Changing eating habits without fear of weight gain

Are you tired of living with a rigid and restrictive style of eating?

Do your food-related habits affect your relationships?

Do you want to stop feeling so anxious, stressed, overwhelmed and conflicted around food-related events and decisions? 

Are you wanting to make food choices that help fuel your active lifestyle, help you feel good physically and satisfy you mentally? 

Are you ready to break free from food rules and build a healthy relationship with food and your body? 

If you said yes to any or all of the following, you may find that there is one thing that is holding you back from feeling controlled by food.....you are worried about gaining weight/body composition changes. 

Unfortunately, we live in a world saturated with diet culture. We are conditioned to group food into "good" and "bad" categories and it's almost universally acceptable to fat shame. Even worse, nutrition experts often encourage disordered eating strategies as a way to improve health, lose weight or enhance fitness/performance. 

Trying to maintain a lifestyle with food rules, rituals and restrictions means you are not living to your fullest potential. The more energy you expend on your food choices, the more distracted you become mentally and physically. Letting go of food-related fears is how you can live a more fulfilling lifestyle. 

But if you are worried that a flexible and varied style of eating will result in a body type that would be seen as unhealthy, unacceptable, unattractive or performance limiting, I must remind you that as an athlete, you need full physical and mental freedom to perform at your best and to keep your body in good health. Restricting the food in your diet, placing food rules on when, how much and where you eat and obsessing over your body will not allow for that freedom. To truly put this 'diet' mentality behind you, you must get over your fear of weight gain. 

• Identify the source of your weight-related fears
  -Comments made by coaches, athletic outfits and performance, a culture that emphasizes leanness.... it's important to identify who or what is making you feel how you feel about your body.
  -Most weight gain fears initiate from cultural weight stigmas. 
  -Success, beauty, attractiveness, ability, happiness, social standard are often tied to what the body looks like. 
  -Food is often used to control stress and to reduce anxiety. Rituals and regimes around food may give you the illusion that you have more control over a situation, making you feel more at ease around eating. Being able to eat without feeling restricted, regimented or ritualistic is a way to challenge the fear of weight gain. 
  
  
• Rewire your thoughts
  -The brain can be retrained. If you constantly think that if your body changes, you will no longer be successful, happy or attractive, it will be difficult to change your behaviors. 
  -Positive affirmations and mantras can help build new thought patterns. 
  -Recognize the triggers for when your thoughts become self-sabotaging. 
  
  
• Change behaviors
  -The purpose of the first two steps is to recognize that there's a close connection between how you think you will look, perform and be treated if you step away from a rigid and restrictive style of eating. 
  -Take a step back to consider how your current style of eating is helping or harming your heath, performance or quality of life. 
  -A healthy weight supports the metabolic demands of your training, while protecting your physical and mental health. It's not controlled, it just happens. 
  

You may be wondering what will happen to your body when you get rid of the food rules? 

The truth is, I don't know and you don't know. The unknown can be scary - thus the constant need to feel controlled by food. While the idea of not being able to tightly control your weight can be scary, your reasons for giving up control over food must be stronger than your fears over weight gain. 

And if that is too hard for you to think about right now, I'll remind you where that fear of weight gain came from.....diet culture! 

Diet culture is constantly selling you methods for how you can and should control your weight to be leaner, lighter or smaller. This puts great pressure on you that your moral obligation as a human being in this world is to control your weight. And if you fail, it's a personal failure. With every diet, restriction, regime and ritual, it's the illusion of control. You must trust yourself that when you eat enough to fuel and nourish your body, while also feeling food freedom and flexibility, your body will be at the weight that it needs to be to function at its best. 

There are many layers to your relationship with food, weight and your body. And these layers change in different times of your life.

But now is a great time to start learning (and unlearning) your food, body and weight related thoughts and behaviors, while challenging those thoughts and deciding what food related decisions are helping you and should stay, and which ones need to be tossed out as they are keeping you from living a meaningful and quality-filled life. 

Effects of dehydration on a body in motion

 

Although water has no caloric value, it’s the most essential nutrient required in your diet on a daily basis. Your body is made of water. It’s part of your blood, brain, heart, lungs and bones. As it relates to exercise, water maintains blood volume, reduces the risk of heat stress, regulates body temperature and is involved in muscle contractions.

To optimize your hydration status, you must be an active participant in your hydration regime by consuming adequate fluids and electrolytes on a daily basis - as well as before, during and after exercise. Leaving hydration to chance or ignoring dehydration symptoms can be hazardous to health and performance.

Sadly, once you are dehydrated, you can't 'make-up' for fluids lost.

Going into a workout dehydrated and/or not replenishing fluids and electrolytes lost during exercise can cause great strain on your cardiovascular system. As dehydration reduces plasma volume, blood becomes thicker and retains more sodium. This makes blood harder to circulate through your body. To compensate, your heart beats faster, which increases heart rate and blood pressure. Central venous pressure decreases which reduces the amount of blood returning to the heart. Less blood entering the heart decreases the amount of blood leaving the heart. An increase in core temperature leads to an increased rate of glycogen breakdown (carbs stored in the muscles), which causes an intracellular increase in acids. As lactic acid is produced, pH decreases causing skeletal muscle fatigue. Dehydration may also increase levels of the stress hormone cortisol - which reduces testosterone levels and impacts muscle growth.

Keeping your body well-hydrated on a daily basis - as well as before/during/after exercise helps your heart pump blood more easily, protects your body from heat stress and allows oxygen to reach your muscles to help the muscles work efficiently.

To learn more about mastering or fine-tuning your hydration needs during exercise, check out my book Essential Sports Nutrition. Not only do I discuss how to best hydrate before, during and after workouts and races but I also provide many guidelines on how to best fuel your incredible body in motion in training and on event day. 

National Nutrition Month - Don't diet, personalize your plate.

 

It's National Nutrition Month!

The theme this year is Personalize Your Plate. 

We are all unique with different bodies, goals, fitness levels, backgrounds and tastes. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to nutrition and health.

When your diet is varied – without restriction – it’s much easier to meet energy needs and to supply your body with adequate vitamins, minerals and macronutrients to support your health and performance goals.

Eating should always remain a source of pleasure, not panic.
Eating should never be extreme or all-consuming.

Don't diet. Personalize your plate.

The fact that there are thousands of diets out there, promoting different tips and tricks, should be enough to tell you that no one diet works. The diet industry loves to profit from exploiting your expectations and insecurities as they damage your relationship with food.

No food is the enemy.

Every food serves a purpose – from nourishment and fuel to fulfilling hunger, making memories and celebrating. Any style of eating that promotes restrictive or extreme eating is the opposite of health-promoting . Give yourself freedom and flexibility with your food choices. While it’s ok to have a preferred style of eating, being spontaneous with your food choices during unique circumstances allows you to remain present and in the moment. This is especially true in sport. Deviating from a planned or preferred meal doesn’t make you a bad athlete.

Enjoying a pastry with your family at a local bakery or eating popcorn at the movies with your friends is not reflection of poor health, cheating on your diet or showing lack of self-control. It’s a normal part of being human. 

Trust your body around food - it is much smarter than you give it credit for.

How will you personalize your plate? 

Change your thoughts to change behaviors

What behavior (or habit) has the strongest negative impact on reaching an athletic goal?

What behavior has lead you into a vicious cycle of self-sabotage?

What habits have you struggled with the most?

What behavior, if changed, would give you the most leverage toward improving the odds of achieving your athletic goals?

Changing a behavior to reach a goal sounds simple but it actually requires a process of changing the way that you think. The idea that if you change your thoughts, you can change your behaviors sounds straightforward but many athletes go straight to behavior change and neglect working on the thoughts that influence actions. 

This is why I created The Whole Athlete. 

As you enter the New Year, the motivation may be high to change behaviors in order to move closer to your athletic goals. While you may have good intentions behind your behavior changes, it's not uncommon for good intentions to lead to bad outcomes. 

I want to remind you that your thoughts are controlled by your beliefs, which are usually ingrained in your subconscious mind. Interestingly, many beliefs are inherited from the beliefs of others - before you are able to form your own beliefs. This is why behavior change can be so hard. 

Many thoughts and beliefs are so deep-rooted that it can be extremely difficult to reprogram your mind. For example, being repeatedly told that carbohydrates are bad for you or that carbs make you gain weight can make it incredibly hard for you to meet your daily carbohydrate needs as an athlete. You may feel extreme guilt, shame or anxiety when consuming bread, rice or raisins - all because of the deep-rooted belief that carbs are bad. Perhaps it's something as small as not eating before a workout or not running with a hydration belt because you feel you don't need to - that you are just fine without. Sometimes you have to change your opinion to experience better results. 

