Nutrition in Wrestling with Karsen Hunter

Teague and Melissa are joined by dietician Karsen Hunter for an episode focused on the best ways wrestlers can fuel themselves through the season, on competition days, and more! 

Get in touch with Karsen:

Nourish Referral Link: https://signup.nourish.com/providers/karsen-hunter?referralSource=Nourish+dietitian&referralName=Karsen+Hunter&utm_source=Nourish_dietitian&utm_term=Karsen_Hunter

Email: khunter0096@outlook.com

Instagram: _karsenh

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome to the Wisconsin Wrestler Podcast with your co-host, Teeth Fenwick, Steve Lurk.

SPEAKER_04 0:16

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to another edition of the Wisconsin Wrestler Podcast. I'm your host, Teak Fenwick, coming to you live from Holman. Joining me, not as always, and yes, folks, you're not mistaken, that is not Steve there. Joining me from Freedom, right? Now, uh it'll take a conna-ish, but Freedom will say, to be more accurate, is my co-host for the evening. First time on the Wisconsin Wrestler podcast as a co-host. The brains behind the Wisconsin Grappler website and it does all the fun things in the shadows, as she says. Melissa Pearson. Melissa, I'm pumped.

SPEAKER_02 1:01

Yeah, thanks for having me. Um, yeah, it's uh I don't know if it's cool to be out of the shadows or not. We'll find out. And uh yeah, to your point, I'm not Steve, so you're not gonna get a lot of wrestling knowledge out of me today.

SPEAKER_04 1:14

I was uh I I was wondering if you were gonna say I stole the line accidentally, but usually I say great to be here, but I kind of fuddled that. And uh Steve always says pumped to be here, so I think that's why I had that in my head. So it's great to be here. We're pumped to be here. And uh folks, it's been a while. I think this is the longest we've gone without a podcast in a couple of years, and uh that's just uh that's how life goes when we're in uh in the dog days of spring, I guess we'll say. And uh coaching tracks been going great. Got a few uh Bangor girls going to states. We got that this week. And uh I know Steve has a senior running track, so he's been uh doing the whole parent thing, and yeah, it's been a good month away, but I think we are ready to get back into things. And uh don't know what Steve's up to tonight. He might be tuning in for all we know. But Melissa, you actually uh you've been coming through in the offseason. I know you've been doing some fun stuff with the site. I think there's been a couple articles, and you were able to hook us up with a top-notch guest. No, we're not talking about 1990 brackets for two hours, which that's fun, don't get me wrong. But we get to talk about a topic that's pretty prevalent in the sport of wrestling and talking some nutrition stuff tonight. So uh without further ado, let's introduce our guest, the man in the middle. I should have got where you were from beforehand, apologies, Carson, but he is a sports dietitian, a sports nutrition contractor, just got done working with the University of Virginia Tech, and he came highly recommended by the UFC's nutritionist. We'll get more into his bio in just a moment here, but introduce none other than Mr. Carson Hunter. Carson, glad to have you on.

SPEAKER_00 3:02

Yeah, thanks for having me. I um super excited to be here and you know chat through nutrition. Obviously, it's one of those sports in wrestling where you know, whether we like it or not, we're we're surrounded by food and this dynamic around food and weight and managing your weight is is something to navigate, both as a parent and a wrestler. And so any insight I can provide, you know, I'm I'm really excited to do so. Um, I guess I can kind of sorry.

SPEAKER_04 3:28

Yeah, you go, you go.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Oh, just gotta share a little bit more just to kind of add in. I'm uh coming from western Nebraska, a little town called Baird on the west side, and um started wrestling when I was five, finished up um around time high school finished up, and um decided I wanted to become a dietitian. You know, I knew the the struggles that I faced as a wrestler um with my nutrition and food, and that was something that excited me to learn more and hopefully do what I can to help other wrestlers and athletes in that space who who struggle to navigate um their nutrition when it comes to performance and weight descent, and took that to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and then there later um to the Olympic Training Center, where I spent some time working with Team USA's combat and acrobatic athletes, primarily with wrestling, but then also with some gymnastics, fencing, um, artistic swimming, which is an interesting one as well. Um, and then most recently, as you mentioned, uh Virginia Tech working alongside the wrestling team there, which is really great, worked alongside Clint Wattenberg, um, who was previously the performance dietitian at the University, uh at the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas, and then now the past like three years has been the director of nutrition with the Virginia Tech.

SPEAKER_04 4:46

So you're you're just kind of a jack of all trades then, Carson.

SPEAKER_00 4:51

I try my best. You know, it's uh I knew I didn't want to specialize too early because there's always something to gain from working from one sport that I can apply to the next. And um it's something that I've surely seen that benefit of like, oh, this is really helpful working with this sport, I can apply this here, and and vice versa. And so it's it's benefited me surely.

SPEAKER_04 5:14

And I know, right? Oh, sorry, Melissa. You go, you go.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

So you've been around the sport, you know, from I think you said age five. Can you talk how a little bit about maybe how you've seen nutrition and wrestling evolve, and then also how your education maybe helped you understand nutrition differently?

SPEAKER_00 5:35

Yeah. So I I was coming from a relative like a small town and like 900 people, it was class D, you know, not a lot of resources, you know, th thrown our way. Um, and also just not a lot of knowledge around what was happening outside of, you know, it's the small town mindset. So you don't really know about the different roles that nutrition places in um college and professional teams. And the idea of a sports dietitian wasn't really something I knew about until towards the end of my high school um wrestling. Uh and you know, for as long as I can remember, I just I just wrestled. It was all year round, going with my my friends' parents to drive to you know Midwest Classic at the other end of the state, and some different tournaments around um our area, the Midwest. And it wasn't until high school that I really started to take a lot more control of my my weight and the idea and the culture around being lighter is better was something that I surely you know struggled with and led to some really poor decisions around how to you know descend my weight. And during that time, you know, this is all pre um post-1998, where they started the weight certification program, which is where, you know, you know, I believe it was three wrestlers across different teams passed away due to weight cutting, um harmful weight cutting strategies. And so there was, it was it became more taboo of like throwing the plastic bag on, but it was certainly something that a lot of people were still doing and and um losing the water weight and way too early. And you know, we were we were doing all of it, and it was something that we didn't really know any better because it is the you know, it had become sort of a part of the culture around the coach learns it when they're a wrestler, um, who learned it from their coach, and the cycle continues. Since for me, it the first three years, you know, freshman to junior year of wrestling, I was significantly under where my body frame wanted to meet in terms of body weight. Um, I kind of shimmied past state qualifying to get into the turn, the state tournament, you know, got beat out the first two years, third year, eventually placed, and then the last year I was like, I've had enough, and whatever I weigh next year, that's when I'm wrestling. And uh jumped from 160 to 195, which was a telltale sign my Bonnie wanted to grow. And um because I mean I felt the best I ever felt and ended up winning a state title that year. And it's so it was kind of my revelation to really get involved in in nutrition, and you know, there is this balance between performance and um wanting to go lower in your weight class and the idea that that'll make you better. It's it's a it's a dialogue that continues to need uh spotlight shined on, and you know, calls like this and podcasts, they're all super helpful in doing so. So this is great.

SPEAKER_04 8:33

All right. Well, Melissa, I know you've been a guest on a show before, but that was a rock star question right away. And uh I'm unfortunately gonna dumb things down a little bit here with my question. But I uh I do have a few friends that are dietitians, Carson, but I have to be honest, if someone told me what a dietitian did exactly, I would not be able to tell them. So hopefully there's a few other people that are learning when I ask this. But being a dietitian, working in sports nutrition, what does your day-to-day look like?

