21,000 Calorie Challenge

Today marks the end of the 21,000 calorie a week challenge. Four weeks. Trying to average 3000 calories a day. It was tough. I more or less made my target for 3 of the 4 weeks. My caloric intake went 21,200, 19,470, 20,850 and 21,810.

As mentioned in previous posts, it was much harder than I anticipated. Over the past three weeks, I only ate out once. So that meant a lot of cooking and planning ahead. I feel like there were three areas where I struggled the most.

• Eating calorie rich dinners. I enjoy chicken and seafood. The problem is that a 6 oz piece of tuna doesn't have many calories. It is a great source of protein and fats. Shrimp is the same way. I can eat 2 dozen shrimp but not stock up on calories.
  
• I need to eat larger portions for dinner. The problem is that I feel like I eat enough. I may have a piece of grilled chicken, potatoes, spinach and bread. I feel full. It met my immediate needs. But my dinner needs to be more than 800 calories for me to achieve 3000.
  
• Snacks. More to come on this later. I focused on cheese, nuts, milk and occasionally ice cream. The nuts didn't workout and left me with a 2-300 calorie void.
  

There were a number of positive benefits that came from the challenge as well.

• Protein intake went WAY up. I average approximately 145 grams per day which is where I should be for my body weight.
  
• Smoothies and whey protein helped in a big way.
  
• I know I ate much better than normal. Oddly, I cut out a bunch of crap from the diet. I snacked less around the office.
  
• No eating out. That was amazing. I hope I can continue this trend though it is extremely difficult on the weekend after training.
• Afternoon energy was up a bit more.
  

This was a very enjoyable challenge. I do feel like my diet still needs some more changes as it is not exactly where I want it to be. However, I hope to continue on with a number of these changes.

The most interesting aspect was watching my weight and body fat. The weight slowly came down (163), popped back up (167), bottomed out again (162) and then settled into about where it was before (165). Last week, I had three consecutive days around 162. I do anticipate that after a weekend of traveling, the weight will settle back down to 163. This seems to be the case when I go out of town for an extended period.

The more interesting aspect was my body fat. It started plummeting. And quickly. After four weeks of this challenge, I am down nearly 1.5%. This morning, I weighed in at 7.2%. That was a weight increase but body fat decrease from last week. I suspect this will climb back into the mid to upper 7s by the end of the week.

What do I think of all this? Not really sure just yet. The reason I set out on this was because I thought my body was literally eating itself. I believed it had become inefficient. When I trained, I theorized that my body looked to muscle instead of fat/glycogen storages because of the calorie deficiency. I still maintain that theory. I would go one step further in that I think that is why my body fat is dropping....my body is learning to attack the fat instead of the muscle.

21,000 Calorie FAIL

The past seven days were a colossal failure in my 21,000 calorie challenge. The week, however, does epitomize the struggle I have with my diet. I found myself on the go a bit more than usual. This included traveling to and from Nashville. The failure was further complicated by the fact that Jessica and I have a no eating out contest going on right now. Typically each of my trips would include a stop somewhere to eat. I am sure that would have put me closer to 21,000.

So in my second week of trying, I only hit 19,470 calories. That is a solid 1500 short of where I need to be. Looking at my food log is is very easy to see what went wrong. First, I fell behind in the beginning of the week. Life was busy and I found myself incapable of preparing a solid meal for dinner. Second, traveling really killed me. I all but skipped dinner on Thursday night and ate very little of Friday. Third, when I did eat it wasn't calorie dense food. We cooked ceviche on Saturday night. While great on the protein end, raw fish just doesn't have the calories needed.

The worst part is that my diet was complete crap last week. Too much snacking. With Easter, I think a half of my calories came in the form of ice cream, jelly beans and other candy. That might explain why the weight was slightly up Tuesday morning.

I did much better on the protein front and averaged 138g per day. That is pretty close. And given the limitations of last week, I consider it a moderate success. Overall, I am not noticing any changes. I do find myself a bit hungrier than normal so I take that as a sign that my body is not starving itself for calories any more. I am growing fond of mixed nuts and cheese.

