Ramadan: Fasting, Training and Eating

What the research says

Ramadan is now studied on its own terms rather than as a variant of intermittent fasting, and the results are more reassuring than the folklore. A 2026 trial of 45 men aged 55–71 found that a month of Ramadan fasting improved walking speed and physical performance and reduced body fat without the muscle loss that older adults are warned about, provided protein intake was maintained. The general metabolic picture is consistent with that: time-restricted eating improves insulin sensitivity, blood pressure and oxidative-stress markers in most trials, and the sports literature summarised in intermittent fasting and athletic performance finds that endurance and strength are largely preserved when sleep and total intake are protected, with the losses concentrated in high-intensity work done late in the fasting day.

The variable that decides muscle outcomes is not total protein but where it lands. A 50,000-person analysis showed that protein eaten at the first meal of the day matters more than protein at the last, and the per-meal threshold reviews in protein distribution across meals put the useful dose at roughly 0.4 g per kilogram per meal, or 30–40 g for most adults. In Ramadan that means suhoor is the meal that builds muscle, and a date-and-water iftar followed by a large late dinner is the pattern most likely to lose it.

Why the Gulf is different

Most Ramadan research comes from Tunisia, Turkey and Malaysia. In Saudi Arabia the fast falls in heat for the next several years, which raises fluid loss during the day and makes any daytime training a dehydration question before it is a fuel question. Working hours shorten and shift later, taraweeh prayers run until midnight, and the social iftar-to-suhoor stretch pushes most eating into a two-hour window late at night and a hurried suhoor. Sleep, in the surveys we have, drops by one to two hours a night across the month. The practical consequence is that the training plan has to be built around sleep and the suhoor meal; everything else is secondary.

A practical plan

1. Pick one training window and keep it. The best-supported options are 60–90 minutes before iftar (low to moderate intensity, short, ends with food and fluid) or two to three hours after iftar (strength and intervals, fully fuelled). Pre-dawn training before suhoor suits only the well-adapted.
2. Make suhoor the protein meal. 30–40 g of protein (eggs, laban, cheese, chicken, legumes), slow carbohydrate (oats, whole-grain bread), and 500–700 ml of fluid. Skip the salty, fried suhoor that drives thirst by noon.
3. Break the fast in two stages. Dates and water, prayer, then a proper meal with another 30–40 g of protein and vegetables. Sweets and fried starters belong after the main meal, not before it.
4. Hit a fluid target between iftar and suhoor. Two to three litres spread across the evening, more on training days; count soups and laban, not just water. Avoid finishing the evening with several cups of coffee or tea.
5. Cut volume, keep intensity. Reduce weekly training to 60–70% of normal but keep some heavy sets and a short interval session; this preserves strength and fitness better than a month of only light work.
6. Protect sleep as the priority. A fixed 20–30 minute nap after Dhuhr and a hard stop on late-night screens recover most of the deficit; the month after Ramadan is when under-slept athletes get injured.

Common mistakes

• Training hard in the afternoon heat while fasting, then measuring the result as “Ramadan weakness”.
• Skipping suhoor to sleep longer, which removes the only morning protein dose.
• Treating iftar as the day’s only meal and eating 1,500 calories in thirty minutes.
• Using Ramadan as a weight-loss month with aggressive restriction, then regaining it all by Eid.
• Returning to full volume the day after Eid without a transition week.

When to seek medical help

People with type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes on insulin or sulfonylureas, kidney disease, or a history of fainting should plan the fast with their doctor before the month starts, and should break the fast if blood glucose falls below 3.9 mmol/L or rises above 16.7, as the international Ramadan-and-diabetes guidelines advise. Severe headache, confusion, dark urine with dizziness, or palpitations during a fasting day are reasons to stop exercising and seek care, not to push through.