SPEAKER_00 9:04

Yeah, so I can kind of answer your first question of like the overarching question of like what's a dietitian? I think we hear the word dietitian and nutritionist thrown around quite a bit. And most people, you know, through like a short class online, maybe can become a nutritionist. But um, in order to become like legally licensed as a dietitian, um, you have to go through your bachelor's program, master's, uh 1200-hour practicum that you're running through different areas of nutrition, and then you after that you take your boards. Um so it is, you know, a lot to get to that point, but it certainly with the amount of issues that we see around um the US on different areas of nutrition, it's you know, that's that's why that's put in place, is to ensure that we can we're provided with the tools necessary to handle any given situation, whether that's like military dietitians, sports dietitians, hospital dietitians, um, being equipped for each area is something just depending on the dietitians' interest and where they want to delve into. But for me, you know, day-to-day, let's say working in the collegiate space is luckily all your athletes are on site. You know, they're around, they're bouncing, you know, to and from, let's say, like a fueling station, which is a place where a lot of colleges um say more so in the division one space, um, division two, it's slowly trinkling its way everywhere of the importance of having you know something as small as a little snack cart to something as big as like a full um little mini kitchen where there's fridges and stuff like that, which is what you'd see at Virginia Tech or Nebraska and um some of these bigger universities. And so you're seeing athletes on the day-to-day, you know, maybe you're not um around them in that setting pre and post-practice, but during practice, you're popping in, making sure everybody's doing good, helping the athletes know that like you're there to support them. And then I would say a large bulk of the time that you're spending would be you know, spending time consulting with the athletes one-on-one. What are the, you know, it's a freshman coming in, they're coming off of some pretty poor weight descent tactics, and they're not really sure where to start. You know, they work with a dietitian. Let's, you know, let's try and reverse some of these habits that have formed over you know years. Or maybe there's things they're doing well, but we can just kind of fine-tune them regarding actual competition nutrition. So you're working through those on the on a one-on-one basis and building out, you know, let's say like a descent plan of, you know, it's off season. This is kind of where I could see myself being with my weight class. I've talked with coaches, they're on board. And then, you know, I consult with coaches to ensure that that's something that's practical based off um where the wrestler sits with their like frame size, available body fat. So there's that side of things. Then obviously, there's the travel prep. You're traveling with teams, supporting the teams, you know, one two-day tournaments, um, all the packing and you know, snack packing, you know, a lot of what I'm doing. You'll these most people see them as like your conventional snacks, but you know, in a performance setting, that's liquid gold, you know, the things like fruit snacks and stuff like that. That um for athletes, that's you know, that's what their body needs. But you know, spending a lot of time packing up, traveling, being with the teams, managing injuries, um, yeah, it's uh it's a whole lot, but I'm happy to you know go into any direction a little bit further.

SPEAKER_02 12:34

I want to talk about those habits you mentioned. So you you talked about the freshman coming in with some bad habits. If you were to say, I wish younger wrestlers had this one habit or they stopped doing this one thing, and so I didn't have to break that habit. Like, what would those what would that be? What would you change?

SPEAKER_00 12:53

So this is and this is coming from this is something that I remember all too well as a wrestler. It's relying on fluid as your main way of manipulating your weight and dehydrating too early. So what we see with with wrestlers is you know that are practicing some of these more harmful um weight descent strategies is you know, they start restricting fluid a little too early, and that's where you notice, like from their perspective, they see the scale drop, right? The scale number drops, they're like, all right, it's working. Um when in reality, you know, if we do need to make any sort of like I wouldn't say restriction, but um like limiting water intake with any given time of the weight descent process as a wrestler, we should not be doing that any more than 24 hours, um, anything further than 24 hours out from competition. So it's like even like you're you know 12 hours out, you know, maybe you drink a little bit less water, you start to taper away from, you know, you're just overall drinking less. And with the two hours post-weigh-in, we know that in that range of time, we could probably get you well hydrated. But if we the rest the longer that time in a dehydrated state continues, let's say it's three days before a competition, you make it equally like increasingly more challenging to hydrate you to a point that um at the end of the day, your your performance is going to be impaired the longer that you sit in your dehydrated state, and those training quality of those um the sessions that you have leading into that competition is gonna be impaired. And so it I would say it's like relying on water, it's knowing that okay, I just had a five, six-pound practice, I'm gonna go drink two bottles of water and then not replace the rest of the fluid that I just lost in that time period. Um so really reversing that and trust, helping the athlete trust that it's a trust is a big thing. It's like because if they see 24 hours before weigh-ins or 48 hours before weigh-ins and their weight is a little bit higher than it normally we be, would be around that time if they had done what they normally do, maybe dehydrating a little earlier, then they're kind of gonna set in this like this panic of like, oh no, this is something I haven't I shouldn't be this above my weight class, but really trusting that process and knowing that when the body wants to kind of release off some of that fluid, um it's better off in a hydrated state. All any wrestler knows that when they're dry as a sponge and they've already kind of lost the fluid, their body doesn't want to sweat anymore, you start urinating less. And so those are some classic signs that we're restricting um fluid too much, and that that dehydration is going to impair performance.

SPEAKER_04 15:47

It's interesting you bring up uh if kids do it three or four days beforehand, and then it how it affects their performance the rest of the week, and then there's you think about that and prolong it out to a two to three month period where some kids might be doing that every weekend or twice a week, and you can see how that compounds over the course of a season.

SPEAKER_02 16:06

Yeah, and you know, those bodies are still growing too. You know, if you think about a kid that's maybe at the front end of a growth spur, too, and the amount of fuel that's needed to power through that growth spur and that that restriction in there that's tough to balance. If you're a parent, or what advice then would you give parents, maybe that have a child in that situation that um is committed to a spot or is um trying to hit a certain weight, and that struggle is real. How do you as a parent start to kind of give? I think there's a lot of guidance here, so maybe this question's a little thick, but maybe we can start like high-level, maybe mental space. What's the what's the sort of mental advice you give to parents to help their children navigate some of that?

SPEAKER_00 16:53

Yeah, I I would say I talk a lot about this a lot, um, but the the identity and core identity that a wrestler has with their sport. So it's like, you know, I'm Carson Hunter, but how much my identity is wrapped and is wrapped up into wrestling, you know, you know, and I talk to this with my athletes a lot. It's like the more that your identity is wrapped into that sport, it's certainly gonna bother you a lot more if you're not able to handle um like getting your weight down or not really knowing what to do. You like want to take more control because there's so much more of there's so much passion in that sport, and you want to perform well. And so to for a parent, I can I can imagine. Um, I can't say but I'm because I'm not a parent, but I know certainly what my mom has seen as me as a wrestler, it's just being supportive and being a provider of you know, you know, assess how your um your kid feels at any given time rather than the first dialogues being, you know, we all know that weight is a part of the sport. And so as a as a parent, be the source of you call it a subjective assessment. So when they get home, it's not the first thing you ask isn't more um the concern around weight. It's like, no, how did training feel? Like, how are you feeling? Are you recovering well? Like, let's say, for example, it's a Sunday or a Monday, um, not being too concerned with how much weight they put back on after a tournament, but it's like, how are you feeling? Like you're recovering well. Um, we can assume that there was some regain after the tournament, and maybe that night when you get home, get off the bus, and you're you know, back home and you want to have some cereal or some different foods. Um but if you think about the interactions and the amount of time per day that the athlete is coming home, and then that first little interaction that they have is revolving around this thing that's a part of the sport. Weight is certainly a part of the sport, but it it's not like it should be performance first, weight second. And if we can focus on that as a you know, as a parent, um it can foster some really like healthy outlooks on weight that go way beyond how the wrestler um you know views himself as a person when they decide to stop wrestling. Um, not sure that fully answers your question, but it it's certainly something you talk about a lot, depending on like which area of it, there's a lot of um moving parts to navigating that as a parent.

SPEAKER_02 19:29

I think that I I hear that in a lot of sports and a lot of you know singular identity tied to the sport. A lot of athletes talk about the struggle that they face when that sport is done. Like, who am I as a person? And so then if you layer in for wrestling, how it ties to eating habits for sure. That's that's complex. That's tough to have. So I love that advice. Teague, I'm dominating the questions. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_04 19:53

No, you're you're doing great. I uh I do a lot of talking, especially like I work out a quick trip, which Carson, I don't know if you've heard of Quick Trip being in Nebraska. I think they're branching out there, but it's a convenience store, so I do a lot of talking with guests and co-workers throughout the day. It's a fun convention institution, Carson.

SPEAKER_02 20:13

Like I didn't know this until we went here.

SPEAKER_04 20:19

I'm a bit of a yapper, so I'm enjoying this.

SPEAKER_02 20:22

This is a good question, Teague. Pre-match, mom and dad stop at a quick trip to get some gas. What are we dealing with pre-match? Um, all right. Maybe you've hit weight, or maybe you're close and like I'm gonna hop off the scale and I know I can have some snacks, I'm in a good spot. What are we grabbing?

SPEAKER_00 20:44

Yep, so it's gonna be different than I mean, the general rule is gonna be we're gonna be aiming for lower fat and fiber. So if we're able to look at the back of that nutrition facts label and see, okay, this is lower fat, this is lower dietary fiber, those are two things that are gonna slow things down in your gut and maybe aren't the most essential when we're, you know, we're trying to perform, our body's gonna prefer carbohydrates. And carbohydrates in the form of like a high fiber source is just gonna slow down your gut, and it's gonna take a little bit longer for those carbs to get into your bloodstream and for us to be able to use for performance. So that's one side of it. So lower fat, lower fiber. So, you know, rice crispy treats are you know, straight, quick digesting carbohydrates that will get into your bloodstream rather quickly. You know, it sounds like you know, you'd people would hear that and they're like, oh, those are really, really unhealthy. I mean, certainly having some like fruit, that are lower fiber fruit, dried mango, like the if you ever I don't know if you all have uh a lot of Costco's up that way, but Costco Sam's Club, anywhere we can get like uh um dried mango, that's a good option if you want to go more towards the fruit side of things. But if you're at a gas station, I would say lower fat, lower fiber. Um, and then let's say you have a pound to work with, and you know, so a good way of framing it is if you're a pound under and you have a pound to work with and you know that okay, I can what should I eat? Half of that should be fluid. So whatever it is that you're underweight and you're about to, you know, you have some time before weighing, half of that weight should be fluid. So if you're a pound under, eight ounces of fluid is gonna be a half pound. And then with the rest of that, we're trying to get a little bit of maybe just a little bit of protein, um, but mainly like a good carbohydrate source that's um not providing a bunch of fiber, and then the protein source that you pick is maybe not like like a slim gym, something that's like super high fat. We're trying to, you know, aim for those leaner protein sources. Jerky's not a bad option, um, but if there's an opportunity to have some like whole food that's you know warm, if it's you know, let's say it's a two-day tournament and you're not sure what to have for dinner, like it's okay to have some chicken and rice and you know, some fluid with with that um those guidelines in mind of half of the weight fluid, the other half split between like some proteins, some carbohydrates.

