SSF: Food Fancy

Sometimes people think in order to lose weight all they have to do is workout like wild animals. While that’s important, there is a tight connection between exercise and diet that you need to pay attention to. This week’s Scramble to Summer Fitness will help you with starting out the diet side of your weight loss.

1. Alcohol – I get it. We’re in college and drinking is part of the culture and it’s getting warmer and all you want to do is go sit outside at a bar, sipping on frozen margaritas. I’m not telling you to stop drinking alcohol all together, I’m telling you to cut down big time! Ideally you would throw it out completely because you would be consuming calories with no nutritional value, but, like I said, we’re in college.

2. Choose Wisely – If you so choose to continue drinking alcohol, then choose your beverage wisely. Drinks like margaritas and piña coladas can have up to 500 calories. That would take you almost a six-mile run at seven miles per hour to work off! If you’re going to be drinking those all night, then you better Run-Forrest-Run your ass to the gym everyday for a week, PLUS your regular workout. Instead of the fruity drink, find a beer that you like, which average 150 calories per bottle, or a nice red or white wine, which stay around 120 calories per five ounce serving.

3. Rewards – You just finished a great workout, you’re fourth this week, and you want to reward yourself. We’ve all been there. You feel like you deserve some jalapeño chips or a blueberry muffin, but you don’t! More than likely you wont just eat a few chips or just one muffin. Plus, this type of rewards system completely undoes all your hard work at the gym. If you really want to reward yourself, don’t do it with food. Instead go out and buy yourself a new exercise outfit or perhaps a new yoga mat instead of using the bacteria infested ones at the gym. There are loads of rewards you can give yourself that don’t have to do with food.

4. Six-a-days: Stop starving yourself. Leaving a six-hour gap between meals (lunch at noon then dinner at six) tricks your digestive system into thinking that it has to store all the food it takes in because it’s not sure when to expect its next meal. Waiting even longer between meals will put this process into overdrive. Here’s the trick, never let yourself feel hungry because that triggers your body into storing foods. Instead eat five to six small meals throughout the day. Let me emphasize the word small. Cut whatever you’re eating during a regular meal in half. In between those now smaller meals, eat a healthy snack like a bowl of fruit, granola bar with a banana, or mixed nuts. You should never feel stuffed when eating, you should feel content and satisfied.

5. To-go box: The moment the waiter/waitress brings you your meal ask for a to-go box. To-go box meet weight-loss-determined-college-student and vice versa. Restaurant meals are usually too much food for one sitting and will absolutely ruin your six-a-days plan. Instead take one half of your meal and put it in the to-go box. Take it home with you and eat it three hours later.

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About Claudia Tristán

News Director    —    Journalism and Marketing double major, Class of 2013
Claudia works to cover current events and political issues that effect the Tech campus. She plans to return overseas as a foreign correspondent.