Will Run For Food

January 15, 2009

Will Run For Food

By Danny Mackey M.S.

I hope everyone enjoyed the downtime from training, racing and had fun with their friends and family over the Holidays. Now that we are getting back into the routine of work and school, most of us look at 2009 and set performance goals. If you are anything like me, the Holidays put a little damper on starting 2009 “fit”. Personally, after a very frustrating 2 years, I began to come around slightly in November and December so I wanted to carry this through to January (as most of us want to). But, the endless amount of food and drink caused me to put on most of the weight I fought so hard to loss in the fall. The runner mentality is to starve yourself and just lose the pounds as quickly as you put it on, but that’s not ideal.

So that’s what we will look at in this article; nutrition. Specifically, I will talk about nutrition after we exercise.

First, I want to make sure we all start on the same page with *Nutrition 101* information. You might hear the term macronutrients to describe proteins, carbohydrates and fats (water is pseudo in this category also, but it does not give us calories). Macronutrients are needed in large amounts (hence “macro”) and on top of providing us energy; they allow us to repair, recover and do many other forms of metabolism and body functions. If you look on the back of food label you will notice it focuses on these macronutrients, these equate to our total caloric value.

You can figure out the total calories without the label telling you because each gram of: protein is 4 kcal, carbohydrate is 4 kcal and fat is 9 kcal (so try the math and it will add up here).

What about beer? Well a gram of alcohol (ethanol) is 7 kcal, but as much as some people might feel otherwise, we do not need alcohol for survival so that beer missed the macronutrient cut-off, sorry!

We hear the term calorie everyday, but exactly what is it? A calorie is literally the amount of food energy, (remember energy here is heat) that will raise the temperature of one kilogram of water 1 degree. An interesting point, well to me at least, is physicists DO actually burn the food using a bomb calorimeter. To do this, all the water is removed from the food and it is ground up into a powder. The powder is then placed into a metal container surrounded by water, and you guessed it, they light this food powder like gun powder…….and Looney Tune style there is an explosion. The explosion gives off heat to raise the water temperature around the metal container and how much of it raises, decides the calories.

Ok, now that we have some of the fundamentals down, I want to focus on nutrition after the run. The reason why……nutrition is a major stimulator of protein formation after exercise. If you are anything like me, the last thing you want to do is eat after a session of nasty mile repeats or a tough long run, but that is when we need it most (and we get the most bang for our calorie buck). One reason why we need it most then is because distance running changes our skeletal muscle’s homeostatis. I specifically bring up the macronutrient protein for a number of reasons. First, unlike carbohydrates and fats, we do not store proteins yet they catalyze almost all reactions in living cells (think about why this can be an issue for a second). Second, out of the 20 amino acids that form specific proteins, we only make 11, thus we need to ingest the other 9 (these 9 are called essential amino acids). Third, the translation process (1^st part of protein synthesis) is specific and if we fail to make even 1 of the 9 amino acids the polypeptide (chain sequence of amino acids to make a protein) is not correct and the protein is not made. The failure to make a protein may result in degradation (breakdown). The negative implication on us athletes is tissue atrophy (loss of protein from cells, specifically muscle tissue).

A close friend of mine whom is finishing his PhD in nutrition sent me an interesting research paper; Morrison et al. Adding Protein to a arbohydrate supplement provided after endurance exercise ehances 4E-BP1 and RPS6 signaling in skeletal muscle. J Appl Physiol 104:120-1036, 2008. The study had rats do an exhaustive endurance exercise followed by ingesting a liquid with carbohydrate, protein, or a mixture of carbs and protein.

The study had results that athletes need to keep in mind after a workout. Any food eaten immediately after exercise is better than nothing because this will lead to a transient (short and quick) increase in signaling proteins. This will be the one time when eating a candy bar that is still under the seat from Halloween on a drive home from a run is OK, enjoy it. Not to rain on the junk food parade, but another performance influenced finding from this study is that supplementing a mixture of carbohydrates and protein immediately after exercise should promote the best activation of protein synthesis.

What to look for, instead of that snickers of course, are foods with complete proteins (these foods have those 9 essential amino acids). All animal proteins are complete proteins, but it is not easy to put down a steak, or practical to have one sitting in your car or track bag. Luckily some plant proteins are complete like brewer's yeast, certain nuts, soybeans, cottonseed, and the germ of grains. Some energy bars, like Cliff Bar Builders Bar, Power Bar Protein Plus etc. should work, but combining foods is good too…..think whole wheat bread and peanut butter. Either way, just check out the label and the bar should note if it contains complete proteins.

Keep this little nutrition tip in mind even If you are dieting to get back down to your healthy racing weight from the Holiday binge. Timing and composition of foods are important post workout and can help you recover quicker for the next session.