SPEAKER_02 23:24

Okay. You you said dried mangoes. Are the dried fruits lower in fiber? Or is it just the hydration?

SPEAKER_00 23:33

Um dried mangoes in particular are low in fiber. Apric, plums, figs, and dates, like those are going to be higher in fiber. Mango is one of those fruits that's typically going to be on the lower end of fiber for like a dried fruit. And so that's one that we see a lot of the Team USA wrestlers typically um they like to have the dried mango, um, you know, applesauce pouches, like your go-go squeeze, muscleman's applesauce pouches, or those are a game changer. Just about every collegiate and professional um sports dietitian is going to be utilizing those types of products for their wrestlers or their their athletes just in general, because it's applesauce, right? It's like you get the unsweetened applesauce, you're just getting some fruit in, it's lower on the fiber, and it's just this quick squeeze pouch that you can have post-swains as well. Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:28

Okay. See, T, you can get all of that at a quick trip.

SPEAKER_04 24:31

You you truly can.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

Maybe not the dried mangoes. I think you can't.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Yeah, maybe not dried mango.

SPEAKER_04 24:37

It's not dried mango, but we do have like uh little fruit strips where it's just the nutrition pack is one mango, like it's the peel and everything just put into one strip.

SPEAKER_00 24:48

So fruit leather, fruit leather, that's it bars, the that's it bar like dried fruit. Um, that's a really popular one. Um, there's a bunch of like Target, Walmart, they're all have this uh particular brand of fruit leathers, but those are yeah, good options. Some athletes, or some people in general, a little bit more sensitive to the fruit, like the fructose, um, or some athletes are a little bit more sensitive to fibers. So maybe someone has no problem consuming something like that before we practice, but maybe someone you know it does. So I think as a parent, it's important to uh ask again. It goes back to the curiosity of like how'd you feel today? It was recovery like, because if you you know get this little piece of information that said, Oh, my gut kind of felt bloated. Well, it's like, oh, what'd you have before? It's like, okay, let's maybe let's try something else. Maybe that food that they had before was higher on the fiber end. Or um, so the curiosity will come into play a lot as a parent because you know you're the one that's seeing the kid when they're not at school, um, and when they come home from practice. And yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

Yeah. I want to talk fiber a little bit more. I've heard um some conversation around like as you're descending, maybe earlier in the week, balancing the point of the week at which you take have a high fiber intake. I think it's because it holds a lot of water in your gut. But like talk me through kind of the the week and how you balance different nutrients, maybe on a if you're wrestling on a Saturday, what does Monday or Tuesday look like compared to Thursday or Friday?

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I would say for the wrestler that's maybe halfway through the week is sitting pound, two pounds above um their weight class, though that three-day outmark with regard to fiber when we really kind of aim for lower fiber um foods, it's it's like you mentioned, you know, we're we all have a certain amount of um GI mass that's sitting in our in our gut that is it's holding on to fluid, you know. It's not necessarily that that's a bad thing, but if there was any way that we could lose weight without really um manipulating like energy levels and things like that, then the first step would be you know doing like three days out, we're going a lot lower with our fiber intake, and it just kind of clears out you know anywhere from one to two pounds. Um it depends on the athlete, their their body weight. Um, but yeah, typically around one to two pounds from switching to low fiber in those three hours, three days before weigh-ins. But then now we we try that, and that's kind of not necessarily enough, you know, and we need to be a little bit more particular about other macronutrients like carbohydrates. And I would say, okay, well, we're not gonna lean on skipping meals because that's gonna be one thing that if if anything, um it's extremely critical to not skip out on the meals, it's just let's maybe see what we can do to adjust the carbohydrates of let's say dinner. Um priority throughout the week leading up to a competition is like we have to do what we can to ensure that this wrestler is training, their training quality is the is the best that it can be. So if we have the option to maybe reduce those starchy carbohydrates, so like your rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, if we reduce the amount of that food group that's being consumed at dinner time, then okay, well, we still have a really solid breakfast, we have a solid lunch. They're going into their training session there after after school and they're they're feeling good, like they they have carbohydrates in their body. But we still maybe we needed to center weight. So overall, we are trying to um consume a little bit less calories from carbohydrates. Best time to do that would be dinner. Um and so throughout the week, you make that change, and then let's say, you know, five to six days out, let's say like that Monday, we're making that change to you would call it like a sleep low dinner. It's like, okay, we're just gonna, you know, first step, let's just rather than jumping way too far ahead and cutting carbs out of every meal, um, let's just focus on dinner and you know, still have a well-balanced plate, like some vet uh a great source of vegetables, a variety, good source of protein. Um, and you know, helping the athlete, you know, feel full is important. And if you're doing everything right with regard to a well-rounded breakfast and lunch, and you're getting each of those food groups, that shouldn't be much of an issue. But what you typically see is with um a lot of wrestlers, it's like it's the easier meal to skip is breakfast. So that's like, okay, I'll start, you know, I'm just not gonna have breakfast this week, and you know, maybe that works for some time, but what you'll see is the cravings that you have later on in the day when you get home and the cabinet's open as a wrestler. Like we all uh we remember that, and it's like, okay, well, your body's trying to make up for some food that you didn't you skipped out on at breakfast time. Um, so we want to steer away from the meal skipping, but just at the individual meal, how we change what the plate looks like, and I can talk through more of that. But generally it's lower carbohydrate dinners, and then three days out, we're switching into like a lower fiber. So some of those like really high fiber um non-starchy vegetables would be what we would want to avoid. And then the whole grain, like high fiber, like granolas and things like that, that really contribute. Let's say like chia seeds, for example. You know, if you're having chia speeds, chia seeds in a yogurt parfait, you know, one tablespoon of that is five grams of fiber. That's great. It's great for overall health, it's great for your your gut, bacteria, immune system, but with the purpose of trying to make weight in the safest way possible and you know, managing risk around weight descents in in high school wrestlers, reducing that fiber in those three days before weigh ins can be one of the safer methods of doing so.

SPEAKER_04 31:16

Yeah, cool. So since we're talking about the the game plan for the week, I got a couple of questions for you, Carson. This one kind of ties back into when we were talking about parenting with your kids in sports and and you brought up the you know their identity when it comes to wrestling and their life in general. I guess your advice as a coach or as a parent, are you even on the basis that a kid is properly fueling themselves, are you even having them check the scale every day, or is that something that maybe if they're doing everything right, do you maybe wait until a Tuesday or Wednesday to look at?

SPEAKER_00 31:57

Yeah, it's a it's a great question. Um, as a dietitian, you really have to assess where the reasoning between, like, let's say it's a wrestler that is is very interested in checking their weight on a daily basis, but you can kind of tell that they're a little bit more um nervous about it, you know, checking weight after meals, things like that. In that instance, I'm gonna work with the athlete to have a better relationship with understanding that hey, we're going into a sport like wrestling, weight is a part of the sport, but we really need to encourage that, you know, encourage wrestlers and helping, you know, as a parent, helping your kid understand that this really is just it's a data point. Like this is just something that we kind of have to keep track of and seeing it as a way of if I'm keeping track of this, I can be confident that myself as a wrestler and my dietitian, let's say it's me, we're both on the same page. And if I need to make an adjustment, I can. Um, but if a dietitian's not present, you know, the wrestler needs to take it upon themselves of understanding that, you know, I'm I don't need to check my weight multiple times a day because you know your weight's gonna fluctuate five plus pounds at different times of the day. But let's say it's you know in the morning before after you go to the restroom, you know, that's perfectly fine. That would probably be the best way to time like when you would check your weight. And again, it goes back to you know establishing like first and foremost, like I look at it from my perspective as a dietitian as a needs assessment. Is this this wrestler looking at their scale weight in a way that's becoming increasingly more and more unhealthy? Or do I with my intuition and what I'm seeing from this wrestler? I they have a it looks like they have a pretty healthy relationship with the scale, and I'm okay with them you know weighing themselves in the morning. And in some cases, you know, wrestlers in the collegiate and professional space will maybe weigh themselves pre- and post-practice, but that's not because they're concerned with necessarily like how much weight they lose to get them closer to their weight class. It's like, no, I just lost five pounds in that practice, I should replace five pounds worth of water, you know, and one pound is around 16 ounces. So it's the reasoning behind the weight checking from a pre and post-practice perspective, it's strictly how can I rehydrate my body and ensure that I'm good to go and have a really good training qual um training session the next day. Um yeah, and and it's we don't want to, you know, assessing. I mean, long story short, we want to make sure that the wrestler's doing it for the right reasons. But yeah, I I will ask, you know, like, hey, how are things going? Like, how you been feeling? But it's not going to become the first thing. I think it's important that we don't let it become the first thing, the core of the conversation. Um, because maybe an athlete's weight is fluctuating up a little bit higher than it normally would at that time of the week, but maybe their training quality is like way better. They're feeling really good. And it's like, okay, well, let's talk through the fact that you're feeling great right now, and this is really good. And then you can eventually get to where, all right, do we need to make any adjustments? You know, it's we're four days out. Um, you know, how much weight are we floating overnight with with sleep? You know, those are conversations you certainly have with wrestlers, but um it's not always a part of the conversation, depending on um if the wrestler is truly struggling with some relationship issues with the scale and with food and the sport itself.