These are only two examples (of many) to show how powerful thoughts can be as it relates to behavior changes. 

Hopefully you can now see how just one small shift in a belief can have an enormous impact on your life. 

Due to the cultural norms of "clean eating" and over-exercising, this sends a message to athletes that it's ok to eat and exercise in a certain way in order to look, feel and perform at your best. Unhealthy behaviors like restrictive eating, excessive exercise and intentional underfueling have become so normalized that behaviors that would qualify as disordered are often considered perfectly appropriate - reinforced by a culture that is obsessively fixated on food, eating and weight. A few of this normalized behaviors include: 

• Denial of hunger and use of tricks to avoid eating (such as drinking large amounts of water, detox drinks or coffee). 
• Refusal to eat certain foods (ex. bread), progressing to restrictions against whole categories of foods (ex. carbohydrates). 
• Anxiety about gaining weight or being "fat."
• Development of food rituals (ex. I can only eat this if I have exercised x-amount of duration or intensity). 
• Rigid exercise routines to burn off calories or to compensate for eating. 
• Withdrawal from friends and activities in favor of new social groups that share similar food and exercise rituals and rules. 
• Regular use of compensatory behaviors such as fasting to burn off calories. 
• Extreme concern with body weight and shape. 

If you have been victim to these beliefs, it's because you have become conditioned to perceive them as normal by professional athletes, the media, fitness influencers and diets. Because extreme eating and exercising strategies are normalized and reinforce behaviors and thought processes that aren't healthy, they can have very serious consequences on your mental and physical health.

You can't change your behaviors without changing your thoughts. Once you accept that your inaccurate beliefs are driving your actions, you can start the work of unlearning and changing self-sabotaging behaviors with more productive behaviors to enhance your performance, optimize your health and protect your well-being. 

Are you ready to change your thoughts to change your behaviors? 

Check out the FREE introduction of the The Whole Athlete course. 
If you found the content helpful and you want to learn more, you can pre-enroll now or register for the 6-lesson course when it opens on January 3rd, 20201. 

Introducing: The Whole Athlete 6-lesson course

 

Over the past few years, I've worked with over 250 athletes from all over the world on nutrition. From daily to sport nutrition and everything in between, I've learned that many athletes struggle with food and body image. Often at the root of having a poor body image and unhealthy relationship with food is the belief that "the lighter or leaner I am, the better I'll perform." 

Many athletes come to me with good intentions when wanting to change the way that they eat or look. As a Board Certified Sport Dietitian, I can confidently tell you that there are healthy ways to improve eating habits to optimize sport performance by changing body composition. But the methods for changing body composition - especially for a performance boost -  should never require dieting, restrictive eating, underfueling and excessive exercise. Sadly, this isn't the case. Far too many athletes are not eating enough to fuel their body for sport performance. Influencing factors for intentional underfueling and overexercising include diet culture, a societal obsession with health and pressure to achieve an "idealized" body composition for sport. Underfueling to try to achieve a competitive advantage in sport or to meet appearance standards for sport or society is not a healthy or sustainable way to achieve success in sport. And when there is a strong desire to "eat clean" to improve health, this can turn into food restriction and rigid dieting, often increasing the risk for binging, disordered eating or a full blown eating disorder. 

Interestingly, body image issues don't always have to do with body fat. Sometimes they have to do with "I'm not good enough" or wanting to gain control. It's not uncommon for people to start a diet after a period of stress, struggling to deal with emotions or feeling out of control. Using food and exercise as a way to avoid uncomfortable feelings of imperfection, instability or inadequacy can lead to devastating consequences as it relates to mental well-being and physical health. 

While the performance pressures that athletes experience will likely never go away, athletes now have another stressor in our life.....the constant stress of living during a pandemic. As if you aren't experiencing enough mental and physical stress from the lack of control you feel in the face of COVID-19, adding extreme exercise and restrictive eating to your life will only make matters worse for your physical health and mental well-being The fact that we live in a culture that is constantly pushing restrictive practices of dieting and exercising to improve "health" may drive you toward "normalized" disordered eating behaviors and destructive exercise routines in order to gain control during such an unpredictable time. This is even more concerning for athletes who already have a long-standing history with disordered eating or an eating disorder. Moments of stress like this time in our life require effective coping skills - not dieting and punishing the body through exercise. 

The New Year is always the time when athletes feel compelled to get serious about training and healthy eating. For the high-achieving perfectionist, there's an added risk of concern. 

Whereas I've spent the last decade trying to spread messages to the athletic population about the importance of developing a healthy relationship with food and the body, I am now even more concerned about the mental and physical health effects that will occur from dieting, restrictive eating and extreme exercise in the New Year. Widespread worry about weight gain and distress of losing fitness during this pandemic will be exacerbated by diet culture - a system that equates thinness to health and moral virtue and reduces food to "good" or "bad" food. 

I see it year after year after year - with motivation high, an athlete will resort to restrictive eating and dieting to retain control of the bodies and the situation. Athletes will often boast how great they feel on social media (often with before and after pictures) but results are typically short-lived. A period of food restriction almost always leads to overeating - making you feel out of control with food. This can make you impose more restrictions to regain control due to blame, shame and frustration. Exercise may become punishment or compensation. This vicious cycle of restriction and binging is damaging to physical and mental well-being. For the athletes who obsess over leanness, restrictive eating practices may further result in relative energy deficiency - a condition that affects physical health and performance, further increasing the risk of mental health symptoms and disorders. 

As an athlete, you put your body through enough stress and hardship through training. You need a better approach with food and exercise to foster better outcomes for your physical health, mental well-being and training. 

Realizing that something needed to be done to protect the whole athlete (not just the athletic being), I took action. After a lot of research, time and work, I created the first ever 6-lesson educational course to help athletes of all fitness levels (in all sports) develop a healthier relationship with food and the body. 

Although it will require some effort on your part, you can unlearn food rules. You can learn to improve your body image. You can bring back the joy in training. You can learn how to eat without shame, guilt or judgement. You can achieve a performance ready body without dieting. And most of all, you can discover your true capabilities as an athlete. 

The better you care about your body, the better you can take care of your body. 

Through The Whole Athlete 6-lesson course, you will unlearn toxic dieting behaviors and the distorted views that you've developed with food and your body. And most importantly, you will replace negative beliefs with practical ways of thinking so you can elevate your performance, optimize your health and protect your mental well-being. 

To learn more about the course and to try out the free introductory course, click HERE.

The 6-lesson course will officially open on January 3rd, 2021.
However, if you want to be one of the first to access the program, you can pre-enroll now. 

(If you are unable to pay the full price for the course, you can split the total payment into 3 payments when the course opens to the public on the 3rd).

What defines a healthy diet?

Food is fuel and nourishment. Your diet should include food that you enjoy. Eating should never cause anxiety, worry, guilt or frustration. Unfortunately, that isn’t always the case. Every individual comes to the table with a unique food history - which shouldn’t be ignored when creating a personal nutrition plan. For example, an athlete may understand the importance of nourishing the body with proper nutrition, but when having to negotiate a packed work schedule and the diet needs/likes/dislikes of your family and/or spouse, it may be difficult to make nutritious choices that help you meet your body composition and performance goals. And in our weight and image-obsessed culture, trying to match energy intake to energy output may be tricky if you have a complicated relationship with body image. But for you to remain in good health, the daily diet is key. This means taking the time to learn about the nutrients that your body needs to function properly, and having a practical game-plan of how to turn this knowledge into action.

Proper nutrition is essential for all bodies. Whether you exercise for 30-minutes a day a few days a week or train for 15+ hours a week, your diet is the only vehicle that delivers nutrients to your body. These nutrients are required to support your overall health, supply your body with essential nutrients, reduce risk for disease, maintain a healthy body composition and power you through your busy work day A nutritious diet that supports your daily activity level will keep your body functioning at its best.

Because not all calories are created equal, learn to see food differently. It's the composition of your diet that helps you meet your nutritional needs - not individual foods or macronutrients.

Don't neglect proper eating until a setback occurs. Through education and a smart action plan, you can optimize health, delay fatigue, change body composition in a healthy way and consistently improve athletic performance.

