Breakfast is for Champions

Champions are too busy getting better to make time for excuses. Charles Williams

It's true, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. So, if you don't start every day with a clean, balanced breakfast, make a plan to start tomorrow! We can't expect our cars to run on empty, so why should we expect our bodies to perform on empty? Think about it, your body has just woke from a 6-8 hour fast, so you've got to replenish it's energy sources in order to perform optimally throughout the day. They say you should eat within the first hour of waking, but you have to make a plan that will work for you and that you can stick with, but whatever your plan, do not skip breakfast! Many people think this is a good way to skip some calories, but in the long run you will probably find yourself eating even more calories to compensate and your body will go into starvation mode and store fat. I love waking up and doing a fasted cardio session at 5:45am every morning because my body taps into my fat stores for energy. Check out this link that talks about fasted cardio: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/assessing-fasted-cardio-training.html. Depending on your goal, fasted cardio may not be part of your plan, but for me it is – I currently have a lot of fat to burn! It's also a great feeling to know that I've gotten in at least 45 minutes of cardio before my day even begins, so later if something comes up or if I don't have time after lifting to get in a second cardio session I don't feel as stressed about it. Most importantly I make sure that I am eating my breakfast within 45 minutes of doing my cardio session to supply my body with the fuel it needs and to keep it from tapping into my muscle stores for energy – I'm working hard to build muscle, so I don't want to sabotage my efforts! Many of you have been asking what I eat, so I'm going to throw out some clean breakfast ideas that include both carbs and protein...

½ cup Egg Beaters scrambled, ½ cup of oatmeal and ½ of a ruby red grapefruit

½ cup Egg Beaters scrambled, ½ cup of brown rice and ½ of a ruby red grapefruit

Protein pancake with a very thin layer of natural peanut or almond butter, topped with slices of ½ of a banana or with ½ cup of berries

My refrigerator is always stocked with egg beaters, spray butter, ruby red grapefruit and berries (blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, blackberries). Although fruit is very healthy for you and contains natural sugar, it's still sugar, so enjoy in moderation. Berries are the best fruits, with raspberries having the lowest number in grams of sugar and carbs, followed by strawberries and then blueberries. If I'm going to enjoy fruit, I typically do so with my breakfast. It's very important to read food labels of all foods you buy. You will be so surprised at how many foods we think are healthy that actually have hidden sugar in them. In the book “Potatoes Not Prozac”, the author talks about overt sugars (the ones that are obvious) and covert sugars (the ones that are not so obvious and are hidden in processed foods), so watch out! When buying peanut butter, go for the natural stuff, but again be careful. You must read the label to make sure that the only ingredient is dry peanuts. Period. Or if you love almond butter the one ingredient should be dry roasted almonds. Period. No oils. No covert sugars.

Many of you are asking how to make protein pancakes and I'm happy to tell you that they are so easy to make and are so delicious! I mix together ½ cup of egg beaters with 1 scoop of my favorite protein powder and joila, pour it into a small pan and make one medium sized pancake! One of my favorite protein powders is MyoFusion. The texture is perfect for my pancakes, for mixing in my oatmeal for my daily snacks and comes in so many delicious flavors! Are you craving chocolate and peanut butter? Throw yourself together a protein pancake made with chocolate protein powder and top it with a thin layer of natural peanut butter! Top with slices from ½ of a banana and your taste buds will really be thanking you and you'll get those carbs you need. If you have a good blender, another way to add some healthy carbs to those pancakes is to add ½ cup of dry oatmeal to the mix. I am one of those people who can eat the same thing, day in and day out, but most people just can't eat this way. So, I encourage you to use the internet to find wonderfully delicious and clean recipes. A couple of my favorites are http://www.oxygenmag.com/ and Tosca Reno's http://www.eatcleandiet.com/.

Now that we all know how important it is to start our day with breakfast, it's equally as important to continue eating smaller meals about every 2.5 to three hours throughout the day to keep our metabolism revved up and to make sure we don't become completely starving which in turn seems to help us in making bad food choices and in overeating. I use an iphone app to track my meals throughout the day and I also set an event on my calendar called “EAT!”. Every three hours my reminder goes off reminding me that it's time to eat and I also go in and edit the event to go off again in 3 more hours. An ideal day for me looks like this:

7:30am Breakfast

10:30am Mid-morning Snack

1:30pm Lunch

4:30pm Mid-afternoon Snack

7:30pm Dinner

9:00pm Evening Snack (Casein Protein Shake)

Here is a great article to read about Casein protein and why I choose to have it as my last meal of the day: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/the-case-for-casein.html?mcid=PO-7day-proteinpowder. Also, I first learned about eating smaller meals every 2.5 to 3 hours back in 2001 when I joined a Body For Life challenge at my local CA gym. It was a 10 week challenge and in that time I lost 16 pounds and 9% body fat, so this way of eating does work, I promise! Check it out at http://bodyforlife.com/.

Ok, so at this point I think I'm rambling and going into information overload, so I'll call it a day. I'm happy to answer any questions, so just fb me or email me as I love to share (can you tell?!). LOL. Choose to be a champion and add breakfast to your day!