Off-season nutrition tips

The off-season is a critical part of an athlete’s yearly cycle—a time to refuel, recover, reset and reset. For many athletes, the off-season is challenging because it brings anxiety about losing fitness or gaining weight. Your daily diet should never be a source of stress. By prioritizing nourishment over restriction, you can give your mental and physical health a boost before you begin your next phase of training. Here are some tips on how you can navigate off-season eating with confidence.

 

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

Athlete (not-in-training) - Off Season tips

Athletes are tough people. 

They can push when the body says push no more. 

They can accomplish a lot before 9am and know how to squeeze a lot into an already busy day.
They have this amazing ability to seek out information to make improvements, always reflecting and analyzing as if there are no personal limits but instead, consistent constant improvements.
Athletes are smart, hard working, passionate, dedicated individuals but sadly, many athletes do not know how to do the off-season properly. 

For the first time in 8 years, I have intentionally taken 5 weeks off from any type of structured activity with minimal running (2 runs on the track, gadget free), a handful of short bike rides (gadget free) and a few times a week swimming (after waking up without an alarm, no more than 30-45 minutes of swimming). I say intentionally because I was not injured, sick or burnt out after IMWI so the rest was planned by me and not forced by a doctor.
And I still have one more week to go of my off season!
(Karel is also joining me in this off-season as we are both getting unfit (not unhealthy) and rested for 6 weeks.

And guess what..... I feel amazing and yes, I am surviving for those who feel it is just too hard to take time off. 

I am actually so busy right now that I could not have asked for a better time for this break in training to occur. We are working on our Trimarni 2015 Roster with our new coaching services (and application) as well as putting together our 2015 Trimarni camps. 
Honestly, I could not even imagine exercising every day right now so thankfully there is absolutely no guilt if I do absolutely nothing active for the day except for walk Campy (which this has happened at least twice a week for the past 5 weeks). 

Although many athletes are cool with a 1-2 week break from activity there are other athletes who think they are taking a break but the lifestyle pretty much resembles the season but without gadgets or sets. And for some athletes, there just no stopping them all year long.  

It is important to recognize that the off season is not base training. For our athletes (us included), the off season is simply the break in the year to turn into a healthy, balanced non-athlete who is active without much stress on the body and without a structured routine. The problem for many athletes is that the training never stops because there is always a race on the schedule. After the off season, we believe that athlete must focus on building a new/improved foundation to turn on neuromuscular pathways, to improve skills and form and to identify weaknesses in the body. This is our transition phase which will know call our foundation phase.

Participating in an endurance event requires an efficiently trained aerobic system as well as exceptional muscular, mental, respiratory and cardiovascular strength. To perform optimally on race day and reduce risk for injury throughout the season (ex. muscular injuries, chronic inflammation and stress fractures, etc), athletes must not overlook skills/technique, flexibility, foundation strength training, diet and muscular imbalances/weakness that should be addressed after the off season (certainly some things like diet, personal weaknesses can be addressed in the off season). 

The off season is not the time to get in the gym and start lifting weights, train for a "fun" race or take part in an athletic challenge at the gym. Rest up in the off season so that come the necessary foundation phase, you have the motivation and excitement to use your healthy body all (upcoming) season long. You may think you feel fine just a week or two after your big key race and want to jump right back into something sport related (as I did 2 weeks after IMWI) but you will feel much better after a needed 4-8 week break after your last big race, particularly if your season included more than 3 races and stretched over 9 months.

Recognize that great performances come from consistency. And to be consistent you have to create a foundation that is durable and as resistant as possible to training stress. Be sure that throughout the first 3 months of your season (which follows your off season) you allow your body to adapt gradually. Do not expect to be at the fitness you were last season but instead, be patient so that you can take your fitness to the next level, this upcoming season. 

The big mistake that athletes make in the off-season is feeling an itch to race too soon or hear the buzz for a new or popular race and sign-up for race(s) without giving major consideration as to the season goals or even if they are the right races for you and your body.

It is extremely important to think about your season goals and how they fit into the races you are choosing to register for, the priority of those races, when those races occur and why you are picking them.

