 We can all benefit from maintaining good eating habits on our easy, rest- days as well as through the hard training days. Don’t fall into the trap of (too often) rewarding yourself with junk food because you “deserve it”. Your body really deserves high quality nutrients, and those rest days should be packed full of nutritious food because you’ll have more time to prepare the good stuff.
Eating high quality food on rest days (lots of fruits and vegetables) will help ensure that your rest day is actually doing what it’s supposed to – repairing muscle and cell damage caused by hard training.
This is especially true after hard races. The craving for junky food is always at its highest after a race, it feels like a reward for accomplishing the task at hand. Yes you crave salt, but try getting it with a V8 instead of potato chips and fries. If you’re diligent about your food intake you can turn those race days in to your best ever training sessions. Good food first, party food later!
Continue reading Eat well on your rest days
 When it comes to having an occasional beer while in training, you probably are not doing yourself any harm. In fact, you could be doing yourself some good!! (as long as you are adequately hydrated). As per an article on www.allaboutbeer.com – If an “average” 12 ounce bottle of beer sported a Nutrition Facts label, this is what it would tell you:
Beer contains 150 calories.
Beer has no fat
Beer has no cholesterol
Beer is caffeine free
Beer contains no nitrate
Beer contains 1 gram of protein and 13 grams of carbohydrates
Beer contains significant amounts of magnesium, selenium, potassium, phosphorus, and biotin
Beer is chock full of the B vitamins (as anyone who has taken brewer’s yeast as a B supplement already knows), with impressive amounts of B3 (niacin), B5 (pantothenic acid), B6 (pyridoxin), and B9 (folate), with smaller amounts of B1 (thiamine), B2 (riboflavin), B12 inotisol and choline.
Beer is 92 percent water
Continue reading Beer and your training
 So the big day is done, you’re feeling sore but satisfied with the way things turned out. Your next step is to get your body recovered and ready to train again. If you’re done for the year, well I guess you could just work your way into the off season and enjoy your free time. But, if you’re looking to race again within a couple months you’d best get going on that recovery. A few things to keep in mind are your need for good calories, your need for fluid, and your need for rest. The good calories are easy, get your fat and salt craving out of the way if you must, but get back on the wholesome food bandwagon as soon as you can. Your body is most likely severly damaged and the only way to bring it around is with good quality nutrients.
Continue reading Ironman Recovery
Quality sleep is one of the most important, yet often neglected, aspects of triathlon training. It is the time where that nasty stress hormone cortisol finally stops getting produced, human growth hormone is released and your body repairs itself. It can definitely be difficult to get enough of the shut eye with work, family [...]
Proper recovery starts as soon as your workout begins. Often we don’t maximise the quality of our training because we haven’t been thoughtful enough in planning our nutrition for the day. As a busy triathlete, having healthy energy bars (Raw Food Bars, Lara bars, VEL bars etc.), bananas, apples, trail mix… stashed away in [...]
 Today’s tip is brought to you by a registered massage therepist, Adrienne Stedford. She runs her practice, Hungry Triathlete, out of Penticton BC and is a therapist for various training camps. If you’re a planning a training trip on the Ironman Canada course – you know who to call.
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Continue reading Massage Tip
 Don’t plan a day off, take it when you need it.
Like we’ve mentioned in several tips, consistency is your best friend when it comes to improvement in triathlon. A great way to ensure consistent training is to avoid planning a regular day off. Let your motivation and fatigue decide that day, not a planned schedule.
There is no reason you can’t train 10 days in a row if you feel like training 10 days in a row. Why settle on Monday as your day off when that day could be a perfect day for a bike ride? This is especially true in the winter or rainy season when weather can interfere with your plans. Don’t pass up the nice day because you have a planned day off (unless you have a coach and he/she says so). If your coach is planning a weekly schedule, then stick to the plan – or at least or be sure to communicate if you simply MUST ride because it’s the first sunny day in a month. If you’re doing your own thing, and feeling good, then it is just fine to train all the time until you really need that day off. Learn to listen to your body and don’t ignore it when you are feeling run down.
Continue reading Triathlon training and taking a day off
 Your feet are a very important but generally neglected part of your body. We may get leg massages but often don’t do a thing to loosen up our feet. Achy heels in the morning can be the initial signs of plantar fasciitis, and you want to do all that you can to avoid that.
First start by walking around in bare feet as much as you can to get all those feet muscles working. Wiggle your toes around while you are eating breakfast, try to move your pinkie toes independently. Roll the underside of your feet out on a golf ball or a full water bottle that has been frozen.
An excellent thing to do after your runs, while your are stretching, is to use toe spreaders (those things that women use to paint their toenails) to separate your toes and help stretch your feet. They feel really odd and rather uncomfortable at first, but they can really help loosen up your whole posterior chain (the fascia that run from the underside of your feet to the top of your head). One exercise is to stand with the toe spreaders on and, with your heels and big toe still on the ground, try to raise your big toe knuckle as high as you can, repeat.
Continue reading Toe spreaders
As much as we’d all like to get a massage from an RMT on a daily basis, it’s obviously not possible. Substituting with your own bout of self massage can really help your recovery and stave off injury. The best type of self massage is a form of acupressure. Find that tight muscle and [...]
A smoothy is the ideal way to supplement your daily nutrition. Great for breakfast or post hard workout. Blend up juicy goodness with fruit and veggies that you may not be able to get down in your otherwise busy day. Make up a large batch and keep half in the fridge. Makes a great [...]
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