OK, I'll share what I know/think about these now...
A) Morning workout is better than afternoon workout.
Source: many.
You've probably heard this one before too. I still wonder how important the difference is. Like Scratch, I agree that it's much more important to actually do the exercise so if not morning then by all means afternoon/evening. I've heard that late day exercise can make it harder to fall asleep but I don't have that problem so maybe it just doesn't matter.
B) Do strength training FIRST, then cardio.
Source: My daughter (certified personal trainer)
On her advice, I switched my sequence. Not sure why this matters and want to know more about it so went looking. I found this article (link) that discusses both and recommends the opposite. There's some interesting reading there.
C) Split one hour of cardio into two half-hour periods with a twenty minute break between, eat nothing, just rest.
Source: My daughter and this article (link)
She's always in such a rush, I didn't get a chance to ask her why this is a good idea so I googled it and it may be well founded. You burn more fat if you insert this 20 minute rest in the middle of 1 hour of cardio a small study found.
D) When working hard all-day e.g. distance hiking over rough terrain, make breaks either less than 7 minutes or longer than 30 minutes.
Source: Ray Jardine from his book "Beyond Backpaking"
Ray was a aeronautical and astronautical engineer working at NASA when he gave it up to become a climber and distance hiker. My kind of guy. I liked the book a lot. I remember this suggestion and his explanation of how it takes more than seven minutes to build up lactic acid in the muscles and how it gets cleared out again after 30 minutes. If you resume activity after say 20 minutes, you might find that you experience more muscle soreness. I think maybe Ray is right about this, but on the other hand, I don't think it matters a whole lot. I've done breaks of various durations and yeah, sometimes the muscles are sore - so what! Man, after hiking for hours on end everything is just plain sore anyway, I press on. But this tip is contradictory with the previous tip so that got me thinking.
