
This week I began the nutrition phase of my Ironman journey. Under the guidance of my trainer at IronCore, I have a plan in place to drop weight before the main training begins in April. The plan is simple, and the foods will vary each week. I am learning about how to weigh food in order to get the exact amounts. Everything is super calculated to make sure I am getting just the right amount of nutrients in a day. Because I do not eat meat, my protein sources are all coming from egg whites (which after 5 days, I'm pretty much over it) and protein drinks. My favorite drink of the day is my Shakeology. It's like a coffee break in the middle of the day. I started with whey protein, but honestly the idea of that much animal product in my diet was making he feel sick so I went to Vitamin Shoppe in Greenville, NC to get a vegan protein powder. I accidentally bought Warrior Blend "Natural" flavor. I honestly thought I was buying vanilla but instead I bought dirt flavored protein powder. I went online and ordered a chocolate flavor by the same company, hoping it tastes better. It not, Im going to seek out another brand.
The hardest part of the plan I have is that I am eating the same thing every day at the same time for a week. The idea is that I am learning about timing, and it makes it easier to shop at the grocery store when I'm just buying a lot of the same thing. Each week the plan will change so I can learn about how things go together and have a batter idea of portion sizes. I have become obsessed with my digital food scale and play games where I try to guess the weight of various objects (my phone, mp3 player, chargers, envelopes, etc.) It sounds silly, but if you had a digital scale, you would feel the same way! One of the things I have to each every day is 200 grams of lettuce. I thought I would do better by changing that to spinach. UNTIL, I realized that spinach weighs next to nothing and that 200 grams of spinach is almost 7 cups. So, pretty much that wasn't going to happen, so I went with a iceberg mix since it weights much more than spinach. If I have that again next week, I think I will add in some spinach to the iceberg lettuce in order to kick up the vitamins a little more. Check out the video below that kind of explains things a little more. I apologize for the length of the video (something like 6 minutes) I started talking to the camera and before I knew it I was like "Damn, I've been talking a while!" Check it out, if you're interested:
Time is flying by this year. It's hard to believe I am one month out from Ironman training. I am determined to make this year better than last year. Many of last years struggles were out of my control, and I know anything can happen this year. So far the year is progressing nicely and shaping into one that will be full of good memories. I appreciate everyone who has an interest in my progress toward my goal of completing at Ironman. This is an exciting (and sometimes terrifying) journey and I am glad I can share it with so many people. Who knows? Maybe one day YOU will be on that start line too! (I can see you sitting back laughing and all I can say is I was in your chair one day)