Today, as I trained my clients, not one session went by without talk about The Diet.
Yes, Michael Phelps‘ diet. I’ll refrain from passing judgment and try to talk about it from an athlete’s POV, as I feel news articles are sensationalizing Phelps - “What a freak.”
The question. “How can he eat all that and still look like this?”
The skinny bastard.
First, the info:
Now, the play by play:
Phelps is 6′4″, 195 lbs. He’s an Olympic-level athlete engaged in roughly 5 hours of rigorous swim training, as well as strength training. And he’s 23.
Using the Harris-Benedict Equation, we get a daily expenditure of 3971 Calories. Shows how limited prediction equations are.
Calculating Phelps’ BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), we get 2089.65 Calories (per day). Add in the estimated expenditure from swimming and strength training (5100) and we come up with an estimated total of 7189.65 Calories per day.
That’s impressive, but it’s still not 8000-10000 Calories. So where do the extra thousand or so Calories go?
The X factors:
Lean mass - The prediction equations I used do not account for Phelps’ lean mass (read: muscle) which burns calories all on its own. You could argue that this accounts for an extra couple hundred Calories per day.
Thermogenesis - Not insignificantly, the food Phelps eats requires energy in order to be broken down and digested. Thermogenesis is estimated to contribute as much as 10% to metabolic rate. If Phelps really is downing 8000-10000 Calories a day, then his digestive system is working overtime to process that food. This could also throw a few hundred Calories into the mix.
Age - Phelps is young (and insulin sensitive). Metabolic rate slows as we age; conversely, we can expect metabolic rate to be higher in younger folks. Being insulin-sensitive helps drive those ingested calories to muscle cells (for use as energy) rather than to fat cells (to be stored for future use). So the food Phelps eats is used immediately (whereas ’tis not so in your average American Olympics viewer).
Reality - The realistic scenario is that Phelps isn’t really eating 8000 Calories everyday, and if we use food logs of athletes as evidence, this bears out. It’s possible that he eats 8000-10000 in a single day occasionally, but that his actual daily intake averages out somewhat lower (say, 6000 Calories or so). So, perhaps, one day he has 5500 Calories; the next 9798 Calories; the next, 6211 Calories, etc.
A final note: Some clients expressed shock and horror at the thought of an Olympic athlete eating pizza and pasta (especially after being told to avoid grains, etc.). My response: Phelps would not be physically capable of downing 8000-10000 Calories a day without the hunger-attenuating qualities of the carbs to aid him. It is precisely because he eats refined carbohydrates that he is able to put away that many calories.
Here’s an experiment: Get together 8000 Calories’ worth of sweet potatoes, avocados, chicken, eggs, and leafy greens. Put it in a big pile in front of you, set a timer to 24 hours, and make that pile disappear before the timer goes off.
Ready, set, go! Good luck.
(Actually, the timer should probably be set to 16-18 hours, since I’m sure Phelps sleeps a little.)
The moral? Phelps definitely expends tremendous amounts of energy daily, so much so that if he doesn’t eat an obscene volume of food, he actually loses weight. And in order to maintain that intake level, he resorts to eating from some admittedly crappy energy sources. Ironically, those same crappy foods enable him to eat the volume of food he requires.
O harmonious universe, how you taunt us!
Not to worry, all. Check back with Mr. Phelps in about 20 years or so - I suspect his caloric intake will be much different.
Olympics time is a great time to point out the obvious, which is that world-class athletes make things look easy, even when things aren’t. In fact, you could argue that the very definition of a world-class athlete is one who makes the impossible (or the incredible) look easy.
This makes sense if you understand sport. Sport is an expression of human movement. And more often than not, it’s not merely the effort you put into a movement - it’s the efficiency and biomechanical “sound-ness” of the athlete’s movement. After all, there’s got to be a “best way” to propel yourself through the water. There’s got to be a “most efficient method” to lift that weight over your head.
These movements are considered the fundamentals of that given sport. What’s true is that every discipline, whether it be baking or judo, has certain fundamental theories, concepts, and executables at its core - and the top exponents of those disciplines are masters of the basics. They’ve spent years and years at perfecting the basics, so that to a champion judoka, executing drop seoi nage is as natural as breathing.
Take a cue from the champs and focus on your basics:
“I discovered a lucky secret the hard way about thirty years ago: you can outlast the other guys if you try. If you stick at stuff that bores them, it accrues. Drip, drip, drip you win.”
My old training partner Gary used to sum it up similarly: “You get good by doing the boring s–t.”
Don’t clutter your routine or make your nutrition overly complex. Just commit yourself to the basics, consistently, over time.
Over the next few posts, I’ll hash out a program template for a rank beginner, someone just looking to lose a little weight, feel better, and get healthier. Then I’ll get to the skribit topics. Promise.
The story? Move over steroids: Viagra is the new performance superdrug. The NY Daily News alleges that Viagra improves nutrient delivery (when taken alongside other performance enhancers) and improves endurance.
The science: Sildenafil (the scientific name for Viagra), has been shown to be a performance enhancer at high altitudes. Pubmed lists 3 studies that show sildenafil’s endurance-enhancing effects. As to the claims that it improves nutrient delivery?
