Operation Nooga Nutrition

I learned when I ran a marathon last summer that no excellent workout can erase bad eating habits. Anyone who has attended a triathlon or even a road race can see this. Not every athlete has this hard, lean body. And while I firmly believe genetics plays a role in body type (I will never get rid of these massive feet and broad shoulders), nutrition plays a huge role (or roll for some of us) in appearance and ultimately performance.

Our smarter-than-us ironman friends have informed us and model the importance of a solid nutrition plan. So, starting today (we're a little lax when we begin new year's resolutions here), we implement Operation Nooga Nutrition. 

Reading about nutrition plans (meaning everyday nutrition and not race-day-nutrition strategies) really intrigues me. Every athlete has an opinion. One of our super-smart friends has one rule: don't let anything cross your lips that won't help you. I like this rule because it allows so much flexibility and thus less stress, which should rule training at this point. Stress, according to another smarter-than-us friend, is toxic, and who wants that. With that said, I think we still need a bit more structure with a few more rules. 

I read a nutrition column recently at triathlete.com by Matt Fitzgerald (author of a book I'd sure like to have time to read) entitled "Racing Weight: the Doable Diet." Basically Fitzgerald says the fewer rules an athlete has about nutrition, the more likely he'll be to stick with that plan. If I have to count fat grams, and protein grams, and carbs right now, I'm pretty sure I'd find myself so stressed I'd reach for the next cookie I could find. (Self-diagnosed cookie junkie medicate themselves this way.) So, the Nooga Nutrition Plan (with the aim of moving us down to racing weight and also fueling our bodies for the fun workouts we have ahead) focuses on our weak spots. It looks something like this for now: 

1. Drink water. Lots and lots of water. 

2. Drastically reduce sugar (this means no more cookie binges :( )

3. No carbs after 6pm. 

4. No snacking after 9pm unless we have a late-night workout (one that ends after 8:30pm). 

5. Eat a real breakfast with protein. 

And that's about it for now. I'm refusing to stress out over the fact that grapes have more sugar in them than any other piece of fruit. After all, they're better than a cookie. (Okay, they have more nutritional value, but really, what can taste better than a cookie?!) 

As far as training goes, we're slowly seeing added workouts. I put in a treadmill interval session that made me want to puke yesterday (I found it to be quite gratifying in the end), and we both are increasing our time on the bike. Mr. T. is utilizing his Spinervals and dreaming of more, and this past week he channeled his inner geek and found a way to map IM Chattanooga and put it on the compu-trainer so we can actually ride the course. He also graciously mapped the courses for the other three tri's I'm doing this summer. Now that's love. 

Looking ahead, I'm most likely going to put in some early morning sessions this next week, which I'm really looking forward to. Nothing feels better than finishing a workout before 7am. We are continuing on with our Tuesday and Thursday night spinning with friends (because our weather REALLY stinks right now--we're under a serious windchill advisory for the next 48 hours). Thankfully, having anywhere from four to seven people spinning simultaneously on a given nigh generates a little heat. We just need to figure out a way to deal with the smell now. 

Crazy vs. Dedicated

We've had our fair share of people call us crazy. But we like to frame our passion as "dedicated." Dedicated . . . to what? To fitness? Why not just take up Yoga and go on a low-fat diet then? Why not just start jogging daily? Why not just make a New Year's Resolution? Why endurance racing?

For one, it's FUN. Once a person has passed that threshold of unfit to fit, from out of shape to in shape, the distances, the workouts, the activity is FUN. We went out on a Christmas Day run for the first time in our workout history. What a blast. We ran the State Park loop (about 2.5 miles), busting through drifts and burning off the holiday energy that had built up after days of cold-weather-induced internment with the three blessings at home. 

It's social. We have the blessing of having several people around us who enjoy the same activities. They like to bike (obnoxious amounts of) miles. They enjoy running (for an hour or more). They voluntarily swim ( lap after lap). Sometimes they do these activities solo, but often they log miles or laps together, pushing each other and smiling along the way, because sometimes a burning chest and pumping heart just feels better with someone else enjoying the misery. 

It's a whole new way to see the world. God made this incredible world, and when we ride bike or run, He shows us things we'd never seen if we sat on a couch or even just rode in the car from one place to the next. We have this cache of "war stories" in a way that prove this theory repeatedly. There's the day that Jason almost hit a deer . . . with his bike. Then there's the time that Jason and two his running buddies helped push a car out of the snow in the local State Park. There's the evening my friend Christine and I were almost hit by another cyclist riding on the left side of the road. He rode right in between us. There's the one summer night that my friend Lori almost hit a skunk with her bike or the early summer morning that I saw one waddle back into its den. We see beautiful sunrises, colorful leaves, and frosty trees. We hear the thump of our feet on pavement, the crunch of snow, and the crackle of dry leaves on the trail. We see, hear, smell, and just experience life in a way different than if we had never laced up our shoes or pumped up our tires. 

It's an adventure. While we'd like to think that every workout is a predictable one, it's not. Fitness allows us to tackle new adventures we never would've dreamed of. And it allows us to dream big too. Take our friend Mathew, for example.

He's a former Marine who moved back to good old Madison, SD after spending much of his tenure in Southern California. He lives to cycle. And he discovered that the cold weather doesn't have to stop him from finding a new adventure, thanks to the invention of fat-tire bikes. Mathew inspires us all to be a little more crazy dedicated. 

It's an accomplishment. We have an entire wall in the basement dedicated to what we've spent the last few years doing. The pictures, the bibs, the medals--they're all these fantastic memories of what we have been blessed to have accomplished. 

With the new year quickly approaching, we Troxells have a few resolutions to implement as we continue in the crazy. The payoff is worth the sacrifice. Stay tuned for Operation Nooga  Nutrition. 

The boring updates: we both continue with our regular workouts. This week we had a first: a swim date. We had a sitter come over the day after Christmas and watch the kids for an hour and a half while we swam. The conclusion: we need to do that more often. We also, for the first time, went on a Christmas Day run. The weather was just too perfect to NOT go for a run. We've both begun to increase our runs this week, and we'll fall into a structured schedule on January 1. I think we're both pretty stoked for the structure.