Nutrition for Masters Rowers

Adair Ferguson, BSc, BA (Human Movement), MSc (qual.)

Nutrition is a subject close to my heart. Apart from studying it at postgraduate level, I spent most of my rowing years as a half-starved lightweight, where every scrap of food that passed my lips was fully analysed on its nutritive value and fat/protein/carbohydrate content, as well as its taste. Many people thought I was quite obsessed and I suppose I was-but to maintain a body fat level of less than 9% and stay in one piece with enough energy to train and compete at an international level is not easy! Not only did I have to make sure that the little I did eat was as packed with nutritional goodies as possible, but that it was eaten at exactly the right time for glycogen repletion and not stored as fat.

Now, with a more comfortable layer of fat on, I have relaxed a bit. I don't have to micro-analyse everything I eat, but by keeping to some basic guidelines I can still train and compete while keeping my weight stable, staying healthy and enjoying the pleasures of cooking, eating and even shopping for food.

I know that many other masters rowers are interested in, and realise the importance of, training and staying healthy while enjoying food, but are not too sure about the eating side of the equation. That gives me the perfect excuse to indulge myself by writing about some of the aspects of nutrition that I have learned.

Of course the basics of good nutrition apply to everyone. But there are some finer points specific to the masters rower so I'll highlight these where I can.

Why Diet is Important for Masters

One of the most important aspects of diet for anyone, especially as we get older, is that a healthy diet becomes a survival skill. It sounds depressing, but as parents, friends and colleagues succumb to lifestyle- and diet-related illnesses, we should be planning for a long and active life.

Many of the most common life-threatening illnesses of today are related to diet. Coronary heart disease and cancer are the stand-out items. The good news is that eating good food will not only keep you alive longer but will help you train and race better.

Some Assumptions

Masters rowers can range in age from 28 to 98 years old. They could be ex-internationals or absolute beginners. They may spend most of their days training or be so firmly tied up in job and family that they are lucky to train once a week. They may know a great deal or next to nothing about healthy eating.

Making pronouncements about nutrition is therefore verging on presumptuous. However I WILL be presumptuous and assume that most masters rowers train moderately hard, are reasonably fit and healthy, and like to (and should, in my view), keep a balance between their sporting activities and other aspects of their lives.

I will also make it easier for myself by assuming that we all have some knowledge about carbohydrates, fats and proteins, we know what glycogen and kilojoules are, and are generally aware of issues such as the need to limit fat and salt intake.

You may notice that I switch between kilojoules and calories at will when talking about energy values of food. I also switch between metres, inches and feet in daily life, and suspect that many of you reading this do the same!

The Basics

A healthy diet

For most masters athletes in Australia eating 'typical' Aussie food and trying to balance a 'normal' life with their athletic endeavours, I believe the key to doing the right thing diet-wise is to decrease the quantity of food being eaten but to increase the quality of what is being consumed.

How? As a starting point, let's refresh our knowledge of what constitutes a healthy diet by reminding ourselves of the grisly consequences of not following one. A healthy diet is:

• low in fat, especially saturated fats. Too much fat in the diet, particularly the saturated fats found in animal products, is a major risk factor for heart disease. Too much dietary fat is also closely linked to obesity. Fats provide over twice as much energy per gram as carbohydrates and proteins, hence a diet high in fat can easily lead to excessive caloric intake, with the excess calories being stored as-fat!
  
• low in salt. Diets high in salt are closely linked with high blood pressure, stroke and heart disease. Also, too much salt can affect your calcium status and may be a contributing factor to the high rates of osteoporosis found in Western society.
  
• high in fibre, i.e. lots of fresh food, fruit, vegetables, and unprocessed cereals. Low fibre diets can cause food to remain in the digestive tract for long periods, irritating the tract and causing bowel or stomach cancer. Interestingly, fibre can coat fats passing through the gut, and hence limit the amount of fat absorbed into the body.
  
• low in simple sugars. Simple sugars (e.g. sweets, lollies) increase caloric intake without any other nutritive value (hence are often called 'empty calories'). High levels of blood sugar can overwork the insulin receptors, leading to diabetes.
  One also should not forget one's teeth. Many athletes give their teeth hell by constantly filling their mouths with sweet sugary drinks or food. Dental caries are the inevitable result, and because it's something that takes a few years to develop it can be more prevalent in masters athletes.
  