The three macronutrients – carbohydrates, protein and fat – are required in relatively large amounts. Carbohydrates, like fruit, bread, potatoes and vegetables, are used as an immediate source of energy or stored in your muscles (glycogen) as a quick fuel source during intense and long training sessions. The liver both stores and produces glucose (digested carbs) for your brain and to stabilize circulating blood sugar levels. Protein, such as chicken, fish, milk or tofu, is not a preferred energy source during exercise but when broken down into amino acids (building blocks of protein), your body can use this nutrient to maintain, build and repair tissues. Fat is a slow, but long-lasting, source of energy. Foods like olive oil, nut butter, seeds and avocado are needed to support cellular growth, protect organs and support your hormonal health. Fat is also important for hormonal health and to keep you satisfied. Plus, fat tastest good! Micronutrients, like iron, B12, calcium and magnesium, are equally as important but are consumed in much smaller quantities. Although specific nutrients play a beneficial role in your health and performance, it’s the synergy of nutrients that greatly affect your well-being, recovery, sleep, mood, body composition and fitness.

Healthy eating doesn’t have to be overly complicated. It’s not about strict rules, eliminating food groups, counting calories or depriving yourself of foods that you love to eat. Improving the nutritional quality of your diet doesn’t have to be all or nothing. You don’t have to be perfect and you don’t have to change everything all at once. Like your love of physical activity or sport, think of your diet as something that you want to stick with for the rest of your life. Make small changes to keep you satisfied, energized and fueled, without feeling deprived. Prioritize nutrient-dense, real food, packed with vitamins and minerals. When cutting back on nutrient empty foods like chips, candies or soda, don’t view these foods as “off limit” – this will only heighten cravings and make you feel like a failure if giving in to temptation. A healthy diet is supported with a nutritious foundation but includes "extra" foods for enjoyment. As with most things in life, don’t make healthy eating complicated. 

Optimize your diet

When it comes to sport success, diet is a big piece of the puzzle that many athletes fail to master (or appreciate). Creating a healthy diet to optimize sport performance is not as confusing as many people make it out to be. Although intense and prolonged training increases energy, carbohydrate and fluid needs, the essential nutritional needs of active individuals are very similar to sedentary people in order to help maintain a healthy weight, reduce risk for disease, improve physical and mental health and live a longer, healthier life. Despite the strong relationship between good nutrition habits and athletic success, many athletes overlook consistent nutrition habits in favor of training harder or longer. However, it’s only when you supply your body with optimal nutrition can you perform at optimal levels.

With many strong opinions on nutrition, it’s easy to fall victim to extreme dogmatic nutrition approaches. But the truth is that every human being responds differently to different foods, making it impossible to prescribe a ‘one size fits all’ diet plan. Nonetheless, the essential component to a healthy diet is very simple - prioritize minimally processed, whole foods. It's important to take the time to personalize your diet so it works for your health and fitness goals. Say good bye to food rules and dieting as you learn realistic, healthy and sustainable eating practices - tailored to work for you physically, psychologically, culturally, financially and socially.

• Create YOUR diet - If you really want a sustainable way of eating, plan your meals and snacks ahead of time. Healthy eating is best accomplished in this order: plan, shop, prepare, eat. When you know where your food is coming from and how much of it you will/want to eat, you will feel more control over your style of eating with less temptation to indulge.
• Emphasize real food - Almost every diet plan has one thing in common - eat.real.food. And to no coincidence, those who eat a mostly real food diet tend to have the best quality of life. Sadly, farmers have a quiet voice in a food industry overpowered by food companies. We live in an unhealthy nation that stresses healthy eating. Take a look inside your daily meal and snack choices to determine if you can make a few tweaks each day to move toward a more real food-based, locally sourced, and wholesome diet. 
• Create a positive food experience - Eating should not be a miserable, dissapointing and time-consuming experience. It is important to have a good relationship with food so that meal time is a njoyable and positive experience. Let your life stop for a brief moment when you eat. Make peace with food and as much as possible, eat at a table and not in the car/behind a computer/on the go. Be grateful for the food you get to it as it should not be taken for granted. 
• Make a lifestyle change - A healthy lifestyle is more than just what you eat (or choose not to eat). Embrace the many components that bring happiness and good health. A healthy lifestyle means managing stress, sleeping well, staying active, moving the body as much as possible, and reducing sedentary time. It’s important to surround yourself with positive people while always making room for “me time”. Create happiness by finding joy in a career choice, exploring nature, traveling and learning, and emphasizing a real food diet that offers flexibility rather than restriction. 

The Athlete's Diet

Every athlete has unique nutritional requirements dependent on the training program, body composition goals, genetics and fitness level. Therefore, there is no one best diet to follow. More so, your nutritional requirements, food choices and strategies will change throughout the year, depending on training volume and intensity.

But even during peak training when energy requirements are increased, your food choices should remain nutritious and health-promoting. Leaving your diet to chance or training to "earn" your food may result in nutrient poor food choices, lacking key nutrients. And a diet of restriction, sacrifice and obsession will lead to less-than-optimal energy availability.

Being well-nourished puts your body into a state of optimal functioning, helping you become a better athlete. The foundation of building a healthy sports diet is to consume a variety of nutrient-dense foods from all food groups. Your diet should not include an off-limit food list unless you suffer from a food allergy/intolerance or need to avoid certain foods for ethical, religious or health reasons.

One of the biggest nutritional challenges for athletes is figuring out how much energy is needed to support your training. On top of that, eating the right foods, timed appropriately with your workout, can help you get more out of your training session.

Although your daily training diet will help you adapt to training stress, the diverse nature of your structured training plan will likely validate the importance of consuming well-formulated sport nutrition products during certain workouts. Ideally, sport drinks, gels and energy blocks/chews are portable, convenient and easy-to-consume during swimming, biking and running, providing a specific amount of fluids, carbohydrates and sodium which can be easily digested and absorbed. Sport bars are typically reserved for long-duration, lower intensity training sessions.

Because many athletes complain of GI (gastrointestinal) issues as a primary limiter on race day, training your gut to tolerate nutrition while exercising can help you avoid unpleasant symptoms such as cramping, bloating, dizziness, nausea, extreme fatigue and a sloshing stomach.

If you would like to learn more about this topic, you'll enjoy my new book Athlete to Triathlete. You can pre-order your copy here: Athlete to Triathlete. 

The dangers of social media health advice

We live in an era where our quickest source of information comes from our finger tips. To help with this, professionals, experts, bloggers and influencers are eager to persuade you - their audience - by virtue of their outreach. With a large following, this builds credibility. Social media platforms are often used to deliver a message, promote a product or build a brand. As a result, trust is built and you can't help but be influenced by the advice of a stranger.  

While there are countless industries out there - like travel, lifestyle,  beauty, sport, fashion and photography - most people are persuaded to "follow" people who are in the nutrition/diet/wellness/fitness/health industry.

There's no denying that there is a lot hype and confusion in the media about the best diet, supplements and lifestyle strategies to achieve weight loss, change body composition, improve fitness/performance, enhance recovery and to combat aging. Far too often, this is all driven by the opportunity to make money and/or for popularity to be gained. Whether you want to admit it or not, in your naivety, you've probably been taken advantage of when it comes to 'buying' into someone's diet plan/program, supplemental line or promising claims.

It starts with the media amplifying every new diet and fitness trend out there - especially at the start of each New Year. Next comes internet "research." And then comes social media - dominated by followers, believers, celebrities and influencers.

We have a real problem on our hands. Inundated with messages reinforcing what's "good" vs. "bad", far too many people are struggling with serious mental and physical health issues after eliminating foods from the diet, exhibiting rigid behaviors around food or trying to replicate the sport nutrition strategies of another athlete. We all know an athlete who has suffered some type of endocrine, metabolic, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, immunological or psychological dysfunction as a result of manipulating the diet for health or performance gains.

With so much attention on health and wellness, food is a fixation for many yet people are more confused than ever before. With a desire to lose weight, change body composition and improve fitness, you may not even realize that you are "following" someone who is giving unhealthy or impractical nutrition advice.

Many social media influencers do not provide credible information. This doesn't mean that they don't mean well but just because a person has hundreds of thousands of followers, this doesn't mean that he/she is a credible source of diet/nutrition/health information.

