As the years start adding up, so, it seems, do the inches around the waistline. A slower metabolism, fewer sessions of high-intensity training and a little less commitment to healthy eating are the biggest culprits to adding more jiggle as we age. Unfortunately, the further we get from our 20s, the harder it is to lose that extra insulation.
But with proper dietary basics, you can begin to turn those abs of flab into abs of steel. Whether you’re just embarking on a new exercise regimen or you’ve been working out for years, it never hurts to have a refresher course in healthy nutrition for athletes. Consider these dietary basics:
Seek help
Weeding through all of today's diet information can be overwhelming. It seems every week there’s new research to discredit what we were told to do a week ago. To help ensure that you are following a nutrition program that best suits your individual needs, it’s best to seek the advice of a nutrition professional such as a registered dietitian. If you are actively involved in sporting activities, hunt down someone who specializes in sports nutrition.
Less is more
The only thing expanding faster than American mid-sections are ingredients lists. Simple foods such as yogurt, breads and cereals are now sporting a list of ingredients longer than your grocery list. More often than not, the extra ingredients add unnecessary calories to your diet. One of the most important steps you can take in cutting pounds is including more foods with just a single ingredient. In other words, lots of whole, unprocessed items such as apples, tomatoes, brown rice and olive oil. When you chomp into these you know exactly what you’re getting. It doesn’t hurt that foods like these are also more nutritious, giving you extra energy to tear it up on the field. Another added benefit: more fiber, which is very filling.
Portion control
Huge portions play a large part in our body weight downfall. Are you starting your day with a bagel? Or in other words, the equivalent of four to five slices of bread. Controlling portions is a must when it comes to healthy eating — especially considering metabolism slows with age. Using smaller bowls and plates, measuring items such as oils and grains and eating more meals at home are great ways to regulate how many calories are entering your mouth and traveling down to your stomach each day. It might not seem like a big deal, but that extra cup of daily pasta can really contribute to extra bulge in the long run.
Protein power
One of the reasons why high protein diets seem to help reduce body fat is that protein has a strong satiety effect. This means that protein helps fill us up so we’re less hungry. Therefore, it’s no surprise that research shows that eating protein with breakfast can reduce cravings and short-term caloric intake. When you are designing your meals and snacks, think about ways in which you can include healthy sources of protein. Adding a hard-boiled egg at breakfast, low-fat cottage cheese as a snack and mixing in lean ground turkey into your pasta sauce are just a few of the ways that this can be easily accomplished.
Be a grazer
Eating frequent, small meals throughout the day as opposed to sitting down and devouring two to three larger ones has several advantages. For one thing, it helps control food intake. When we go long periods without sustenance (e.g. between lunch and dinner) we have a tendency to overeat at meal time in part due to the fact that we’re simply a lot hungrier. Add exercise into the fold and this is amplified. Many who are successful with maintaining a healthy body weight make it a habit to include several snacks between meals to help regulate hunger and prevent unplanned trips to the vending machine.
Avoid the sweet stuff
It’s no coincidence that as the consumption of sweeteners such as high fructose corn syrup has increased, so too have our percentage of body fat. Sugars are nutrient-deficient calories and their intake needs to be strictly controlled in order to support fat loss. Read your food labels carefully and gravitate towards foods with natural sugars like fruits and low-fat dairy.
Fuel your workouts
When you combine exercise and competitive sports together with a weight loss program, you’ll want to make sure you have the energy you need to perform your best and burn more calories. To make the most of your workouts, you have to eat properly, both before and after exercise. Preworkout snacks (e.g. yogurt and fruit), and post-workout meals (e.g. whole-wheat pasta with meat sauce) can give you that extra oomph needed to keep you going day in and day out.
Matthew Kadey is a dietitian, personal trainer and free-lance writer based in Toronto.
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