The Gluten Free Triathlete

There is a lot of talk today about different types of diets that claim many desirable health benefits.  The two most popular I hear about are the Paleo Diet and Gluten Free Diets today were talking only about Gluten free diets. Before you go head over kilt into something, I feel it is best to understand what you are going into and for what reasons. You need to understand if you need to be Gluten Free?  What being Gluten Free means? Why you would want to be Gluten Free? Also what are you going to be losing by going Gluten Free?

Gluten is everywhere?

Gluten is the major protein that is found in wheat products such as breads and pasta. The Gluten Protein is found in the wheat seed and is approximately 80% of the protein found in whole wheat products. The Gluten protein has elastic properties that give the desired doughy texture to the products it is found in.  The Gluten protein can also be refined in a wheat mill and used as an additive in many manufactured food products because of its elasticity characteristics, availability, and low cost to refine.

Gluten Free or Not?

There are truly only 2 reasons why a person should be gluten free and hundreds of reasons why people actually choose to be gluten free. The first reason is Celiac Disease. Celiac Disease effects about 1% of the population comprised predominantly of white American women in their mid to late 30’s. Celiac Disease is an autoimmunity disease that causes the intestines to inflame and inhibit all absorption of nutrients. Celiac disease if un-treated is a very serious disease that causes dramatic weight loss and needs to be diagnosed by a doctor.  The Second Reason is Gluten Sensitivity. Gluten Sensitivity affects about 10% of the population and is becoming more and more prevalent. The cause of Gluten Sensitivity is unknown but it is likely a cross of gluten allergies and some other unknown stress related problems.  The Symptoms of Gluten Sensitivity can range from extreme to mild discomfort, just to be safe this is something that needs to be discussed with your doctor.

Health Benefits of Gluten Free

If you lie outside of the 11% of the population that has been diagnosed with a Gluten problem and you choose to be Gluten free there are a number of health benefits. These health benefits include weight loss, and a leaner body composition. I personally do not believe that it is the removal of Gluten from the diet that gives you these health benefits. The benefits of you are seeing come from decreasing the amount of processed foods you eat daily and from preparing food from home.  If you are going to go gluten free you are making a life change that is going to cause you to be more conscious of what you are putting into your body. From an athletes perspective this is key to performance gains and life long health regardless if you remove Gluten or not.

Health Benefits of Gluten

If you took the time to read the last paragraph then you understand now that the health benefits from being Gluten Free are not actually from being Gluten free. The health benefits are from taking the time to see what you are eating, preparing foods from home and by limiting the amount of processed foods from the diet. Gluten is not bad for you, it does not make you fat or sick, heavily processed foods and inappropriate portion sizes are most likely the culprit.

Take Home Message

If you have a serious Gluten problem that a doctor has diagnosed then always follow what they say. If you are the other 89% and are looking for performance and health gains you need to make the decision to go gluten free all together which is a difficult task and takes time to become efficient at. Or the other option is you can slow down daily, Don’t eat out so much, Take the time to prepare foods at home and Limit the amount of processed foods in your diet. Option 2 is what I’ve chosen, and I think if you give it a good old college try you will find that it’s not all that hard to do. Slow down eat well!

Carbohydrates Triathletes Best Friend

In the world we live in today there is an increasing talk about Carbohydrates. The truth is that carbohydrates really are the endurance athlete’s best friend, with out them we could not Swim, Bike or Run with any bit of enjoyment or proficiency.  Without carbohydrates our capacity for endurance would just about disappear. So the question on everyone’s mind is how many carbohydrates do I need? To answer this we first need to understand what carbohydrates are and what they do in our bodies.

What is a Carbohydrate?

To the endurance athlete carbohydrates are basically either Glucose, Fructose or some combination of the two. (There are different types of Carbohydrates but for this we are only going to talk about those two.) Carbohydrates can be linked together to form different types of Sugars or chemical structures such as Sucrose (Glucose linked with Fructose) also know as table sugar. Carbohydrates can also be linked together to form more complex molecules like Amylose or Amylopectin which is basically a long string of glucose molecules linked together commonly found in plants.  Carbohydrates are found in foods like fruit, bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, grains, and sweets. Carbohydrates can be classified as either Simple like in cookies and soda or Complex like in whole wheat bread or pasta.

What does it do in the body?

Carbohydrates once they enter the mouth begin to break down into a digestible form.  Your saliva contains an enzyme called amylase that begins to break down complex carbohydrates into a more simple form preferred by the small intestines.  Next, carbohydrates are moved down into your stomach where they are further broken down into a digestible form called chyme. This mix of partially digested food is then released slowly into your small intestines where it is broken down further into the simplest form, glucose. Glucose now can be absorbed into your blood stream.  Once glucose is in circulation your muscle cells and liver can begin to uptake glucose with a little help of from our friend insulin. Inside the cell, glucose either is made into glycogen for storage or used for energy in glycolysis during exercise. Once glucose has entered glycolysis it can be used to make energy both anaerobic for a short period of time or glucose can be used to fuel the citric acid cycle at medium to medium high aerobic efforts. Depending on your exercise intensity your body will begin to burn a blend of fat and carbohydrates.  Carbohydrates are not 100% essential but for an endurance athlete they are critical. With out carbohydrates it would take a long time to restore glycogen levels to an acceptable range after training.

How much do I need?

