9 myles - 1.05:02

Lone Tree Loop - 9 AM

30s, clear, dry

mind/body - not working for me today

easy effort

Very uncomfortable run this morning, not sure why since the body and mind are rested. Guess that's just how it goes sometimes. I also had a strange twinge in my calf that hurt all day but now is fine. Just the creaks of getting old huh?

I finally watched Super Size me. Wow! What a good reminder of how bad we eat here in the United States. This guy put on 17.5 lbs in 30 days with 10 of that coming in the first week. Which means the body stored as much as it could initially to preserve itself and then leveled out and adjusted to the calories coming in, ~5000/day. Also he found himself depressed most of the time and the only time he was happy was right after a meal, which made him want to eat more Micky-Ds. On top of all that his cholesterol shot straight through the roof, chest pain, and a fatty liver. Make no mistake about what is happening here in the U.S. with very powerful lobbyist in Washington protecting fast food. Things are NOT going to change unless YOU decide to boycott chains like Micky-Ds.

See if you can set a New Years resolution of not eating the big four: Mickey-Ds, Burger King, Wendy's, and Jack in the Box. Save your calories for beer....

8 myles - 1.14:07

Treadmill - 3:00 P.M.
bunch of new snow, cold, windy
mind/body - positive/not sore
easy effort

Prescribed workout: 60+ minutes - easy/steady pace

Actual workout: 8 myles 1.14:07 - 9:15 avg. - more of an easy pace. Walked the first mile @ 4 MPH

Surprisingly, I was not sore - stiff - but not sore. I just thought I'd get on the treadmill to give the legs a spin. Just walked the first mile at a pretty quick pace then bumped up to 7 MPH for the majority of the time. I'll take tomorrow off and then jump into more speed work.

On another note, the Pearl Izumi-Smith team website/blog is taking form. Rather than posting my sporadic nutrition posts on my training blog I thought it would be best suited over there. Starting next week when the site is fully operational you'll see the first of, hopefully, monthly posts on nutrition tips for training and racing as well as facts about proper nutrition in general.

Serving Size

I must admit this is a very untimely post since we just finished the day long pig out known as Thanksgiving. It's no secret that American's have healthy appetites but it's probably due to the healthy serving sizes we give ourselves every meal and not even know it. Hopefully some of you find this helpful as we wrap up the eating season and eventually help with good eating habits.

In the two previous posts for the Nutritional Facts label I went over carbohydrate/sugar ratio in which sugar should account for less than 50% of total carbs. Then I followed it up with good fat/bad fat in which 20% of calories should come from fat and of that no more than 20% saturated fat. So far the example label has lived up to a pretty good food coming in with 16% sugars from total carbs. and only 3 grams of saturated fat. But the caveat here is "per serving".



All nutritional facts labels are set up on serving sizes. You'll notice in this label the serving size is 1 cup but there are two (2) servings per container. That basically means if you eat the entire container you have to double all the numbers listed on the Nutritional Facts label. The ratios don't change - meaning that the sugar/carb ratio is still good but your consuming twice as much sugar as you once thought. Now for the entire container instead of a measly 3 grams of sat. fat, you have doubled it and almost reached your limit of 11 grams per day. Having said that, Mac n cheese is still a pretty good food but in very small quantities.

Have you ever spent a day measuring all your food to correspond to the appropriate number of servings per day? Do you know what 4 oz of chicken looks like? How 'bout 1 ounce of cereal? Well it happens to be that 4 oz of chicken gives you one serving of the meat group and 1 ounce of cereal is one serving of bread group. I have spent an entire week measuring my food and to be quite honest I was shocked at how much I was actually eating. Granted I burn a ton of calories running and really shouldn't be skimping but if you're one that wants to lose weight then you better know what and how much you're eating.

I recommend two things if you want to eat healthy and/or lose weight: 1. Take one day out of your life and measure all your food to know what serving sizes look like and 2. Go to this website to find out what the appropriate number of servings for each food group is for you. It really does vary from person to person and is dictated by the different lifestyles we lead.

So in summary of all the Nutritional Facts label look for 3 things: Fat/saturated fat content keeping saturated fat to less than 20% of total fat. Next look at the sugar/carbohydrate ratio and make sure sugars account for less than 50% of all carbohydrates (measured in grams). And last look at the serving size and the amount of servings per container. Obviously there are other things on the label you need to look for, particularly if you have a medical condition, such as sodium for hypertension or fiber for diverticulitis. The main point is know what you're eating.

Thanks for reading

Good fat, bad fat

In keeping with the nutritional facts theme, my goal is to review the entire nutritional facts label so that each of you are able to look at foods and determine if it's a healthy food or not. Last week I reviewed the carbohydrate to sugar ratio, this week I will review fats.

