How an athlete should eat properly

It's a fast time, so everybody's in a hurry today and they don't have time. But everyone should be able to make time for food. For athletes it is especially important to pay attention to their diet, because without a good diet you cannot perform at a high level, let alone in the long term.

The working athlete and especially the racing cyclist struggles with lack of time even more. A racing cyclist needs to train optimally 2-6 hours 5 times a week. Enough of that time for training is very difficult for a working person to find, He often has to sacrifice a lot and also has to be able to plan well. In addition, a competitive athlete, can not eat fast food, but must have a quality diet! Such food is not commonly found in restaurants and food supplements are no substitute for quality food! He has no choice but to provide a home-cooked diet, which can be much tastier. If this cyclist doesn't have a supportive partner, he wonders where the hell he's going to find the time to cook for himself?

How do you eat properly when doing sport?

The solution is to cook either simple quick meals or meals, that can be cooked in large quantities and then easily reheated later. Of course, to ensure that the food has a high nutritional value, it is important not to cook with frozen or other semi-finished products.

First of all, when choosing recipes, you need to think about what is and is not appropriate to consume. Any food that is too fatty or anything made from pork belly, for example, or that is fried or deep fried is not suitable. Anything where the basic ingredient is white plain flour, for example yeast dumplings, is not suitable. It is also advisable to avoid sauces as they are usually thickened with flour.
An unsuitable food is, for example, a classic goulash. But just adjust the recipe and it's a different story. That is, do not thicken the stew with flour and serve it with rice or potatoes. Goulash is also made with beef, which in this recipe can be cooked quickly until tender in a pressure cooker. Goulash can thus be a convenient way to incorporate simple beef into your diet. You can also add some vegetables to the stew. For example, if you don't forgive yourself a pie, it's a good idea to replace the plain flour in the recipe with semi-coarse or wholemeal flour, but then it becomes a different dish. It also depends on how the food is prepared. Especially when it comes to fat, it is popular nowadays to put too much of it everywhere. That's why you need to check the recipe and the preparation of the food.
Potato salad can be made without mayonnaise. Bolognese sauce should be made from real tomato puree and not fake ketchup set with oil, as schoolchildren commonly encounter when their spaghetti is swimming in oil. There is no cream in Krkonoske kysel! If the recipe is followed, Kyselo is a diet food.
Various meat products such as pâté, sausages and salami are completely inappropriate. It is necessary to absolutely eliminate these foods from the diet. It is only suitable to keep ham if we have verified that it is produced honestly and from lean meat.

Suitable side dishes are: potatoes, pasta. Probably the best side dish is rice, which bodybuilders can't afford. Rice is cheap, does not spoil in storage and is easy to prepare for eating. Rice can be cooked separately and in large quantities, even a whole 1kg package. Once cooked, it can be stored in the fridge and later reheated very well.

So what specific foods are suitable?

Main meals

• Pasta with meat
• Pasta with bolognese sauce
• Beef, pork or chicken steak. As a side dish with potatoes, rice or even quicker to prepare with couscous. A good cook is able to select, prepare and make the meat so that it is tender and juicy. Pork is the easiest to prepare, but beef steak can be tender and chicken breast can be juicy.
• Krkonosské kyselo
• Rizeto - if cooked the Czech way, it can easily be made with 1kg of rice.
• Goulash with rice or pasta
• Baked chicken and rice. Cook the rice separately, then you can cook a larger quantity. It is optimal to bake 6 chicken quarters with vegetables on a baking sheet.
• Buttered fish with potatoes. Neither Pangasius nor Carp are good quality fish, but you don't have to buy Salmon outright. For example, Hake is a good and cheap fish. It is preferable to look around to see if one has any fish farming nearby, for example, a local trout farm is a good source of affordable and fresh fish. Fish is always best fresh!
• White yoghurt with flakes, raisins, banana and other fruits or with unsweetened muesli.

Quick meals:

• Sardines or canned tuna + bread
• Smoked mackerel + pastry

Soup

• Chicken soup. Especially suitable in winter or cold weather.
• Cherry

Drinks

Don't forget to follow a drinking regime. Drink coffee minimally and then drink it before training or a race. Limit alcohol to a reasonable level, it is good to cut out hard alcohol. It is definitely not good to drink alcoholic beverages after training.

• Clean skimmed water
• Green loose leaf tea with honey and lemon
• It is recommended to drink kombucha regularly to help detoxify the body.
• Vincentka - this is untreated, therefore honest mineral water.

It is not advisable to consume commonly available sweets and other sweet products. But home made sweet food can be acceptable in reasonable quantities when properly incorporated into the diet.

Sweet foods

• It's hard to go wrong with fruit.
• Chocolate cheesecake.
• Cakes with rhubarb or fruit.

You need to include a lot of vegetables in your diet, for example salads. If at the end of the day we no longer need to take in more energy, a salad can take the place of the last meal.

Regular food can also be used as a dietary supplement. Various seeds are a source of healthy fats and various trace elements. For example, pumpkin seeds contain zinc. During and after a workout, a banana comes in handy as a quick source of carbohydrates, which also contains potassium, which helps prevent muscle cramps. Later after your workout, consume cottage cheese as a source of quick protein. In the evening, it is advisable to eat cottage cheese or olomouc cheese as a source of protein. As a source of calcium, which is also needed for good muscle activity, green vegetables are best. Fresh vegetables, whether leaves or roots, also contain large amounts of other minerals and vitamins.

An excellent source of information on diet is Bodybuilding, but the following should be considered a cyclist needs a different diet than a bodybuilder and also every athlete needs A customized diet.