The next time you come across an "expert" in any field ask yourself the following to ensure he/she is the right person to take advice from:

• What makes this person credible to provide nutrition advice? 
• Is this person transparent? 
• Is this person truthful with advice/information? 
• Is this person consistent with advice/information?
• Does this person give information that is nutritionally sound/evidence-based?
• Does this person have sufficient education, training, the right knowledge and time to provide realistic and practical information?
• Has this individual met scientifically and medically justified criteria to provide online advice?
• Is there bias in their nutrition advice because of other interests (money/sponsors)?
• Does this person provide prescriptive advice (food related allergies, weight loss or specific health/medical conditions) or general food related advice (ex. bananas have potassium).
• Does this person have a clear and comprehensive set of disclaimers assuming that all advice and plans/programs are undertaken at your own risk?

For any individual who provides information, consults or counsels in the fields of health and wellness, there are legal and ethical limitations regarding nutrition advice. For example, in many states, it is unlawful to engage in nutrition counseling unless you are a licensed dietitian. It's the responsibility of every individual (you and the expert) to know the difference between general nutrition information about food vs. prescriptive advice and who can legally diagnose/treat/care for your health and well-being. 

It's wonderful to follow someone who is passionate about a certain topic or has built a platform around a personal journey. But when it comes to being influenced about your health, fitness and nutrition-related decisions, remind yourself that not every person is the expert that he/she appears (or claims) to be.

Nutrition during an injury

Whether you are a highly-trained athlete or a fitness enthusiast, there’s always a risk for injury. While some injures are minor, such as a bruise or inflammation, others are much more debilitating such as a tear, broken bone, impingement, stress fracture or ruptured tendon.

To avoid a decline in muscle strength, neuromuscular control and overall fitness, nutrition is vital in the healing and rehab process. Sometimes, with the right therapy, re-training program and dietary habits, athletes come back stronger and faster after an injury. Because the body has altered nutrient and energy needs during an injury, the following recommendations will help expedite return to sport:

• Protein - While the precise amount varies, be sure to keep up with your protein intake (ex. 1.5-1.8g/kg/d) – especially after exercise/rehab – to maintain strength and muscle mass.
• Carbohydrate – Slightly lower carbohydrate intake to prevent excessive weight gain and prioritize higher-fiber, satiating foods such as whole grains, fruits and veggies. 
• Fats –Prioritize plant and fish oils and be mindful of portions to decrease inflammation.
• Vitamins and minerals – Calcium, Zinc, vitamin D, vitamin C and A will help with wound healing, immune function, tissue repair and cell growth. Consume three servings of dairy (or fortified calcium + vitamin D rich foods) a day for bone health. 
• Hydration – to help delivery nutrients and support your joints and soft tissues, stay well hydrated with 90-120 ounce fluids per day.
• Plan ahead - By having meals prepared in advanced, you can feel confident about meeting your daily nutritional needs to ensure that you are getting enough of the right nutrients, at the right times, to keep your immune system healthy as you recover from injury.

Fear of gaining fat – Many athletes feel they don’t deserve to eat calories or carbs when not expending calories. However, your body still requires energy, carbs and nutrients – even at rest. And if you have surgery, your daily energy needs may increase by 10-20%. Give yourself the building blocks it needs to promote proper healing instead of dieting. Use this time to work on your lifestyle choices, develop a passion for cooking and create new meal planning strategies. For most athletes, a 5-7 lb weight gain is nothing to be concerned as you are likely used to a different body composition that results from structured and intense training. Learning how to love your body in different shapes and sizes is an important part of self-care.

Coach vs. the Dieting Athlete

In many sports, it is considered beneficial to achieve a leaner body composition for locomotive efficiency — in other words, the less you weigh, the easier it is to move your body. Within the sport of triathlon, triathletes are not immune to this mindset and will often manipulate the diet in order to achieve a lower body fat percentage. Although there are safe and healthy ways to change body composition, triathletes can be very rigid and inflexible with their thoughts and actions. When a driven, perfectionistic, competitive, achievement-oriented triathlete is constantly exposed to diet discussions, advertisements, articles, endorsements and images on social media, a general interest in weight loss may manifest into an unhealthy obsession.

With so many ways to enhance performance and to optimize health, two of the most popular sought-after strategies by athletes include diet and body composition changes. When done correctly, performance may improve. However, it’s not uncommon for athletes to engage in unhealthy weight control methods, resulting in great emotional and physical consequences. Whether for aesthetics, competitive leanness, body dissatisfaction or in pursuit of an ideal “race weight,” athletes often place unrealistic expectations on performance and their bodies. What may start as an innocent attempt to lean-up or to lose a few pounds, can easily spiral out of control, undermining health, training, recovery, performance and mental well-being.

Earlier this year, I was asked to contribute an article to the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter - an educational newsletter provided to all USA Triathlon coaches. For the month of June, the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter was dedicated to nutrition. As we all know, for optimal performance, nutrition is just as important as training. For triathlon coaches, it is important that you are familiar with nutrition guidelines and recommendations as well as understanding how to effectively speak to your athletes about nutrition and body image.

If you are a coach, you have a responsibility to take care of your athlete - physically, emotionally and mentally.

When your athlete feels pressure to achieve a leaner body composition, an increased fascination with nutrition, body fat, weight and calories can develop into an unhealthy group of eating behaviors called disordered eating. Typical disordered eating behaviors include obsessive counting calories, clean eating, carrying out food rituals, fasting, avoiding sport nutrition products, having an off-limit food list, or avoiding certain foods or food groups for non-medical reasons.

If you are concerned that your athlete may have an unhealthy relationship with food and the body, start the conversation with a non-judgmental tone in order to make your athlete feel safe and cared about. Making it clear that you care about your athlete’s health and well-being, you may say, “I’m worried about you because I’ve noticed that you are struggling to complete your workouts lately.” You may also say, “you’ve been experiencing a lot of injuries/sicknesses lately. It may be best to consult with a professional to make sure you can adapt to your upcoming training load.”

The most common precipitating factor in the development of an eating disorder is dieting. What starts as a well-intentioned diet plan, slowly transforms into skipping meals, undereating, removing specific foods or entire food groups from the diet and sacrificing calories before and after workouts. An eating disorder is a serious psychiatric condition that affects all types of individuals. Eating disorders are complex and multifactorial. Interestingly, athletes are at higher risk for an eating disorder compared to the rest of the population. A disciplined, goal-oriented athlete can be guilty of chasing perfectionism. Feeling great pressure to succeed, restricting food can become an easy way to exert control. Constantly pushing the body to the limits, athletes don’t realize how much food and fluids are needed for training. Lastly, many athletes believe that leanness is an essential factor in improving performance. With these realities in mind, it’s not difficult to understand why so many athletes suffer from eating disorders and disordered eating behaviors.

With several different genetic and socio-cultural triggers, risk factors for an eating disorder include dieting, need for control, weight stigma, body dissatisfaction, perfectionism, anxiety, biochemical imbalances, traumatic life events, behavior inflexibility, nutrition misinformation, low self-esteem, and being teased or bullied. With a strong stigma behind eating disorders, it’s important to show support to those who are struggling and to emphasize that help is available.

As a coach, routinely remind your athletes that optimizing performance should not require excessive training and restrictive eating. Resorting to destructive methods of manipulating body composition will only sabotage performance and health.

Pay attention to any warning signs that your athlete may be eating too little and training too hard. Fatigue, anemia, compromised bone health, hormonal imbalances, hair loss, notable weight loss, lack of energy, a decline in muscle mass and strength, mood changes, amenorrhea, restless sleep, and overuse injuries are common signs of an energy imbalance. Inadequate caloric intake relative to energy expenditure (RED-S) will result in extra stress on the body – increasing the risk for injury, sickness and burnout. 

Encourage athletes to maintain healthy training and eating behaviors that will favor long-term health and longevity in sport. It’s encouraged to partner with a Board Certified Sport Dietitian to provide effective, safe and personalized nutrition advice to athletes. If you are concerned about an athlete’s weight or health, a Board Certified Sport Dietitian can counsel athletes who are struggling with the physical and emotional consequences of dieting.

As a coach, how much emphasis do you place on body image? Do you often talk about weight loss, body fat or dietary trends to your athletes? Body composition is a sensitive and personal issue yet far too many coaches share an overvalued belief with their athletes that a lower body weight will improve performance. Inadvertently, you may be placing your own values and attitudes regarding weight, dieting and body image on your athletes. As a coach, you should never assume that reducing body fat or weight will enhance the performance of your athlete. Every athlete has his/her own optimum performance weight where the body functions the best and this body type is achieved through consistent training, nutritious eating and proper fueling and hydration. Acknowledge an athlete’s strengths beyond the physical, for athletes are more than just a look. Making remarks about body composition and performance can trigger or exacerbate disordered eating thoughts and behaviors. Don’t be the coach who makes stereotypical assumptions about the ideal body type for athletic greatness.