I am determined this week to hit the 21,000 calories. I forced myself to spend $150 at the grocery store the past two days. Last night, in honor of my challenge, I bought some red meat and went to town on some burgers. Protein and calories UP. I also bought some ice cream which should help top me off each night. I will be even more interested to see what happens to my weight over the next week!

21,000 Calories Later

Week one of the 3,000 calories a day challenge is in the books. Wow, that was much harder than I thought. I typically log my calories the next morning but in an effort to reach 3,000, I had to be a bit more proactive at night. For the week, I ate a total 21,200 calories or just over 3,000 per day. My weight was down exactly one pound with my body fat holding steady.

For the first week, I tried to not alter my diet too much. Obviously I was forced to add things to the list but overall I don't think I went out of my way to eat more. I tried to rely on items that would occur naturally in my diet. I ate out about as much as I normal would. I ate the typical portion sizes. Here is what I learned:

• This was harder than I thought it would be. Trying to be proactive on the calorie count, I was consistently hitting about 2600 calories for the day.
• Even harder was getting 150g of protein a day. I tried and I only hit 117 for the week.
  
• Milk, nuts and cheese are my friends. This means planning more snacks during the day. My afternoon snack is cube cheese, almonds, macadamia nuts and cashews. Voila, another solid 3-400 calories.
• Smoothies are a staple. I don't see a way around it. A smoothie for mid-morning snack gives me about 500 calories. Plus, it fills me up!
• Milk before bed. I drink whole milk and a large glass provides me an additional 200 calories before bed. Add chocolate syrup and make it 300 calories. :)
  
• My dinners are still on the light side. Chicken, fish and sushi might be a great source of protein but the calories don't add up. I need more options.
  

What I found most interesting is that I was content at night. This seemed to be about the right about of food...comfortable but not stuffed. Of course, I suppose the real lesson here is that I need to train my body to take in the extra calories. Adding a 500 calories a day to my diet certainly shouldn't leave me hungry but riding 3 hours should.

For the first week, I can't say that I felt any difference in working out. But then again, given that it was post ING and a big week, I probably can assume that the lack of calories would have left me even more sluggish. My body certainly needed all the food to aid in recovery. And I think my body is enjoying all the food.

Moving forward, I am going to make a few subtle adjustments. First, I need to eat bigger dinners. I need more dense food to accompany my meal. I probably need to eat more for breakfast, even if it is just a glass of juice. My focus this week will be not eating out. I would rather devote those expenses to my grocery bill. Finally,

Weight, Body Fat and New Challenge

Too much to blog about and not enough time. I meant to post this blog last week as I ended the magnesium challenge but time once again alluded me. I am still tracking my weight and body fat each and every week. I was reminded to blog about this when I stepped on the scale this morning and saw my weight down significantly (though it is not reflected in the weekly totals).

Yesterday marks the beginning of a new challenge. The timing couldn't be any better for this one as I moved from the base to the build and eventually the peak periods of my training. Training is going up therefore my caloric need is going up. As I mentioned in the past, I frequently track my calories. I am on a good roll right now with nearly 2 months worth of data.

Aside: Tracking your calories is really not that difficult. Most people shy away from it for two reasons. First, they think it is time consuming. The reality is that most of us eat the same foods over and over again. That makes logging it very easy. It takes me approximately 5 minutes each morning to log the previous days food. Second, it forces people to face the reality that their diet is crap. Very true.

One thing that I frequently ponder is if I am fueling my body properly. I never really question if my diet is 'good.' I think I have a moderately healthy diet and don't splurge on snacks. Junk food is very sparse. You won't find it in my home, minus a few remaining girl scout cookies. If anything, my diet isn't diverse enough.

More importantly, I often wonder if I eat enough. Given that I have a very consistent diet, my caloric intake is relatively stable. I wonder if it is too LOW. So this month, I am revisiting the challenge from last summer...to eat more. My goal is to consume close to 3000 calories a day. Gulp. That should put me nearly 21,000 calories for the week. In the past seven weeks, I have only achieved 21,000 calories a week....once. And that was a week of major eating out. That means I need to eat about 2000 calories MORE a week than I typically do.

