The Essential Nutrients Needed For Runners
If you run for the sake of fitness, for a good body form and proper mental functioning, but you forget to feed your own stomach, you might ended up prowling your own fridge at night. Basically, nutrition is very vital for runners.
Running lots of miles may be good for your legs, but when you run for 30 to 40 miles per day without considering the nutrition intake, you might running away from the trails and from the road just to run straight to your fridge. When it comes to nutrition, runners should consider it as a part of the training. It is essential to put nutrition as a number one list to consider.
Whether you are running to spring up yourself and enjoy the fresh air or it is your goal to lose some weight and to stay in shape, you should start thinking about hydration before you run, so that you are well hydrated by the time you step out the door.
Nutrition Basics For Runners:
-
Carbohydrates
Runner’s diet should consist 60% of carbohydrates to fuel up energy and stay healthy for the rest of the running session. They need more carbs than non-runners to fuel their working muscles (about 3 grams for every pound of body weight). Since, there are two types of carbohydrates, “simple and complex”, runners should aim mainly complex carbohydrates such as; rice and pasta, baked potatoes in their skins(nutrient-packed carb).
In order to prevent glycogen depletion, runners needs “carbo-load” to stored up energy in the muscles. Carbohydrates are essential to distance runners as they provide the main bulk of the muscle glycogen ( a white compound polysaccharide) stored in the liver and muscles of humans and animals and easily converted to glucose as a source of energy). If you run within 30 minutes, you should eat carbohydrates to restore your energy.
-
Protein
This is an essential nutrients that a runners should store in their system. Protein is vital to rebuild the muscles after a run and repairs the damage caused by the trauma of running. Eat about 70 to 100 grams per day in the form of lean red meats, seafood, eggs, poultry and soy (rich in protein). Runners should consume 20% of protein to fuel muscle repair.
If you are running for more than an hour each day, your daily requirement is slightly increased to 1.0 to 1.2g per kg of body eight, means 60 to 72g of protein if you weigh 60 kg. But eating extra protein is nothing, you can get no benefits from it, you will not build muscle quickly, it doesn’t enhance and boost your performance as well. As a matter of fact, the extra protein is metabolized and excreted, rather than converted into muscle. So, do not replaced carbohydrates with protein, it will never do any good to your muscles.
-
Fats
Runners need fats to sustain energy. Although, there are different types of fat, you should avoid fat that isn’t essential. Some type of fats, like omega-3 and omega-6 are essential for a strong immunology system and healthy skin. Omega-3 fats prevent disease and boost immune system.
Foods that can be found in fat fishes, soy oil and nuts are a type of fats that reduces the triglycerides and cholesterol levels, though too much omega-3 can slow down the blood coagulation.
Get the few grams per day as a part of your regular diet. Fats have their place in the diet program, go for unsaturated fat and avoid the trans fat because they are basically artificial types of fat.
-
Vitamin C
Since Vitamin C cannot restore in the body, you should have a daily intake of Vitamin C. It serves as an antioxidant, Vitamin C counters the oxidative damage that happen during exercise. Vitamin C Supplementation may enhance resistance to the post-race upper-respiratory tract infections that commonly in competitive ultra marathon runners.
-
Minerals
Zinc for runners is vital to healthy immune function, people with severe zinc deficiency are prone to a range of disorders linked with compromised immunity, sometimes leads to infection. A regular exercise without a zinc intake may reduce blood zinc concentration in which triggers to a health threat. Zinc is a type of minerals that helps your recover from injuries and assist the creation of new blood cells.
Best food zinc powerhouse include yogurt, brown rice, whole wheat bread, oatmeal, baked potato, milk, clams, oyster, fish, salmon, turkey and lamb. Zinc stand out consistently as important to healthy cell and tissue regeneration.
Liked it
