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I’ve got a question on fuelling timelines or perhaps dynamics of fuelling over a week, for a low volume swimmer. For arguments sake I assume my BMR is 1800 kcal and I have three sessions in the pool per week where I burn approximately 500 kcal beyond my 1800 kcal BMR. Do I understand you correctly that in the acute perspective, I can fuel 200 kcal extra (2000 kcal) the day prior to my swim, fuel 300 kcal of sports nutrition or food poolside and then my regular 1800 kcal for the day? All based on a long term even base intake around 1800 kcal with the peaks around my sessions.

I’ve got a dexa scheduled for finding my BMR. Asking because I find myself having the mood swings, lack of energy and very poor sleep as you described for under fuelling athletes, although I’m not even close to burning 1500 kcal in my training day. Fuelling for my 3h 10k swim race will be my next challenge.

Thank you for all the advice here!

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With those symptoms, I would boost fueling across all days.

As I note in the series, it's really challenging to get an accurate view on our actual intake/burn and even small deficits will compound over time. Sounds like your needs are above what you've estimated, so far.

For the 10km race, you'll need to develop & train your race fuel strategy as well.

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Many thanks for your reply! It’s been compounding over years without me thinking about it. It’s much more visible when my girl moved in and wanted to do stuff besides training and sleeping. I’m grateful I found your thoughts on low energy availability, this was a big step towards getting out of the downward spiral I found myself in.

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We've got a couple of articles on LEA coming in the next couple weeks.

g

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