• moderate in total energy consumption. Excess calories are stored as fat.
  
• moderate in alcohol consumption. Alcoholic drinks are generally very high in calories with little nutritive value. High alcohol consumption is a risk factor for heart disease and many forms of cancer. Conversely, light to moderate alcohol consumption has been shown to have a protective effect against heart disease.

Carbohydrates, Fat, Protein and Glycaemic Index

Just what is the correct ratio of carbohydrate to fat to protein?

For a healthy diet the generally recommended ratio (in terms of kilojoules) is around 55:30:15 and most sports dietitians would suggest a slightly higher percentage of carbohydrates and lower percentage fat to around 65:20:15.

Forty years ago the serious athlete would consume a hearty breakfast of steak and eggs before competing and cram his/her body with as much protein as possible. Egg flips were the rage.

Then, not so long ago, carbohydrate-rich foods such as bread, pasta and rice were regarded as the magic ingredients to success.

Now, as we shall see below, there has been a slight swing back to protein.

Carbohydrates

Everybody knows that carbohydrates (or 'carbos' in nutritionist-talk) refill our glycogen energy stores and that they should constitute the major part of an athlete's diet. Masters rowers should choose carbos carefully. It is all too easy to end up consuming too many 'empty' calories, i.e. carbos with little other nutritional benefit. To get the nutrition you need too many calories end up being consumed that are not balanced by an increase in activity. The inevitable result is an increase in body fat. Also, many masters rowers tend to eat carbos as though they were elite rowers, but forget that they are not training or racing quite as hard as elite rowers, and the race distance, at 1000 m, is half what it used to be. The inevitable result is that the boat sits a little lower in the water whenever you get in it.

Most people equate pasta or bread with carbos, and so they are, but there are many other carbohydrate foods that are packed full of vitamins and minerals. Sweet potato is a perfect example: 14.1 g of carbos per 100 g and high in Vitamins A, B and C, compared to the ever-popular pasta which has 24 g of carbos but negligible amounts of either vitamins or minerals. The mighty banana has 21 g carbo per 100 g with loads of potassium, magnesium and Vitamins A, B and C. No wonder the cyclists live on them!

The moral of this story? Have a break from the same old pasta meals for carbo loading. Just because a food is high in carbohydrates doesn't mean it's the bee's knees. Think quality carbohydrates!

Protein

Long regarded as unfashionable, the role of protein in an athlete's diet is now being reconsidered.

Bodybuilders have never forgotten that protein provides the major building blocks for muscle development, and helps the muscles and tissues to recover from strenuous exercise. But even endurance athletes should consider that protein in their muscles gets broken down for energy when they are low in glycogen; that is when they have been exercising for more than an hour or two. If you train very intensely or several times per day it is not enough to simply replace the glycogen with lots of carbohydrates-you should ensure that some of your post training/racing snacks have some foods high in protein.

There are plenty of different types of protein foods, but the trick is to choose ones that are low in fat. These could be low fat yoghurt or cottage cheese, fish, lean meat, chicken or even soybeans or lentils.

Perhaps surprisingly, many cereals contain significant amounts of protein. Wheat is about 11% protein, and rice and corn have about 6­8%. Even some vegetables contain protein-broccoli has about 5% and brussel sprouts 4%.

Fats

There is little argument that fats should be kept to a minimum in a healthy diet. However they are not total baddies. Vitamins E and A are stored in fat, and a diet too low in fat would lack these. Also, fat gives a feeling of satiety and makes food taste better.
Athletes training many hours daily may need more fat-rich or energy dense food so they can actually consume the calories necessary without too much bulk or having to spend too many hours eating. In fact the Australian Institute of Sport is now conducting a study on high fat diets for athletes. I'll keep you posted!
Most western diets are very high in fat anyway, and most of us need to reduce our fat intake rather than increase it. We get so many fats in our diet without realising it. That oily topping on your pasta on carbo loading night, those corn chips, the toasted muesli (35% fat), biscuits, muesli bars...
There is a good reason that we like fat so much. It was an evolutionary advantage in that fatty foods are energy dense, so it doesn't take as long to eat enough for your basic energy requirements. A caveman could 'fuel up' quickly and would then have more time to run, hunt, fight or think. The trouble is that the fat that was advantageous in caveman days is now, in an age of convenience foods and supermarkets, distinctly dangerous to our health. Our primeval urges are leading us to early deaths from heart disease and other obesity related diseases.

