I’m presently training towards an indoor rowing competition. The race will be an all-out effort over 2000m which, all going according to plan, will take me just under 6:30. My understanding is that energy for 2000m rowing is provided 80% from the aerobic system and 20% from the lactic-anaerobic system.
My current training is 5-6 sessions per week on the erg. Usually 3 sessions per week are long steady rows (9,000m or more), 2 sessions are anaerobic intervals, and 1 optional session is around 5,000-6,000m. I also do two weights sessions and additional core, prehab and mobility work.
Right now a typical day’s eating looks like this:
8am - 4 eggs and an apple, water, 2 fish oil caps, multivit, vit E, vit C
9am - coffee and water
12pm - half a large chicken breast sandwich on whole wheat bread with lettuce, tomato, cucumber, and cabbage. One apple. Water.
1pm - water and coffee
4pm - other half of sandwich
6:30pm - training. Sip recovery drink during training (18g protein, 40g carbs)
8:00pm - post-training drink (18g protein, 40g carbs)
8:30 - 150g-200g lean beef, large can of kidney beans or black beans, heaping plate of veggies
10:30pm - small loaf of organic malted whole wheat & raisin bread with butter. Whey protein mixed with milk
Any suggestions to help me maximize my performance?
Preformed fish oil caps (6X1 gram cap/day) are the most efficient, flax less so (b/c of issues related to conversion of ALA to EPA/DHA). Olive oil, etc. Extremely low fat diets hamper intramuscular triglyceride restoration and that harms endurance performance. You’ll perform better (and be healthier) with 20-25% of your total calories from fats.
Lyle - I think my fat intake is high enough. On a typical day I have 4 fish oil caps (combined 540mg DHA/EPA per gram), 4 eggs fried in olive oil, lean beef, butter on my bread at night, plus some fat in the assorted grains, legumes, and meat that I eat. If I get hungry in the evening I often add a bowl of all-bran with semi-skimmed milk as well.
I’m certainly not afraid to have some fat in my diet - I just think there’s enough there at the moment.