Ask An Olympian: Can Food Really Improve Your Athletic Performance?

Like with everything else, when you reach a plateau you must go into reset mode and it’s really not that complicated – just hard to maintain until you’re able to live it and breathe it. Simply put, if you want to become faster and stronger, pay attention to the foods that you eat. Achieving and maintaining the proper levels of the right nutrients is the key to peak performance. So what are some of the main nutrients necessary to build and maintain a strong body?

Luke Walton, USA Olympic Rower suggests “HYDRATION is key to proper nutrition. There are too many positive effects of water to list here. Flushing toxins is one big one! Hydrating muscles, cells, etc. Water also aids proper digestion and absorption”.

Walton also suggest healthy fats. The kind found in avocado, coconut oil, flax seed oils, nuts, etc. “Too many people try to avoid fat completely and that is a terrible thing to do, especially for endurance athletes”.

Calcium is probably the most important nutrient for an athlete and calcium intake should be monitored by those who train seriously and consistently. Calcium is essential in the growth, maintenance, and repair of bone tissue, maintenance of blood calcium levels, regulation of muscle contraction, nerve conduction, and normal blood clotting. So it’s no shocker that low levels of calcium can increase the risk of low bone mineral density and stress fractures. And recent research shows that male endurance athletes of all ages experience testosterone deficits that can also cause osteoporosis. Say what?! Ok so let’s make sure we stock up on those dairy foods like milk, yogurt, and cheese, as well as dried beans and leafy green vegetables. Dairy intolerant? Then make sure you find the right supplements.

Iron is an essential nutrient and part of hemoglobin, which is a protein in the blood that transports oxygen to all the cells in your body. The brain has a big demand for oxygen. Shocker! That being said, without proper levels of iron in your system, you will find it hard to concentrate and will start feeling tired and irritable. Inadequate iron levels can decrease the delivery of oxygen to tissues and therefore reduce the capacity of muscles to use oxygen for the production of energy. Athletes have higher iron needs which puts them at a higher risk to experience iron deficiency (did you know that iron is lost in sweat?). So to improve your iron levels, be sure to increase your intake of iron-rich foods like red meat, rice, wheat, oats, nuts, dark leafy greens, dried fruit, beans, iron-fortified cereals, breads and pasta.

Here is a great article on Blood Iron Levels and Athletic Performance article by the Inside Tracker you might find helpful.

Proper levels of Protein will help maintain a good metabolism rate, good recovery times and will decrease susceptibility to infections. Interesting fact: endurance athletes need more protein than strength athletes because endurance athletes use protein primarily for maintaining aerobic metabolism, while the strength athletes use it to increase tissue-repair needs. In short, protein helps replenish depleted energy stores and prepares your body for its next workout, and in case of a protein deficit the body will take its needed dose from lean tissue. Not good! So make sure you get your daily protein requirements. Animal protein sources include meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, and dairy products but if you’re a vegetarian get them from plant-based sources such as beans, peas, nuts, and soy products. I mean, who doesn’t like peanut butter?

Photo: Anna Mos, amosportfolio.com

Article Source: http://lordwallington.com/ask-an-olympian-can-food-really-improve-your-athletic-performance/

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Understanding Energy Balance For Athletic Performance

Are you putting yourself into a chronic energy deficiency without even knowing it? Regardless of the athletic endeavour, studies have shown that many athletes are chronically energy deficient. This includes weight class athletes in strength sports like Olympic Weightlifting and Powerlifting, but also in endurance sports, the female training population, and bodybuilding competitors.Training and performing within a negative energy balance that is not properly constructed can be detrimental to your performance and void the benefits of your training. 

We are going to examine what energy balance is, what factors play a role in it, and how we can reconstruct our thoughts about eating for performance for both the strength athlete and classical sport athlete. Because the reality is our energy balance has an effect on everything from our metabolism to our hormonal balance and mood.

What Is Energy Balance?

Energy balance refers to the relationship between the energy coming into your system and energy going out of your system. It's governed by the law of thermodynamics and decides whether you as an athlete you gain, maintain, or lose weight.

