw up astonishing things. And you won’t be able to apply most of it in your life. Optimal is not going to happen. In fact, there are a startling number of things that the science says is sub-optimal but is still useful for you to do as an individual. Simply because optimal in all things health is not an option for most normal people.