Glycaemic index

Glycaemic index, or GI seems to be all the rage in sports nutrition at the moment. GI indicates the rate at which carbohydrate from food enters the blood stream. Foods can be ranked by their GI-high GI foods cause a fast rise in blood sugar and low GI foods act over a longer time.

In general, low GI foods (e.g. porridge, baked beans, mixed grain toast) are better consumed before exercise for longer lasting energy while high GI foods (jelly beans, calrose rice, water melon) are thought to have a role in post-exercise recovery by maximising glycogen resynthesis.

Note that the prevailing GI 'wisdom' does not always correspond to the complex versus simple carbohydrate rules where complex carbs are eaten before exercise and simple carbs after. For example brown rice and potatoes, both classic complex carbohydrate foods, have very high GIs.

Lists of food with corresponding GIs are available, and it is worth having a look. Interestingly, parsnips have an extraordinarily high GI. Jelly beans and jelly snakes are high, but chocolate is low.

Some high GI foods for eating after training include cornflakes, rice bubbles and puffed wheat. Conversely, bran and mueslis are low GI foods. Pasta is low. Watermelon is high, while apples are low. Glucose and maltose are high while fructose is low. Milk products are low.

For masters rowers I think it is best not to get too obsessed with glycaemic index in foods. When making food choices the primary consideration should always be the highest nutritional value of the food with the least number of calories. (Down with quantity, up with quality!)

Choosing your Food ­ Two Golden Rules

1. Choose a VARIETY of FRESH food.

This is important because it helps ensure that you are getting the full range of vitamins and minerals that your body needs to function optimally. You can supplement your diet with these micronutrients, but it is extremely difficult to judge exactly how much of what vitamin or mineral you actually need. They often interact with each other, so going overboard with them all won't necessarily help either.

Eating fresh food helps ensure that you're getting plenty of fibre and keeping your salt intake down because most of the salt in our diet comes from processed food.

Practically speaking, to eat a variety of food you should break some of your eating habits. For example, as I advocated earlier, try eating as many different carbohydrates as possible-they don't end with bread and pasta. There are many other kinds of cereals/grains, all with slightly different nutrients, e.g. corn, oats, barley, rice, rye and triticale.

Many vegetables also have a high percentage of carbohydrates, as does fruit.

Eat as many different types of protein food as possible too, because each protein has its own combination of amino acids (although eggs are fairly complete). To get the full range of amino acids vary your protein source.

2. Choose foods with as HIGH a NUTRITIONAL value as possible.

This means thinking and learning about food, reading labels and knowing what you are eating.

For example choose a full grain variety of cereal wherever possible (e.g. in your breads, breakfast cereals, pasta). An occasional baguette won't hurt, but if you always choose white refined grains you will miss a major source of vitamin B, which is so important in energy production, and vitamin E, an important anti-oxidant and arguably beneficial to aerobic endurance. You'll be missing out on fibre as well.

Apply the same principles to the rest of your food. Add that extra egg into your cake or soup and you add a valuable complete protein and vitamins A, B and iron. Use vegetable juices instead of water for sauces or gravies and you'll get a whole lot more vitamins and minimal extra calories without even trying.

Nutrition in the Life of the Masters Rower

Does our typical masters rower need to consider diet more than Joe Citizen? I think our masters rower needs the knowledge to discern which aspects of a sportsperson's diet pertain to them. I think the factors that should be considered are:
1. The caloric demands of the sport
2. Metabolic rate and aging
3. Recovery and aging.

1. Caloric Demands of the Sport

Many athletes, including masters athletes, think that because they are training and competing they have an excuse to eat anything they feel like and they will stay healthy and lean. This is simply not true, as we shall see.

Lets look at the event itself and at the type and duration of training. The race length for masters rowers is traditionally 1000 m (although this may soon be changed to 1500 m). This would usually take from 3 to 4 minutes, depending on the type of boat and the speed of the crew. It is possible to race 3 or 4 races in one regatta, so you would end up doing 12 to 15 mins of racing and maybe 60 mins of lighter rowing (warming up, paddling to start, warming down, etc).

Total energy expenditure would be a very approximate 3000 kilojoules for the regatta. You could consume this in one Musashi Amino Edge bar and a couple of pieces of fruit, or in one litre of most commercial sports drinks. (By the way, it's best to take in this food in small doses during the regatta, preferably immediately after each race).