Energy balance is often spoken of as “calories in, calories out,” but taking this at face value for athletes will not produce the qualities needed to improve your athletic performance. What happens at your cellular level also plays an important role in this equation and is something to be considered when designing your nutritional performance program. That’s why looking at it as an equation of energy in vs. energy out with the goal of maintaining balance is more appropriate.

The goal of athletic nutrition is to maximize our performance. To do this, we train our bodies into the sport-specific size and strength that is required for success and focus on training the correct mix of energy systems relative to the requirements of our sport. Nutrition and working within energy balances can produce the changes that we seek for performance improvement and can sometimes be the difference in performance against competition.

Energy expenditure is a combination of your basal metabolic rate (BMR) plus the thermic effect of foods (TEF) plus the thermic effect of your activity (TEA). This essentially breaks down to your activity level and your energy requirements when you are at rest, as well as food and fluid absorption, digestion, and transport. Your energy intake is a combination of the protein, fats, and carbohydrates you eat, along with your fluid and supplement intake.

ENERGY EXPENDITURE

The energy you expend is dependent on what type of training you are doing, along with the duration, frequency of training, and intensity of that activity. Other items may play a factor such as the sex of the athlete and their prior nutritional status. Because many people don't have access to the equipment that can determine actual total-body expenditure, we use predictive equations in it's place.

The two prediction methods that best estimate energy expenditure are the Cunningham equation and the Harris-Benedict equation. Most sports dieticians use the Harris-Benedict equation.

To estimate your expenditure, BMR or RMR is multiplied by a factor of 1.8-2.3 dependent on your physical exertion levels. An alternative to this method could also be using METs, or metabolic equivalents, recorded during a 24-hour time period. Most find Harris-Benedict a sufficient starting point.

ENERGY BALANCE

There is a lot more to energy balance than just a change in your body weight. It also has to do with what is happening at a physiological level. When your body is in a chronically low energy balance it will turn to lean tissue and fat for fuel. When you lose lean tissue mass as a direct result of your nutrient intake, you also lose strength and endurance and have difficulty adapting to your training regimen.

In addition to performance, you may also compromise immune, endocrine, and musculoskeletal functions. With a chronic negative energy balance, athletes can see a reduction in their bone mass, thyroid hormones, testosterone levels, and metabolism, as well as a disruption of their endocrine system. All nasty stuff for athletes who want to perform optimally.

 But almost all athletes will say, “But I am losing weight!” And while yes you are losing weight, your body has no idea in what way this is happening. Your body cannot tell the difference between a carefully constructed nutritional program and you being stranded alone on a desert island.  All your body knows is that it is not getting the energy intake it requires. As such, your body will slow down or stop certain non-survival functions..

On the flip side, there are detriments to over-feeding or taking in more nutrients than your body requires for your sport. Blood pressure and cholesterol can increase, you could develop insulin resistance, and plaque can build up within your arteries. The human body is in constant motion, and with that it must be adaptable to the demands we place upon it. Micronutrients can help mitigate some of the issues mentioned above.

MICRONUTRIENTS

So what should be the goal of your nutritional intake be in regards to keeping a proper energy balance? Food quality and adjustment of your macro nutrients relative to the needs of your sport while accounting for fluid intake, micronutrients, and fiber. Micronutrients (vitamins and minerals) act as co enzymes in freeing energy from your food, helping in the repair and growth of body tissues, oxygen transport and oxidative metabolism, antioxidants, immune function and more.

If micronutrient intake is not sufficient, this could lead the athlete to sub-optimal health and an athlete that is performing at a decreased level is unlikely to perform at their best. We want to maintain micronutrient intake so as to not disturb the athlete’s energy balance and reduce the chances of the unwanted side effects of under- or overeating.

Before all the diet fad people start chiming in, let’s revisit who we are talking about - competitive athletes. We are not discussing aesthetics in this case or about your recreational competitive athlete. If our food quality (rather than quantities) could provide even a 0.01% difference in training or performance, think of the resulting effect on game or meet day. What if the athlete next to you has been poorly managing his or her energy balance? Advantage - you. When scouts are watching and scholarships are on the line, that very small difference could have a meaningful impact for you.