SPEAKER_04 35:38

Okay. Good stuff. My second question, and I will say, see, we got a few people uh popping in and out watching the live. Feel free to throw a question in the chat for Carson if you have them, ladies and gentlemen. This one will kind of lead into a tournament dual day preparation and fueling as well. But Erica from Iowa Grant Highland, she has a son and a daughter that wrestles. And Carson, she asked us earlier uh if you have any meal prep ideas for the in season, but is there a difference in fueling between boys and girls? And yeah, she just uh she says that she has one of each in high school wrestling, they don't maintain or lose weight the same. And she wants to know about pre-match fueling, which I know we'll talk about. But yeah, let's talk about that difference there. Boys and girls, do they have to fuel their bodies differently, or is there other biological differences that are taken into account?

SPEAKER_00 36:37

Yeah, I would say from uh like if we're looking really narrowed in on like the actual plate of like how much are we providing like fruits and vegetables to provide provide like a nutritious nut diet, and how much protein do we give, you know, protein largely going to be determined, like the daily protein intake is gonna be determined by by body weight, let's say. But so not much different difference there. But do it what we do see with regard to um female wrestlers versus male wrestlers, it is pretty individualized, but you will see like with menstrual cycles during the the luteal phase of a menstrual cycle, um you know, your daughter may say, like, I'm feeling bloated, and and around during that time, there's there's gonna be some water retention. And so what they would normally lose across a practice might be a little bit less during that that phase of their menstrual cycle. Um and so if let's say, for example, if that falls around like a competition weekend, knowing that ahead of time, and you can say, okay, well, um we're kind of prepared for this, and we understand that your body might be a little bit more of a sponge and you know, it might be might not lose as much per practice. So preparing in earlier on in that week, if you know that you can kind of make a little bit more adjustments to like let's say um you know fueling and making the adjustments to dinners of reducing you know dinner carbohydrates just a little bit more. Um, but again, we're still promoting a good amount of like fruit and vegetables, and more a quarter or more of your plates should be coming from protein. So we're not removing um major food groups here. Um but in terms of the difference post-way in, now we don't see you know, food tolerance differences might be a little bit different just across any any athlete. So that's something to think about. But it it comes down to like what are the individual preferences, what's the starting point for how much food a wrestler can tolerate after weigh-ins, and then slowly creeping our way up there. So if you have two two kids both wrestling, we can't expect that one is gonna tolerate the same amount of food post-weigh-in than the other. Um so with with with any given case, male or female, we still just want to ask those questions, be like, like, how are you feeling? Okay, I'm feeling really bloated. It's 15 minutes before I'm gonna wrestle, or it's you know, okay, so let's, you know, let's look back at the um the post-weigh-in plan and see if there was anything that we could do a little bit better. Maybe there was something that we had that we didn't know was really high fiber or was really high fat that led to some of that, like those um discomfort after the weigh-ins. Um so it's less so with you know, to answer the question, less differences when it comes to post-weigh-in recovery. That's just gonna be very individualized from wrestler to wrestler, but you see more of the differences when it comes to weight descent and you know, like a slowly transitioning weight to a lower um weight class in a safe way. You're gonna see differences between male and and female wrestlers. Uh you know, there's differences in muscle mass. You know, male wrestlers are gonna hold a little bit more muscle mass. Um and I mentioned with the menstrual cycle, holding a little bit more fluid with those female wrestlers. You're it's it's um I'd say the best advice to give there is just accept that it is different and not try and align it with the experience of a male wrestler and how they're gonna descend their weight. You know, just like take it as it is, like this is the individual case. It doesn't need to be the same as as you know, the plan that a male wrestler has because it it's not, it's different, you know. Like, you know, those individual differences from what I see with female wrestlers is it's pretty variable even amongst female wrestlers. So um there's no clear cut and dry, like do this here, do this here. Um, but it is something that there's there's certainly considerations and just being aware that the differences can be helpful.

SPEAKER_02 41:09

Is it worth it for me to uh I love that menstrual cycles have entered the wrestling chat, but like but Carson, I think it's a very real challenge that female wrestlers face. Um with with the grappler side, we'll do rankings and and we see the females fluctuate sometimes between two and three weight classes consistently. Um I it feels a little bit like there's um that that fluctuation has become part of the sport and part of what's accepted, which I love that at times in the season girls are are wrestling what they weigh instead of going through the the cut. And you you know, as you get to postseason, you start to see them lock in on a certain weight. But I know I know that my husband early on was like, my gosh, it's impossible to rank these girls when they're constantly changing weight classes. But when you design the sport around their experience, that's part of that's part of what it should be. That those fluctuations are very real. You can wake up five pounds heavier for no damn reason. Um, and that's just reality. So how do how do you um what advice do you have for maybe male coaches that have never had to navigate this? And then a girl shows up in the room and all of a sudden it's uh it changes the conversation. How do you what advice do you have for them?

SPEAKER_00 42:24

Yeah, it kind of goes back to what I said of just like we have to reinvent what we think like the rules that we kind of have internally around um this is what I can expect for my um you know, male wrestlers as their weights descending, and then maybe it's a little bit more, it's typically going to be a little bit more linear, like just kind of like steady decline. You know, let's say it's a wrestler that you know has a routine that's dialed in and it's it worked well to get down to weight. Maybe the descent is a little bit more linear than a female wrestler that's just as dialed in with their routine and has things figured out, but they're still seeing these fluctuations. And and as a coach, you know, just knowing to like we can't immediately attribute that to lack of discipline. Like we have to understand there's like clear differences here. Um, you know, re-establishing like how we see um you know weight descents and the different components that come to play with um, like you said, like the growing that occurs, jumping around weight classes. You'll see that even to the freshman year of college. Like it's one thing that's not talked about too much, but these growth charts are continuing into you know 18, 19, um, 20 for some individual individuals. And so even coming in freshman year, it can be discouraging for a wrestler that had this weight in mind and for college, and their weight's still going up and they're still growing. And so it's just always knowing, like at the back of your mind, that you know, high school wrestling were We can't resist the growth chart that we know is supposed to happen during these times in our in our life. Like we there has to be um like performance first, wait second. It's like the athlete, there is a turning point in which thinking that wrestling lighter is going to benefit you comes back to to bite you in the butt because now your power output is lower. These are all things that we see, like your speed is lower, your power output, reaction time is lower. All these things that we want to perform well and as a wrestler, but the tunnel vision around being lighter is is is better, can kind of cloud ourselves to those other aspects of wrestling at a healthy weight that your body wants you to be at, you're gonna you know have that competitive edge in those those areas that are also important to performance.

SPEAKER_02 44:53

I want to highlight too, you have mentioned a few times now the the trust between an athlete and a coach. And I think any of these conversations, that's that's a foundational element of it. So for an athlete to be able to say, like, I don't think I can make this weight. I I need fuel or I'm growing on and establishing that, I think is so critical. And I think it's um, I'm gonna represent my female athletes here too. Being able to go to your coach and say, I'm on my period, I'm struggling, or I'm gonna be heavy and I need this, I need this bandwidth. Like that's all part of that trust that you have to build, both as an athlete and as a coach, and and making sure that can navigate some of those choppy waters together.

SPEAKER_00 45:38

So yeah, it's it's critical. I mean, you you're relying on a coach to have a certain level of you know, competency in that space of understanding that these are these are things that are at play now. That you know, female wrestling, women's wrestling isn't going anywhere, and it's you know, we're it's going up and up, which is so great to see. And so, you know, coaches that you know, obviously when with the female wrestling coaches, that like helps so much. It's like the trust is improved because the wrestler knows that you know their coach understands some of those things that you know. But you know, as a male wrestling coach, you just kind of have to do what you can to be curious and and understand that. And um it certainly takes courage as a wrestler to come up and have those conversations, but um, you know, like mutual respect between like, okay, this is your body, you kind of know how you're responding to your weight being on your menstrual cycle. You're like the wrestler knows that they're only gonna lose, you know, pound, pound and a half on their, you know, during like a particular phase of their menstrual cycle versus the rest of the um cycle. And so um being transparent as you're comfortable doing so, or as a parent um to those things helps a coach understand, but then the coach themselves has to be pretty receptive to that and knowing that um you know at the end of the day, you want the wrestler to wrestle well and enjoy it, and yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:09

Cool. Ting we diverged hard there. You had some match day questions, I think.

