Natalie Coughlin on Food
Saturday, March 26th, 2011
Last week I had the opportunity to chat with Natalie Coughlin, two-time Olympic swimmer, Dancing With The Stars alumni and and Iron Chef judge. Our conversation focused on two of my favorite areas, food and sport.
Natalie explained that most athletes completely over think nutrition, taking the pleasure entirely out of eating. This was a major overall theme of our conversation and really refreshing to hear. Natalie reiterated that fueling an athlete’s body should be pleasurable and nourishing. For refueling after a long practice, it makes sense to ensure that you have the proper levels of fat, protein and carbs, but not the the point where you are counting every gram and completely draining enjoyment from the process. Nutritional value is always something that is in the back of her mind, but is not the primary driver of the food choices that she makes.
It was interesting to hear an Olympic-level athlete with 11 medals focus so heavily focused on the pleasure of food and not not over analyze the nutritional value to optimize performance. Athletes can easily get caught up in trends like loading up on carbs days before a race, or on protein just after a hard workout, without any focus on actually enjoying the calories that we are consuming.
One of Natalie’s favorite healthy snacks is dried plums. She chooses them because they are very sweet, packed with nutrition and come in single serving packs so she can always have a few stuffed in her swim bag for after a workout. Nutritional value is key, but obviously so is portability when you spend so much time training at the pool.
I asked Natalie what favorite recipe she’d pull out of her hat if she ever was on the other side of the Iron Chef judging table and had to go against Mario Batali in “Battle Plum.”
Without hesitation, she whipped out Vietnamese-style bahn mi with dried plums. (Something I had honestly never heard of before. Think of it like a meatball sandwich.) She loves its ethnic flavors and the sweetness that the dried plums give it. The recipe is here if you want to check it out along with an instructional video from Natalie.
Before we parted ways, I had to ask if she had any advice for both young swimmers starting out as well as the swim team moms that support them.
The biggest problem that Natalie sees is parents over scheduling their kids. Without having the time necessary to be successful in any one sport, parents are setting up their kids for failure. Whatever sport they get enjoyment out of, the overall goal is to stay physically active and to stick with it. From there, encourage them to foster relationships with their teammates, enjoy the challenges and rewards of competing and benefit from the discipline that an organized sport involves and your young athletes. From there, they’ll be in a good position to succeed.
Tags: food, natalie coughlin, nutrition, olympics, swimmer | Posted in Nutrition, Swimming, Triathlon | 4 Comments »
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