Sports food is no longer a concept applicable to professional athletes only. Choosing your food wisely is one of the healthy human priorities to restore energy.
Long surfing runs can be energy exhausting, and you need to know how to choose your food.
You are what you eat in the long run — before surfing and after it as well. Nutrition is as important in surfing as your actual performance on the water.
Before Surfing
Energy is what any person needs to be physically active, and surfing is no different.
Riding surfing marathons take lots of energy, and your food must be up to quality. Now it is not the time to be afraid of calories because during a surfing run you spend a lot of energy.
It is vital to properly charge your batteries before a long surfing session to keep your energy last. The only trick is to know which food is good and which one is bad for you when you go surfing regularly.
Let us determine the time interval required by your body to convert consumed meals into useful energy.
Before any exercise, this time frame is 1.5 hours or 90 minutes. In order to help this energy last and be depleted gradually, we should look at foods with GI which is short for Glycemic Index.
Such products are slower to convert thus giving a prolonged store of energy while surfing.
The food we need in this regard consists mostly of vegetables (excluding starchy ones like potatoes), milk, wild rice, fruits with the exception of watermelons, baked foods (whole-grain bread), green salads, and almost all protein-rich foods (nuts, fish, eggs, a few types of meat).
You can spice things up with foods containing medium amounts of sugars (carbohydrates): any whole wheat pastry, most kinds of rice, yam, table sugar are also great for providing you with energy.
Great meals to make your energy ready are the following:
- Whole grain tortilla flatbread filled with black beans, cheese, eggs, and ham.
- Whole grain bread with peanut butter, various nuts, and a glass of milk.
- Breakfast Cheerios (always whole grain) mixed with sliced apple and milk.
After surfing
Not every hard day at work can hold a candle to that devastating hunger one may experience after surfing.
It is time to restore your depleted energy with carbohydrates and help your muscles recover by consuming proteins.
But first, you need to wait 30-60 minutes after your surfing session in order to maximize enzyme p roduction for additional energy.
Food consumed on the opening of this “window” will provide a maximum effect in terms of both energy restoration and muscle build.
Foods with a high GI are perfect for recharging your energy banks after surfing.
These mostly are various sweets: straight glucose, white bread and sweet pastry, watermelon, Rice Krispies, potatoes, corn flakes, etc.
Still, low GI foods should be the base of your diet. Glycemic spikes are OK after a good exercise but not at any other time.
Abusing high GI foods may lead to diabetes, some forms of cancer and heart disease.
Something to help you with hunger includes:
- Chicken breast with a side of baked potatoes and white rice.
- White bread with cheese and turkey, also add watermelon and corn chips.
- Hash browns, Italian sausages, waffles with syrup.
Balanced nutrition is important for every person who is into sports.
Some surfers disregard it because of low budgets, short sessions, and dawn patrols.
But no matter when and how you go surfing, always remember to treat yourself with respect in order to be fully energized and ready for another wave.
