Today I wanted to talk a little about nutrition and my personal view on nutrition and fitness. I also wanted to share my personal experiences, explain a bit about my relationship to food and how I generally eat week to week.
When it comes to nutrition I've never been one to take it to the extremes of only eating protein or restricting myself to some sort of high fat, low carb diet. Diets have never really interested me but I also have been lucky to have started playing sport from a young age and I've tended to always maintain (what I believe is) a good physique year round. I'm not saying diets don't work. They definitely work for some and they don't work for others. But I personally have never really restricted myself when it comes to food. I'll tell you a story; I used to compete in cross country running in Spain (during my year out at university) and I was at an age where I was insecure and felt I needed to be big and muscular to feel good about myself and receive validation from my peers. I went from about 75kg to 90kg over the course of a year or two- and to be fair a lot of the weight I had gained was muscle. I got to Spain and began competing in cross country running. As I am naturally good at endurance sports this I believed would be my forte and it was, however I would consistently finish in the top 10 so I was doing unbelievably well at that level for my age group, however I was not getting to 1st, 2nd or 3rd...so no medals. I was young and impatient and wanted to achieve in a day, what it took the fist place athletes, what I'm sure were years to accomplish. I tried training more, running harder and longer, but that only took me from 10th to 8th after 3months of intense training. One day I was speaking to one of my friends from the cross country team and he told me, I was very good, very talented but I was carrying too much weight for the sport. He suggested I try lose a few kg to try and do even better. This was the first time in my life I had dieted. And as I was young and didn't know any better, I just began eating less and less. I began skipping meals, eating smaller portions, trying to avoid eating out with friends, so I could reach my goal of being lighter again, and hopefully that would give me the chance to win some medals. It was horrible, I was constantly hungry, I did feel like I was achieving something when I did skip a meal and I was eating very little calories but I found it harder to train. But nevertheless I kept pushing myself and after about a month I lost the weight. I was at about 76kg. I went back and competed in my first cross country race since being that light, and I did better. I ran a little faster and came 7th. But I felt awful throughout the race, I'd never felt like I was struggling so much in a race. I was doing well in the race but I felt awful. The only way I can describe it is, that I felt unfit, even though I should have been at my peak with all the training I was doing. After the race, I continued dieting, I continued skipping meals and I continued to avoid eating out with friends. But after a few months of the dieting I started getting serious cravings, I started craving a lot of junk food for some reason and I've never really been the type to crave junk food, but I began having some biscuits here and there, chocolates...pretty much all the things I had denied myself. My body wanted. I went from some biscuits to a whole pack of biscuits...and then I would feel guilty and not eat the rest of the day. And then I would wake up starving, skip breakfast and eat some junk food like a McDonald's meal and a dessert. Whatever I was craving on the day...and then again I would feel guilty skip a meal and then repeat the following day...and slowly slowly it got worse, until most of the food I was eating was unhealthy food. Fizzy drinks, pizza, chocolates, crisps, biscuits. And I ended up feeling terrible. I ended up putting on weight, and was nearer to 90kg than 75kg, and this time it wasn't all muscle, I no longer had the 6 pack I was so used to seeing in the mirror. So I knew it had become serious and I had to stop once and for all. And bit by bit I had to reintroduce healthy foods into my diet and try to eat healthy meals again. I began by eating a pasta at least once a day, because as my body was used to bad carbs it was easier to eat some good carbs and then slowly come off all the other processed sugar, using pasta as my go to food when I was hungry. And once I had come off all the junk food I slowly went back to eating normal. A bit of an extreme story but that was my only experience with dieting. After that I've never skipped a meal and I've never tried to lose weight fast by not eating. I couldn't do it. If I'm hungry now I eat, but I try and eat well. I generally try and cook all my own meals, and if I feel like a piece of cake or a flapjack I will make it myself. It only takes 30mins or an hour to make and if I make a batch I can always keep the rest for the following days. I've learnt to love cooking, so I don't mind at all making things. I put my music on and get to work. Its quite therapeutic to be honest. I've also learnt over the years that if my nutrition is good, then my body will react to the training I do very well. So if that's a lot of cardio, I will drop weight, if its weights, I will gain muscle. Good nutrition I've learnt is the building blocks for sculpting the physique you want. If you eat well and train well, the results will come. So what do I eat? To be honest it changes from week to week depending on my schedule and how I feel, but I try to have breakfast, lunch and dinner. For breakfast I love a coffee (either an espresso or I make my own latte) and a bit of yoghurt & granola. I love it. I look forward to this breakfast everyday. I did try to add nuts and seeds and berries to it to make it healthier but this gave me a stomach ache. So I stopped. Once In a while I add a bit of honey. But I have a small portion of yoghurt and granola and it sets me up well for the day. Lunch is an interesting one. This is the part of the day where due to the nature of my job I never know what I'll be eating and when. So I try to eat healthy. I like a bit of carbs and some protein for lunch. I'm not much of a meat eater so at lunch I like proteins high in fat that will give me energy. I love things like sourdough bread mini baguette with eggs or cheese, some boiled kale or spinach and I add some chill flakes and a touch of olive oil- this is my absolute favourite thing to eat for lunch! The carbs from the bread give me the energy to keep going for the rest of the day and the protein will help my body recover from the work I put it through. If I don't eat this at lunch then it can be things like some pasta with fresh tomato and garlic, or roast potatoes with some spinach. Lunch is usually a bit of carbs, veg and protein. For dinner I like to come home and cook something nice. With Dinner I take my time and put more work and effort into it (but I enjoy the work) I like to make various dishes like chapati (handmade) and curry (usually veg) or I cook Italian food like parmigiana (which is like an aubergine bake) or a broccoli soup or I make a greek salad with pitta bread. Really whatever I feel like on the day. This stops me craving anything and I don't end up feeling like ordering food or wanting to eat out, because I make the things I really want. I also have to mention, apart from not really ever eating out, I don't really drink alcohol. If I do it will be a little bit once every 5 or 6 months. So overall my diet is generally rich in nutrients, although I do eat foods that provide no nutritious value here and there, it’s the nutritious food that makes up the majority of my diet...
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Health & Fitness with BazA space for me to share a bit about my own fitness journey, tips and tricks I've learnt over the years as a personal trainer and some of my favourite health and fitness products Archives
January 2020
Categories |