High quality foods with the groups mentioned becomes very important due to the fact that weight class athletes are at risk for a low intake of important vitamins and minerals. Many athletes are still young and in periods of growth and development where the low intake of important minerals can lead to deficiencies. It should be noted that vitamins do not play a direct role in energy supply but do play an importance in regulating metabolism. An athlete deficient in B-group vitamins for instance, are at larger risk of premature fatigue along with the inability to maintain a heavy weight training program, necessary for athletic improvement.

Overeating on quality food choices can also happen. The athlete needs to be cognizant of extra calories coming in through high-density food choices, such as olive oil or mixed nuts. Eating these foods is great, but eating too much of them could be detrimental to your athletic performance and health.

One productive way for a coach to address athlete energy balance during competitive season can be through maintaining weight stability. Weight stability shows the proper energy requirements are being met, providing the athlete with the ideal balance to ensure optimized performance for competition. For the athlete, this can include checking weight before beginning the day’s training, then rechecking post-training to provide feedback on his or her hydration status, providing necessary feedback for hydration protocols.

IN CLOSING

For the athlete, the maintenance of an appropriate and specific energy balance can mean the difference between standing on the podium holding a trophy and shaking your head trying to figure out where it went wrong.

Are you cognizant of your energy balance? What have you noticed your needs for your sport consist of? Let us know in the comments below.

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Article Source: http://blog.pantheratrainingsystems.com/understanding-energy-balance-for-athletic-performance

Menstrual Cycle and Athletic Performance

How you store and use carbohydrate depends on your cycle.

After British tennis star Heather Watson was knocked out of the Australian Open in the first round last month, she blamed her poor play on "girl things." That sparked a series of articles in the British press on a generally neglected topic: the effect of menstrual cycle on athletic performance. The BBC's take has some interesting details, like Paula Radcliffe's negative experiences with a drug called norethisterone that's sometimes used to delay periods, and the fact that she subsequently set her first marathon world record on the first day of her period (with no drugs).

I decided to take a look at this topic for my column in the Globe and Mail this week. There has actually been quite a bit of research on the effects of menstrual cycle on endurance performance, but with few definitive conclusions, in part because the effects seem to be highly individual. One key point: it's not just about the period itself – hormone levels vary throughout the cycle, with effects on various things like temperature regulation.

The most interesting detail to me was the effects of estrogen-to-progesterone ratio, which flips halfway through the cycle, on carbohydrate, protein, and fatmetabolism:

[Dr. Andrew] Bosch [of the University of Cape Town] and his colleague Dr. Tanja Oosthuyse of the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa have found that these hormone fluctuations hamper pre-exercise carbohydrate storage during the first menstrual phase, and may compromise carbohydrate and protein availability during prolonged exercise during the second phase.

That means that carbohydrate loading the day before exercise is more important for female endurance athletes during the first phase, say Oosthuyse. During the second phase, it becomes more important to refuel during prolonged exercise, primarily with carbohydrates, but perhaps also with protein if you’re out for more than a few hours.

Moreoever, there may be a "sweet spot" a day or two before ovulation where a spike in estrogen leads to optimal endurance performance. Oosthuyse and Bosch found some hints of this effect in a cycling time trial study.

Here's my rough sketch of a figure (based on a graph Ooosthuyse sent me) showing how the hormones vary, and where the different performance effects take place (this figure didn't make it into the newspaper article, which is I'm including this highly artistic sketch):

By Alex Hutchinson

Article Reference: http://www.runnersworld.com/womens-running/menstrual-cycle-and-athletic-performance

Picture Reference: http://www.robertharding.com/

Can You Be Better Than Your Best?

I thought I’d share a tidbit with all of you this morning, that has drawn some interest on Facebook…

An ironman triathlete I coach, in her unending quest to be a better athlete and achieve her (for now) ultimate goal of qualifying for Hawaii, asked a question on her Facebook wall, hoping that all of her friends might chime in with a “golden nugget” or two of wisdom, that would help her answer THE question.  And what was it that she posted?

