SmarterFitter Blog Less diet, more brain

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This last year I’ve been swimming regularly and cycling every day. More recently, I began running. I’ve thought about doing a triathlon, but I’m a little worried. I should feel great from all this exercise, but often I feel sluggish and stiff. Am I not stretching enough? Sleeping enough? Eating enough? (Wouldn’t that be a wonderful problem to have?!) Sometimes I’ll have a great swim one day, and a lethargic run the next. Yesterday I took a brisk one-hour walk with Tim after swimming the day before - the walk totally conked me out. How embarrassing. I should be perfectly capable of walking!

It turns out that multi-sport training in tough, and it’s basically impossible to excel in more than one sport at a time. The New York Times explains that the body responds to different sports in different ways. Changes that help you be a kick-ass runner may screw your swimming. And if you think about musculature, it makes sense:

Swimmers need large muscles in their backs and shoulders. Runners and cyclists want small, light upper bodies. Cyclists need large quadriceps muscles. Runners don’t, and in fact they don’t want any extra muscle weight on their legs.

It’s just as well that I don’t hope to win any races; I just wanna have fun and be fit. In fact, training for a triathlon should be good for a recreational athlete like myself. Or so says the physiologists:

Cross training — cycling one day and swimming the next, for example — lets you maintain your energy and enthusiasm and avoid injuries that come from doing the same activity day after day. That’s also part of the appeal of being a triathlete, [triathlon coach Joe Friel] said.

“It’s fun to train,” said Kelly Couch, a 30-year-old triathlete from San Mateo, Calif. “Just being a runner, just being a cyclist, can get a little stagnant.”

Agreed: doing multiple sports is appealing, if only for the variety. But what about my energy? Are there any triathletes out there who’ve experienced this? I’m not even training for real, yet, and need a little reassurance that a triathlon won’t totally wear me out for all the other good things in life, like strolling in the park and throwing frisbees and playing pool.

For Peak Performance, 3 Is Not Better Than 1 [New York Times]

Ecuador: The Ayme family of Tingo
Food expenditure for one week: $31.55
Family recipe: Potato soup with cabbage

United States: The Revis family of North Carolina
Food expenditure for one week: $341.98
Favorite foods: spaghetti, potatoes, sesame chicken

I discovered Time’s Photo Essay, “What the World Eats” on Mark’s Daily Apple. I agree with Mark: these photos are a fascinating window into the world’s food cultures:

From a traditional MDA perspective, we were struck by not only what the collective grocery items say about each culture’s diet, but also by the relative cost and what we choose to pay for in each society. Finally, some photos were all too telling with the comparative “volume” of food that feeds each family.

From a not-so-typical MDA stance (if you’ll allow us the liberty), we found ourselves fascinated by this photo essay’s window into the cultural and, well, simply human experience of food – in its traditional significance and regional roots, its healthfulness and indulgence, its necessity and scarcity. It’s a view that is, at once, intimate and universal.

The photos are part of a larger book, Hungry Planet: What the World Eats, by Peter Menzel and Faith D’Alusio.

• Link to We Are What We Eat? on Mark’s Daily Apple
• Link to Hungry Planet: What the World Eats on Amazon