We believe that in order to peak appropriately, athletes must training appropriately throughout the year to build a strong foundation and ultimately, get stronger in order get faster and then go longer. Most importantly, you, the athlete, should want to do everything possible/right to help you arrive to your race healthy, injury free and confident to execute.

PLAN FOR NEXT SEASON

-Consider the time it takes to prepare for a race. For many athletes, the body can appropriately progress and tolerate around 14-16 weeks (3.5-4 months) of specific race training. 10 weeks may be too short to adapt properly and more than 16 weeks can increase risk for burnout and injury. Believe it or not but if you train smart (and consistently), 3 months is a long time to train for a key race when you are training smart.  You can race more than once throughout the season and perform well at both of those key A races but "peaking" is hard to do twice in one season. You can have two outstanding performances but you should keep in mind the training that is needed (overtime) to build a great performance and that if the season is too long (without a short season break in between training for key races) the body may get too tired and motivation will dwindle.
 Be patient with your fitness and understand that it takes time to build a successful race day performance.
-What did you learn from this past season in terms of training/racing? How did the weather impacted your training (ex. did you pick a key race too soon in the season, without adequate time to acclimate?). Do you need to choose longer distance races for late season and shorter distance races early season to accommodate your lifestyle/work schedule or vice versa? Did you find yourself burnt out at specific times of the year? Did you experience an injury or set back that could have been avoided? Did you peak at your races? Did nutrition affect your performance?  What are the best courses for you to race on? 

-What did you learn from this past season in terms of how you balanced life and training? Did you make the most of your available training time or did you try to squeeze in too much every day? What needs to be modified next year or changed to focus on quality workouts?  Did you feel as if you tried to balance too much on your plate? Did you find your diet, sleep and stretching neglected because you were trying to balance work, family and putting in the miles/hours? Was your racing schedule too ambitious that you could not peak appropriately? Was your family supportive of your racing/training schedule all season long? Be aware that there is no such thing as the perfect number of hours to train for a race. If you want to succeed, it all comes down to personal success. How many hours can you train and what can you do with those hours?

-What did you learn from this past season in terms of your body/healthy? Did you get injured, sick, have fluctuations with your weight/eating habits, get burnt out, etc. Although coaches should help athletes train smart with adequate rest and recovery, it should be understand that it is tough at times to balance it all. We all have “triggers” in life so rather than getting upset when things happen, learn from them so reduce the risk to make the same mistake twice.

-Are you figuring out what courses fit you the best? How about racing venues, logistics and anything else that can negatively and positively affect your race day performance and previous training. Races should make you excited to train for them but also to race appropriately. Sure, we all have anxieties and it’s exciting to try something new/challenging but consider what fits your strengths the best, what races work within your triathlon budget and work schedule and when/where those races occur. Again, don’t just sign up for races because they are new, open or all your friends are doing it, without giving those races some serious thought as to your goals for the race but also how you will prepare for them.

You have a lot to think about so this is why now is a good time to start brainstorming about next year. The most important thing when considering your season is to think about your short AND long term goals. Your racing/training schedule should make you happy and healthier, it should be financially reasonable and it should help you better yourself as an athlete, parent, spouse, employee, boss, friend and/or human being.

Off season: Turning into a non-triathlete

Countdown to race Kona for me and Karel....One year and one week away! 

It's been almost 4 weeks since Karel and I raced IMWI and our lifestyle has changed dramatically.
If you lived a day in the life of Marni and Karel right now, you would be doing a lot of the following:

No structured workouts, no workout schedule, no intense exercise, very little gym time and no alarms for workouts.

Guess what... We are LOVING every day of it!

This is all part of our master plan to prep for Kona 2015....we are turning into non-triathletes for 6 full weeks. Although this may seem like a long time to do absolutely no structured training, it is very needed and perhaps long over due. 

