Carbohydrate in the MuayThai diet

Have you ever noticed that the harder you train and the fitter you are – the more often you get sick!  

It’s been described as walking a knife-edge between being incredibly fit/healthy and going down under colds, coughs and other mild but irritating illnesses.

There are many things which you can do to balance all of this out and ensure that you are in good condition for training everyday. One of the most important things you have to look after is your diet. Fads and information-overload can result in confusion but some basic things are essential.

An intake of enough carbohydrate to ensure you are capable of training as hard as you want is the building block to everything else. This is in spite of the celebrity fad to avoid carbs – remember you are not a supermodel, you are an athlete; training at optimal intensity can only be achieved if you have high muscle-glycogen concentration from eating enough carbs.

Carbs are stored as glycogen in your muscles and liver. As a boxer you will have higher levels of muscle glycogen than a normal person - and you need it all! The liver glycogen helps to control your blood sugar levels. Research indicates that 2 hours of high-intensity training (yes, kicking pads and sparring falls under that category ;) ) will almost completely deplete the glycogen in your muscles so you  have to refuel straight after training.

So, how much do you need? Your intake should be determined by the level and intensity of your training on a daily basis – harder training means more fuel is needed to keep going.  This is a suggested outline of how much you should aim for:

Light activity:        3-5 hours/week   4-5 grams/per Kg/body weight
Medium activity:   10 hours/ week    6-7 grams/per Kg/body weight
Elite boxers:         20 hours/week     8 + grams/per Kg/body weight

Lack of carbohydrates to fuel the recovery phase of training will result a drop in endurance, power and strength and due to tiredness you will probably be more prone to injury. You often hear boxers talking casually about “over-training” but it is actually extreme exhaustion caused by glycogen depletion.

The traditional view of Carbs is a plate of steaming pasta or rice – but there’s more to the story than that.

The following foods give you about 30g of carbs in one go, as you will see many can be matched up:

Liquids

150-250ml of fruit shake/ smoothies - (easy to get if you are in Thailand)
300 ml low-fat milk
200g yoghurt-drink
500 ml sports drink
250 fruit juice, soft drink
(try to avoid the latter as they are filled with empty calories)

Breads

2 slices of bread – whole-wheat is better than white!
3 rice-cakes
1 English muffin /crumpet
1 American muffin – small one not the massive chocolate one in the bakery!
2 medium pancakes (watch the syrup and cream and …. )

Grains

1 cup cooked pasta
? cup cooked rice
150 grams baked beans
1 ? cup cooked lentils (not just for hippies)
200 gram potato
1 ? cups sweet potato

Fruit/ Vegetables

1 cup thick vegetable soup
1 large corn on the cob
2 medium pieces of fruit
1 large banana
1 cup fruit salad
45 grams dried fruit

Other

40-50 grams chocolate
3 tablespoons jam or honey
2 tablespoons of sugar

GI Index – what is it?
Not all Carbs are created equal; research has shown that certain foods have a high Glycaemic Index (GI) while others are lower. Simply put this means that foods with a high GI are better for getting carbs at a fast rate into your bloodstream, these foods are good to eat just after training.  And foods with a low GI are good to eat before training as they will release their energy slowly over time. 

To be honest, there is a lot of debate as to whether this is an accurate science or not but in general low GI before and high GI after training is a good rule of thumb.

Check out http://www.glycemicindex.com for GI food-values.

Your main focus as a boxer should be on re-fuelling after training, especially for those of you training for fights and training 5-6 days a week.  This means that if you don’t eat enough carbohydrate on Monday, that shortage builds up over the week so that by Saturday you are even more shattered than you would normally be.

The best time to begin re-fuelling is within 2 hours of finishing training -  so even if you have to rush straight to work after the morning session or are going to bed after the evening one  stop and eat ! You should look for high GI foods if you are training every day. Sports drinks, sports bars, breads, raisins and most breakfast cereals will do the job.

The main thing to remember is that you are working out to a very intense level – whether training in Thailand or in your home country. Your body is working to full capacity and needs plenty of fuel in the form of carbohydrates. Eating a low-crab diet will result in a short-term weight loss (due to loss of water and glycogen) but this is not a smart way to approach your whole training programme.