The thing with processed food is that many of the processes are... just fine as far as nutritional content goes, and usually make it last longer or easier to digest or just taste better. Pasteurisation, Curing, Pickling, and so on are all processing the food too -- and similar processes like that are part of basically every food culture in the world, and the absence of these processes doesn't imply the food is necessarily high quality. If it helps to cut these out too, there's nothing wrong with that, but you can still have a diet that meets all your needs and avoids unhealthy excesses without going to the extreme of avoiding all processed food. The problem lies with ultra-processed factory food, which optimise for shelf-life and desirability (read: addictiveness) rather than for our health and needs. It's definitely worth while to cut these out if you can.
I switched to a whole foods plant-based lifestyle and it has transformed my running and recovery. I just got second place in the Wisconsin Marathon yesterday and was already recovered to run 11 miles today with only minor soreness. Currently listening to this while I’m landscaping.
Hotter than the devil's crotch! 😂😂 Great stuff. I'm all about 80/20, in running and eating. I try to eat whole healthy foods most of the time, but I'll never say no to a piece of birthday cake or a BBQ. I get very rebellious when I feel deprived. If I deny myself a couple cookies here and there, I'll eventually snap and eat the whole box in one go.
Ben and Mary, you guys really do amaze me. You're full time educators, you run many many kilometres per week to keep up with your training, you film videos, edit and produce them, and then you also train other runners... do you have a secret 8th day in a week?! And your videos are always so well planned scripted and thoughtful. Very thankful for all you do for us! ❤
As a beginner runner, I am really appreciate of your straight to the point, and real life experience videos. Real gems in the noise of running advice videos. With easy to understand and practical advice. THANK YOU! 🙌🏻
At 47yo diet has been my cheat codes. In the last 3 weeks+ I've run my first BQ marathon in 3:07, no rest of the weary but I was recovered enough 8 days later to run 38:52 PR 10k and 7 days after that I ran a 18:35 PR 5k. This is not a brag, but to point out my diet that was always good tipped into cheat mode when I started eating more plants and less meat. Due to kidney issues, I cut out red meat and pork completely and replaced that with more salmon, chicken and turkey and plant protein: beans, nuts, avocados and I eat a lot of hummus in lieu of mayo and other condiments. I've always been one for salads and use salsa as dressing a lot. This won't work for everyone, it just happens to be what works for me. If only I had a Delorian with a flux capacitor to go back in time and smack my 25yo self in the head to eat less pizza and burgers as a reward for running and working out. I feel great, I have limited inflammation between races despite putting in more mileage in the last 2 years than I ever have. Sleep, religious foam rolling, stretching, yoga, lifting heavy things and prehab are all factors too. I do all the things to run better better than I ever have.
Yeah, I can't keep "junk" food in my house either. Planning your meals in advance, knowing what your menu will look like for the week ahead, helps with writing a grocery shopping list and sticking to it.
Not normal but I had to switch to a super low carb diet mostly meat only to remove an addiction to foods. So mostly all my carb use is usually in the middle of a workout after say two hours and a little after workout. I found for me a handful of blueberries. Will send me to ice cream bar. This is fully healing, same diet runner, Jeff, Browning, and Zach Benner and Michael McKnight and a few others are on and help me with some health issues and mental issues so I think everybody is so different. It’s so interesting.
Very good advice. I smack on nuts, that is healthy fats. Breakfast is normally two fried eggs with kale or spinach and tomato, yogurt and fruit 400 Cal. 40 grams of protein. The next I replace the eggs with oatmeal with a few strawberries. Lunch is normally a salad with salmon or sardines with beans, kale, red beet, onion, tofu spiced with turmeric and pepper. An apple for dessert. After noon snack is normally a quarter cup of nuts. Dinner is a variation of chicken, quinoa, rice, carrots, asparagus, turkey with spaghetti, Salmon.
