Performance Nutrition for Crossfit

Here are the top 5 mistakes people and some trainers make and how fixing them can help you feel, look and perform to a higher level.

1. You’re eating for fat loss yet you want performance – this is the single biggest mistake most people make. What this means is that you want to get better at performing your activity e.g. Crossfit, yet you continue to eat like you’re trying to drop body fat.

How does this look? It looks like you’re deliberately trying to restrict carbohydrate intake so you consume little to no starchy carbs such as, rice, potatoes, oats, beans, pulses, not enough fruit etc.

Just so were clear – you want to do Crossfit or even something that remotely even looks like crossfit, which has at its core high intensity metcons or wods, that for the most part are fueled by carbs yet you want to deliberately restrict them in the stunning belief that you might gain fat or lose your abs? Good luck with that and see you in a month when you have zero energy all the time, you’re draging your tired ass to the gym 5-7 days a week and you’re muscles feel sore most of the time.

The solution – if you’re lean and highly active then eat more bloody starchy carbs. Test body fat regularly to ease your mind that you’re not gaining fat.

If you need to drop body fat while doing crossfit, then consume the bulk of your carbs in the post workout window i.e. after your training session eat more carbs as opposed to other times of the day.

Stop thinking about your abs and start thinking about your performance and what you need to do to fuel it.

Do you honestly think Rich Froning (this guy here) cares or counts how many grams of carbs he takes in daily? No he doesn’t, I don’tand you should only care if your fatness is getting in the way of your performance or you struggle to consume enough carbs.

2. You supplement before addressing real food – the cornerstone of your nutrition is real food. No processed junk, no wheat, little sugar and you’re good to go. If you need to get by on excessive coffee and energy drinks for all your training sessions then you’re on the fast track to a major energy crash.

The solution – Just eat real food (most of the time and see the next point for supplements)

3. You take the wrong supplements – it amazes me the amount of people that do crossfit that are massively concerned about joint pain and joint issues.

So what do they do? The start looking for every supplement under the sun that could possibly help them relieve joint pain when the ACTUAL problem is their sh1ty program which typically has far too much volume, especially in the metcons, not enough recovery work, not backing off in training sessions when they need to and little attention to fundamental mobility issues.

I won’t even get into protein powders, should you take them or which ones are best as I talked about that before here.

The solution – So what supplements should you be taking? Delighted you asked and what do you know I covered that here.

Note the focus on fixing your digestion and overall health FIRST and how important that is for overall performance.

Oh and take some creatine, it’s very cheap, it works, it won’t kill you and there is a ton of evidence that it can help you get stronger and churn out a few more reps.

Want the best darn ergogenic aid review ever published? Got you covered here.

4. You fail to prepare – I will never leave the house without a ton of water and one or more of these snacks.

It’s very rare I will fail to have the food i need around me at all times. Relying on “picking something up” is not good enough as you need to be in full control of what goes into the machine that is you. So stop acting like an beginner athlete when you want to be a pro.

The solution – make Sunday a day where you prepare at least 50% of your main meals for the week and ALL your snacks.

5. Paleo is NOT a guide for carb intake – crossfit was the largest community that embraced the nutrition approach that is paleo but the biggest mistake when applied to crossfit is misunderstanding that Paleo is a guide for you to understand food quality and NOT carb intake.

Visit almost any crossfit site and take a look at their nutrition recommendations. They are often in favour of restricting starchy or favourable carbs.

Go back to point number 1 if you didn’t get why this is a bad idea if you’re lean, strong and active.

Yes, yes, yes eat natural foods like your primal ancestors did but for the love of god stop with the potatoes, oats, beans and rice aren’t paleo. Carbs are not the enemy and I’ve got the abs and performance to prove it.

Should you lower carb intake on non-training or very light days? Yes of course but this is built into my recommendation of adjusting carb intake accoring to activity. So less active = less carbs. Plus less active + really weak (you’re a guy or girl but haven’t developed the ability to do simple exercises such as squat and dedlift your own body weight, do press ups and pull ups easily) and no strength work at all = even less carbs.

Carb intake will go up as you get stronger, fitter and leaner otherwise stop eating like a pro athlete when you have the activity levels of someone on a constant TV box setmarathon.

The solution – go read this. Yes it tells you most of what I already told you above but hey I’ve only been doing this for 20years so you might need to read the same advice twice and on a site that has a greater readership than the 10 people that read my site.

Hope you found this of help and you need some one to one assistance you can book a session with me by calling 086-8073888 or email me dominic@dominicmunnelly.ie