“I hate holidays like Thanksgiving … there’s so much food and all I do is eat too much,” complained one of my clients. Clearly, she was missing the point of the holiday! I encouraged her to put more focus on the PEOPLE and not the food.  Yes, she would have the opportunity to enjoy a nice meal, but she could also enjoy the companionship of family and friends. By putting food on the bottom of the priority list, she might find that she could better enjoy the holiday.

If you are fretting about calories, remember that overeating on Thanksgiving is normal; it is not bad or wrong. Even “normal eaters” overeat, as do dieters and binge eaters. One extra-large meal will not ruin your life forever! And, if you pay attention to your hunger signals, you’ll discover the day after Thanksgiving you will not be very hungry; you will naturally choose to eat less (without enforcing a starvation diet).

I hope you have a nice holiday, find a few minutes to count your blessings (rather than count calories), and are able to be thankful for having a healthy body that allows you to enjoy an active lifestyle.

Nancy

Hi Nancy,

I have a question about getting calcium from foods vs pills.

I’ve been a lacto-octo vegetarian for about 30 years and I’m a big soy milk drinker. You say calcium-fortified soy milk is a good source of calcium. I don’t see much difference between getting the calcium from the soy milk or from a pill, because the soy milk has had a calcium pill dissolved in it to make it “fortified”. What’s the difference?

Hi Paul,

There's not much of a difference in terms of calcium. But when you get the calcium via soy milk, you at least get the protein and a myriad of other good nutrients along with the calcium. If you just take the pill, you might “forget” to drink the soy milk and you'll miss out on all the good stuff it offers--including high quality protein that vegetarians might not get otherwise.

As you know, eating whole foods is always preferable to taking supplements; so many bioactive compounds are in foods that are not in pills. Supplementing a whole food can further boost the health value.

Enjoy your fortified soy milk!

Nancy

For more information about calcium, protein and supplements:

Nancy Clark's Sports Nutrition Guidebook, Chapters 1. 7 and 11

http://www.nancyclarkrd.com

Yes! Despite popular belief, eating a fruit- or grain-based snack, such as an energy bar, banana, handful of pretzels, or an apple, just 5 minutes before a workout can boost your energy at the end of the session. Research also suggests that eating 15 minutes before you exercise is as effective for boosting your energy as eating an hour before.

Your body can digest food while you exercise. Your muscles get to use the food to enhance your workout, as long as you are exercising at a pace that you can maintain for more than half an hour. Most athletes train at a moderate pace, hence they can benefit from a pre-exercise energy booster. If you’ll be doing a sprint workout, you might want to eat an hour or two pre-exercise, so the food has time to empty from your stomach.

Your best bet is to experiment with different pre-exercise snacks, to determine when you can eat them without causing distress, and which ones settle best and help you perform at your best.

Having a drink of water right before exercise is also a smart idea, even if you will be exercising for less than an hour. Water is also helpful during exercise. Water can turn into sweat In only 10 minutes (in trained athletes). Ingested fluid moves rapidly, so don’t hesitate to keep drinking even towards the end of your workout.

Be wise, fuel well, and enjoy your high energy

Nancy Clark MS RD CSSD

  http://www.nancyclarkrd.com

Almonds—and all nuts, for that matter—are a positive addition to a sports diet according to research presented at this year’s annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine. For four weeks, elite cyclists enjoyed about 60 almonds a day (~450 calories) prior to meals. They increased their anti-oxidant capacity 43% after a time trial as compared to the group who ate an equal number of calories from cookies. They also improved their time trial distance by 5% compared to the cookie group. The bottom line message is: Food Works!!!

Too often I talk with athletes who are on the “see food” diet. They see food and they eat it. They pay no attention to the quality of the calories, but just to the pleasure. While eating whatever you want may seem a nice reward for hard workouts, the reality is food has a strong impact on both health and performance. The trick is to find quality foods that you totally enjoy. Almonds, anyone? Better yet, slivered almonds mixed with (dried) fruits (apricots, blueberries, pineapple, etc.) and yogurt for a protein-carb combination that both fuels and builds muscles.

Eat wisely and well!

We are all familiar with unfit couch potatoes … the sedentary folks who sit all day and shudder at the thought of doing purposeful exercise. Yet, few athletes recognize they may also be couch potatoes—apart from the time they spend exercising. Think about it. The average “active” person:

Sits at breakfast

Drives to work

Sits at work

Takes the elevator to the lunch cafeteria

Sits at lunch

Takes the elevator back to work

Sits at work

Drives to the gym

Exercises for 45 to 60 minutes

Drives home

Sits at dinner

Sits in front of the TV or computer

Sound familiar? Even if you consider yourself “athletic”, you likely spend the majority of your day sitting! We no longer get built-in exercise by opening the garage door, rolling down the car window, climbing stairs, walking down the hall to ask a question to a colleague (email is easier), etc., etc..  You get the picture.