As a coach, use your power and authority. In today’s fad-diet, body image obsessed society, it can be difficult for athletes to keep a healthy perspective on body image. Help your athlete understand the importance of maintaining a healthy body composition – even if that image doesn’t look like the idealized image seen on social media. Protect the physical and psychological well-being of your athletes by discouraging dieting and enforcing health and performance-promoting eating habits.

Extreme nutrition habits are extremely trendy while discussions of health are lacking. Be a role model and encourage your athletes to care for their mental and physical health. Eating is not cheating. Meeting daily nutritional needs and supporting training sessions with proper sport nutrition is a necessary component of athletic success, and it keeps sport fun and health-promoting.

My article can be found in the 2019 June issue of the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter.

IM 70.3 Chattanooga - gear and nutrition recap

Marni Race Day Nutrition 

Pre Race Nutrition (race day)

-2 waffles, peanut butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, cinnamon
-Cup of coffee (Nescafe Gold Instant)
-Small glass of water
-Small glass of water w/ 1 scoop Osmo pre-load for women

-In the 90 minutes before the race - 16.9 ounce plastic water bottle filled with 2 scoops NBS Carbo Hydration (100 calories/25g carbs/300mg sodium)
-~15-20 min before race start - 3 Skratch Rasberry chews

Bike: -Front bottle cage - 26 ounce bottle w/ 6 scoops NBS Carbo Hydration Strawberry Lemonade (240 calories/60g carbs/720 mg sodium).
-1.2 Liter (40 ounce) Ventum hydration system - 4 scoops INFINIT custom nutrition (pink lemonade flavor) mixed with water in a bottle, then poured into hydration system (total: 500 calories/122g carbs/1012mg sodium)
-Rear bottle - 26 ounce bottle w/ 2 scoops INFINIT custom nutrition (grape flavored) (250 calories/62g carbs/506mg sodium) - only consumed a few sips, used as back-up fuel/hydration.
-Bag of Skratch chews in bento box (opened in advance) - not consumed, used as back-up fuel.

-Water at aid station 2 and 3 for cooling (and a few sips)

Run: -Naked Running belt (size 3)
-2 x 10 ounce flasks - each with 1 scoop Carborocket Hydration Raspberry Lemonade (108 calories/27g carbs/331 mg sodium per flask)
-Sip of coke at mile 9 (not planned, just on impulse)
-Water at each aid station for cooling/sipping

Karel Race day nutrition

Pre Race Nutrition (race day)

-Quaker overnight oats (mixed in the morning), 2/3rd Rasberries and lemon bar.
-Espresso from Nespresso machine (brought from home)
-Glass of water with 3/4 scoop NBS pre load

-In the 90 minutes before the race - Water bottle filled with 2 scoops NBS Carbo Hydration (100 calories/25g carbs/300mg sodium)
-~15-20 min before race start - -Nutrend Magneslife strong

Bike: -Front bottle cage - 26 ounce bottle w/ 6 scoops NBS Carbo Hydration (240 calories/60g carbs/720 mg sodium).
-1.4 Liter (47 ounce) Ventum hydration system - 12 scoops NBS Carbo Hydration mixed with water in a bottle, then poured into hydration system (total: 480 calories/120g carbs/1440mg sodium)

-SIS Electrolyte Gel - consumed in last 30 minutes of the bike (87 calories/22g carbs/300mg sodium)

Run: 
-2 x 10 ounce flasks (stored in kit pockets) - each with 1 packet Skratch (80 calories/21g carbs/380mg sodium per flask)
-1 Enervit sport gel

-Water as needed for cooling/sipping 

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MARNI GEAR

Swim
-PR lotion (applied before arriving to race venue)
-Castelli San Remo one-piece Trimarni kit

-Lulu sport bra

-R2 Compress Sport Calf Sleeves

-TYR 2.0 Special ops clear goggles

-ROKA Maverick X wetsuit

BIKE

-Ventum One
-Alto cc56 front wheel (tubeless)
-Lightweight autobahn tubeless disc
-Bontrager Velocis Women road shoes
-Giro Air attack helmet with shield
-Socks: Compressport pro racing ultra light
-Garmin Edge 500

RUN

-Nike 4% running shoes
-Garmin 235 watch
-Garmin HR monitor
-Roka custom sunglasses (SL-1 series)

-Trimarni BOCO visor 

-Perfect Fitness Perfect cooling towel

-Naked Running Band (size 3)

KAREL GEAR

Swim
-PR lotion (applied before putting on wetsuit)
-Castelli San Remo one-piece Trimarni kit

-Michael Phelps Xceed goggles

-ROKA Maverick X wetsuit
-Garmin 735 XT

BIKE

-Ventum One w/ custom Kcycle paint job

-51 Speedshop mono bars with FSM extensions
-Shimano Dura Ace Di2 groupset
-Dash Strike Custom Saddle/Post combo
-4iiii powermeter
-Front Alto CT 56
-Rear ALTO CT 311 Disc

-Continental Force 24mm tubular tires
-Giro Aerohead
-LG Tri Air Lite shoes 

-Garmin Edge 820-Scosche Rhythm 24 HR monitor

RUN

-Nike 4% running shoes (1st generation)
-Garmin 735 XT
-Roka custom sunglasses (SL-1 series)

-Trimarni BOCO trucker running hat

-Socks: Compressport pro racing ultra light 

Appreciate your body image

We all come in different sizes and shapes based on our unique genetic make-up. However, it’s common to turn to exercise to change the way that you look. Some athletes may desire a body composition change to help improve endurance, speed, strength, power and agility. Others may want to improve health. While health and performance may be of interest, athletes are often heavily invested in appearance - wanting to look leaner or more like the idealized image of an athlete in their sport. Keeping in mind that athletic success cannot be predicted based solely on body weight and composition, athletes come in vastly different body compositions. Because no two athletes are alike and sports invite athletes of all different sizes and builds, your body weight should not be your sole focus for sport enjoyment. 

Due to pressure from society and coaches, it’s not uncommon for many athletes to have body image struggles, despite not being overweight or over fat. In turn, many athletes resort to unsafe weight loss methods and strategies when feeling "too fat."

It’s not uncommon for athletes to significantly limit caloric intake, believing that a body that weighs less will lead to athletic success. Harmful or obsessive eating behaviors are often used in attempt to achieve a lower than normal body weight or in pursuit of an extremely healthy diet. Examples include rigid or righteous eating, fasting, anxiety, control or preoccupation with certain foods, food rituals, extreme concern with body size and elimination of food groups. 

Unfortunately, comments made by coaches, body shaming, fat talk, attributing poor performances on weight, and regular weighing intensify body image concerns, leading to disordered eating behaviors. Because many athletes are given a socially acceptable setting to justify excessive exercise and strict eating habits, it’s not uncommon for the performances by an energy starved athlete to be celebrated by coaches and on social media. Bear in mind that any initial performance improvement occurring from unhealthy weight loss is typically short-lived as nutrient deficiencies, fatigue, anemia, reduced cardio function, chronic illnesses or injuries and low motivation will eventually impair physical and mental health. 

If you are struggling with body image problems or fear gaining fat/weight, remind yourself that sport participation should improve the health of your body – not destroy it.  

As you learn to love your body image, I wanted to share this quote passed along to me by one of my athletes. 

Swim training - to fuel or not to fuel?

During our 3.5 day train-cation in Clermont, Florida we were spoiled by swimming in NTC pool - perfect water temp, lots of open swim lanes, surrounded by swimmers/triathletes and most importantly, swimming outside! Because the pool is my happy place, I was super happy to see so much swimming on my training plan. In four swims (over 5 days), I completed 17,600 yards of following the black line and I never stopped smiling.