SPEAKER_04 47:16

Uh well uh to uh to finish that point off, is is it worth it for me to ask what a loadal cycle is, or is this just like the people who know no?

SPEAKER_02 47:25

Oh, okay. I this almost came out of my mouth. But look, male coaches, go watch a five-minute YouTube video about the cycle. Like, you're gonna learn so much about your female wrestlers, maybe your wife. I just just go do it. But yes, T, ask the question.

SPEAKER_04 47:42

There are people that can you can you expound on what the luteal cycle is?

SPEAKER_00 47:48

Yeah, I mean it's a it's the second half of the menstrual cycle, so it's gonna be occurring right after right after ovulation, and so it ends when your period starts. And so typically, I mean, it's gonna like the timing is gonna, you know, be pretty variable amongst wrestler to wrestler, but it's typically around like 10 to 14 days, but maybe they only really notice the significant bloating for a smaller time period in that in that um phase. Um, but yeah, I can go in a little bit more, but I I don't want to speak out of my bounds here. It's certainly something that even myself, I'm learning more and more every day, and it's definitely necessary for me being in the space. And it's interesting stuff to learn about. And if I can share that you know, I have some form of understanding, but not empathy, um, it certainly is helpful because I will not understand any of that um in my personal experience, but I can do what I can to sure learn about it.

SPEAKER_02 48:48

I think there's some emerging research too around injury, um injuries at different points in the cycle, too. Like females are more prone to injury in the couple days prior to periods, too. So we I hear a lot about it a lot in soccer with ACL injuries and the correlations. So I think that's so it's nutritional and weight related, but there's also training impacts too.

SPEAKER_00 49:12

So yeah, it's an area that um certainly needs a lot, like there's a lot of conflicting research that shows that it does, some that shows that it doesn't. So within like the scientific method, let's say we can't we can't conclude that it does, but there has been stuff that show that um tendon laxity, so like the ability of the tendon to stretch and how much you can stretch it. Um there's been some talk of that being impacted with during certain um times of the menstrual cycle, but it hasn't been conclusive yet, just because I think it's it's a hard thing to study out in the field. And so far, we're not to the point where we can say that it it does, but um it's uh it's certainly an interesting area that people are always trying to keep producing research in to figure out really if there is a performance benefit, performance detriment versus this time and this time. Yeah, it's it's interesting.

SPEAKER_04 50:11

You're asking for a lot of transparency from your subject, so I'm sure it might be tough to get that sometimes. Uh Carson, we've talked about nutrition leading of the week of. Nutrition like before we hit the scale the day of. You hit the scale, you make weight, you wrestle in about an hour, hour and a half. I think 80% of people that we've interviewed when we asked them their pre-match meal after weigh-ins, they'd say PBJ sandwiches, maybe just peanut butter sandwiches. How would you rank that for one? But if you don't like that, what are some other options for people?

SPEAKER_00 50:52

Yeah, it's a a PBJ, let's say if it was just the peanut butter and jelly, it would sit lower on that uh on that ranking. But if it's like if our starting point is there, it's not it's not terrible. We're getting some depending on like let's say it goes back to the um dietary fats, you know, if if that's something you're used to and doesn't bother you too much, the the fat content of peanut butter, then okay. But um, if we go a little overboard with the peanut butter on a PPJ, then you start to run into that like GI distress, feeling a little bit more bloated for a little bit longer, feeling full longer, um, could be related to um the fat intake from peanut butter. But typically what you see is like that alone will do it. Um, you're getting a good amount of carbohydrates from the jelly, the bread. Um, so it's not terrible, but I would say first and like if we were to walk through the timeline of you know, I get off the scale, what do I do in that hour, an hour and a half, or two hours, depending on what the time is. First thing first is we have you know the opportunity to rehydrate, we got to do that first and foremost. So through that you know, week, we've probably, you know, let's say in the last 24 hours before weigh-ins, maybe you lost a little bit more fluid, you're sweating out a little bit more, and maybe you weren't hydrating um as well as you needed to, and you ended up coming off the scale dehydrated. First things first, we should say we should get some fluid in. Um, electrolytes can be certainly really beneficial. I mean, you can get sodium from foods for sure, you know, like snacking on some, having you know, some I knew people that liked pickles and things like that after weighing just to get something salty in. But um averginia tech, it's gonna look like a liter of fluid, an electrolyte packet, and that's let's say this is two-hour weighing. So maybe not going the full liter if an athlete's not used to it. Um, I would say a minimum 16 to 24 ounces and higher if you're able to within those first like good 30 minutes of weighing in with a good electrolyte packet, and that's you know, again, electrolytes aren't necessarily like you have to have these. It's going to be based off of if the wrestler is, you know, having a harder time with their descent in the first place, and you can kind of tell that they're a little bit more, their starting point off the scale is a little bit more dehydrated than the next. But they certainly do help. It's a good safety net to know that we're getting some fluids in and we're getting some sodium. But we also want some carbohydrates. You know, if we think about our carb storage in our muscle like a battery, throughout the week, it was just slowly draining, depending on how um you know much weight we're needing to descent to get to work class. Now we hop up the scale, it's our job to we got to replenish that. And so we start with fluids, maybe some some electrolytes, and then you get into like carbohydrates, where it's like you know, a sandwich, you know, it's uh some protein's okay. Uh maybe a slice or two of cheese is gonna be okay. We just don't want to go overboard with like the fat content in the um cheese slices. But those things are okay on the front end, but as you get closer and closer to the match, we're choosing more and more of what you would call the refined carbohydrates, those really like quick carbs, fast carbs, you know, a bunch of different terms out there. But like a sandwich when we weigh in.

SPEAKER_01 54:34

Applesauce is yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 54:36

Fruit snacks, applesauce, the you know, people like the hunting stingers, sports drinks, sipping on a sports drink is is perfectly fine. Like we're trying to get carbs in the system fast, and um the body is gonna use that to refill the battery, and we need that for the match ahead. So I would say like on any given like Gatorade Power aid.

SPEAKER_04 54:59

Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 55:00

Yeah, Gatorade, power aid, maybe it's a body armor with a little like tiny pinch of salt added to the body armor. Um, body armor is typically gonna be a little bit lower in um sodium than let's say something like a Gatorade. So if you have an athlete that reports cramping a little bit more during like training and things like that, then maybe I would lean more towards having an electrolyte packet after weigh-ins, just because it's a good indication that they lose a little bit more sodium or salt through their sweat than someone else, which is differs athlete to athlete. You know, I might I might lose as much sodium in my salt in an hour as you know, for me, it's maybe like 1500 milligrams of sodium, which is like a lot. But I've tested athletes with um sweat test kits, and maybe they only lose 500 milligrams of sodium. Um, so it's it varies, but generally you'd ask like have you cramped during training sessions? Um, notice you know, if parents, if you're ever wash in your um your kids' clothing and it's got salt crystals on it built up around the areas where they'd be sweating, it's a good indication that okay, A, maybe they've been using the same you know, clothes for practice a couple times in that week, or B, they're probably a salty sweater and they've just been losing a lot of salt in their sweat. So that's one thing to think about. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:26

Um, where do you stand on the energy drinks at postway in? I see a lot of kids walking around with just illegal amounts of borderline illegal amounts of caffeine on their energy drinks. So how do you how do you feel about that?

SPEAKER_00 56:39

Yeah. Um, I would say caffeine becomes it becomes problematic when you look at the sources and then the tolerance that builds up. So having, you know, coffee, tea, cold brew, like some of those sources of caffeine is gonna be the better alternative. But and then you'd also want to think about the time of the day that that's being drank at. So I think about sleep disruption when I think about caffeine in in high school athletes, is a lot of times they're consuming it before practice, maybe it's 3 or 4 p.m. Um, caffeine has a you know six to eight hour half-life. So what that means is if you consume a 200 milligram Celsius, let's say, let's just say it's four hours. Um four hours later, you still have 100 milligrams of caffeine running through your system, and then four hours later your body's you know gotten through it. If we're having caffeine at 3 or 4 p.m., that kind of gives you an idea of how much that um can overlap with when we need to be getting precious sleep. Um but then post-way-in, I would say, you know, caffeine certainly has its place in performance. But what an athlete thinks when they hear that is like, I need to have the white monster and I need to have the pre-workout. When in reality, it's like, no, let's, you know, maybe you try it a couple times in practice and you have a little bit of um, you know, you know, some coffee or something like that before or cold brew before a training session. And you're like, okay, I I'm I feel okay. It's like, and then after like post-wins, you know, you have a little bit of that, but there I don't, you know, staying below that like 400 milligrams per day is the typical guideline. And I would even argue that you know it's important to maintain a like a lower tolerance because high enough caffeine, we start to see actual like negative health outcomes when it comes to performance. So more isn't better, and um, I would generally recommend wait until you get to like the college wrestling space before you really kind of dabble with finding that like performance dose of caffeine that certainly does exist, but there's so many other things to focus on as a high school wrestler that's gonna benefit your performance and um staying up late, drinking energy drinks, things like that, playing video games on the weekends when you get done with tournaments, like all the caffeine in that mix is certainly gonna cause more problems than benefits.

