Body fat, post-workout meals, and those awful tastes.

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Okay, so I need to keep my body fat levels down, but how low exactly should it be?
Remember I am an athlete now XD.
I play varsity football (a guy can dream ya know) and I'm trying for a bunch of other sports such as track and stuff.

Also, if I may briefly bring up Ramadan again, I cannot eat or drink after or during traing due to timing.
So will I actually break down rather than build muscle due lack of replenishing? I eat between 9 pm and 4 am(ive gone nocturnal) and train around 5-7


Lastly how can I eat plain yogurt without throwing up? I put honey on top of it this morning and that helped a lot.

Your bodyfat level is pretty much up to you. You need about 10% to see abs. I've never gotten to 10%, but I'm reasonably happy with my physique at 15-20% (was 20% last I checked, but I gained height and some muscle since then, and lost a tiny bit of weight, so I don't know what it is now.) I'd like 10% or less basically for the hell of it, though. Everyone wants abs, you know?

As far as training goes, I don't really know about muscle gain or loss. I do remember reading that strength can be gained even in starvation settings, so you're probably not too bad off. What you should do, imo, if it's possible, is just sleep during the day and train at night, if it's possible. It's sorta cheating, as you're just sleeping through the fast, but yeah.

As far as plain yogurt, I find the best plain yogurt to eat is the Greek yogurts. I didn't really like regular yogurt much, especially plain, but that Greek yogurt is pretty great.

I know nothing about exercise and training regimes, but I was talking to a Muslim woman yesterday and I mentioned briefly your questions about training during Ramadan. She said that a lot of people use Ramadan as an excuse or prompt to lose weight and do work out too. Maybe you could get more specific advice from people at your local mosque as it seems that there will be many people in your situation.

It's like us and Lent...

Lol! That is exactly what my son said yesterday!

His birthday is just before Christmas, which is a difficult time to organise a birthday treat, so instead he has an "official birthday", like the queen, in the summer. . His two school friends came round and I took them all to a theme park in the afternoon. One of his friends is Muslim, and his family were ok about him eating, but asked me to make sure it was halal.

Orthodox Lent is weird, as it's usually not during Catholic Lent, and then Orthodox Easter is after Catholic Easter usually. So you're just seen as a weird person. Then we got the Wednesday and Friday fast days most weeks of the year. AND we got the Nativity Fast before Christmas. Most fast days are just Lenten rules, though, though I think the day before Easter, no food at all, maybe a few other days too. As for me, I've totally bombed out regarding all the Lenten stuff, but meh, oh well, one day I'll get that situated, maybe once I'm not living with my parents.

One thing interesting, the Ethiopian Church, though it's not really a canonical rule, because they're so closely connected with Judaic roots, they usually abstain from pork, too. They also claim to have the Ark, too. Interesting stuff.

My advice for the sport you want to do:

Don't worry about body fat for the time being, study everything you can about nutrition and training, eat and hit the weights hard.

Focus on compound exercises and free weights.

Try to stick to chicken, tuna and lean meats. If possible eat several servings of chicken breasts throughout the day if you can afford it.

Ramadan is a problem as far as excercising is concerned, as you should consume sufficient carbs before and protein after training (just as a rough guide). I almost never consume larger meals anymore, I eat 5 to 7 smaller meals a day to keep my metabolism (and my brain) running. Remember that right after training, your body will start to break down your muscle (that is why many people tell you to not train the same muscle group on two consecutive days) before it starts building new. The better your input immediately after your training, the less muscle gets torn down (again, as a rough guide, there is alot more to it, but it is very individual and you need to figure that out for yourself).
As for body fat: The most efficient way to lose body fat is by simply dieting. While weight training indeed is better for burning calories than most cardio workout, building up muscle and losing weight are two concepts that are more or less mutually exclusive to one another: If you want your body to use up its fat deposits, you gotta stay under your daily energy requirement. If you want to build up muscle, you cannot go under your required calory intake by too much. There really is no way to "transform" fat into muscle.
When I was all about getting in shape, I first got rid of all of my body fat (like, almost literally, I was at about 4 to 5%) simply by running alot and... well, eating almost nothing (not healthy, not recommended, I was simply being impatient), and afterwards, I started builind up muscle (about 35 pounds over the past 7 months), and gained very little body fat (I am at about 6 to 8%), but I do monitor my input very carefully.

Weight exercises aren't always great to do...especially if you skip a few through no fault of your own.

Steady, small intense exercises for a few months will build endurance, and that is when you can start doing really taxing weight exercises.

I, myself run at least an hour now when I used to do 15 minutes.

You need to build it up.

Biking should be done over running if you wish to not injure yourself, but running is necessary when you can't bike.

Pull ups are good too, and doing it first thing in the morning is also something you should do...as you won't forget later on.

Don't forget to stretch as well in the morning.