Two of our workouts went by extremely fast, even though they were 4000+ yards. Not always do Karel and I have the same swim workouts (or on the same days) but for camp we swam the same sets but had different cycles for the main set. Here were my two favorite swim sessions from camp:

Tuesday (4000 yards)
WU: 800 choice

Pre-set:
100 drill

3 x 50's (kick/swim)
2 x 75's open turns
100 choice
4 x 25's build

3 x 50's head up free
2 x 75's kick/swim/kick
100 choice

MS: All with paddles
18 x 100's as:
#1: on 1:20 (cycle)
#2: 1:30
#3-4: 1:20
#5: 1:30

#6-8: 1:20

#9: 1:30
#10-13: 1:20
#14: 1:30
#15-18: 1:25

CD as needed

Wednesday (5000 yards)
WU: 600 w/ buoy

MS:
9 x 100's on 1:30 @80% effort
4 x 200's w/ paddles on 2:50
7 x 100's on 1:30 @90% effort
400 w/ buoy
5 x 100's swim on 1:30 @95% effort
2 x 200's w/ paddles on 2:50

3 x 100's swim on 1:30 @best effort
200 buoy

Post set:
200 EZ

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Many triathletes and swimmers feel that fueling/hydrating during a workout isn't necessary for if you can't do it during a race/meet, why do it in training? The point of training is to change your physiology in order to maximize your athletic performance/fitness while also preparing for the race day demands. With this, it's critically important to stay consistent (and healthy), so we often do things in training that we don't do in races in order to help build strength, endurance and speed, while also improving skills and technique. Sport nutrition and nutrient timing are two important ways to help the adaption response to training. 

When I swam in High School and in College, I would rarely sip on water on deck when I swam. There were mornings when I would swim a long workout on an empty stomach and I never had a precise fueling strategy for a swim meet. While I did OK during this time in my life, I wish I knew then what I knew now, as I feel I could have adapted a lot better to swim training, while also reducing my frequent issues with muscle soreness in my back, while also feeling rundown and exhausted. 

Although my swim workouts are not as long (or intense) as when I swam in college, I still typically swim 4-5 times per week an around 60-75 minutes per swim. Although I don't consider them as exhausting as some of my run and bike sessions, I still make the effort to always eat before my workouts and use sport nutrition during my workouts. Rather than going into the specifics of how to fuel for swim training sessions (you can find detailed info about fueling your workouts in my book Essential Sports Nutrition), I'd like to share a bit about the physiology of swimming and how proper fueling can help you better adapt to your swim training, especially if you are triathlete. 

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Swimming is a strength, technical and endurance sport. In addition to the difficulty of dealing with your displaced body in water, there's a lot of resistance (or drag) when you swim. As you push against water to move forward, water pushes back to slow you down. A huge part of swim training is optimizing technique in order to forcefully thrust (or propel) yourself forward while reducing drag and optimizing buoyancy and alignment. Although technique work is important, it's only in the face of fatigue that good technique will give you a big performance boost. If your form falls apart when you get tired, your propulsive force will greatly decline and you'll become more inefficient and exhausted. Thus, an overvalued component of swimming (especially for triathletes) is being strong in the water. Simply swimming back and forth, for x-yards, is an ineffective use of your time as it relates to making significant performance improvements. You must train your different energy systems (swimming at different speeds), while keeping great technique.

Although swimming may be exhausting to many and easy for some, it should still be viewed as a strength-endurance sport. This means your training should include a mix of high-intensity efforts (to tap into the phosphagen system and anaerobic glycolysis) and endurance or lower-intensity training to improve efficacy of swimming technique while improving your aerobic pathway (VO2 max, max oxygen consumption).

Understanding the physiological demands of swim training (and outcome goals for each session) is important because as it relates to sport nutrition, you'll quickly realize that with swimming, glycogen stores in the muscles can easily become depleted. This will compromises your ability to keep good technique under fatigue and will affect your propulsive strength capacities. Consequently, this decreases the training adaption that you could be making through your swim training. Sure, you are checking off the workout but it doesn't count if you aren't making significant performance gains. By understanding the demands of your sport, you can better identify the factors that will affect your ability to adapt. Certainly nutritional strategies can help optimize your swimming performance. 

While any athlete can "get by" for a workout or two in an energy deficit state, long-term periods of being in a poor energy balance can affect hormones, metabolism, strength and power, while increasing the risk of injury, burn out and sickness. Beginning a training session with low carbohydrate availability (especially if you trained the night before an early morning workout or you are restricting carbohydrates in your diet), can increase metabolic stress during your swim workout. Again, yes you may be able to complete the workout, but without proper fueling, the stress response increases. It's also worth mentioning that when engaging in high intensity training sessions, adequate carbohydrate intake/stores can improve the health of the immune system - meaning less risk for sickness. Lastly, even though you may not feel it, you still have hydration needs while swimming. The higher the water temperature (or the warmer you feel in the water), the higher your sweat rate. Starting your sessions well hydrated and hydrating throughout your training session (often with a sport drink containing carbohydrate and sodium) can help optimizing hydration while maintaining blood glucose levels. Because most triathletes are not overly fond of swim training, a significant drop in blood glucose can turn your mood sour and raise RPE - making it easy to cut your workout short (or dislike swimming all together). 

Getting your nutrition right is key for athletic success. Don't compromise your performance and health by being extremely dedicated to your training plan and apathetic to your diet and fueling regime. 

7 triathlon nutrition myths and misconceptions

Within every sport, there are "must try" nutrition strategies for athletic success. While some are effective, most are extreme, unhealthy, unrealistic and unsuccessful.

In the sport of triathlon, combining three sports together can be challenging. The longer the distance, it becomes more difficult to master the art of fueling to delay fatigue and optimize hydration while minimizing GI issues. There's also the mindset that a lean body will outperform a body that is "overfat" because less is best when it comes to body weight. Sadly, more and more athletes are using extreme endurance training in an effort to achieve a certain body image over attempting to improve performance. Therefore, triathletes will often gravitate toward any style of eating that provides food control and helps take away the guessing of what to (and not to) eat in order to improve the odds of race day success.

To help with the dietary confusion and to ensure that your health isn't compromised in route to your upcoming event, Carrie Barrett reached out to me to hear my input on a few common nutrition myths and misconceptions in the sport of triathlon. Because these nutrition myths are found in many sports, all athletes and fitness enthusiasts should take the time to read this great article that Carrie put together. 

7 triathlon nutrition myths and misconceptions

3 effective off-season nutrition strategies

The off-season is not the time to be focused on your race weight nor is it the time to look for a diet plan as a restrictive and controlling eating method to assist in weight loss.

The off-season provides the best opportunity for you to learn how to create a foundation diet.
And for many athletes, a prime opportunity to learn how to plan a healthy diet.

By adopting a healthier method of eating in the off-season, you will likely find yourself in better health throughout your more specific phases of training.

Ultimately, be creating a style of eating that helps you maintain a healthy weight (every athlete is different), while staying in great health in the off-season, you will be more inclined to maintain your realistic and balanced eating strategies when your training volume and intensity increase.
Which, as you know, when training volume and intensity increase, healthy eating habits often get thrown out the window because of lack of energy and time.
Yep, every athlete has been there!
Cereal is a meal, right?

Even during the holiday season, you can still eat well and move closer to your health goals.

Spend the next few weeks working on my three sensible off-season nutrition strategies to help you create a style of eating that is sustainable and realistic.

To start off, it's time to develop a healthy relationship with food.

 I hope you find these off-season nutrition tips valuable, as they create the foundation of healthy eating which every athlete needs before advancing with training volume and intensity.

1) Develop a healthy relationship with food

This goes without saying but a great relationship with food paves the way to great eating habits.
With a healthy relationship with food, you can create a style of eating that works for you. There are no bad foods or off limit food lists, no obsession with calories, gluten or carbs or any other food that has been previously labeled "unhealthy."
Instead, you appreciate the nutritional value found in food.
Diet plans are effective because they tell you what not to eat.
But, they are not sustainable and that is why they are not long-lasting after the initial weight goal is reached.
Because there is a clear difference between feeling passionate about what you put into your body and dangerously obsessing over every calorie you eat, it’s important that you see the off-season as the perfect time to get a handle on your definition of “healthy eating” when you are not expending a ridiculous amount of energy.
For those who fall into the later category of being hyper-obsessed with food, healthy eating should include indulgences and there's no better time to practice responsible, feel-good indulging than around the holiday season.

Plus, eating healthy is much easier to accomplish when you have extra time in your day to spend in the kitchen, when you are not swimming, biking or running.

Here are a few tips on how you can improve your relationship with food.

1) Learn to eat mindfully. Pay attention to your hunger and satisfaction cues. Honor you biological hunger and recognize when you eat out of boredom, emotions or stress. Work on your eating-related decisions, specifically at meal time, snack time and in the evening.

2) Improve your eating experiences. No food should be forbidden or scary unless it is for a medical reason. You should always feel better after you eat than before. Learn to become a better planner and eat with the purpose of nourishment. Indulge responsibly and on occasion (seriously, it's healthy to indulge!).

