Many teammates that I have talked to experience a wide range of dieting practices which further illustrates the point of these habits being case-specific to your goals. Most people are not into or going to put forth the effort in the form of measuring and calculating that is required to put you on a magazine cover. The laziness is justified I suppose if physical appearance is not high on your priority list or reasons for cleaning up your diet. However, there certainly can be too much emphasis placed on a minimum effective dosage; how can I put in the least amount of effort that yields the most return? That said, let me continue...
My last athletic competition was in May of this year. That was over three months ago. At the time I was about 165 lbs and ~5.2 percent body fat. There was definitely a great deal of neurotic calculating and measuring involved in getting to that stage and as I would be taking some time off from competing in the coming months I did not see it as productive to continue. Rather, I relied on the good eating principles that I had learned and encouraged myself to take part in the habits that I had engrained in my brain over the years. Before I go into more detail keep in mind that I spent the better part of two years building up these habits. It was not like I Googled a miracle diet promising overzealous results, read a couple blogs and forums, tried it for a week, then decided I was set for life. It took a lot of practice and patience, trial and error to get to this point.
A thought crossed my mind a week or so ago that I had not weighed myself or checked my body fat composition in a few months. This was quite a long period of time considering my procedure during competition seasons. Out of curiosity then, the next morning I stepped on the scale to find that I weighed 167.5 lbs. Due to good eating habits, in spite of reducing my training from 5-6 days per week to 2-3, I still weighed relatively the same. This got me curious about my body fat percentage. I pulled out my calipers and checked my chest, abdomen, and mid-thigh (the 3-sites specified in the Jackson-Pullock procedure), checking each site four times and plugging the average into the formula (you can find this online here or for your android phone). Much to my surprise and satisfaction I had a calculated Percent Body Fat (PBF) of 5.6%. WOW! In regards to my weight and composition I was pretty much the same as when I was training much harder and putting a lot more effort into planning my diet.
A previous Diet of Mine would have looked like this:
May 2012 Training Camp Diet
| Daily Intake: 2000 cal | |||||||||
| Meal | Apx Time | Protein(g) | Fat(g) | Carbs(g) | Calories | Descrip | |||
| 1 | 8:00 AM | 23 | 2 | 5 | 130 | Coffee, Whey, 2 Fruits | |||
| 2 | 10:30 AM | 29 | 14 | 41 | 406 | Coffee, Whey, Nut Butter | |||
| Post Wrkt | 1:30 PM | 43 | 14 | 59 | 534 | 6oz Meat, 60g Starchy Carbs, MultiV, Joint Supp | |||
| 4 | 4:00 PM | 45 | 12 | 10 | 328 | 6oz Fish, 2 Vegetables, 2tsp Oil | |||
| 5 | 7:00 PM | 33 | 12 | 10 | 280 | 6oz Meat, 2 Vegetables | |||
| 6 | 10:00 PM | 9 | 20 | 8 | 248 | 40g Nuts | |||
| 182 | 74 | 133 | 1926 | ~ 3 x 20 calories for condiments | |||||
| 728 cal | 666 cal | 532 cal | |||||||
| 37.80% | 35% | 27.60% | |||||||
| Notes: | Supplements: | ||||||||
| 1) First Meal w/in 30 min of Waking | MetRX Natural Whey | ||||||||
| 2) Meal #3 is Post Workout or First of Day | XCAP Natural Mins | ||||||||
| 3) Cinnamon w/ Coffee (insulin sensitivity) | Equate Glucosamine/Chronditin/MSM | ||||||||
| 4) Multivitamin & Joint Guard Post-W | |||||||||
| 5) Cold Shower Post Workout (recovery) | |||||||||
| 6) Hot showers on non-workout days | |||||||||
| 7) One hot bath per week (Relax) | |||||||||
| 8) One Cheat Meal per Week - Sat | |||||||||
| 9) Fruit Jiuce with Cheat Meal, Spicy Meal Prior | |||||||||
| 10) Cheat Meal Replaces Last 2 Meals of Day | |||||||||
Now, this is what is stuck to my refrigerator:
August 2012 Diet
5 x 30g Protein (whey (2), poultry, red meat, fish)
2 x 60g Carbohydrates (Starch)
2 x 20g Carbohydrates (Fruit = < 20g Carbs)
4 x 60-80g Non-Starchy Vegetables
2 x 30g Nuts (nuts, pea/hazelnut/almond butter)
1 Tbsp oil (Smart Balance)
Snacks: Avoid, but < 100 cal OK on occasion
*Keep Sodium Low
*Keep Condiments Minimal
*Supplements: Whey Protein everyday, Joint Guard and Multivitamin on training days
Weekly
*1 Cheat meal that is NOT a buffet
*Large serving of fruit juice with cheat meal (laxative effect)
*Large amount of capsicum (spicy stuff) on cheat day (laxative effect)
As you can see, the principles are essentially the same and I still measure my food in terms of mass (grams) for accuracy. However, the current plan is a much more simplified version and is much less intimidating. It is, as indicative of my current weight and composition, nearly as effective yet much easier to mentally and procedurally digest (pun intended).
If you're curious, I have picked up my training pace to about three days per week of Jiu Jitsu, one or two days of light Yoga, and perhaps one day of Rock Climbing. This is not as intense as it my seem since the Jiu Jitsu days are really the only "hard" training days. The yoga and climbing are more for active recovery aspects. I am not a doctor or nutritionist and my advice is a mere suggestion, not a prescription. The examples provided are taken from procedures I have actually used and were/are specific to my lifestyle and training regimen at the time they're implemented. Nevertheless, hopefully there has been something useful in here for you guys. Thanks for reading!
Train Smart, Live Hard, Be Well!
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