My Binge Foods

Well I was right about what direction I would end up taking to balance my calories from one day to the next. I thought that if I had a mince pie with my lunch, before my workout, it would ensure I got enough calories and I would be less hungry after my run (and better able to resist the various cookies and chocolates later). Did it work? In short: Not so much. I found the lure of the open candy tin irresistible last night, in part because I’d had a good run and burned over 450 calories. I found myself thinking I deserved a treat or three and it wouldn’t make that much difference anyways. Which is very dangerous thinking and the reason many people actually gain weight when they start marathon training, despite all the exercise. I’m always amazed at just how little junk food it takes to put me over my calorie limit for the day. For example, I would have been dead on 1800 calories yesterday if I had avoided the 9 chocolates I had last night over the course of an hour in front of the TV.

Everyone has ‘binge foods’ items which we love so much we can never have just one. For me, I cannot resist chocolates and gluten free pastry treats (apple or mince pies for example). If they are in the house I have to have them, and I usually find it impossible to stop at just one. One the other hand, I can easily restrain myself when it comes to Christmas cake or plain dark chocolate. While delicious, these foods don’t produce the same mindless eating response as the others. Which is why if I was serious about losing weight I would throw out or give away the chocolates and mince pies to get them out of the house, because there’s no way I can work them into a ‘sensible’ eating plan (having just one pie on a workout day for example).

However, as it is Christmas I’ll just have to get used to the idea that no weight loss is going to happen this month!

The Score:

Calories:	Protein:	Carbs:	Fat:	Alcohol:	Fibre:
2197.94	111.31g	307.14g	56.71g	0	28.89g
	20%	56%	23%
Calories burned through exercise:		457

What I ate:

Time	Item	Amount
07:45	Vitamins - Centrum Advance A to Zinc, 400iu of Vitamin E, 1000iu Vitamin D3 and 500mg Glucosamine sulphate	1 each
	Cold water	200mL
	Sainsbury's Be Good to Yourself smoked bacon medallions	82g
	Mesa Sunrise cereal	60g
	Alpro Soy milk	120mL
	Sainsbury's orange, mango and passionfruit juice	200mL
09:00	Black Tea	500mL
11:00	Brazil nuts	6g
	Cashews	17g
	Red Apple	about 100g
	Raspberry and Echinacea tea	250mL
12:00	Orange, mango and cinnamon tea	250mL
13:45	King Prawn Stir Fry with Oyster Sauce	310g
	Merchant Gourmet tinned puy lentils	105g
	Sainsbury's Freefrom mince pies	1 pie
15:00	Black tea with milk and sugar	350mL
15:30	Easy Run - 36 Minutes
16:15	Lemon Lime Nuun electrolyte tablet in water	750mL
16:45	Total Greek yoghurt	125g
	Sainsbury's frozen mixed blueberries and strawberries	100g
	Sponser vanilla Recovery Shake	20g (1 scoop)
	mixed with hot skim milk	150mL
17:45	Quality Street chocolates	3 pieces
18:15	Quality Street chocolates	3 pieces
18:45	Quality Street chocolates	3 pieces
19:45	Turkey Cottage pie	225g
21:00	Ellactiva Chocolate Calcium Chew	1 chew
	500mg Glucosamine sulphate	1 pill

Plus 500 to 1500mL of cold water sipped from a water bottle throughout the day.