For each training session you would need another 2000 or so kilojoules. So, it is apparent that the extra kilojoules necessary for the masters rower can easily be incorporated into a fairly standard diet. A few extra pieces of fruit, maybe a tub of low fat yoghurt and some raisin bread is quite enough to replace the energy used in training.

Many masters athletes are already carrying a few extra pounds which is another good reason to make sure that you do not consume vast amounts of kilojoules. You can still eat as much as you want without taking in excessive calories, if you choose foods which aren't energy dense. So (again!) keep away from simple sugars and fats.

2. Metabolic Rate and Aging

As people get older, especially after forty or fifty, it's a sad fact that they need fewer kilojoules to sustain basic metabolic processes. This is largely due to the lower proportion of muscle tissue to fat, but also because they are no longer growing. If you are losing muscle tissue as you age then you won't need as much energy. Athletes who can maintain their training consistently through their lives may prove the exception to this, but the trend is that as you age your basic metabolic rate is less.

3. Recovery and Aging

Recovery becomes critical as you get a bit older, mainly because recovery gets harder, and with other aspects of your life to consider, there is not as much time to sleep or relax during the day. Timing your meals for optimal glycogen repletion is therefore very important, and we'll go into this in the next section.

Ensuring adequate fluid replenishment is also an integral part of efficient recovery. To do this you have to make drinking a habit, and that's water not alcohol (which is a diuretic, as are coffee and tea).

As with planning your meals and taking food with you to regattas and training, always take your trusty water bottle. Water is usually good enough, but if sessions are over 90 minutes or very intense a diluted glucose polymer sports drink such as Energise or Maxim might assist recovery. If it's very hot and you've sweated over 3 kg then you might consider an electrolyte replacement sports drink such as Staminade or Lucozade. Many of the commercial sports drinks have very concentrated amounts of sugar and salts and you may find it preferable to dilute them to avoid an upset stomach.

One word of warning about sports drinks: Never try a new sports drink during competition-you never know how you will react to it. I learned this lesson the hard way while at the 1994 Commonwealth Regatta in Canada. I found myself quite dehydrated, but without my water bottle and (can you believe it?) there was no drinking water on site except for a sponsor's sugary and salty sports drink. I never use electrolyte bolstered drinks and the effects of this one on me were a surprise to say the least. I got severe cramps during the race in my calves (of all things) and limped home a very embarrassing second last.

It is important to note that injuries can occur more readily in a dehydrated body, especially in joints which rely on fluid-filled sacs for lubrication. Dehydration also seems to predispose tendons to injury, as I have found out, to my personal cost.

Food has fluid in it, and if you aren't eating much, you need to drink more to compensate. Conversely some foods will help to re-hydrate you-watermelon is a very good recovery food.

After long and intense training sessions when you are low on glycogen you have to dip into your muscle tissue to provide energy. Protein intake then becomes a more important part in recovery. It is now known that endurance athletes who train over long durations may need up to twice as much protein as recommended for a standard sports diet. Usually, consuming this amount of protein isn't a problem as the total amount of food intake increases so does protein intake. However it is worth making an effort to think of including a little protein in your post-exercise replenishment routine, preferably after that first hit with the high glycaemic index carbos.

Recovery isn't only a matter of refilling those energy stores. Damage is often done to muscle tissues, as well as to tendons and ligaments, and stress fractures can occur from overuse. Can diet influence recovery from injury? According to conventional wisdom no, but when you're injured you can get desperate.

Not so long ago I was sidelined with a broken scapula and vertebrae after a cycling accident. I had 7 weeks to get fit for the world championships, and I couldn't row because I couldn't use my upper body. I could use the exercise bike at the gym, however, I could go to 'spinning' classes, and I could use the leg press. I tried every vitamin pill I thought might give me a chance to hasten the healing process. These were Vitamin E, Vitamin A, Vitamin C with bioflavinoids, and calcium. I also made sure my protein intake was adequate, which was especially important as I was on a very low kilojoule intake trying to lose weight to make the lightweight category. I eventually passed the fitness test to make it to the world championships (but then got pneumonia while there and couldn't race!). Did the extra vitamins, minerals and protein have a hand in my recovery? Who can say? At least they didn't do any harm!

