Racing Weight

Source: Barnes & Noble
The last two weeks I've been living the life of my former self. I've been loving it and actually not loving it. I love the no pressure to workout or schedule time for workouts, but I feel fat. I don't mean that in a degrading way, but I mean that in a I want to move way!

I gave myself a 2-week deadline to just relax. To decompress. To take in the last five months of training for the half marathon and to figure out what went so terribly wrong.

I figured out a big problem was the way I have fueled myself. An online running friend suggested reading Racing Weight by Matt Fitzgerald. I sort of hosed myself because a couple of months ago I actually bought the "quick start" book that was a supplement to the main book. It basically said losing weight during training isn't the way to go. It's downright impossible, and boy, he was right.

So I took the time to read the main book and  I loved it! I see that what I ate for the past five months was the absolute opposite of what I should have been eating.

The book gives you various strategies on how to reach your "racing weight." Now this is not the same as your goal weight for a bikini or even a goal weight for weight loss. This is how to get to your weight that is good for endurance sports to help you through the event and your recovery afterwards.

Well people, this is what I have been searching for. And well people, it's actually not rocket science.

Imagine a diet of fruits/vegetables/quality meat/chicken/some dairy/water and more water. Yep, that's the diet we ALL should be eating anyways.

But there are specific foods he lists that are beneficial to training. And this I loved, he gives you the ACTUAL meals on a training day for various athletes. Runners, cyclists, swimmers, triathletes are all in there.

It seems that if a food comes from the ground or from a plant, it's fair game. If it comes from a box it's not. With the exception of what I assume are their race sponsored-products like gels and drinks.

Matt also makes a BIG distinction between starving yourself and eating a well-balanced diet for athletes. I admit I have had the misconception that if I don't eat, I won't gain weight and thus would be a "better runner."

Wrong. It actually makes your running worse. He gives specific examples of certain ironman/runners who starved and ended up with poor performances.

The book does give you a formula to try to find your racing weight, but he says it really depends on your actual races and performances. You compare past ones to ones you've trained for while using the tips in the book.

So there we have it. I'm going to try to "eat clean" as all the healthy living bloggers say and hope that my race in December will go a lot smoother than the one I just ran.

Don't worry, I won't make the blog all about my training for the next race. I will have a few posts here and there about the training plan I'll use and my workouts because I know a few runners read my blog. But I won't bore you with day-to-day details about the training.

Are you training for anything right now? Are you trying to lose weight?