3) Eat at the right times. When your workout volume is low, you don’t have to worry about eating a lot before workouts or reloading yourself post workout. But at the same time, if you find yourself in a cycle of under eating around workouts, and then overeating (or rewarding yourself with food), something is not right with your meal/snack timing and macro nutrient distribution.  To start, try to eat at similar meal compositions at similar times each day and plan snacks before and after all of your workouts. As you listen to your body, you can make small tweaks, as needed, based on your hunger/satisfaction/energy cues.

4) Remove trigger foods from your house. In the early stages of improving your relationship with food, it’s important to remove temping foods from your house or work environment. When you really need that special food, plan a special occasion around eating it and be sure to yum! The ultimate goal of improving your relationship with food is to learn how to eat mindfully. There will be a time in your life when you can have/be around previous tempting foods and not feel the urge to eat those foods. This will be life changing but first, you must create a healthy relationship with food.

5) Give yourself permission to eat. Stop your day and slowly enjoy a meal. Smell, taste and enjoy your food. Every meal should be worth stopping for. Proper meal eating habits are critical for athletes. If you don't learn how to plan and eat your meals, you may be sabotaging your workouts due to lack of energy/nutrients or feeling too full/hungry around workouts.

6) Don’t work out to eat or to indulge. Restriction may lead to overeating/binge eating. Don't reward yourself with food. If you want to eat a cookie, eat a cookie. You don't have to workout for 5 hours to deserve to eat something.

7) Don’t let food control your life. Avoid being too rigid, restrictive or strict about “healthy” eating. Nothing bad will happen if you eat the occasional sweet treat or eat an extra portion of a dish that makes your tummy feel great inside.

For further reading, here are three of my most popular articles on the topic that I am so very passionate about as it relates to helping athletes improve their health and performance.
Having a healthy relationship with food and the body is the key that unlocks great performances!

Develop a healthy relationship with food

How healthy is your relationship with food?

The off-season weight debate

If you want to take the next step to improve your relationship with food and the body or nail your off-season nutrition, let's work together so that you can have a professional nutrition guide in your individual journey. I'll help you take away the guessing so that you can feel more confident in your daily diet and food choices.
Trimarni nutrition services

Trust your eating plan

Far too many times, athletes who want results will try to rush the process of gaining fitness. 

This is not far from the truth when it comes any individual who is seeking a positive (and healthy) change in the body composition. 

As I think about individuals who jump from one diet plan to another looking for the magic fix, there is a tendency to think that one plan will solve everything - health issues, bloating, gas, inflammation, overeating, cravings, etc. Most magazines, diet plans and health-focused commercials want you to believe that you need fixing - you are broken, failing or desperate for change. 

Thus, by changing this, eating that and eliminating these foods, you will feel better, be better and look better.

Often times, athletes get wrapped-up into this diet-mentality thinking and stop seeing food for fuel but instead, see food as good/bad for weight loss. Despite the massive amount of calories we burn each day/week through structured training, athletes are being brainwashed to believe that the same diet plan that is marketed toward someone who is in need of a healthier or more active lifestyle, will work for our extremely active lifestyle. 

Well guess what. 

Lean people still get bloated and have gas.

Toned and fit individuals still get inflammation and feel sore after workouts.

A low body fat percentage does not make you immune to disease, sickness or injury.

And lastly, regardless how much you weigh or how much body fat you have, if you have a body and have crossed a finish line, no one can take your athlete title away from you. 

Everyone has an off-day. 

We all have a day when the body just feels blah or clothes feel a little tighter than the day before. But guess what, your personality and great characteristics do not change just because you feel a little different in your skin. You are still a hard-working, passionate, go-getting, loving type of person.

 You are not defined by what size clothes you wear, how little jiggle is in your wiggle and certainly, the scale is not designed to run or ruin your day. So if you can carry-on with your day despite feeling a little off one day, you may find that your individual eating plan is perfect just for you because no matter what plan you think you need to follow, everyone has an off-day. 

You wouldn't stop working out just because you feel tired during one workout, would you?

How many times have you felt blah before a workout but made yourself carry-on and ended up feeling great afterward?

Come to terms that you have to trust your plan, your journey, your path of improvement when you want to make a change for the better. 

Changing your nutrition habits is all about discovering what works best for you. A sensible plan is not a cleanse, fast or detox and it does not (absolutely does not) involve eliminating major food groups. Don't ever let someone tell you that you one food or food group is off-limit, bad or poison. 

Trust a plan that will provide you with realistic changes. A good eating plan will help you see food differently. See the good in food and how it enhance your life. 

Your eating plan should enhance your quality of life. If you don't feel good inside with your diet or you feel controlled by food (or food restriction), your plan is not designed for you. 

Recognize that when you follow a plan - whether it is designed just for you or a mass-marketed plan - you are going to have to make some changes. And with these changes, you are also going to experience several mind games in your journey. 

Doubt, fear, worry, second-guessing, comparison.

But with no deadline in place in your eating plan, you must learn to quite those thoughts. Just like a new training plan, if you don't trust your plan, you will never trust that the hard work you are putting in will pay off. 

And with eating, don't let one experience, one day, one occasion force you to think that your plan is not working. You must give it time and not always will it feel easy and comfortable at the beginning. 

Most people deviate from a nutrition plan when they are vulnerable to their body or life feels out of balance. 

This can go both ways. 

Someone who has been restricting food for a while and/or overexercising to control body composition or food choices may feel extreme anxiety over what may happen when eating habits change and exercise volume is decreased. Despite the necessity to put on weight and change the exercise or eating regime in order to improve health and/or performance, there are thoughts as to how uncomfortable it may feel to experience a change in the body or diet. 

And the other end of the spectrum. 

If you feel a little bloated one day or look in the mirror (or comparing to someone else) and feel that the body is not changing fast enough to drop weight, you may lose faith in the plan and decide it's just not worth continuing. 

Diet plans make you believe that you can't figure out your own style of eating on your own. 

If you have an unhealthy relationship with food and your body, you may find comfort in having a good/bad food list (whether you created it on your own or per a book/website). 

Whereas there may be some good in your eating plan, you should be putting your energy into developing a healthy relationship with food and that means trusting your own plan of mindful eating and fueling your active body. 

Do's and don'ts and many non-negotiable's. 

These are key components of diet plans or disordered eating habits. 

Absolutely do not eat this, avoid that and don't even think about that. Or else.

This all or nothing mentality can wear heavily on your mind and body and it is not a plan that you want to put all your trust into. 

Discover food freedom in your eating plan. Learn to fall in love with the process and trust your eating plan that works for you and your lifestyle. 

Positive results are in your near future, just don't give up. 

And for all you athletes reading this post, weight loss (or reaching your "racing weight")  may change your body composition and it may make you more efficient so you feel lighter when you run and bike as you will be carrying less body weight.

But weight loss doesn't bring on significant training adaptations. Losing weight through food restriction or over-exercising with an undernourished/under-fueled body, doesn't make you more powerful, faster or stronger and it certainly does not improve your endurance and lactate threshold nor does it create a positive relationship with food and the body. 

If you want training adaptations and a strong and fit body, you have to work for what you want and the only want you can get to where you want to be is following a well-designed plan with your well-fueled body. 

Athletes and fitness enthusiasts: a few good reads

I remember this day like it was yesterday. 2006 Ironman Florida.

Months and months of training were put to good use when I crossed my first Ironman finishing line in PCB Florida. What an exciting day...a day that I will never forget. Everyone thought I was crazy for "racing" 140.6 miles but my 24 year-old mind and body fell in love with endurance triathlons and since then, I still continue to find myself  looking forward to another IM journey.

I've been a bit busy with work at the hospital, my business and training...oh, and of course, cooking and snuggling with Campy. Luckily, I get to spend many "dates" with my hubby these days as we are swimming, biking and (not at the same speed) running together on a daily basis. We get to share the highs and lows of Ironman training together and I have really enjoyed every moment (the good and the lessons learned) since signing up for IM Lake Placid last July.

(2006 Ironman Florida - Karel and I were dating. He made me this sign...you will see a few important references such as a burger from McDonald's to make me laugh, animals to make me smile and a sign pointing to Kona to keep me focused at my first Ironman). 

Here are a few articles that I have been quoted in as well as a few helpful articles that I wrote for all the athletes and fitness enthusiasts out there who are working toward individual health, fitness, diet and body composition goals. 