Fitting Eating into the Masters Rower's Day

Before Early Morning Training

Early morning rowers should try to eat a little something before training, even if that's at 5 o'clock in the morning. Blood sugar is very low in the morning and you may very well go a bit hypoglycaemic (lack of blood sugar) if you train without eating. This food should have a fairly low glycaemic index and it will be absorbed more slowly, allowing for the energy to last for the whole training session. These foods are often high in fibre, however, so be careful not to eat too much or you may feel sick in the stomach when you're out there on the water.

After Training

Studies have consistently shown that it is essential to replenish your glycogen as soon after training/racing as possible. The best way to do this is to consume some carbohydrate-rich food of high GI within 10 minutes of training. A sports drink might be useful here, or choose real foods with a high GI such as rice, processed cereals or plain bread without grains and seeds. Don't forget that fluid replenishment either.
Some fruit is good at this stage-watermelon and pineapple have the highest GIs and also help fluid replenishment.

Breakfast

Breakfast should be within an hour or so after the glycogen replenishment. It should still be mainly carbo rich foods, but here you can include a greater variety of cereals and fruit, and even a little protein.

Be more careful about the nutritional value of your food at this stage. You are looking for a longer-lasting meal now. Cereals should preferably be of the unprocessed variety (porridge, puffed wheat, rice, natural muesli), or at least avoid the processed cereals that are high in salt or sugar. Avoid toasted mueslis and muesli bars-in addition to vast amounts of sugar, both can contain up to 20 grams of fat per 100 grams which is actually about 35% of the total energy value of the food. (When reading food labels an easy way to estimate the percentage fat in the food is to double the fat content given in grams per 100 grams).

Really try to get into the habit of using low fat high calcium milk if you haven't already-full cream milk is such an easy way to take fats in without really noticing it.

The Rest of the Day

By lunchtime you can include a bit more protein and a little fat. In effect, you're back to 'normal' food: a chicken and salad sandwich for lunch, for example, is fine.

Dinner can also be relatively 'normal', as long as you follow the principles of good nutrition outlined in this article (low fat, low salt, less quantity, more quality).

If you are training very intensely, or training again later in the day, have some more carbos with your lunch and a snack in the afternoon. If not, you don't have to keep eating heavily all day.

To keep your weight down it's better to have most of your kilojoules in the first part of the day, which is one of the reasons why I have emphasised the early morning and breakfast intakes.

As a general principle eating smaller meals more often is better, for several reasons:

1. You don't get large highs and lows in blood sugar (so your moods and energy levels stay even, and you don't yawn during that important meeting! You also minimise stress on your insulin system)
2. By eating a small amount of food quickly after training and you have more chance of getting more carbohydrates into your glycogen stores, which will means the stores will be recovered for the next day's training.
3. If you are going to train again later in the day, even if only moderately, your stomach will not be uncomfortably full.

Fitting eating into regattas follows similar principles.

A Warning About Energy Drinks, Fruit Juices and Energy Bars

Energy drinks, fruit juice and energy bars are easy ways to consume a lot of kilojoules without realising it. These foods should be kept for specific times when they are necessary and useful, e.g. during regattas when you haven't the time between events to eat a meal or on long training rows (over 90 minutes) It should be remembered that this is food and part of your daily energy consumption. If you are using energy/sports drinks as a major part of your total caloric intake then make sure you have chosen some with added nutrients if they are meal replacements. Sugary sports drinks with no nutrients are okay for straight after a training session or race, but are otherwise not a good thing.

Conclusion

I have rambled over all sorts of things in this article, yet I feel I have barely got started. For example, I haven't even begun to cover osteoporosis, the pluses and minuses of caffeine, differentiating between sports drinks and supplements, sodium bicarbonate loading, creatine monohydrate or how to cope with decadence and appear normal. Maybe another time.
Coming up with a conclusion is not easy, but I guess my overall message for masters rowers is the one I started out with-decrease the quantity of food being eaten, increase the quality, and time it right!

Two useful books

Louise Burke's The Complete Guide to Food for Sports Performance (Burke/Allen & Unwin 1992)

If you are more serious about the whole food scene in Australia, a very useful book (that is currently on special) is the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare's Australia's Food and Nutrition (author Ian Lester, published by the Australian Government Publishing Service 1994). Alternatively, surf into the full text for free at http://www.aihw.gov.au.

Adair Ferguson is a former World Lightweight Single Sculling Champion, Commonwealth Games gold medallist, and many time national champion. She is currently Sports Development Officer for ACT Rowing