Seven people can’t make a dent in Phelps’ food

A more adventurous reporter than I attempted to eat what it’s been reported Olympian Michael Phelps eats in a day, and he couldn’t even make it through half of breakfast. Guardian reporter Jon Henley managed to down 10 spoonfuls of porridge (the British substitute for Phelps’ grits), half a fried egg sandwich, half a five-egg omelet, a slice of French toast and one and a half chocolate chip pancakes before needing a break.

That’s only a tiny portion of the reported large bowl of grits, three egg sandwiches, five-egg omelet, three slices of French toast and three pancakes that Phelps starts his day with, plus two cups of coffee to wash it down.

Henley also managed to get down a few bites of pasta before allowing his colleagues to get their fill and reports that with the help of six others they still didn’t make a dent in the huge amount of food that keep Phelps moving.

Of course there’s no reason for a regular human being to eat that much food, and some suggest Phelps probably doesn’t need that much food, either, and certainly not that much fat. But a training schedule shows that he’s swimming around eight miles a day and doing some land-based exercise as well.

Plus, he’s a big guy (six feet, four inches and 192 pounds of “pure joy,” as an exercise and nutrition professor put it) so he needs a lot of calories just to maintain his weight. Sure, he could be eating some of those sandwiches on whole wheat bread or throw in some more vegetables, but given his recent success, it’s hard to complain too much about his diet.

Lighting Bolt ran on nuggets

Want to know the secret to the world’s fastest man’s success? Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt says he work up about 11 a.m. on the day of the 100 meter final race and ate some chicken nuggets, then he slept a little more and ate some more nuggets.

Bolt was so far ahead of the pack he slowed down at the end of the race and beat his chest like Tarzan before crossing the finish line.

Back home, Bolt’s dad said his speed and size came from a steady diet of yams when he was younger. Either way, experts say it’s a sure thing he can run even faster than he did in this competition.

Obesity doesn’t trim number of medals

Yoni Freedhoff writes on his Weighty Matters blog about Silken Laumann, a three-time medallist for Canada, who says her nation hasn’t medalled in Beijing because of its lack of a sporting culture, rising rates of obesity and a lack of funding for athletics.

Freedhoff says that argument doesn’t make any sense, since the nation with the most medals, America, also has the highest number of fat people, and China, which is second in the medal count, has the fastest-growing number of overweight and obese people.

He argues that obesity is more about the energy going in, that is, what people are eating, than it is about what people are doing to burn off calories, and that putting more funding into athletic training would waste time and resources better spent educating people about nutrition.

(By Sarah E. White for CalorieLab Calorie Counter News)

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This entry was posted on Monday, August 18th, 2008 and is filed under Celebrities and politicians, Food miscellaneous, Foreign stories (non-U.S.), Nutrition. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed. Permalink.