Post a Comment

#16	Anonie February 4 at 10:25am danny, what's your opinion on the below? or is it a variation from your article above? ... i do understand that the "general" pop and the running pop after different breeds, but ... ? Fact or Myth? Eating Protein After a Workout Will Build Muscle Answer: Myth "That's definitely a myth," said Elisabetta Politi, a nutrition director at the Duke University Diet & Fitness Center. "What you need after a workout are carbohydrates." Related Should You Work Out While Pregnant? Medical Issues While Exercising? Everyday Things To Do To Lose Weight? When you work out, your body uses the glycogen stored in your muscles and liver. Glycogen is made from carbohydrates like glucose. The exhaustion you feel after a workout, Politi said, is because of a lack of glycogen. "The best way to be reenergized is to eat carbohydrates," she said. Protein is helpful in toning existing muscle. However, Politi notes, the average American eats twice the necessary amount of protein already. "If [you're] eating an average diet, [you're] probably getting plenty of protein," she said. http://abcnews.go.com/Health/WellnessNews/Story?id=6797940&page=4 reply
#15	Ryan Hall January 22 at 9:39am Mackey, Havent been sick since Illinois played Arizona in the NCAA tournament. Morning: Venti Skim Wht/Mocha with whip and sausage sandwhich Lunch: Nothing Dinner: 2-8 Beers, Wendys Triple stack burger, biggee fries, Sprite, M&M;Frosty. 3x a week and add in some frisco melts, milk and cookies and hotpockets + some jacks pizzas and your good to go. reply
#14	C Clark January 21 at 2:35pm There are many other ways to get protein in your diet other than being a meataterian. Generally people only think of protien bars and steaks. Something as simple as substituting Quinoa instead of rice is what a lot of vegetarians do to get their protien. Below is a good list of these non-meat protien sources. http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/protein.htm#table2 A question for this forum - When people refer to "Good" and "Bad" Calories what are they referring to? For instance does it make a difference to your body if you get 800 calories from the leftover grease from McDonalds or if you get 800 calories from a cottage cheese and tuna sandwich. reply
#13	Danny Mackey January 20 at 5:17pm salwilliam, It does seem like a lot doesn't it? To be sure, try a daily log for a week and break down where your calories are coming from. On that last question, not sure. I'm not a certified nutritionist so I'd be a little uncomfortable here giving black or white advice. So I'll tell you what I do when I'm trying to lose weight (as I'm doing now) and I've worked with a doctor on this, we just make a rough estimate based off my basal metabolic rate, and overall caloric expendiature (you can get an idea of this, maybe I'll just make our conversation the topic for next week actually!) but once that's known, county your calories and I try and do a 300 calorie a day deficit. That's the huge trick with athletes, you don't want to totally deprive yourself because you can't recover, run a risk of injury, etc etc. So basically, just go for a gradual loss. reply
#12	Billy Kish January 19 at 6:09pm Good Article. Solid Nutrition after a workout is so important and often gets overlooked by younger runners. Recovery from a workout/ run is the only way that you see benefits from training. Nice work. reply
#11	Sal W. Delle Palme January 17 at 2:09pm 137 grams of protein, wow, yeah that seems like a lot to me, I probably get 100 per day on avg at best. I think I'm eating too many carbs and fat. I should consider becoming a little more meatatarian, I think my semi-vegetarian habits may have led me astray. I'm still trying to lose maybe 10-15 pounds ( I was 210 last spring lol), maybe a better macro-nutrient balance will help me with that? Should I eat for the weight I want to be, say 177, or my current 189 or somewhere's in between? reply
#10	Danny Mackey January 16 at 3:07pm Hey Salwilliam, Thanks. Good question: so if you're 189 that's about 86 kg. Most recommendations for endurance athletes is about 1.6 grams of protein per kg of body weight (this is a rough recommendation and you may hear of difference but the ballpark is good here): so that 137 grams. Which is 550 calories, which might be a lot or alittle, look at what you are eating. But for a workout like you are talking about I think the drink/soy mix is good (doesn't taste as good as queso though huh). Try to get it in soon, the article I referenced says within 30 min, I try quicker, at in ASAP. But the benefit is transient, so look to use the PB&J;about 60 -90 minutes again later. Space it out, in other words. Let me know what you think. later reply
#9	Sal W. Delle Palme January 16 at 2:48pm Great article, I've been thinking about this stuff lately, and I've got a question. I'm a biggish guy (6'1" 189) and lately I'm on the track doing workouts from tempo to hard interval pace (up to 800m race pace or so), totalling from 2 to maybe 7-8km + the warmup and down, and other stuff afterwards like medball, lower leg drills, mobility drills and/or crunches/pushups/chinups. What I'm in the habit of doing is loading up a gatorade bottle with half the suggested gatorade powder for the serving size (or using 50% diluted fruit juice), and I also scoop in enough soy based protein powder so that I know I'm getting 10-15 grams of protein (hey, it's not the most pleasant mix to drink, but it gets the job done). Is that enough? Should I still be thinking of bringing a peanut butter sandwich or maybe some queso along as well? Also, when should I drink/eat? One guy I train with always wolfs down a powerbar right after the running portion of the workout, and then pumps out the supplementary strength/stability stuff, I usually wait until we are done. reply
#8	Darren Brown January 16 at 7:41am yes yes ... beer and kirby queso should definitely have been involved in this story. I will even Volunteer to be the test subject for this study if somebody offers to provide endless beer and queso! Nice article bro. reply
#7	D Nut January 15 at 7:07pm Nice article! reply
#6	Michael Machado January 15 at 6:30pm great article; I think few people realize that this too composes an important part of running. reply
#5	Danny Mackey January 15 at 3:44pm Ryan, Austin queso has it's own sub category, science knows little, we know it's possible to run 90 miles a week solely using that as energy. No XC Nats if February, I'm injured right now with a flared up achilles (and I'm sick), pretty much a mess. My boss just sent me home from work and told me to sleep for 24 hours straight and come back. I just need queso and everything will be fine. reply
#4	Rob Watson January 15 at 1:28pm Good stuff, Danny. Your articles are top notch. I'm going to conduct a study that proves beer is excellent for recovery. Good luck with the running. reply
#3	Ruben Galbraith January 15 at 1:10pm Right on, Mackey. Going to XC Nat's in February? I can point you towards some bomb food in MD, my home state. reply
#2	Jeff Jonaitis January 15 at 12:15pm Mackey, you look like you had a little 7kcal in you when you took that profile pic! You should just get the stomach flu every other week, works for me. reply
#1	Ryan From Flotrack January 15 at 10:25am I didn't read anything against it so I'm guessing dirty 6th and chips & queso are acceptable too?? reply