My exception to eating past full is when there are like 3 green beans left over, not enough to put away as leftovers, easier to just eat them then. I am different from Ben in I can have some of the snacks around. My favorite cookies' package says serving size 2, so I have 2. 🤷♀️
Other end is eat enough. A trap is that you could under eat. Yes this can happen. Remember this is a running channel , if you run 20 miles thats got to be fueled.
I’m still a faithful watcher! A lot of life changes and new pursuits have kept me from commenting much; but I always watch, like, and train! Wish I could sign up for marathon but I just don’t think my body can make it yet this year. Just going to keep plugging away and hope at some point in the next few years I can do a marathon. I’ve moved and everything around me is hilly. Vast majority of runs are on hilly rough trails. Maybe that will help.
Definitely whole foods and the least amount of processing possible goes a long way in terms of how foods make you feel ad perform. On the contrary I will go on record to say, I have cereal/cookies/candy/etc daily as there is an amount of satisfaction that can't be mimicked sometimes by other foods. Moderation is key, not putting certain foods on a pedestal is also key 👍🏼
Love finding out you use Biovitt protein powder. It's my favorite, too. Hopefully, I'll stumble across you guys at an event here in Thailand one of these days.
Nutrition is a massively complex topic that has a huge amount of individual variation - the best diet for anyone is going to be the best quality diet that they can stick to. For some people, that might be vegan, for others it could be keto. Some people can do well on intermittent fasting, for some people that's disastrous. Etc. For me: I follow a "if it fits the macros" style of flexible dieting. I have floors for fat (at least 50g a day), fibre (at least 30g a day), and protein (at least 140g a day) that I ensure that I reach or surpass every day, along with making sure I get at least 2,000 calories a day. Beyond that, I usually aim for a slight calorie deficit most days (250 to 500 calories). I find that eating at a slight deficit makes for more comfortable running, and fewer emergency dives into the bushes. Then, on the day before a rest day, I eat at a calorie surplus to make up for the deficit, and as an opportunity to do things like enjoy a family BBQ or whatever without ever saying "no thank you" to food that looks tasty. In terms of food choices, I mostly eat a lot of minimally processed and whole foods like fruit, vegetables, yogurt, whole grains, nuts, legumes, a bit of cheese, a small amount of lean meat. I also drink whey protein shakes, which are about as processed as food can get, but I think that there's probably a big difference between the likes of whey protein and more typical ultra-processed foods like frozen pizza or potato chips. On my calorie surplus days I eat a bit more low quality food. I try to practice moderation in all things, including moderation. But that's me, and what works for me. Different things will work for different people.
It's also important to cut vegetable oil, and margarine I use butter instead I learned that we are short of Omega 3 fatty acids, these are supplied with flaxseeds and chia seeds.
Just bare in mind that we can get most of our vitamin C from food and as our body doesn’t store it, so wherever you take in excess is going to be eliminated in your urine. To have a strong immune system you need a combination of all vitamins, minerals and amino acids, not down to a particular vitamin. Even leaving in a hot country, I’d check my vitamin levels as you need to be exposed for a minimum time per day to produce it and because it’s hot, some people might struggle to do it and Vitamin D deficiency is quite common in countries like Australia and Brazil, which are predominantly sunny ❤
Yes .. thank you for this comment. I live in an area that sees very little sun most of the year. Everyone here assumes you need vit d, but not everyone does. While most supplements are safe for most people... Those who are eating a balanced diet etc probably don't need them. It's best to have a chat with your doctor first before taking anything.
Good advice with food. I agree eating a variety and a balanced diet - and best not to have snacks in the house. I dont do suppliments - unless my doctor tells me I'm deficiency in something, I don't feel I personally need to take them. There are just as mnay papers saying you SHOULD take them as SHOULDN'T. so you do you.
2:02 okay I'm drawing the line at chicken nuggets 😀😃. I love me some McDonald's chicken nuggets after like a half marathon, and we're going big we're going for a 20 piece 😎.