SPEAKER_02 59:22

How many seven years does that take? 400 milligrams.

SPEAKER_04 59:27

I'd say probably get like two largest. 400 is a lot. That's like uh a bang and two bubblers, probably.

SPEAKER_00 59:37

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:43

It's 68 milligrams, I think, of caffeine. And I've learned it's like I used to drink like either a C4 or a monster or bang a day, or like I started taking advantage of the bubbler deals, and like, oh, I feel just fine on 68 mil. Like, I'm not wired, but like I feel fine, and I can still do things and have a clear head. So yeah. Yeah, I'm totally built.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:07

Generally, that sweet spot isn't too high. Like, you know, we just gotta find just enough, you know, and um building a tolerance is something we don't want to do um as a wrestler, and because then you just need more and more, and uh yeah, it's uh caffeine's an interesting one because there certainly is a lot of you know there's benefits, but um we didn't try not to focus on like we don't want to major in the minors, right? So as a high school wrestler, that I'm feel pretty confident that there's a bunch of other components to the nutrition, the sleep um meals that you're gonna get so much more performance benefit from than um the little bit of a benefit you might get from caffeine.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:54

You said something earlier that piqued my interest, Carson. And hey, I'm sorry if you already like touched up on this, but I've been taking it a lot on this episode. It's been a lot of good information. I've magically gained 25 pounds since I turned 30, so I think I might be able to take some of this home with me. You talked about adding a little bit of salt to uh some of your drinks. And I've always grown up, I mean, even until today, like I've always had the impression that more sodium equals bad. But I don't have letters after my name. So please explain to me, a common man, why uh a little bit of sodium or balanced amount moderation isn't bad for your body.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:39

Yeah, so when we sweat, the primary, like primary electrolyte that we're losing is gonna be sodium. There's gonna be like smaller percentages of things like potassium, magnesium that's lost. So let's say, for example, my my comment earlier about body armor. Body armor is marketed as something that's you know coconut water based. Coconut water is a lot of, it's got to be marketed as a good amount of electrolytes, but the type of electrolytes is not necessarily sodium. It's like potassium. Like we all know, bananas and coconut water, it's a it's a good source of potassium. But when we're sweating a bunch and the primary thing that we're losing through our sweat is sodium, that's really where that fits into a performance model of thinking around you know, athletics and improving athlete performance. Because if we're you know, you lose you sweat out, let's say lose a thousand milligrams of sodium per hour, and someone's out you know in a hot room wrestling for two hours and they lost um you know they lost four pounds. If they're losing at a thousand milligrams per hour, then you know it's a lot of sodium, you know, and it could be on the lower end for you know high school wrestlers, it varies a lot from athlete to athlete. But with that in mind, you know, we're certainly going to get a lot of sodium from food. So like we don't want to rely on these things to fill our needs, but um most of us are getting enough from whole food, well-rounded um diet. But within like the post-weigh-in setting where we're more depleted than what we would expect from just like your typical workout during the week, that's where adding in like an electrolyte packet could be uh is typically like a net positive benefit to like get the body hydrated quicker because we don't have as much time and we're our starting point is way more um let's say you know dehydrated in some wrestlers than it would be after like a training session during the week. That's why I don't usually recommend electrolyte packets like every day of the week after training sessions. It's not um it's not always uh a necessary thing just because I know they're getting enough from whole food.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:59

It's perfect. So this electrolytes, the salt, allow higher absorption of water ultimately, right? Is that how it function? Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:08

Yeah, so I mean we need to maintain a certain electrolyte status just for overall um health, but from a hydration perspective, it's you know helping our body retain, utilize fluid. Um when you have that imbalance, you run into issues with regard to your body's ability to you know cool and replace the fluids that are lost and thermoregulation. So being able to you know keep your heart rate at a lower level for higher if you're wrestling at a higher intensity, you know, it's important that our body can keep up. And so sodium fits into that.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:46

Um yeah, T, how'd you do in high school chemistry? Should we deep dive here?

SPEAKER_04 1:04:54

I wasn't bad. I was like, I think I got like an A B or B in it. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:05

Um go ahead.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:08

I feel sodium chloride.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:10

I'm mentally in scientist world, sorry. So um so Carson, here we are in Dairyland in Wisconsin. Um, and one of the things that I hear talked about too is how uh incredibly hydrating milk is. Is that the combination of salts and then also the the vitamins and minerals that are just inherent to milk?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:32

Yeah, I mean it's salt. I mean, there's gonna be sodium and and milk. You know, people you we all hear like the chocolate milk recovery, like having chocolate milk after a tough workout. And a lot of that has come from the fact that chocolate milk is gonna provide protein, it's gonna provide carbs, it's gonna get you some fat, it's gonna get you some sodium. So it gets a you know, it hits a little bit of from each bucket. And, you know, if we're not planning on having a big meal. um right away after practice, you know, that certainly you know is can be really helpful. Or it's something you can pair with your breakfast in the form of like a like a shake or a smoothie, like a fruit smoothie. So it can fit into a lot of the overall diet. But yeah, generally speaking, it's because of the the mix of a little bit of everything. It helps hydrate you. It's primarily water, but it's got protein, carbs, fat. And it tastes great. You know, I'm from Nebraska we steak, potatoes, and you know vitamin D, like whole milk is kind of what I was raised on.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:41

I know was that like the big chemistry question Melissa or no my pause teeth was I decided to back out of that. Respect it would probably entertain just me. Like maybe maybe me and Carson would be the only one to dive into that.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:09

You can I mean we're on the show. We have Carson here right now. You can ask it we'll we'll get back to the wrestling plot in just a second.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:18

It's all good. Okay. I wonder I do want to talk off season a little bit.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:22

So obviously we're kind of in the off season for the time I'm sorry to time you before we do off season I was going to ask about of any big tips on what to do after a tournament.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:35

Like do you recommend going and eating like two orders of General Shao's at the Chinese buffet or is there like a thing to do to help help you recover from the day and then also help you prepare for the week ahead yeah um I would say you're you know we call this like plate building or performance plate building in in sports nutrition but it comes down to just like what you want the plate to look like and you know we want to get a little bit of of everything you know your fruits vegetables but we're also not gonna you know cut out those starchy carbohydrates that your body needs to refill that battery like we're we're trying to recover so we need to we need adequate protein to recover. So I'd say like a quarter of your plate coming from a good protein source let's say it's like a a chicken a beef you know your poultry options um like a good source of protein and a quarter of the plate and then between fruits vegetables and some some starches I would say a good um I would say probably more than around half or so of that coming from like your starchy carbohydrates. So um we use some visuals that um I can provide after the podcast and then that's maybe something that you guys could have access to and use as you wish but just of how we build these plates for very low intensity training days, medium intensity and then a really difficult high intensity training days or high volume but for after a a wrestling competition it's gonna we're gonna treat that like a we're recovering from a high intensity day so half the plates coming from starches. So go and get your your pasta um quarter plate protein and then a good serving um serving or you know or more of vegetables and fruit on that other on that last quarter of the plate then fluids you know keep drinking the fluids throughout the whole um throughout the night you know it's easy to just think about the food but we got to get you get you back to full hydration status if you were sweating all throughout the day competing.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:45

I'd like to know the amount of times the word fluid has been used in this episode which I think of where we yeah of where the focus is I've I was while you were talking about I was trying to finagle how I could like b do that game plan at like a pizza ranch team meal or something.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:03

Yeah a little tougher in that situation pasta chicken parm you know it's not it's not a bad option you know getting protein you're getting some good source of pasta some carbohydrates and pasta but then we just don't want to skimp out on the vegetables and going and hitting up like the salad bar and getting a good variety of color you know like we're always going to promote color on the plate. You know you're getting things from carrots that you're not getting from tomatoes and vice versa. So if we can you know build our plate out so that we have a good variety of that it can ensure that we're not missing out on some of these you know micronutrients and things that our body really needs I think that's really good for youth wrestlers actually to like that's just an easy mental model.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:49

My plate should be colorful.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:51

Mm-hmm and understanding you know the why you know like fruits you know fruits and vegetables and that wide variety of colors is not just this thing that you know your parents tell you to get you know this is something that is really going to benefit your immune system and help your body get what it needs to to perform um on a daily basis and if you're you get sick but you're not as sick because you did a really good job of getting a wide variety of fruit and vegetables during the week you know that's just one of the benefits you know is like seeing a reduced severity of illness when we do get sick if we have a stronger immune system that can handle it better.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:39

