Tuesday, June 05, 2012

Challenge

Okay so the triathlon season is well underway, and my training is actually going pretty well at the moment. My diet however is going down the drain. Or actually thats not true, I am doing great for the most part, but then I have a giant cheat day, which often progresses into two and then all the progress is kinda lost.

So in order to get this right, and get into the best possible shape for my half ironman on June 17th and thereafter I am going to do a 30 day modified paleo challenge.

Week 1: I am going to ease into it by allowing artificial sweetener in the form of a few diet cokes and some sweetening of my breakfast smoothie. There will be no more cheat days though (read B&J days), but high quality chocolate (86%) in moderation is ok. I am going to try and track my intake this week to get a sense of the amount I eat and the macros as well. Generally you don't really need to monitor your intake on paleo (or so they say) but I kinda want to get a better idea about how much I actually consume. I have been indulging in bacon wrapped dates as a snack lately, and even though it is actually a paleo food, I got a big surprise when I tried to weigh one of them. The little delicious bastard without the bacon weighs in at about 20g which roughly corresponds to 60 calories. Add the bacon and the fact that I probably have 6 per serving (not really that filling).... hmmm definitely need to have more of those aha moments. During my long rides/runs (90min+) I am using gels and energy drink since I have to get used to those anyway. Also since my HIM is only 2 weeks away I will have to keep a somewhat high carbohydrate intake to avoid bunking in my workouts, or even worse during the race.

Week 2: Going to cut out the artificial sweetener, which will probably be a really good thing leading up to the HIM. Keep using Gels etc during my training, and keep the carb intake pretty high.

Week 3-4: Going to cut down on the carb intake for the next few weeks and mostly use it during and post workout. Increase the amount of fat that I consume to compensate.