I was extremely fortunate this year to have an injury-free season. Both Karel and I raced to our full potential at each of our planned races and our bodies did not disappoint us. We never experienced the slightest itch of burnout or fatigue and most of all, we loved the journey of becoming the best we could be this season. With Kona being my 10th IM and Karel doing IM Lake Placid and then Kona as IM #4 and #5, we both feel as if we have more fitness to gain in 2015.

After Karel and I reached our BIG dream of this year qualifying for the 2015 Ironman World Championships at IMWI, we found it quite deserving to take some time off from training.

And beyond taking a little time off, we are going to change up a few things next season as to how we train throughout our season, as we focus on performing the best possible, in the best shape possible, in Kona, Hawaii next October. 

And that training starts now. 

We are turning into non-triathletes for 42 days and do as little as possible with our body in order to be mentally and physically recharged, healthy and fresh for the transition (foundation) phase of our season. 

I realize that this is a very difficult time for athletes. The off season often bring sadness as if something is missing in life. Other athletes feel concern over appetite, perhaps weight gain and feeling out of control with eating. Some athletes feel as if fitness will be lost and will be hard to gain again. And then there are athletes who just refuse to take a break and after a few days off after the last race they are already training hard again for a running race or well, just because. 

 Taking a break from training does not mean you have to be sedentary and I would not recommend to be inactive. The off season should not bring worries or concerns about weight because you are not required to be at a racing weight if you are not expecting your body to perform at its best right now. The easiest way to summarize this is that as athletes, we eat to support our training load. Training load increases, we must eat more to support that training load. And more food means more nutrients to keep the body healthy, fueled and nourished. 

Reducing training doesn't mean stop eating or avoid carbs or do the complete opposite and eat anything in sight and do nothing with your body. It means eat similar foods that nourished you while training but in smaller portions and with slight modifications to macronutrient distribution (carbs, protein, fat) to keep you satisfied between meals (with small snacks to hold you over between meals).

The goal of the off season is to build good habits and to discover joy for body movement. 

After racing 4 Ironman races in 14 months, I feel I owe it to my body to take off more time than I think I need to take care of my health. Endurance racing is damaging and it is not healthy. I want to ensure longevity in this sport of triathlons so I want to do whatever I can to protect my body from too much intentional training/racing stress.

 I will also only be racing one Ironman next year to ensure that I peak appropriately for Kona. After Kona, I am taking a break from IM racing for at least a year but probably closer to 1.5-2 years just to give my body a break.  I love Ironman racing and I love my lifestyle as a triathlete but it is not my life. I absolutely do not need to race Ironman triathlons to be healthy, to manage my life and to de-stress. 

I will always feel comfortable calling myself a triathlete, even when I'm not racing in Ironman races. 

Although I do not feel it is necessary for all triathletes to take 6 full weeks off, I highly recommend giving yourself a break that is long enough for you to really enjoy being a non-athlete but not too long that you struggle to feel the itch to get back into training again. Typically 2-4 weeks is an ideal time to remove yourself from structure and to follow some of my off season tips. However, in the big picture of a season (which is typically 8-11 months), this is hardly the break your body actually needs to return to the sport healthy and strong.

Here are a few tips of mine as to what to focus on during your off season. 

1) Recharge - after waking up with an alarm for months and months and months, reset your body. Sleeping is not only great to help you feel alert and fresh but it also necessary to help manage your appetite and to help you feel fresh and recovered. Certainly you need to set an alarm for work and life responsibilities but use this time to discover what your body can feel like with restful, consistent sleep. 

2) Remove the schedule, be health conscious - Athletes are quite structured and often very rigid. While this can be beneficial when it comes to training and eating for performance gains, we do not want to feel as if this is the only way we can live life or need to live life. Allow yourself freedom with your body but never lose your love for staying active and healthy. Move your body as much as possible but with the least amount of stress. When you wake up in the morning (rested), decide on the best way to use your free time with your body. 

3) Change the routine - It doesn't matter how much you love your sport or your active lifestyle, but without a break, the body and mind will get stale. Many times, athletes will discover (or search out for) ways to keep a tired body moving (like energy drinks, skipped workouts and then overload the next workout, just logging miles to get it done, etc.) and this is absolutely not what a healthy and performance focused athlete should be doing throughout the season. By changing up the routine in the off season, we have the opportunity to discover other ways to feel healthy and accomplished, we can catch up on neglected to-do's and we also get hungry to train again. 

