Thanks, I haven’t had fast food since indoor season started. When I cheat it’s usually dessert… cake or ice cream :D.
Speaking of colin jacksons diet, he wrote in his autobiography that at one point in his career (i believe it was leading up to his WR) he would only eat a tomato sandwich once a day if that, as he was obsessed with power to weight ratio. Forget a mc donalds diet, this would kill me within a week!
Charlie,just make sure you can sleep straight after eating the bar or else you’ll be counting sheep all night
Guys, how many of you drink some liquid while eating ?
I mean, water, fruit juice, refri´s…at lunch and dinner ?
I drink only in “special occasions” like barbecue, pizza and other weekend meals.
Didn’t the East Germans also pair people up so they had sexual activity before big meets? I think that probably took care of any late night energy!
I don’t know about that, but I eat a giant bag of candy everyday and my bodyfat% is probably in that range.
View the skinny and weakness here:
Mo said sprinters don’t need carbohydrates? Why’s that, I’m just wondering what I’m missing?
Carbs carry water (1 g of carb carries 2.7 g of water)
For best explanations you can check CFrancis’ interview and articles (for t-mag.com)
I didn’t know that. Now the whole athletical debate about Atkins becomes clear when they say they only lose water, not fat.
If Mo eats low carbs, how does he stop himself from getting headaches from low blood sugar?
Your body converts protein to carbs (gluconeogenesis). The carbon skeletons of all amino acids except for leucine and lysine can be converted to glucose via this mechanism. His diet in the first post doesn’t really specify how low his carbs are, though it’s looks to me like he’s timing is carbs more than eliminating them.
With regard to McDonald’s, I think it’s entirely possible for a world class athlete to consume this “food” a few times a week and not suffer from it. One major thing that separates the top athletes from the rest of us is their genetic ability to build muscle and stay lean with ease. I know of many top athletes who have a metabolism that allows them to eat nearly anything while still remaining in awesome shape.
There is also another factor which may also be at play that allows them to to pay less attention to details in their diets than we would think they do - and I think it’s one thing that alot of people posting in this thread probably don’t think about. However I have to respect the rules of this board and not bring them up. But let’s face it, this factor can have a major effect on an athletes ability to eat poorly by many standards while still maintaining a world-class physique.
Does anyone know how much rest Maurice Greene is taking inbetween sets in the weightroom?
I know this isn’t always the case. Craig Pickering is a perfect example of this!
Doesn’t a big Mac have carbs- he was seen eating them.
Charlie as you’ve posted here, could you give a quick recap on your opinion on diet, or is there a thread here with it on already. I know it is not in CFTS or Speed Trap, yet I have read Ben ate quite a few carbs. Sorry if this is a lazy post!!
u r goin’ to hate me when you hear this. i am 29, have been sprinting for about 2.5 years p/t time off and on. although my times aren’t great
(due to nervousness in competetions), i have 2.7% body fat and have the worst diet imaginable. the only good thing i have done is drink 2 protein shakes a day. the rest of my diet is junk food. now get this, compared to the more elite sprinters who live in my city, byappearance alone you would naturally assume i was at there level,but by talent i am clearly not (yet). point being is that you still may look like a million dollars with a bad diet, but you certainly won’t be worth it
I can believe that. It is not uncommon to see sprinters who are not particularly ripped competing at the highest level. I already mentioned Craig. Darren Campbell too was never particularly lean. Gatlin was not, nor was Greene. I think sometimes it is easy to become too obsessed with getting lean and power to weight ratios. I am not pointing the finger, as I would just about guarantee I am more guilty of this than anyone else on this board!! I think part of my proble is linked to the fact I was a chubby teenager, and also vanity. I would like to be ripped for the sake of being ripped.
2.7% bodyfat right. Let me guess, Tanita scale? You would probably die (or have extremely adverse health effects) if you stayed that low for more than a few days (or better yet, a few hours if we want to be more realistic).
The junk food thing isn’t the surprising–it still comes down to calories in vs out (even if they are “bad” or less nutritious ones, assuming you get adequate protein intake for your activity level). Genetics will obviously help with the partitioning, but that doesn’t change the basics.
To get a reading of 2.7% you still have to be pretty low no matter how the reading is taken, 5-6% I would guess??
Secondly Davan, are you suggesting that if you create a calorie deficit with sufficient protein, you are guaranteed to burn fat??
Actually, after a certain level tanita (and similar) forms cannot accurately provide you much. A lot of types of bf testing can also only provide relative differences to yourself (ie if you improve, you have lost fat, but the exact number is not necessarily correct). Bodpods and other methods seem to be more accurate.
PSMF–protein sparing modified fast–works based on reading dozens upon dozens of logs of trained people (though most are not sprinters from what I recall). They have also done studies where they essentially starved relatively lean men (low teens bodyfat) with like 800 calories a day (I think that was the number) and almost all of them got to about 5% bodyfat without tons of muscle loss (keep in mind, those 800 calories were not mostly from protein either–it was like 60 grams total a day to simulate a pow camp sort of thing).
The fact is, a caloric deficit will burn fat, period. The amount of fat burned vs muscle vs glycogen, etc. is dependent on your training, genetics (and general endocrine profile), and what else you are eating, but you will still burn fat. There are bodybuilders that get lean off of McDonald’s. There are plenty of studies that show, isocalorically and controlling for protein, it pretty much comes down to just calories in vs calories out, for the most part.
Ok, cool, interesting! That is probably one of the most helpful posts I have read, thank you! Simple but helpful. Probably what I needed in a topic where there is such conflicting information!!! As a follow up question do you have any time scale in which it would take somebody to get from low teens to around 5% fat off a 800 kcal/day diet? Also how long would it take on a more realistic 2000 kcal/day diet? Is it simply a case of doing the maths?