Nitric Oxide (NO2) plays a major role in vasodilation (relaxation and widening of blood vessels) and is believed be a primary factor in arteriosclerosis and heart disease. Sildenafil works as an NO2 enhancer, relaxing blood vessels in the penis and allowing for increased bloodflow.
So the logic goes, increasing bloodflow into muscle tissue should translate into increased nutrient transport into muscle, although I’m not aware of any science showing this to be the case.
It’s worth noting that the hottest (legal) supplements for bodybuilding are NO2 formulations - which provide the user with a greater sensation of muscle pump when consumed before the workout.
The Daily News article quotes Dr. Michael Dusa:
“That may be why these guys started using it in the first place…I suspect they started taking it for impotence and found that it had other benefits, too, but bodybuilders are not the kind of guys who will admit impotence.”
Bingo. An athlete who’s overreaching/overtraining or a bodybuilder on a severely calorie restricted diet will have markedly blunted testosterone levels, and may need a little “pharmacological boost.”
Sorry; without the hard evidence (no pun intended) to back up the claims, I’m not convinced that the IOC should add Viagra to its banned substance list for Beijing. Now, if the Olympics were being held in the Andes…
That’s right; hold yourself to your progress. What I’m asking you to do is to test yourself. Not in the Marines’ “Everyday you don’t test yourself is a day wasted sir!” way, but by performing a workout that tests your current ability against your past ability.
The athletes reading this post are all slapping their foreheads and saying, “Of course! How obvious.” But for those of us whose lives aren’t under such close scrutiny (”8:15am? Time for your 500mg of bee pollen!”), benchmarking performance isn’t intuitive.
Of course, benchmarking makes sense if you think about it. Perform x amount of work for x length of time, and you have the formula for prescribable, progressable, and scalable exercise. Want to improve? Simple; increase your power output (i.e., increase the amount of work done, the length of time, or both). Every single exercise program that gets results has this simple formula at its core. Sure, you can lift more in the Lateral Raise now than two years ago (at least, I hope so), when you started. But how does that really compare? And is there a way to look at the whole picture instead of parts of the whole?
Using a benchmarking workout is probably the best way to compare the current you with prior, lesser versions of yourself. While a benchmarking workout can be many things, I’ll loosely define it here as any workout with fixed parameters that allow for infinite progression.
Crossfit’s “Cindy” WOD is a great example of a benchmarking workout. The parameters are fixed and simple:
One round = 5 Pull-ups, 10 Push-ups, 15 Squats; As many rounds as possible in 20 min.
In May, you perform Cindy and only get 10 rounds in. Then, you train for two months, and curious, you try another Cindy. If you get more than 10 rounds, congratulations; you’ve improved, and you can show it in a measurable and definable way.
Of course, metabolic conditioning may not be your cup of tea; perhaps pure strength is your thing. Your benchmark workout might be your 5 RM (the maximum weight you can lift for 5 reps) of Leg Press, Bench Press, and Bent-Over Row. You can imagine how easy benchmarking is if you’re involved in a sport (times, rounds, serves, punches, etc.). And fat loss? The only metric worth caring about - total body fat, however you choose to measure it.
If you’ve not done so before, or if you’re looking for a tool to help you restart your motivation, give benchmarking a try. Create (or find) a workout that you can set a baseline with. Train for a little while, then test yourself again.
What’s most instructive about Scott’s post is the notion of a “controlled-carbohydrate” diet for athletes (particularly those involved in high-effort activities) vs. a traditional ketogenic diet.
(Now, I (being a geek of sorts) enjoy labeling and compartmentalizing things, so realize that none of the following bullet points are going to be on the exam and that you may skip down to the rest of the discourse )
A controlled-carbohydrate diet involves curtailing carbohydrate intake except for “refuel meals” immediately following exercise bouts. Carb intake on this kind of diet tends to be under 120 grams of carbs daily.
A Paleo-style diet involves not eating foods that Paleolithic Man didn’t eat. Nothing processed; no dairy; no sweeteners (except honey); no grains; limited starches. By its very nature, it tends to be a low/controlled carb diet, since very few pure carbohydrate foods (save leafy vegetables and seasonally available fruit) can be eaten without in their natural state (i.e., without processing).
A low-carb (or ketogenic) diet is one where carb intake is under 60 grams daily.
Scott, a recreational athlete himself, reveals that he ingests roughly 100-120g of carbs a day to help fuel his workouts. This is interesting and parallels my own experience (namely, “needing” to eat more carbs to recover properly from jiujitsu). However, Scott’s thoughts on “carbing up” by eating “real foods” like sweet potatoes, squashes, and fruit as opposed to grains is valuable (and a concept explored in Paleo Diet for Athletes, where athletes are encouraged to copiously refuel glycogen stores in the meals immediately following exercise bouts).
This selection from the blog post sums it up nicely:
“My version of a carb load entails adding in a sweet potato after one of my more grueling workouts, but beyond that, I figure that my normal carbohydrate intake* will refill my muscles before the next rough workout.”
*my note: Scott’s normal carbohydrate intake involves a lot of green stuff. Here’s a pic of one of his typical meals.
Bottom line: Lay off the pasta before race day. Eat real food (and some fat) instead.
The 
Benchmark yourself.