Now that you have the gist of what a carbohydrate is we can discuss how much and endurance athlete needs. Typically and endurance athlete needs 50-65% of their diets from Carbohydrates and less than 10% of those carbohydrates coming from a simple form. Here is what I recommend.

Training time                      Carbohydrate grams/pound body weight

1 hour/day                          2.7-3.2 per lb

2 hours/day                        3.6 per lb

3 hours/day                        4.5 per lb

4 hours/day                        5.4-5.9 per lb

So if I am a 180lb man and I am training 2 hours per day, 180lbX3.6g/lb=648g grams of carbohydrates. I recommend splitting these up through each meal of the day so for 5 meals that is 129g per meal. Since are 4 calories per gram of carbohydrate that is about 520 calories per meal from carbohydrates.

I realize that this may be a little bit too much information, but the beautiful human machine is complex and there is no owner’s manual.  So go out there eat carbs and train hard!

Office Baseball

So I totally got busted at work for posting this video on Youtube however I feel like it was worth it. As you may or may not know I was a college pitcher and at one point in time I threw in the low 90's im not sure how fast I got that ball up to in this video but its was pretty sweet. haha.

Protein for dummies

Protein

Let’s face it one of the many questions we have as triathletes and endurance athletes is how much protein do we need daily and am I getting enough of it? To answer this we need a little bit of insider knowledge of what protein is? And what it does inside the human body?

What are Proteins?

Proteins are compounds composed of many Amino Acids linked together like a Chain by forming a peptide bond. This Chain of Amino Acids is then wrapped around itself to form many different types of structures. These relatively larger structures are then pieced together like building blocks to form tissues in the body such as Muscles, Skin, Bone, and many more critical body parts.

Proteins role in the body:

Protein is the second most abundant molecule in the human body and is absolutely essential for survival.  As tissues in the body break down or get injured you need dietary protein to repair or regrow these tissues this is especially important to endurance athletes.  Not only does the human body use protein to grow and repair it will also use proteins as a source of energy through a process known as gluconeogenesis although this is not a preferred source of energy.

How much protein do I need?

There is much debate on protein requirements I personally feel that we already consume too much protein in our diets so this is what I recommend depending on your activity level.

·         Recreational Endurance                  .36g/lbs

·         Resistance Training                         .36g/lbs

·         Moderate Endurance                      .54g/lbs

·         Elite Female Endurance                  .53-.63g/lbs

·         Elite Male Endurance                     .72g/lbs

·         Muscle Maintenance                      .36g/lbs-.54g/lbs             

·         g/lbs= Grams per Pound

For Example:

If I am a 180lb man that is a moderate endurance athlete I need about 97g (180lbs X .54g/lbs) of protein per day. What I recommend for this is to break those 97 grams up into 4-5 meals, so for each meal 20-25g would be adequate on a daily basis. Remember that a piece of chicken the size of a deck of cards is 20-25g of protein.

Sources

There are many sources of protein and meat is not the only source you can also find it in Beans, Nuts, Whole Grains and many more.  I encourage you to go out there any try many different types of protein my personal favorite is from Pepitas also known as pumpkin seeds. This is not all there is to Protein I would need much more of your time to tell you that story but if you are interested in finding out more check this out. Click Here.  

Hydration- Water for life

There is no greater impact you can make on physical performance than there is with hydration.  Poor hydration can lead to disaster on the race course or in training as I’m sure many of you have found out the hard way.  Let’s face it there are four basic nutrients that your body needs, carbohydrates, protein, fats and water. You can survive for many days without carbohydrates, proteins and fats but you will not last more than a day or two without water it is 100% necessary for life as we know it. 

Let’s take a look at what proper hydration does for your body from an athletic point of view. One of the most important roles hydration plays is in body temperature regulation. Water acts to cool the body down by absorbing heat and acting like an evaporative cooler via sweat on the skin.  Another important role hydration plays is in maintaining proper blood volume. Since water makes up a large portion of blood if you are dehydrated your blood will become thicker like syrup making it harder for your heart to pump blood to the rest of your body. You become less efficient. Studies show that a 2% loss in body weight during prolonged endurance activities is enough to impact performance capacity. So if you weigh 150lbs that is only 3lbs lost!

Stay hydrated:

1.       Drink early Drink often

2.       Pay attention to the color of urine

a.       Darker the color the more dehydrated

3.       Activities lasting more then 90 min use a sports drink that contains electrolytes

4.       Pay attention to weight loss in training

a.       If you loose more than 2% body weight drink more water

5.       Carry a reusable bottle of water with you

6.       Practice hydration in training this will transfer to race day

Benefits of proper hydration:

1.       Improved athletic performance

2.       Cooler body temperature

3.       Faster recovery from training

4.       Improved circulation

Hydration plays in important role in athletics as well as in everyday life. Pay attention to how often you are drinking water and you may be surprised. So go ahead and have a glass.. (of water)

A year to remember (I Hope)

I’m Sitting at work right now and the thought has just dawned on me to reflect on the year that has just flown away. I’ve pretty much spent the last year on cruise control and have raced as much as I could afford literally. I spent a lot of time and money on this. All together I have raced 9 triathlons 2 half marathons and a few more road races. I’ve also had a number of PR’s this year (it was worth the work) including winning my age group a few times. I’m hoping to continue the PR year at the Tucson Marathon that is 1 week away. Shooting for a 3:10 that’s a 7:15 pace and a Boston Qualifying time! Needless to say that I will be hurting.

Here is the old trusted ride

Here I am racing in black and white