But the list goes on antioxidants anti-inflammatory so any sort of soreness and injuries that start to come up that wide variety of color is gonna provide those anti-inflammatory um you know foods that can go in and combat that like overuse entry or soreness that you're feeling I've heard you use the word so in addition to fluids I'm also hearing the word fueling a lot and I think there's some intentionality around that if I'm not mistaken. So talk to me about like when you're talking to a kid or an athlete the word choice here I'm hearing weight descent I'm hearing fueling I'm assuming that's a conscious choice you're making to to pick those words over cut and other choices. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:30

Absolutely um in an ideal world you know we we don't like there's a lot of part like we've you know the basis of sports dietitians and in combat sports and wrestling is due to the the negative health outcomes that can come from lack of guidance in a space where weight cut you know the term weight cutting is um created these taboo you know topics around how an athlete gets down to their weight class. And for me uh you know experiencing that firsthand and you know knowing what what I did to get down to weight knowing that that continually occurs ideally we're not doing much of that stuff you know we we you know we're in the middle of uh high school years and the growth growth charts indicate that we're continually growing and growing and growing and so um letting the athlete grow and following the growth rather than trying to see the timeline from the beginning like freshman to senior year as like this linear like flat line that we're just gonna if we want to jump up this weight class we should but it's like no you know walk alongside the growth chart and acknowledge that the rather is going to get bigger and and be okay with that. So I there's that side of it but then with regard to like weight cutting versus weight descent when we think about weight cutting it's it's drastic, it's quick it's um in a lot of cases it's harmful and weight descent um is a term that yeah is definitely used intentionally because I want to steer away from those strategies that have built up over the years of understanding that if we want to get down to that weight in the safest way possible and it's been established that that's actually like a healthy weight based off I don't know if they call it um in Wisconsin but in Nebraska we call it like alpha testing your weight certification that you do before the season where they run your yep run the skin fold is establish what's the lowest level weight class that you can go to. There's a reason why that's gradual and that's put in place as as guardrails is to ensure that we're not doing things too quickly because when do when we do that quickly we're losing fluid and we're losing um protein we're losing muscle mass. If we have a gradual weight descent we can allow our body to be nourished during that that weight descent and get us down to weight and ideally coming off the scale with without heavy legs you feel good you have energy levels and you can still go in and have a really solid post plan. Then fueling is you know yeah we we use it a lot and I don't even notice when I say it but um helping athletes understand that carbohydrates are what your body wants when you're when you're training like that's your body's always going to prefer that you know let's say if it's a lower intensity something like a lifting session where the intensity is lower your body can rely on you know maybe the the fats from dietary you know dietary fats a little bit more but in most cases as that intensity goes up in all cases there's an increase in reliance on carbohydrates and eventually you reach an intensity where it's only carbs like your body's just needing that and so using the term fueling around like pre-fuel before your your before your training sessions we need to make sure that we're having um a couple carb snacks like a piece of fruit fruit snack maybe it's a couple pouches of applesauce and some fluids um yeah you can know you can apply the term everywhere but depending on kind of what you're um talking about it could be different.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:17

Did we all notice Melissa drinking out of the souvenir avatar cup at the same time?

SPEAKER_02 1:16:22

Okay I was trying not to laugh because it was all you laughing I saw you know like the baby Yoda lifting the mug it um you don't even notice in the movie theater yeah but it's the best cup so it's terrible it's like worn down like it's seen for days it's uh yeah do you have a favorite cup?

SPEAKER_04 1:16:49

I have a favorite cup I do well I I got my I got my Yeti right here drinking out of this puppy every day. Before we get into Melissa's off season this could be asked after the offseason question but I don't want it to float away in my little gold retriever brain here. Carson I think someone could listen to this episode and theoretically they could build a whole plan for a week or a month of the season with the information that you've given us tonight. And I'm sure there there's some people that can listen to this and they'll say it's easier said than done and I have these time financial location constraints what would your response be to them and do you have any advice just to even for people to ease into you know building these perfect plates every day yeah I I would say that with social media it can it can be a tricky space to navigate especially as a parent because we're we're seeing more and more of this content that's telling us like eat this, not that, avoid these ingredients on this ingredient list and you know that you you would call it like chemophobia or like the fear of chemicals and the words that sound like they're very long sciencey terms when in reality maybe it's like some term that's super long in science form but maybe it just means vitamin B12.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:13

You know stuff like that that you see on ingredients fax labels that you know social media makes it overall just a tricky place to navigate. But I would say that those fancier let's say or like the organic foods and stuff like that that cost more it doesn't need to look like that. And ultimately we don't have clear research that shows that organic food is better than non-organic food. And so from a price and cost you know cost effective point of view we you know fruit let's say like frozen fruit big bag of frozen fruit is going to be a lot cheaper than trying to buy fresh fruit every week and um you know me personally in terms of yogurt that's providing a higher protein your Oikos Pro yogurt cups or the Chibani 20 gram protein cups that are coming out mixing that with some frozen blueberries is you know a good way of building out a breakfast but it's something that as a parent you're not taking a bunch of time to do like if time is a constraint with work like that's quick and easy and you know helping create an environment where you're fostering like the independence of the wrestler preparing those things for themselves in the morning um and then it's you know there's this there's no perfect picture necessarily with with this like we can work towards what's optimal um but seeing the proof of concept and how your um your kid is feeling is that should be the only real you know feedback that you need you know it's not like you need to jump from where you're currently at to this picture perfect meal plan of this this and this and you got to go out and buy these things it's like no like what what feels manageable if improving um breakfast feels like a manageable thing to do and using your own education as you know it's a free resource to you of like okay I have this information now that I can at least you know hey let's no no need to restrict fluids right now you don't wrestle for another five days like those types of things that's um free information if you know where to look and you know that's why podcasts like this is really great. But yeah it's it's it's something just assess what's truly manageable on that regard and you know whatever that feels like based off what you've heard today and you know any part of that can create a win for that wrestler and how they're feeling and how they're performing love it.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:49

You're knocking it out of the park by the way Carson I know you're like you're an expert in this field but yes you're yeah this has been fun.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:58

Yeah it's really fun I love it. Obviously I could talk about it for forever and it's very passionate so thank you.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:04

I also have to I said baby Yoda earlier it's Grogu.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:07

My apologies to the Star Wars fans I don't know about the Star Wars uh wrestling overlap but you know the for the purist out there all right going back to Melissa's question that she almost asked 15 minutes ago sorry it's actually a concert way from the like the habits to change like if you think about off season um how does your advice differ in off season and and maybe what habits can wrestlers work on to set themselves up for a good sort of in-season yeah um you know there's two two areas of that with you know you have your wrestlers that are wrestling all year round um versus those that definitely take a longer break maybe they go to a camp or two during the summertime um but overall it's just kind of they're not checking their weight anymore they're just just eating um my the shift should be just like continue working on the things that you are in the season of like we got to make sure that we're getting a well-rounded plate with like a bunch of different you know the food groups that our body needs to not only support performance but also just overall health as a like providing resources for the body to grow is important in the off season because um especially depending on how challenging it was for the wrestler to you know weight manage during the season um we need to let the body you know recover and in an ideal world we're not going through that within the season we're just kind of wrestling where the weight sits and making these like small adjustments let's say to like fiber and maybe four or five days out making a small adjustment to carbs and that's all we really needed to get weight down um to our weight class but you still see the aggressive cases where you know dehydrated more days of the week um seeing more of those problematic weight cutting strategies and in those wrestlers it becomes that much more important that we allow for recovery and reframing the mind around um we're fueling for health and not just performance you know out of the season we should be focusing on all of you know food gives us a lot of benefits it's it's a social thing it's being able to have like a meal around your family and be intentional about it and um going out and hanging out with friends so I would say try not to place a bunch of like restriction um with regarding to like you can't go out to eat that type of restaurant or this or that um creating freedoms around that is going to freedoms on top of education around what's a well-rounded you know like what what are the fruits and vegetables that we should be getting on the day to day like how do I drink enough water throughout the day am I carrying a water bottle with me when I'm going and hanging out with my friends just focusing on those little habits that are more should just be a given for overall health when they're at when the athlete no longer is an athlete. So that's how that it shifts. It's like yeah we're you know maybe weight comes up in conversation if I'm working with an athlete in the offseason but maybe it's just with regard to like where they kind of see theirself and the next season with you know weight class. But um more so it's like that's an opportunity to really focus on the technical development as wrestling. You're feeling good during training sessions we can focus on being um really high you know high quality training sessions allows you to focus more on like these these technical um flaws that you have with your wrestling that you can kind of fine-tune um if you are wrestling during the summer going on camps and stuff like that's great and not really having to worry about where your weight's at and you can just focus on being a wrestler and enjoying it. You know I wish more of that like mentality bled into the in-season space of like seeing a wrestler go out to a camp and you see that enjoyment it's because you know they're not their their mindset isn't really centered around weight and so we want to see more of that in season um it's not going to disappear like that but slowly changing the culture around um weight cutting is something that'll get us there.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:34

