Maybe it was the beard...

I had a great long run today. Speed wise, it was one of my best. It was comparable to a couple of long runs I did last spring when I was running my best.

Considering I did 7.5 hours of training yesterday, it made this run all the sweeter. It's amazing the difference a week can make. Taking Monday and Tuesday off due to fatigue, proved to be the right thing to do.

There was a few differences on this run than the past couple. I didn't do the run/walk, I ran it all, and I did it with my week long beard growth while listening to music and not my regular Podcasts. Also my Garmin heart rate monitor finally worked, 95% of the time. I think it was because I had my jacket open. Maybe a closed jacket is the problem?

After the run I made a big mistake. I took a hot Epsom salt bath without eating after my run. I lost more fluid and by the time I got out I was weak and in a mini bonk. It took my 45 minutes of lying on the bed to cool down. Once I had a bowl of cereal and some water I bounced back quickly. Thankfully.

I didn't shave for a week because Reid wanted to see what I'd look like with a beard. The first thing I noticed was I have lots of grey facial hair, which was surprising because I only have about 5 or 6 grey hairs on my head. I also noticed I don't look good in a beard, unless I decide to push a shopping cart around the streets and live in a cardboard box. I told some of the folks at work I was growing it because I wanted to look like G.I. Joe. and I told others I was going into the witness protection program. I'm waiting for Barclay to tell me it's a sign I'm old.

Not a lot to blog about today, except that I'm really trying to eat healthy and lose weight. I've realized my problem is that I don't like hunger pangs. To lose weight you need to overcome the feeling of hunger. If I can get down to 181 lbs before the end of the month, I still be on track to hit my Ironman China goal weight.

Earlier in the month, fellow PFG Johan from Tri-Stemmet left me a comment on the diet plan he follows to lose weight. I thought is was an excellent approach and wanted to include it in today's post.

Here is how I did it and what made me lose plenty of pounds. Don't know if it is 100% correct and maybe a dietitian can help but it worked for me and I haven't fallen over instead I've done a few IM's.

First you need to determine your BMR( Base metabolic rate), that is how many calories you need to maintain(survive) in a day. There is websites that help you determine it. Just google "Determine Base Metabolic Rate"

Mine is 2107 kcal.
Then you need to write down how many calories you burn during your training for the day. No day is the same as some days the training is more intense and longer than others.

For example I've done an one hour bike session in the morning and the calories burned were 818kcal.

In the afternoon I did a one hour run and I burned 841 kcal

so in total I've burned 3766 Kcal for the day.

Now you need to subtract 100 kcal for every hour of training as you used that hour and it is part of the daily BMR. It is not exactly 100 but actually 87 for me but I just use 100 to make it easy.

so the nett total for the day is 3566.

Now I write done all the food I eat during the day and don't exceed 3566 but to lose weight I try to eat between 500-1000 Kcal less than the 3566, thus 2566.

What I do is just after lunch time I add the totals up to see how close I am at my maximum and to see if I need more protein/less fat or more Carbs for snack and dinner time.

Over time I've learned which days are my heavy training days and which are my easy/recovery days and I eat according to that.

Now for Ironman racing you need to eat at a ratio of 60% carbs, 20% protein and 20% fat.

But remember carbs and Protein needs to be divided by 4 and Fat by 9 per gram.

So in my case of the 3566 Calories in a day 60% Carbs is 534.9gram( 3566*60% div by 4). 20% must be Protein 178.3g(3566*20%/4) and 20%must be Fat 79.2g(3566*20%/9). I will then not exceed the above.

I know it looks very complicated but as you learn your body it become so easy and you learn how to determine what to eat on what days very quickly.

Remember Ironman racing has four disciplines and most people only train for three of them(swim/bike/run) and don't train for the fourth(Nutrition)

If you want to qualify for Hawaii you need to train your nutrition also.
As with the other three, some days it really hurts doing them, Nutrition and working out what to eat in a day also hurts some days.

Sorry for the lengthy comment but I needed to share it with you as you need to get your nutrition right when you are training to qualify for Hawaii.

Cheers
J

Long Run - 2:10:10 / 26.49 km / 4:55 pkm / 7:55 p/mile / avg hr 141 / elevation 1969 ft

183.6 / 21.8 bmi