Eat your way to a PR

Nutrition rules of endurance athletes

Eat for performance, not reward

What to do when you have eaten too much

Build a better body image

Fueling Kona: your daily plate

Eating with a purpose

The inside scoop on sport nutrition

Move out of your comfort zone
Hydrate yourself for summer training

Mediterranean eating - it's not about off-limit food

A big thanks to the Today Show for sharing the recent significant research on adopting a more plant strong diet! I really like that the focus was on addressing what "we" should be eating more of rather than talking about bad or off-limit foods. This makes it easier to change eating habits without feeling like you are sticking to a food-controlled diet. Hopefully there will be a follow-up study on adopting a more Mediterranean lifestyle which includes finding the right balance between work, sleep, exercise, food and friends/family. It’s about slowing down at meal times, not rushing life, staying active (moving the body) and enjoying it all through fresh, wholesome foods, enjoyed with family and friends.


Today show segment

For dinner last night I took use of a few spices in my kitchen. This is just a few of the many herbs and spices that I use with my meals - from morning to night. If you aren't adding herbs and spices to your daily diet, watch this video and you will be convinced.
I had the pleasure of listening to Dr. Greger speak at the 2012 Florida Dietetic Association conference and I was blown away by his knowledge and passion for whole foods. 

I hope you enjoy my plant-strong creation that was enjoyed by Karel and myself last night. We both YUMMMMM'd our way through dinner as it was packed with flavor!

Best part about this creation....you don't have to "cook". Allow 10 minutes of prep and 45-50 minutes of cooking (use your time by catching up on emails, laundry or stretch your tight hip flexors) and you will have a delicious dinner that is perfect to keep your heart and tummy happy.

Feel free to use your own choice of protein.

Tempeh
Asparagus
Fresh garlic (chopped)
Lentil and bean mix
Cauliflower
Wild rice
Olive oil
Tumeric, red pepper flakes, garlic powder, onion flakes, pepper

1. On stove top, cook lentil and bean mix according to package (allow around an hour for this). I used a baggy of raw lentils/beans and prepared 1/2 bag.
2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
3. Wash and chop head of cauliflower.
4. Chop off stems (about 1 inch) of asparagus, wash and steam in microwave in shallow dish w/ a little water (I set on vegetable setting).
5. Chop garlic and slice tempeh into 1 inch strips.
6. Cook rice according to package (I used boxed wild rice w/ seasoning packet and only used 1/4 package of seasoning) - allow 8-10 minutes for cooking.
6. Place chopped cauliflower (in large pieces) on baking dish and toss in a few tsp of olive oil. Season with spices to your liking (I used tumeric, garlic powder, pepper, red pepper flakes)
7. On separate baking dish place asparagus and tempeh. Drizzle asparagus with a little olive oil (then toss) and sprinkle chopped garlic (about 2-3 cloves). Season with onion flakes.
8. Bake for 40-50 minutes for cauliflower to turn soft and slightly golden. Asparagus will be done around 35-40 minutes (should be soft and tempeh should be firm and golden brown).

9. Assemble your plant strong plate - add more seasonings to your liking and yum away!

Active kiddos - Marathon High Program

A few weeks ago I spoke to a group of half marathon runners in the Jacksonville area on the topic of daily and sport nutrition. This is not my normal crowd as these individuals are not running for PR's...and they are not allowed to drink. Some of them can't even drive yet.

That's right....almost 200 High School kiddos in the Jacksonville area (divided among 5 schools) are training for their first or second half marathon - 26.2 with Donna. 

If you are not familiar with Marathon High, it is a non profit program that encourages high school students to develop self-respect, confidence and healthy lifestyles through training for and running a 13.1 half marathon. 

Here's a bit more about the program:

"We are a proud partner with the Galloway Training Program and the 26.2 with Donna Foundation. This is a free, after-school running club open to teens of all backgrounds and abilities in grades 9-12. The program is non-competitive, which means speed does not matter. What does matter is showing up, being committed and completing the goal during each training session and on race day.

Marathon High may appear to be all about running, but it's more about the life lessons that happen because of the running. Marathon High is about changing lives, inspiring dreams, and making a difference. It’s about helping teens rise up and become the people they were meant to be. It’s about shifting the way young people think about themselves and their place in the world. And it’s about challenging them to make the “impossible” possible. All while doing something most teens never do: running a half-marathon."

If you'd like to get involved or donate, here's the link w/ more info about the program:  Marathon High - Florida. 

One of my friends and fellow Oakley Women ambassador (Fitz) has a similar program that she developed called the Morning Mile. Morning mile is "a before-school walking/running program that gives children the chance to start their day in an active way while enjoying fun, music and friends. It’s supported by a wonderful system of rewards, which keeps students highly motivated and frequently congratulated. It’s a proven project geared towards fighting childhood obesity and increasing the physical activity levels of school children nationwide."

I don't think we can disagree that kids need a lot of activity in their life.....and so do adults. When was the last time you said to yourself  "I feel like a kid, I have so much energy!" Or perhaps, maybe you are saying "I wish I was a young again." Either way, there's something to be said by having an indescribable amount of energy and wanting to use it without tracking miles on a Garmin or software program. Why can't we get back to moving the body without a purpose (outside), inventing games that are best played with a healthy imagination and eating until satisfied (even if food is left on the plate) because you are eager to keep on playing until it is time for bed. There is something that is removed from our society....physical activity yet we place blame on so many factors affecting childhood and adult obesity and we have all these ideas as to how we can be a "healthy" society but the bottom line is that we just aren't moving enough....yet we eat (and crave foods) as it we were moving our body all day long.

Even if you exercise daily or train for a sporting event at an age-group level, it is likely that while you are working for 8-10 hours a day, the primary times that you get up out of your chair is to eat or use the restroom. There's a lot of research on sitting too much but I also believe that we would have more energy if we had a balanced lifestyle....good restful sleep, stress management, healthy work and home environments, consistent exercise and a diet to support individual lifestyle, health and performance needs. 

I really enjoyed speaking to the kids about fueling their bodies with foods that would help them get stronger and fitter and keep their bodies healthy as they get older. Although the Marathon High program is not a competitive program, all children like to see improvements - whether it is exercise or learning, it is nice to see hard work be put into action. 

If you have a child who is active (or is trying to become more active) and you feel their eating style can be improved, my best advice is to inspire. Do not speak of food as "healthy" and to categorize food as "good or bad" but instead, show them in a way as to why they should be eating certain foods.
Carbohydrates like grains, starches and fruits and veggies give the body energy and keep the immune system strong to prevent sickness and reduce risk for disease. We want to keep the body in great health so that we can make sure all our dreams come true as we get older.
Proteins like fish, lean meat, beans, lentils, milk, yogurt and tofu/tempeh are all great options to keep the muscles strong and to help with appetite control.
Fats are not bad and can be wonderful for the heart. Without them, food wouldn't taste that good and we would be hungry all day long. Nuts, seeds, oils, avocados and nut butters are a few that can be enjoyed with meals to keep the tummy happy.
To help with energy before workouts, encourage kiddos to have a small pre workout snack - something that will digest well and will not cause stomach discomfort. Keep it simple and easy to consume, like a PB&J sandwich or a small wrap. Other simple options include cheese and crackers and a piece of fruit or yogurt and raisins.
During the workout, kids should emphasize water and encourage kids to stay hydrated all day long.
Post workout, don't let the child "wait" for dinner - have a post workout snack ready such as a chocolate milk (low fat), low fat milk w/ cheerios or a banana with yogurt. Again, be sure the food is tolerable post workout and leaves enough room for the next meal to nourish the body.

As you work on inspiring your children, consider your own personal diet. Consider the snacks you are eating as well as meal time. Is there a connection between your eating habits and energy levels? Do you eat with a plan and a purpose and do you expect willpower to be your #1 reason to stop changing habits? Create a positive food environment and set yourself up for success. 

If you  head over to my website and click on Events & Media, I have a few articles (one featured above) featured in USAT magazine dedicated to active kids. 

Any questions or concerns about kids and nutrition? Feel free to send me an email. 

I would like to give a HUGE THANK YOU to Oakley Women and Hammer Nutrition for providing all 200 kids with a water bottle (Oakley) to help the kids stay hydrated during all workouts and a few samples of Hammer Nutrition products. I feel 100% comfortable recommending Hammer Nutrition to children who need the added electrolytes and carbohydrates and as a long-time Hammer Nutrition user, I couldn't ask for a better company to help fuel active bodies.