My hypothesis is that by keeping my caloric intake low, 2000-2300 cal/day, I am starving my body. This prevents it from recovering after a long workout. It also prevents it from preparing for the next workout. If my glycogen stores are not topped off, then my body goes through the fat and carbs as fuel sources too quickly. It then turns to the muscle for fuel...not good. My hope is that by not 'starving' my body, I will actually lose a bit more weight because the body isn't trying to hoard the calories. Counter intuitive? Maybe, but I don't suspect that will be the case.

I actually think this will be a real challenge for me because I like to eat healthy. Most dinners consist of chicken or fish...both great sources of protein but low calorie options. I also don't want the calories to be empty. They need to be natural foods that I would select in ideal situations. That means not splurging on wings and beer. I suspect there will be five staples in this challenge: nuts, cheese, milk, ice cream and peanut butter. I also don't want to cheat by eating out more often.

As a subset of this goal will be my attempt to ingest 140 grams of protein a day. I seriously slack off in this area and often only get about 110 g/day. The adjustments to the diet should aid the protein goal. They will also raise my fat intake which should help will the weight loss challenge.

The timing, as mentioned, is perfect. I will try this for four weeks and see how I feel. That puts me right into my taper for Rev3...an ideal time to cut back the diet. So can someone pass me a smoothie and protein bar?

Nutrition and Body Experiment 1

As the quote says at the top of my blog, I like to test, tweak and alter my body in different ways. I recently discussed tracking my body weight and fat. I have also in the past discussed the different 'diet' methods employed to achieve maximization. Of course, I facetiously use the word diet because my first few experiments included ice cream, peanut butter and chocolate syrup. At least I enjoyed it.

This year, I am letting my body be Jessica's guinea pig as she explores different nutritional theories that impact the body...particularly endurance athletes. The idea is that each month, I will try something new with my diet. I will monitor how I am feeling mentally and physically. Ideally, I will see improvements but they may come in the subtle form of minor body composition adjustments, reduction in inflammation and fatigue or sleeping better at night. I enter each new challenge with a bit of skepticism and fear about what the changes might mean for my body and training.

Experiment #1: Increase the level of magnesium in my body.

From a NYT Health article:

• Magnesium is readily available in foods that form the basis of a healthful diet -- whole grains, fruits, dark-green leafy vegetables and nuts. But the highly processed foods that most Americans live on are sorely lacking in the mineral. The latest national studies found that as many as three-fourths of Americans do not consume enough to avoid the adverse effects associated with chronic magnesium deficiency.
  

From NIH

• Magnesium also helps regulate blood sugar levels, promotes normal blood pressure, and is known to be involved in energy metabolism and protein synthesis

From Jessica

• Magnesium levels are related to levels of a hormone called adiponectin. As magnesium goes up, so adiponectin goes up. This is important because adiponectin has an INVERSE relationship to body fat: as adiponectin goes UP, body fat levels go DOWN. This is also why an optimal magnesium level in the body reduces the risk of Metabolic Disorder and Type 2 Diabetes. Magnesium is also helps with stress, relaxes muscles, helps with sleep and restless legs, reduces blood pressure, and is necessary to carry out the metabolic functions of cells.

I started this process four weeks ago. I began using a product called Natural Calm. It is a flavored powder that dissolves in hot water. I began with just 1/2 teaspoon a day and worked my way up to 1.5 teaspoons.

I can't say that I have seen any significant improvement. My biggest complaint is that it changed the way my body processes food and made me a bit irregular. I have not experienced a weight or body fat loss. Those figures are still holding steady. I can't say for certain that I am less sore as there are too many variables in that equation. I will say that I am a bit more focused than normal. I suspect that despite the adjustment to my schedule, I am slightly more energetic as a result. I am definitely sleeping well right now but that may be related to going to bed earlier and focusing on recovery.

In the end, I don't know that I experienced an significant benefits from taking the extra magnesium. With ING this week, I am discontinuing my dosage so that I don't suffer from any GI issues Sunday. At this point, I don't know if I will go back onto the Mg. Of course, that might all change if I start feeling the subtle signs of fatigue, etc.

I am more excited about my next challenge...I get to eat a lot!!!