“I am looking for a way to be better than my best.”

Ironically, we had discussed this topic in an email exchange prior to her posting this, but she was looking for more!  Yes, she is determined!  And I love that!

So, to get to the point, I read through a litany of responses from her friends, and was amused to read all of the things that had been posted, such as “try P90x,” or “dig deeper,” and even “let me know when you find the answer.”  At the end of a long string of responses, I posted a single word: “interesting”….

Of course, this athlete posted something which in hindsight, I should have expected: “Give me your thoughts, Coach!”

Since she had reached out and asked for more thoughts, I chimed in. Here’s what I posted on her wall; I hope you all find what I had to say valuable AND interesting, and I hope you find something which applies, as you ALL embark on your own hero’s journey….
———

I found all of the comments your friends left, as quite interesting, that’s all. You work very hard, certainly as hard or harder than many athletes out there whom you’re competing with for a coveted Hawaii slot. “Digging deeper,” or trying some fad training program that is sold to the gullible masses, not as a way to “train” smarter as an athlete, but as some kind of magical “workout,” designed to carve a “six pack” and make you like yourself more when you look in the mirror, is NOT the answer. In my humble opinion, what you are looking for is a way to short circuit the “grind.” The process. And in my experience, that rarely – ever – works.

What it DOES often do, however, is cause us to be impatient, and look for an easier, or in your case, “better” way.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending upon how you look at it) it takes a long time to get good in this sport, and we ALL have our own unique adaptive abilities, which we aren’t in control of, as hard as that is to accept sometimes. Rather than look for ways to press on the gas pedal HARDER, why don’t you step back, and with respect to your LIFE, take your foot off the brake.

In other words, try to see if there is a way to enjoy the process, the grind, more, by not looking beyond the task at hand.

Look for more ways to balance your life away from the sport, and then what might be the hardest thing of all – accept that IF YOU continue to train smart, work hard, recover harder, and stay the course, that you will get where you want to go……because you will.

The “problem,” is that you don’t get to hand pick when that will be. Life isn’t like that.

Mental toughness isn’t just about gritting your teeth and hammering more…..it’s also about being focused on the task at hand, and not looking for any specific result from the process, EXCEPT for the process itself.

Smell the roses. Enjoy the grind. Be present. Learn every day, about yourself and about the sport. Accept that you CAN’T control much of the results of what you do, despite your desire to. And while you are working very hard, and recovering as hard as you work, just let everything else take care of itself…”

Article Source: http://pursuitathleticperformance.com/2015/can-you-be-better-than-your-best/
Photo Source: http://www.robertharding.com/

Time of Day Affects Athletic Performance

Researchers have found that an individual’s personal circadian rhythms can affect the physiological processes that are integral to athletic performance. Based on their natural circadian rhythms, athletes were classified into either “larks”, those who rise and sleep early, “owls”, those who rise and sleep late, or intermediates. Larks and intermediates hit peak performance levels six hours after they woke up while owls peaked 11 hours after waking up (1).

Larks and intermediates have better athletic performances about 6 hours after they wake up while owls best perform 11 hours after waking up​.

20 field hockey players were selected as a representative group with fitness levels and circadian rhythms matching the general population (25% larks, 50% intermediates, and 25% owls). Researchers conducted cardiovascular testing six times a day. Across individuals, there was an average performance difference of 11.2% between the lowest and highest performance. Lark and intermediate performance changes ranged from 7% to 10% whereas owl performances had an average range of 26% (1).

The larger variance in owls may explain why a majority of elite athletes are larks (2). Even a difference of 1% in performance can drastically change results. In the 2008 Beijing Olympics a 1% increase in the performance of the fourth place competitor in the men’s 100 m sprint would have resulted in a silver medal. A 1% increase in the women’s 400 m spring and 400 m freestyle would have given the fourth place a gold.

