Coach B’s RAFT – Racing And Fitness Training
Important side note:
There are more training options available now! Thursday evenings at 6pm (San Jose/Campbell), as well as Wednesday mornings at 6:30am (Palo Alto/Mountain View) are available. There is also interest in a Monday evening time slot. If you are interested in joining us for the drop-in sessions, send me an email!
Exercise of the Week
Tips: for first time use, keep the rings low enough so your feet can touch the ground, use feet or bands to assist, then progress to unassisted. At the bottom of the dip your upper arm should be parallel to the ground, shoulder and elbow at the same height.
Foods to Consider
Onions! In the quest to balance diet and fight the battle of body fat, as well help with cardiovascular and recovery needs from exercise, check out the onion!.
Onions as a part of your daily diet contain chromium, a mineral that helps cells respond appropriately to insulin. If your diet is high in high-glycemic, sugary foods, chances are your body is responding inappropriately to insulin, thereby building fat stores. By changing your diet to include more natural foods (like onions) you are doing yourself a favor by A: eating lower glycemic foods, and B: eating foods that actually help the body manage the insulin response.
For athletes that are training hard, your body responds to intense workouts by kicking in an inflammatory response. Muscular swelling can show up after a workout and it can be attributed to the body’s attempt to manage what it perceives as an injury (which technically speaking, that’s what muscle soreness is).
There are more benefits to the onion, check out the references below:
Resources:
- http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=45
- http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/9173/2
Focal Point
Remember it’s not conducive to put in back-to-back hard workouts or have back-to-back weeks where your volume (intensity and duration) are consistently on the high end. You have to plan in your recovery.
Recovery methods: Get enough sleep. Eat well. Take a day off. Ice.
If you can’t take a day off(i.e. you have a job that keeps you on your feet), go for light activity and skip the workout for the day.
Ice. Ice (alongside nutrition) is a great way to recover from workouts that may have pushed you a little more than you were ready for. It controls inflammation and helps prevent you from losing the gains made in the workout. 20 minutes of an ice pack on the affected muscle is sufficient, or 5 minutes of ice massage. That’s right. Grab an ice cube and rub that thing into the sore quad, calf, shoulder or back. But only for 5 minutes. The muscle tissue needs to warm-up again.
Happy training!
Brandon Nugent
USAC LVL 2 cycling coach
ACE PT / CrossFit LVL 1
TRX/Outdoor Fitness Training
http://brandonnugent.com
408.480.8441