Monday, August 22, 2011

Nutrition...

So, I have been feeling great with all this training lately.  I have been watching the Saturday night booze (see previous post) and trying to get enough sleep.  Still - I have been gaining a couple LBs.  Truthfully, I had also been trying to watch what I eat - but was not afraid to reward myself with one (sometimes even two) McFlurrys after a tough workout.  McDonald's has Rolo McFlurrys this season and they are pretty much amazing.

Anyways - I sought out some recommendations for a nutritionist and ended up scheduling an appt. with a guy here in Columbus who did some nutrition counseling for a pro triathlete - but his day to day role is more focused on strength training for high school athletes.  I had to blow into a tube for 20 minutes to evaluate my base metabolic rate (which is how many calories your body would burn if you sat on the couch all day).  My base rate was 2100 (yipee!).  Then, he calculated roughly 15 hours of physical activity each week into the formula and determined that I need to consume 3750 calories PER DAY to fuel my body.  Wowzer.

Here is the skinny.  I can pretty much eat what ever the heck I want, as long as it is "clean" food.  No preservatives, no processing, no added sugar...you get where I am going with this.  The grocery bills are ginormous.  I have been eating tubs of Greek Yogurt as opposed to a individual serving cups.  We buy family size bags of almonds, and I eat the whole thing in three days.  And what do you know - I am down 7 lbs from 5 weeks ago.  Amazing.  Don't get me wrong, the no sugar thing is killing me.  I haven't had a McFlurry in weeks and I dream about them.  Other than that - it has been fun to eat all day and watch your co-workers give you weird looks when you open up yet another Cliff Bar and it isn't even 10:00 AM yet.


This has actually been a ton of fun - learning about nutrition, researching injury prevention stuff, buying all this new workout clothes.  But I have got to reign it in a little.  I will update my spending spreadsheet soon - but I am scared.  It is not going to be pretty.....

Margaret:)