Larks, intermediates, and owls performed best at difference times of the day. However, when the data was viewed based on each individual’s biological clock rather than standardized time, larks and intermediates had nearly identical performance curves. This suggests that sleep and waking times have a relatively small effect on performance and a physiological condition controls performance (1).

A possible explanation is that larks have higher cortisol levels in the morning and more variation in cortisol levels throughout the day whereas owl have lowered cortisol levels in the morning and static cortisol levels throughout the day (3).

Article Source: http://dujs.dartmouth.edu/news/time-of-day-affects-athletic-performance#.VOmCfrOUd2c

Sources:

1. ScienceDirect (2015). The Impact of Circadian Phenotype and Time since Awakening on Diurnal Performance in Athletes. Retrieved January 31, 2015 from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098221401639X

2. Br. J. Sports Med. (2012). Sleep quality evaluation, chronotype, sleepiness and anxiety of Paralympic Brazilian athletes: Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games. Retrieved January 31, 2015 from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098221401639X

3. Biol. Psychol. (1991) Morningness-eveningness and early-morning salivary cortisol levels. Retrieved January 31, 2015 from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098221401639X

Improving Sleep to Help Performance!

No matter how good your nutrition or training is, if you do not adequately rest and recover you are blunting your efforts.

A lot of people can argue the point that they survive on only a few hours sleep and of course they are correct, but who wants to just survive? I have to think what is their potential if sleep was placed higher on the priority list and what are the long term effects to having a sleep deficiency?

I say deficiency because no matter who we are or where we come from we basically all have the same hardware. There are variations, but we all are typically made of the same stuff and work pretty similar, meaning we need to have proper quantity and of course quantity of sleep to optimally perform.

Performance covers daily life, work commitments, and of course sporting and fitness motives.

On average people sleep 5-7 hours per night. This figure is a very general statement as a lot of factors will influence the average persons nightly sleep. Varying factors influence different people so generally 5-7 hours seems a fair statement for the average night.

I'm sure many of you reading this can relate and probably average out somewhere between this figure. When you compare that average or your own normal sleep hours with the recommend 7-9 hours per night, you can see how this deficiency isn't just representing those of us working on less than 5 hours per night, it's nearly all of us.

For me a good night sleep is the best preparation for anything, if I am rested and recovered my training is better, food choices are improved and everything seems to just flow properly.

People put a lot of emphasis on pre-workout drinks to give them that boost before a session, and if they work for those people that's fine, but for people not getting enough sleep and buying expensive supplements to help their performance just sounds insane to me.

Getting good sleep is not as easy as it sounds however. It takes practice and training and habit. It's not just simply a case of going to bed early tonight and you're on track. Your body adapts to anything you put it through and your wake/sleep cycle will have forced your body to adapt to your current routine. It will take time and effort to correct it back to an optimal cycle. Even though your body has adapted and you don't feel exhausted or lethargic on a daily basis you must understand that you are under performing!

Changing this cycle will require attention to all or at least most of the following points on how to get a great nights sleep.

Sleeping At The Proper Times

Going to bed at bedtime! Simple but crazy effective, we are creatures that have adapted to our environment. We are programmed to sleep when it gets dark. There are chrypotchromes below the skin and in the eyes that detect sunlight, so if it is bright or not your body knows and wants to respond accordingly.

If you are altering this reaction of your body by forcing yourself to battle to be awake or sleep, you are causing a hormonal imbalance that will have negative health implications.

Getting Your Nutrition Helping

As kids we were all told not to eat sweets or drink fizzy drinks at night and it hasn't changed since we have grown up. High sugar content in our system is not what resting bodies need to relax and recover from the day's activities.

Equally sugar sources from other high carbohydrate containing foods can have an impact on our rest as well. Foods like fruits, breads, pasta, and pizza will put your body through an ordeal when it should be relaxing.

I am a fan however of eating my carbohydrates late at night to aid recovery and when my body is more insulin sensitive to use the carbs better, but I know what works for me nutritionally will not work for everybody.

So listening to your body and knowing what will aid a good nights rest should be exactly what you eat prior to sleeping, take an active approach to improve this aspect of your own life.