4) Reflect and plan ahead - Often times, athletes are extremely fit but very unhealthy. Athletes accomplish workouts but can not execute on race day. Athletes do the same thing over and over and want better results without changing anything. Although these are situations that may not apply directly to you (right now), the best thing you can do is reflect. When I think about my recent successes over the past two years in endurance racing, I can always reflect as to what worked really well in my season and what I can try differently for different results. I am very open to change and never feel as if there is a by the book approach to training. My only goal is understanding what amount of training load works the best with my body. As you reflect on the season and explore new, different or better/smarter approaches, plan ahead. I encourage athletes to not race a lot. Minimize your tune-up races, multiple endurance events and for triathletes, there is no need to turn into a "runner" with running races in the off season. Plan and prioritize your season around your 1-2 KEY races so that you peak appropriately and utilize all phases of your season appropriately. 

5) Create a strong, healthy relationship with food and your body- Athletes are all over the map when it comes to eating habits. Underfueling, undereating, overeating, overfueling, cravings, too much snacking, not snacking enough, afraid of carbs, too carb heavy, etc. I could go on and on about the eating habits of athletes. Although eating habits of athletes may stem from optimal performance gains, there appears to be an underlying focus of ideal body composition which affects eating and fueling habits. Although athletes may have a different standard as to what their ideal body should look like to perform well, it is important that in the off season, you keep in mind that this time in your life/year is temporary. This is an optimal time to understand your diet and appetite without hours and hours of weekly training and stress on your body (which are hopefully always supported with adequate food intake and sport nutrition). Use this time to develop a great relationship with your body and real food and identify your individual missing links that can assist in performance gains, optimal health and a healthy body composition during your season. I realize that I left this category wide open for suggestions and tips but I feel that if you can learn to create a real food diet, love the food you put in your body every day and feel great about your food choices...without hours and hours of training, you will feel SO great about your body during your off season. If you take this time to work on your relationship with food, then come "training" time again, you will feel much more in control of your eating and not feel so confused as to how to fuel your body as an athlete.
Lastly, as mentioned above, a healthy body comes in a variety of sizes and right now, you are not expected to perform with your body. Gaining a few lbs is not the end of the world and for many, can be extremely healthy. Also, 2-6 weeks off now is preceding 8-10 months of structured training. I would suggest to not be so focused on what may happen now but instead, think about what you should do now to help set you up for a great upcoming season. No need to overindulge but no need to be strict. Learn to eat like a non-athlete and feel great about it so that come race season you will have a body that is healthy and primed to perform.
Certainly you should always be eating healthy to nourish your body but during the season you get a bit of slack every now and then with the diet due to expending so many calories. But if you hold a high standard as to what your body should look like right now (as well as all year long), I encourage you to consider the different phases of your season and how the body changes according to the work load which is supported by adequate fuel. There is going to be a time when you want your body to perform and that time will come with moths of previous training, good nutrition and fueling and a lot of attention to detail in your life, eating and training. Now is the time to enjoy a bit of "healthy" food freedom and learn to love the body you have, not as an athlete but as a healthy human being. 

Here's what I have been doing over the last 4 weeks:

-Hiking (not technical) with Campy in Paris Mountain state park
-Riding my road bike (twice, 30 min ride and 90 min ride)
-Swimming (no more than 30 minutes  or 2000 yards, ~6 times)
-Light hip/glute/core work (no more than 20 minutes) - 2 times per week
-Walking - daily with Campy
-There have been about 8-10 days when I have done nothing except short walks with Campy
-When I'm not working (which is not a lot since this is our busy time of the year as we prepare our business for 2015): spending the weekends at Farmers Markets,  watching Netflix at night (staying up later than normal), cooking yummy food, catching up on to-do's around the house, taking care of my Garden, exploring new places in Greenville, entertaining friends who come to visit us in Greenville, hanging out with our neighbors and reading books.