We have engineered activity out of our lifestyle. For many of us, the only movement we get in a day is when we do purposeful exercise. According to Neville Owen, speaker at the American College of Sports Medicine’s Annual Meeting (Seattle, May 2009), the average person sits 9.3 hours a day. This high amount of inactivity is bad for our health, even if we are physically fit.

Owen reports the more a person sits, the higher the risk of mortality. Hence, we not only need to find time to exercise, we also need to find time to not sit – such as by standing up when talking on the phone or answering emails (raise your computer by putting it on a cardboard box that you keep under your desk), and biking to work. We can even go back in time and hang laundry out to dry (instead of use the clothes dryer)!  I invite you to be creative, and figure out how to move your body in ways that have purpose and meaning. Your health and waistline will be glad you did.

Nancy Clark

Chocolate milk is an excellent recovery choice. After a hard workout, your muscles want carbs to refuel and high quality protein to build and heal. Rather than buy an expensive engineered sports food, enjoy a tall glass of low fat chocolate milk (or any flavored milk, for that matter).

In a study with cyclists who:

--depleted their muscles during an exhaustive bike ride, and then

--refueled with equal amounts of carbs in chocolate milk or a commercial recovery drink,

--then the next day did a time trial,

the cyclists gained no performance benefits from the commercial drink.

The bottom line: Save your money—and also nourish your body with a whole food that offers far more life-sustaining nutritional value than just carbs and protein. Likely tastes better, too!

Nancy

Q. I recently bought a really good scale and I weigh myself every morning. Some days, when I think I should have lost weight, the scale says I gained two pounds. How could that happen? What’s going on..?

A. The scale weighs not just changes in body fat, but also changes in body water and intestinal content. Hence, body weight generally fluctuates one or two pounds daily (depending on if you are constipated, have diarrhea, ate a salty meal that retains water, are bloated pre-menstrually, etc.).

Do not expect your body to consistently weigh, let’s say, 120 pounds but rather vary within a range between 118 and 122 pounds. Many factors affect water-weight. These include:

• hormonal shifts that occur not only premenstrually, but also if you are stressed or over-tired.

• salty foods, such a Chinese dinner or a bag of popcorn.

• hot weather or a hot environment.

• overeating carbohydrates.

When you overeat carbohydrate (pretzels, cookies, frozen yogurt, raisins, bagels, pasta, etc.), you store about three ounces of water along with every ounce of carbohydrate in your muscles. Water weight quickly comes, and quickly goes. It is not permanent. It is not body fat. You should not let this normal fluctuation depress your mood for the day.

Rather than weigh yourself every morning, I suggest you weigh yourself only once a weekor better yet, not at all! The scale rarely tells you anything you do not already know. If you feel thinner, if your clothes are looser, and if people are even commenting that you look leaner, then you have lost body fatdespite the number on the scale.

Rather than starting each day by weighing yourself, how about starting each day by smiling at yourself in the mirror and appreciating your body for all the wonderful things it does to help you live a fulfilling life? That sounds more fruitful to me!

Nancy Clark, MS RD CSSD

Sarah, a 45 year old fitness exerciser, office manager and mother of two hungry teenage athletes, complained about cookie temptations. “I feel surrounded by my kids’ cookies; this makes it hard for me to lose weight. I inevitably end up eating as many as they do….”

When you are tired, stressed and surrounded by cookies (or other treats), the challenge of moderating your food intake increases. I suggest Sarah ask her kids for their support by keeping their snacks out of sight, such as in a cupboard, instead of on the kitchen counter, or in a ceramic cookie jar, rather than a see-through plastic container. She could also ask her kids to not eat cookies in front of her. As the saying goes: Out of sight, out of mind!

Some weight-conscious parents stop buying cookies altogether, believing their kids get plenty of sweets and treats outside of the home. You can discuss this option with your children, but recognize this approach fails to teach you how to come to peace with cookies. Will you simply binge-eat cookies the next time they do wander into your sight? (You know, “Last change to eat cookies, so I’d better eat them all now…!!!”)

The alternative is to allow yourself to eat one or two cookies every day at lunch or snack as a part of your calorie budget. This way, you do not feel denied or deprived, nor have you over-indulged. By planning this treat into your food plan, you may be better able to eat just one cookie at lunch--instead of the whole bag at night. Ultimately, fiding peace with cookies is more effective than taking them out of your diet.

If you need help with healthfully integrating cookies and treats into your food plan, consult with a sports dietitian. The referral network at www.SCANdpg.org can help you find a local expert.

Nancy Clark MS RD CSSD

Certified Specialist in Sports Dietetics