Issue 069
January 2011
Get a game plan for your mid-day meal
Fail to prepare and you prepare to fail’ has become a cheesy cliché. It’s used in varying scenarios from staff training days to football team talks, often without any tangible significance given to what that ‘preparation’ should entail. What is the significance of ex-President Benjamin Franklin’s original quote (“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail”) for a fighter’s meal plans? And what should that preparation involve?
To assess the significance of meal preparation for an MMA athlete, let’s look at a worst case scenario: a fighter that does absolutely no meal preparation. Breakfast is no problem as there are still plenty of suitable food choices that require no prior preparation. Dinner’s much the same as it’s possible to create healthy, balanced meals without putting days of thought into them. The one traditional meal that it can be difficult to plan for is lunch.
The reason? Typically, most people are away from their kitchen during the middle of the day. This leaves you restricted to whatever the food availability and quality is like whenever and wherever you take lunch. Generally this’ll be staff canteens or a deli. For civilians, this is no problem. For a fighter who’s eating for performance and trying to improve power, it isn’t ideal. The standard sandwich, chips and a fizzy drink – containing upwards of 60g of sugar, minimal protein and potentially high levels of fat – isn’t an ideal lunch for a fighter.
Many of us will skip lunch altogether. For a fighter this can mean no quality nutrition from breakfast until dinner. This could be as long as 14 hours (or over half a day!) without a
good feed.
If you’re trying to increase power, there are several key points to consider (right).
CALORIE INTAKE
It’s difficult to give generic calorie recommendations without knowing energy expenditure, specific goals and the like, but it’s safe to say that a fighter trying to increase power will require a higher calorie intake than the more sedentary members of society. This, in all likelihood, will require more frequent meals. So lunch is fundamental to success.
PROTEIN INTAKE
Most research suggests a protein intake of around 2g of protein per kilogram of body weight is suitable to increase power. For an 80kg fighter: 160g of protein. Another key consideration is ensuring the body’s protein availability is higher than protein use. This requires frequent servings of protein throughout the day to keep protein availability high. A standard canteen lunch has minimum protein, and no lunch has zero protein. Neither of which will help to increase power.
RECOVERY
A fighter aiming to raise power is likely to be undertaking additional training sessions. For performance to be optimal in subsequent sessions, the body needs to recover. Carbohydrate and protein are required, and in larger amounts than normal. A nutritious lunch can be important to continue the recovery process.
What should preparation entail for a power lunch?
Make double the dinner
Most of us will have a healthy dinner; why not make double the amount and take half to work for lunch the next day?
Cook multiple meals
If time is an issue, cook lunch for two to three days in a row and refrigerate it. For example, chicken, pasta and vegetables.
Healthy sandwiches
There’s nothing wrong with a sandwich for lunch; it’s just that most pre-prepared ones are on refined bread, with small amounts of protein and lots of mayonnaise. An example of a healthy sandwich is chicken and avocado on whole-wheat bread.
Ideally, a power lunch will have a balance of carbohydrate, protein, essential fat, vitamins and minerals, so preparation needs to take this into account. Preparation doesn’t have to be difficult, but a little thought can provide you with quality nutrition throughout the day and help you achieve your goals – and avoid failure.
This meal plan would vary depending on your goals, but the above gives an example of structure and the type of foods to incorporate for health and performance – hopefully without too much hard work!