Get An Awesome Bed

If we go by recommended averages then the 8 hour sleep time is the one that most of us will be familiar with. This is 1/3 of each 24 hour day that we should spend asleep.

If we are actually alive for our life expectancy of 78-81 years (for the Irish population), this leads to the assumption we will spend on average about 27 years of our lives asleep.

For some bizarre reason people are sleeping on uncomfortable beds and mattresses leading to poor quality sleep and even injures from lack of support.

For 1/3 of your life I feel your bed should be one of the most valuable and comfortable things you own. Buy a decent bed, mattress and bedding and see how the quality of your sleep impacts everything else in your life. Any other purchase can and should wait.

Electronics    

Not having the blue light from electronics bombarding your brain before bed is always a way to improve sleep. 95% of Americans struggling with poor sleep, have reported using some type of electronics at least a few nights a week within the hour before bed.

It's a pointless habit that a lot of people won't easily be able to stop.

Research has demonstrated that night time light exposure suppresses the production of melatonin, the major hormone secreted by the pineal gland that controls sleep and wake cycles It is also well established that short-wavelength or blue light from phones or laptops is the most melatonin-suppressive light.

Therefore, a reduction in melatonin at night is associated with levels of sleeplessness and insomnia.

But melatonin suppression has far worse implications than simply poor sleep. It has also been shown to increase the risk of cancer, disrupt immune system function, and possibly lead to other illness such as type 2 diabetes, obesity, and heart disease.

"With serious consequences like these, preventing melatonin suppression should be a top priority in anyone's healthy lifestyle" Chris Kresser practitioner of integrative medicine. http://chriskresser.com

My Sleep

Personally some of the best ways and little tips I found to help me sleep were to darken the room as much as possible. I sleep so much better with a pitch black room and blackout curtains have always been a good purchase.

Equally if the room is really cold I conk out. From living in Darwin even though it was crazy hot outside, my bedroom was always 19 degrees, I was always asleep after a few minutes due to the icy temperature.

Also from sharing a room with a Darth Vader like breathing machine who will remain nameless, I began sleeping with earplugs, a practice I still do to this day, the peaceful silence aids my falling asleep better than anything else.

One trick that I would do ever before making conscious decisions on how to sleep and recover better was to write before I slept.

Not only was I not on a computer, watching TV or on a phone which helped in itself, but the process of deloading my mind eased the dreaded "over thinking before sleeping" when you can't switch off. By writing out a list of all I had to do the following day I was free to let my mind drift knowing that all I needed to do was laid out ahead of me.

Conclusion

Above all tips and tricks to sleep better, it's very clear you can't beat a routine. By almost forcing a good sleeping pattern on yourself you will soon adapt and early mornings won't be a chore and you will find yourself tired at night and getting adequate rest.

The best way to begin is to get up early, expose yourself to sunlight and be active. Easier said than done but it's all about creating habits in your daily life. Soon this will not be an effort but something you look forward to!

If you get yourself into a good sleeping pattern you will rest better, lose weight quicker, build muscle faster, be more productive and generally feel and perform better.

Everybody has the same amount of time per day and I can guarantee you that the people who seem to get more things done, achieve more and perform better are the ones who sleep and rest better too.

As always comments or questions are welcome either here or on my Facebook https://www.facebook.com/daveburkePT.

Let me know if you put any or all of this advice into to practice and what was the outcome?

Thanks for your time,

David

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8608041

Photo 1 Source: http://www.robertharding.com/index.php?lang=en&page=preview&subpage=1127-5573

Photo 2 Source: http://www.robertharding.com/index.php?lang=en&page=preview&subpage=857-15208

Photo 3 Source: http://www.robertharding.com/index.php?lang=en&page=preview&subpage=857-15209

A Video On 'Passion' For Your Monday! :)

Are you living your passion? Your training is usually a great indication! Don't just look for something that interests you, find something that you will truly commit to! Then, increasing athletic performance will be fun...



What are YOU willing to commit to?

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