“We don’t plan to fail, we fail to plan” said Benjamin Franklin or something similar.
You get the picture.
When it comes to feeling your best, and performing at your best in your sport or at work or at home, planning is essential. And meal planning is an essential for optimizing your health, your recovery and your performance in sport and life!
Meal planning should be viewed like you view your work schedule: you plan meetings, you plan to prepare for the meetings, and you get everything together so you are ready for that meeting!
Let’s look at you, the athlete.
You plan your workouts – either morning before work, or later after work. You wear your clothes to the workout at the gym, and plan to take your clothes for work so you can shower and be ready for work.
But did you think about your recovery meal? Lunch? Snack? What you’ll have for dinner? What will you eat before your evening workout? Most of you will pack it all the night before – I know i did! Then in the morning, just grab your gym bag, grab your clothes and grab the meals all ready packed up.
I suggest you look at your meals the same as you view your workouts. Make a plan. I often help clients with these plans so we can work on a 3 Day rolling calendar. This way, you can be ready for all your meals and focus on other things during the day rather than winging it! and fail miserably with some grab and go option or a quick stop at McDonalds or Wendy’s.
Here are what I suggest you include in your meal planning for better performance:
- Look at today and tomorrow, maybe the next day. What meals do you need to eat? When will you eat them?
- Do you have what you need for those meals? Do you need to go grocery shopping (or have the groceries delivered?)? Do you need to cook anything today or tomorrow? When will you do that?
- What can you make today – can you make more chicken and roasted potatoes at dinner so you have it for lunch the next day along with your ceasar salad, for example?
- What snacks do you need? Do you have them or do you need to make the snack?
- Can you make more at dinner so you have leftovers for your recovery meal tomorrow after your workouts?
- Put all these items into the schedule. It is your priority so try not to let someone else get in your way.
Try to carve out some time to plan the meals, the cooking, shopping, etc so you can eat exactly what it is you need every day. As you get used to the rolling calendar and meal planning, it will get easier. If you take it with you, you can eat it when you want and know you will have a good meal every time!
If you are struggling with cooking, maybe a meal delivery service would make sense. I have used LifeChef who is based in Trenton, NJ and delivers on Tuesdays and Fridays. This can take some of the guess work out of meal planning. Use code NIMPA100 to get $100 off your first 5 orders.
They are home cooked meals and include vegetarian, gluten free and things like mashed parsnips and roasted root vegetables so it is not just boring food!
If you need some help with meal planning so your performance starts to soar, reach out at [email protected] or schedule a 15 min chat here. As an athlete, you want to perform at your best in your sport and life, but you also want to not add stress of ‘what the heck am I going to eat now??’ and choose low quality meals. You want to optimize your recovery and be your best at work, too so try meal planning so you can optimize your performance!