Awareness of nutrition and it’s impact is paramount to anyone’s success with a training program. All of the training in the world can’t undo a bad diet. To drive this point home, there is a fun mental exercise I do with all of my athletes to drive this point home.
Nutrition Visualization
First thing I do is ask them to fill out a 3-Day Food Log by writing out everything they eat and drink for 3 complete days. For many, this is an eye opening experience and this alone is a motivator to get them to be more conscious of their food intake. For others, they can’t seem to understand while they consume bagels, pop tarts and chicken fingers, they still can’t have the body they want.
So the next thing we do is talk about visualization. I tell them about using their imagination and I ask them if they could have the body of any one athlete in the world, who would it be???
Usually I get Lebron James, Alex Morgan, etc.
Next I tell them to imagine that I just finished training their ideal athlete and you are showing up for your session. Visualize that they are just stretching out and cooling down and they are just ripped, jacked or whatever attributes you desire.
Now, as your soaking that in, is the first thing that comes to mind, “Boy, I bet you he/she eats a lot of bagels, pop tarts and chicken fingers???”
Probably not. They probably work really, really hard and sacrifice quite a bit to look that way.
Or maybe not…
Now, here is the harsh reality. There are athletes that look like amazing and can still eat whatever they want. There is a word for them: “freaks”. That’s why we pay money to watch them on pay per view, buy their jerseys and give up our Sundays to see them play.
I had a NFL player that I trained that when I went to his house he had 2 food groups:
1. Barbecue Potato Chips
2. Tequila
The guy looked like a carved statue and had veins in his abs and calves.
Some lucky ones have it like that. If you and I did, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
christina P says
Food is a science that contributes to our make up. It's so hard to keep a clean diet with so much temptation.