I spent a few hours this week with my old gym comrade, Frank Donley, at what used to be Brickhouse Strength. While there we talked about all kinds of stuff and it was nice catching up with him. During the conversation he brought up how he changed his eating schedule and really saw some huge improvements with his sleep. This approach to eating has been what I have been following for the last 4-5 years and it really fits with my schedule. Let me explain how it works...
The origins of this approach comes from Rhonda Patrick and what she calls Time Restricted Eating (click here for more information). I would say the only rule for this style of eating is that you need to keep your calorie consumption to an 8-12 hour eating window and my personal recommendation is to consume these calories in the first half of the day. I like this for two reasons: one, your glycemic response to the same foods is lower in the mornings and highest in the evenings. So, if you do slip up and eat something not so healthy, consuming it earlier in the day has less of a negative effect than if you were to consume it later in the day. The second reason is that I did not want to eat a meal within a few hours of bed time. While laying down to rest, if your body is digesting food it will impact your ability to get into a deep restful state. Also, for me, a late meal usual equates to me feeling a negative effect in the mornings and sometimes have a heart burn or bloat-like feeling. Either of those things are never desirable!
Is Social Media Killing Youth Sports?
In the early 2000’s, while I was finishing up college, I decided to embark on a coaching journey that lasted for 12 seasons. During this time, I began to see changes in the landscape of sports that I did not anticipate or expect. As a football coach, we would go to games and see the opposing teams' sidelines and wonder, where is everyone? Junior Varsity rosters were shrinking due to low participation and there were times when we had a football game with only 15 kids suited up and barely enough lineman to play. During the wrestling season, we would go to matches and compete against teams that had terrible participation. Some programs had less than ten kids competing between grades 7-12! In more recent years, I hear stories of basketball teams struggling to fill their lineups and soccer programs not getting enough athletes out to have a Junior Varsity team. This baffles me.