Pretty much automatically follow the diet here, except I only take Magnesium before going to sleep. My only bad remaining dietary habits are, and they are big, added sugar and too much coffee. At worst, I eat two ice creams daily, two pieces of cake and drink a small 100ml coke. At best, I can stay away from any added sugar for 6-7 weeks and I feel wonderful and lose weight, but then suddenly again the habit comes back. And Coffee... Coffee is 400mg a day because when raising a small baby you sleep 4-6 hours (if you are lucky) a night in 2-3 segments. And when you have an extremely demanding, busy job and you are responsible for a large area, it is difficult to keep the coffee amounts low as you need to push it every day at work. And finally the sugar on top is purely a reward, a guilty pleasure after a tough day. But, I am determined to kick both habits or at the very least get them under strict control! Then my diet and lifestyle (except for the constant lack of sleep, which should fix itself in the coming years) would be pretty much perfect given the circumstances. And that, would make me a much better runner.
Watch your Vitamin D if you wear sunscreen. I’m Aussie, get lots of sun but my bloods were low in vitamin D. I won’t go without sunscreen because of the cancer risk here.
My biggest weakness is the running munchies. Just raiding the cupboards post long run. I also generally eat too much, finishing mine and whatever my wife doesn't.
Diet is one thing I fall down on massively. I just love all the bad stuff and am not disciplined enough to cut them out. If I don’t buy snacks I then get really annoyed when I can’t find snacks 😂 I could never be an elite athlete 😬
Good video with some helpful comments. As an OR nurse just a caution... make sure the health. are team know you take things like omega 3 and turmeric. These and other supplements ts have blood thinning effects. Not generally a big deal and I use them regularly, but they will want you to stop before procedures
Did it for a long time when I still had weight to lose and was no problem, however started having breakfast again and noticed I was performing a lot better even on easy runs after eating
Some people can make it work, some can't. Some people can train themselves to make it work, some can't. I'm not into IF myself, but I've found that I can do up to at least 25k at marathon pace after an 18 hour fast. But that's me, and my body - I wouldn't expect my experience to be universal.
I'm amused that despite living in Thailand you had bangers and mash for dinner and have baked beans and cornflakes in the cupboard :) I guess you can't have green curry every night!
Love ur vids. A couple of observations (no criticism tho): I read that taking supplements means the body is not as effective extracting nutrients from normal food - not sure how true it is (I still take turmeric tho); corn flakes are great for pre race carb loading; and how do survive on so few oats for breakfast - I must eat 5x that volume!😂 Keep up the great advice - thanks.
I found it curious you don’t have magnesium in your supplements. Have you managed to get the same benefits from something els or manage to actually get enough from food alone? I no the same rule doesn’t work for all but it’s something that so so often comes up when talking about what to take
Phinney and Volek have proven otherwise, both for endurance athletes and overall health, go with an anti-inflammatory diet, since almost all chronic diseases are inflammatory and inflammation aggravates any stress on the body, including the stress endurance athletes endure. What’s the most anti-inflammatory diet? A fish-based ketogenic diet (a Mediterranean-ish keto diet). Lots of fatty fish (why take fish oil supplements? High rate of them are adulterated and they tend to go rancid, esp if not refrigerated). See Zach Bitters, Tim Olsen, Chris Froome, Miranda Carfrae, etc. 😮 champion keto endurance athletes. Also, if you want your vanilla yogurt to be more of a ‘Whole Foods’ here’s what you do - buy plain yoghurt. Then buy vanilla. Then put the vanilla in the yogurt and mix it. It’s not that hard. And will taste better b/c you put as much or little vanilla as you want, and can buy a higher quality vanilla than what’s in the processed junk.
0:07 what is that? what in the world is Ben eating 🙂? I'm sure it's something like 100% vegan, ultra healthy, no sugar, gluten-free 😀😄😄... I want to see Ben munching on a slice of pizza 😎.
