OiPolloi's Group - FULL (Page 4)

Great questions Lesley Anne.  I've immersed myself in Nutrition education the past 2 years because of many reasons, so I might be able to offer some help here.

I too am a vegetarian.  Probably not as strict as you since I still consume very minute amounts of fish and cheese (whey).  You seem very well educated in the protein aspect of vegetarianism so I don't think I need to get into the benefits of Soy.

First of all, looking at your daily diet I would say you're getting plenty of protein from your plant based diet.  The key is WHEN to introduce protein throughout your day.  When your training ramps up and you begin doing long workouts (2+ hours) you'll find that having protein in your stomach will hinder your performance (until you go past 3 hours, then you'll need some protein during exercise).  If you train early in the day try and eliminate most protein from your early-day diet and concentrate your calories on complex carbs (ask if you need suggestions).  Save your protein for after intense or long workouts.  Your muscles absolutely need protein within 2 hours of these hard days.  The sooner the better.  Without it you will not recover as you should and will not be prepared for the following days training. 

Post Workout suggestion:  Smoothie made from frozen berries, soy milk, banana, powder protein (soy or whey).  I used Whey protein by Hammer Nutrition because it worked better for me (even though it violated my vegetarian diet).  This recovery meal is just for recovery and is not meant to replace a meal.  Within another two hours of this "smoothie" you should consume another 200+ calories of carb/protein mix.  A Clif protein bar or PowerBar protein bar will suffice. 

During workout:  You seem to already have a plan for calories during a workout if you're already using Gel or bars.  Since you have a hard time"eating" I would suggest you introduce more liquid calories into your diet.  Again, this all depends on how long and hard you're training.  On my long days I would drink Perpetuem by Hammer Nutrition.  Perpetuem is a carb/protein powder you mix with water and is very calorie dense, but is also very easily digested and easy on the stomach.  For shorter workouts try using carb drinks like Gatordaide Endurance, HEED, or PowerBar sport drink.  This is another way to get calories into your system with your water, rather than water alone.  When I would do long training rides (5-7 hours) while training for my ironman I would mix 1000 calorie bottles consisting of Perpetuem, Heed and Hammer Gel.  Without these calories I would never have been able to finish those long days.

Portable calories:  There's nothing wrong with getting calories from bars like Clif or PowerBar as long as you're not over-consuming high fructose corn syrup contained in other bars.  PowerBar Protein bars use Whey protein and Calcium Caseinate (another protein and amino acid made from whey) and Soy protein.  If you're strict vegetarian then maybe you won't want to use these bars.  I use them with great results.  I got burned out on eating protein bars all the time so I made my own portable food that I called Power Pancakes.  See below....

Power Pancakes:  I would make these every morning and usually make a couple extra to carry with me to work for an afternoon snack.  Below are the ingredients...
-Whole wheat pancake mix
-Package of Oatmeal
-Tbs of Flaxseed
-Smashed Banana
-Natural Peanut Butter

Mix ingredients and cook on griddle.  On some of the pancakes I would spread more peanut butter.  I also used honey as a topping rather than fake maple syrup, which is pure high-fructose corn syrup.

Other than what I've suggested above, I don't see a lot of grain in your diet other than oatmeal.  I would suggest introducing more whole grains in your diet (breads).  I make vegetarian scones and carry those with me as well for meals or snacks.  The scones I make are from whole wheat flour, no egg or butter, brown sugar, apple sauce and blueberries or cranberries. 

When I trained for the ironman I did eat 7,000 to 8,000 calories a day.  Its tough getting that much in your system, especially if you're trying to eat healthy.  But it is necessary if you're training needs it. 

There's a saying in the triathlon world that "Nutrition" is the fourth discipline of triathlon.  You have to be as disciplined with nutrition as you are with swim, bike, and run.  If you don't get your nutrition mastered then the other legs will crumble.

gentle_storm - 2007-02-19 5:32 PM OK. I managed to put the picture in my album -- that's all I could manage. How did you get such a large picture of your front hub on the blog page? Mentor's privileges?

I'll give you partial credit since two of the photos are of Red 'X's. 

The key to getting photos up is to keep the file size under the maximum allowed kb.  Maybe that's been the problem.  When saving them just lower the quality (if you have that choice).

You and your husband make a great couple!.....(at least by looks). 

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention.....the photo of the hub is a URL of the image I grabbed from the internet.  If you want to post a picture that is stored on any given web site, then right click on that photos, Copy the URL string, then paste in here .  This inserts the photo into the blog, thread, etc.  You can paste any photo from anywhere on the internet, like this....

Helllooooo all!!

I've been missing in action. A lot of rescheduling has been going on and we just had a long holiday weekend of eating. I did go on an off road bike ride for half a day exploring a nearby island. Man, I was covered in mud. But it was SO fun! And I was dead tired. Fell asleep right after dinner at 8pm!

I tried to post multiple pictures of my bike, but it looks like only one came up ;o/ At least you can look at it! I'm going to the bike shop today to pick up some SpeedPlay pedals and see if I can hunt down the Shimano TR02 women's shoes. After spending months researching which bike to get, I'm just going to use a friend's recommendation on the pedals and shoes cause I don't think my brain can handle processing that much more bike info. I'm excited to see if it actually does increase power. Not so excited to fall at traffic lights though.

I completely lost track that my first race is coming up so soon!!! I won't be doing it fast, but I'll be able to finish it. I'll have to come up with a better training schedule for the next one. I'm just having so much fun cycling and seeing the countryside that it's distracting me from swimming and running.

Exciting news Maia!  I'm glad you're getting out on the bike.  Its a good excuse to not run or swim, but you've got to do a little of everything.

Good choice on the Speedplay pedals.  I use Speedplay Zero pedals on my road bike and Tri bike.  I love them.

Be safe out there!  Train hard!

You may regret asking us to harass you.

The harassing will commence.

gentle_storm - 2007-02-22 7:03 PM . My husband claims that this picture is scary enough to push anyone over the edge, so maybe you could print it out and put it on your car window... Good luck; thanks for asking for the encouragement/harrassment. (I'm going to make another attempt at posting this pic. If it doesn't happen, just imagine some weird girl with innappropriately sported clothing.) p.s. I'm kidding about the gear being for my first tri, but I have threatened to wear it to school...

Great picture!  You are such a ham! (non-meat ham, that is).

Looks like you're all set for your season of triathlon. 

Don't forget your helmet!

The recipe sounds tasty!  I'm a big fan of squash.

Regarding protein.  I don't think "cutting back" is the right advice, rather, we should be limiting our protein consumption to after training and for recovery meals.  If you're logging massive hours of training its hard to digest protein throughout the day.  This is why it should be saved for recovery meals and should be limited to clean proteins, like Soy, whey, or even "smart" chicken.

Lesley_Ann.  As vegetarians we don't have to be as careful with our protein intake.  Soy milk or even soy powder digests a lot easier than animal proteins.

Another reasoning behind the "cut back" of protein is to allow for the calorie increase of carbohydrates that you'll need for the increase in training volume.

Our Group:  I agree.  Its dwindled down to just three of us.  Thanks for keeping it alive Lesley Ann.