Despite what you might think there are types of fat that are good for you and happen to be necessary for healthy nutrition. They key is finding the good fat in the right proportion and staying away from the bad fat - for the most part.

Here's the label again. Last week I said that as far as carbohydrates and sugars are concerned mac n cheese is a good food. Sugars should be less than 50% of total carbohydrates -16% in this case. Now let's see if mac n cheese lives up to the bill as a good food as far as fat is concerned.



There are many types of fats but the FDA only requires the manufacturer to list total fat, saturated fats, and trans fat. Recent tables indicate that if you consume a 2500 calorie diet/day then about 20% of the calories should come from all fat, which turns out to be 55 grams (500 calories) of total fat. Of that 55 grams, saturated fat should make up no more than 20%/day - around 11 grams. So as it turns out mac n cheese fits the bill as a good food for fat as well - 2 for 2. But there's a catch that I'll discuss in subsequent posts.

Total fat includes: saturated, unsaturated, monounsaturated, trans, polyunsaturated, omega 3, 6, 9, and hydrogenated fats. Without going into the chemistry, all you need to know is that it's harder for our bodies to break down saturated, hydrogenated, and trans fat - i.e. it takes more energy to break them down and are more easily stored in the adipose tissue for easy weight gain. Make sense?

For this one food item of mac n cheese the total fat is 12 grams with 3 grams (~20%) coming from saturated fat - pretty good ratio. Try to keep each and every food item to less than 20% saturated fat and the whole day should workout to less than 20%. The trick is to keep the total fat around 55 grams/day.

I often look at fat content because as an endurance athlete a high fat diet may be deleterious to performance, fat may replace carbohydrate for the fuel source, and fat has caused me gastrointestinal distress before. Not only that but high fat diets can cause heart disease and high cholesterol. As an athlete your body needs quick energy and the best source for that is carbohydrates. Even though fat contains more energy, it takes longer for the body to breakdown fat and that doesn't work when your in the middle of a workout or race. The longer the event, the more likely you should include a fat source.

• Sources of food with a little bit of good fat include: veggies, fruits, beans, natural whole grain products
• Sources of food with high good fat include: nuts, seeds, and avocados
• Sources of food with high BAD fat include: whole milk, cheese, candy, desserts, crackers, and potato chips.

So in summary, keep your fat intake around 20%/day with less than 20% of that coming from saturated fat. Good fats: monounsaturated, polyunsaturated, omega 3, 6, 9. Bad fats: saturated, trans, and hydrogenated. Hydrogenated is usually lumped in with saturated but look for both terms. And last, don't eliminate fats altogether because most of our major organs need them as an energy source.

This kid knows good nutrition!

Don't always believe what you read

This is the first in a series of posts dealing with nutrition. Nutrition labels can be very misleading and very tricky to understand what you're really eating. This week I'll focus in on carbohydrates and sugars.

Here's a prime example of a label being misleading "always Fat Free". Is that true? Technically yes but what they're not telling you is that this form of sugar is stored in adipose tissue (fat) if not expended.

Each of us have what is known as carbohydrate craving and is determined by energy expenditure and metabolism; i.e. if you exercise more it's higher. Endurance athletes have the luxury of not only having a high energy expenditure but also a high metabolism so most of this energy never makes it to the adipose tissue.... unless you eat a lot of it!

Candy is considered empty calories, meaning they offer no nutritional value. To top it off the sugar that candy, soda, and most anything sweet that is processed comes from High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS). I'm not going to go into detail about how this "chemical" is produced, if you want to know more you can read here. Just know that it's not natural and there are a lot of chemicals involved to make this product. But having said that if I were to choose a "lesser evil" candy then it would be Red Vines as a "treat".


When looking at nutritional facts the one thing I focus on is the percent of sugar grams contributing to the total grams in carbohydrates. If 100% of the sugars grams account for all the carbohydrates then the carbohydrates are all sugar; as in most candy and pop.

Ideally in all foods with nutrition facts the rule of thumb is to have no more than 50% of the grams of carbohydrates coming from sugar. It requires a bit of calculation but it's easy math so don't fret. In this example of macaroni and cheese 16% of the of the "Total Carbohydrate" are coming from sugar - that part is good. Does it mean that Mac and cheese is a good food? Not entirely!

In the coming posts I will go into the other parts of this label so you get a full understanding of the nutrition facts.


So in summary: don't always believe what you read, know what you're eating, keep the percent of sugar grams to 50% or less, and keep your treats to being only a "treat".