time of day: What's the Best Time of Day to Run?

When someone asks me what's the best time to run, I always say, "Whenever you can fit it in." It's hard enough to find the time to run -- I would hate to give people restrictions on when they should do it. And we all know that exercising at any time of day is better than not exercising at all.

That being said, there's some evidence out there that says certain times are more ideal than others. An article in today's New York Times says that researchers in various studies have found that "subjects tend to do slightly better on measures of physical performance — including endurance, strength output, reaction time and aerobic capacity — between 4 and 7 p.m." Hmmm...maybe that's another reason why it's tough to get a treadmill at my gym during those times.

Anyway, according to the article, other studies show that your body can adapt to the time of day that you train. So, if you're training for a marathon or other race that starts in the morning (which most do), it's good to do the majority of your training (especially long runs) in the morning.

While it would be nice to always run at the time when we'll hit our peak performance, it just doesn't work that way. Most of us run whenever we can squeeze in some miles, sometimes in the early morning or late evening hours. To keep up your running habit, you should just do it whenever it works for your schedule and goals, since the advantages of running in the late afternoon are slight.


Source: running.about.com