Yeah I think Sarah Hildebrandt has been a cool voice around like the joy of sport and the joy of wrestling and like shouldn't be defined by just the hard yeah that that's present but there's also a ton of joy to be had I think she's done a really cool job of reframing some of that.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:51

Yeah for sure and I I mentioned the identity and core piece um earlier and a lot of that comes from uh Steve Magnus he has a really good book called Win the Inside Game and that's something he was he was one of the coaches out of Oregon during the Nike Oregon project within track that whistleblow regarding some like poor coaching like inappropriate behaviors and things like that from a coach and coaching that was reinforcing let's say like an eating disorder and problems and he talks a lot just about his experience through that process of whistleblowing on that program and eventually just like athlete identity is something that he talks a lot a lot in that book and all the key coaches athletes and he sees that when an athlete can detach themselves from that and they learn to enjoy the sport more and more then they perform better and you know that's what they were searching for all along but it was just in this kind of blind spot we could probably do a whole other podcast on that teek be a part two yeah yeah Carson I have I have one last question for you I think I think we've ran the gambit tonight again like Melissa said we could open up a whole lot more Pandora's boxes or rabbit holes or whatever uh the last question I have in regards to this tonight might not even be in regards to wrestling I just kind of want to know what are your thoughts on cheat meals or cheat days yeah um I'm against them I would say if I had to put it into a statement I would say we don't need to earn our like we don't need to earn our food right like we don't need to earn nourishment you know food is so many great things and something we have to earn is not one of them. And so the mindset around like I did good during this I earn this um meal can become you know a toxic frame of mind um over time. I would say that oh I'm crushing it during Out during the week, let's say, in an overall sense of you know, just general population trying to lose weight and trying to have acceptance around meals that are conventionally like they're more calorie dense. You know, maybe it's a weekend restaurant and you're not really having as much intention with them. Um going into that, knowing that I'm gonna have this, I'm okay with it, and then I'm gonna get back on track um the next day, and I'm not gonna have this, you know, bleed into my mental state and cause me despair. I'm also not gonna let this meal influence my the intensity of my workout the next day. Maybe I just feel good the next day, so I'm gonna work out harder, but I'm not gonna work out harder because I need to burn the calories from that meal. So it's like it may not be a problematic thing, like outlook in the beginning, but over time it does become more problematic because that that internal dialogue or the the internal critic will kind of become overwhelming and convincing you that you didn't deserve that, or just maybe it's a little voice, but over time that voice becomes larger and tells you like, yeah, like we don't need to have this meal, or you think about it midway through the week and you're like, I'm working hard right now, I'm excited for that meal on the weekend. Like it's not not the best way to look at it. I think we should just you know accept those things as they come, have the meal, be okay with it. And 80-20, 80% of the time you're you know, crushing it 20% of the time, learn to be okay with that 20% of the time that you're allowing yourself to have those, you know, unconvention like conventionally, let's say unhealthy meals, but when in reality it's still giving you some form of nourishment, but maybe it's not always in line with the goals that you have.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:45

You have me like thinking how I'm gonna mentally attack like it doesn't queso night at hot the end of the yeah now. So yeah, that's that was I'm so glad I asked that because it's nice hearing an answer like that from smart people. So that was that was awesome. Well listen, you got anything else?

SPEAKER_02 1:30:07

Carson, I I would say let's kind of there was a so there was a ton of information. Maybe some listeners are overlooked by what they've heard. So maybe let's wrap it up with a start, a stop, a continue. So, what's one thing wrestlers should start doing? What do they stop doing, and what should they keep doing?

SPEAKER_00 1:30:26

Yeah. I would say, particularly with what I see in in high school wrestling, it's like start eating breakfast. If you're not eating breakfast, you should be. Um if you're uncomfortable and not hungry in the morning, then that's probably just because you're not used to eating breakfast. And so the same way your body knows when it should fall asleep and wake up, the our body kind of runs on that clock when it comes to when we should be hungry and when we're like less hungry. And so it's to keep us in cadence with meals. So if you're used to not having breakfast, then all of a sudden you have breakfast and it hurts your stomach. The initial response might be to pull away and not do that anymore. But that's when I want you to you should lean into it and understand that your body's gonna adjust to it. You'll start to notice that you'll get a little bit more hungry at breakfast time. And the volume of food that was making you feel uncomfortable no longer makes you uncomfortable, let's say a couple weeks into it. So your body, your gut will train like your muscles do, so give it the time to do so. And what you'll also notice is that you know, maybe after practice after practice, you're not as hungry as you would typically be because you did a good job of starting the day with a good um a good breakfast that provided you, you know, 20 grams or more of protein and got you some good carbohydrates that um your body's needing for that training session. A little bit of fats, maybe it's like a yogurt parfaits are a great start. Yogurt cup with you know frozen blueberries and some high fiber granola with a little bit limited added sugar, keeping the fiber in mind for later on in the week, but in general, this is great. And then having you know a couple, maybe it's a couple eggs if you have extra little extra time on the weekend. Um but yeah, I would say yeah, start having breakfast. Really, really important. And then I would say for the stop aspect, um stop the stop restricting your fluids, you know, in general. You know, it's like we should be feeling hydrated all the way through, maybe until like the last, you know, little bit before weigh-ins, where like you're just trying to sweat a little bit and you have like a less than less than a pound to go. You know, overall I wouldn't recommend it in general, but I would say that we certainly shouldn't be diet dehydrating ourselves um three, two days, three days, four days, and so on out before a competition. Um, it will your body's gonna go into a mode where it wants to hold on to every fluid that you consume, it'll start to respond like a sponge. You won't, um, and it'll just make it harder for your body to sweat. And um so overall, that's it's a really big one. If you notice that your legs are heavy after you hop off the scale, there's a good chance that that's um like hydration related, also low carbs, you know, not a lot of energy, but there's a good chance it's hydration related. Also, some considerations with regard to iron levels in female athletes. That's one thing women touched on. Um but menstrual loss of iron um is something to consider as well with regard to that side of things. But um, I'm certainly I'm happy to answer questions regarding that because I do think that is something that's important to mention. Um and then with regard to keep, um keep focusing, like keep the um pre-training carbohydrates. Like we shouldn't, there shouldn't be a time of the week where we feel like we have to pull away from food that's consumed before your training sessions. We want to protect the training session, we want to have carbohydrates in our body to ensure that we can get through that session and are performing like we should. Because if you have better training quality, you know, you get more out of that workout, you're gonna perform better over time. But if you're consistently or having poor training sessions because you're not eating much beforehand, um overall focus, your endurance, it's it's it's gonna go down.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:31

Okay, cool. That's easy. Start eating breakfast, stop restricting fluid, keep eating pre-training carbohydrates.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:40

There we go. Oh, fam's home, Melissa. Great timing. Uh, Carson, last but not least, give uh let's get a little plug for yourself. Uh what social medias can people follow? Or do you have any articles or books or any resources that you'd like to share with us? And of course, send us an email with all this too, and we'll put it in the podcast link as well. But where can people uh see more from Carson Hunter?

SPEAKER_00 1:35:10

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I do have a Instagram, um, but I would say if uh like email would be the best. So, like um, that's something that I don't know, I can name it out right now, but if you have questions, follow-up, you know, anything that you're um particular cases with your athletes, I'll I'll be sure to try and you know get back to you, provide some resources there. Um, so that would be the best place for questions, and that's gonna be you know khunter zero zero nine six at outlook.com. And um yeah, I would say that that would be the best place. My I don't have a particular page on Instagram for um nutrition, but it is something where if people want to keep up with, I can I can give you that afterwards. And yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:59

And Carson, we just want to put in a plug for you. We kind of talked pre-show, you do some consulting and and coaching.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:05

Yeah, yeah, I was gonna mention that. Yeah, so I take on um I take on clients, both athletes and non-athletes, through Nourish, and that's a it's gonna be a it's a pretty large telehealth company, and that over 94% of the clients that go through nourish end up being completely um insurance covered. You know, so they have like they work with seven major insurance companies. So you'd be able to work with a dietitian for um, in a lot of cases, you know, zero dollars out of pocket. And if so, maybe you know, there's a range in there, but in most cases, people are covered. And that's through Nourish. Um, you can go through, there's a website to be able to check if your insurance covers it. And I meet uh with a wide variety of different clients through Nourish. And it's very clear, laid-out portal for messaging to be able to work with athletes, and um, you know, I can provide like meal planning if there's some need for structure around an athlete who maybe relies on like the gas station food too much, and we gotta you know circle back to some real mood foods. And so I do that, and then um, yeah, so I do take on clients, um, athletes primarily, but then also just some like general population for with regard to you know healthy weight loss.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:21

Like 31-year-old podcasters got it. I'll take them.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:28

I'll take that age any day, take.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:34

Well, folks, yeah. Carson, thank you first and foremost for coming on and taking the time to to share your knowledge. You you are a wealth of knowledge, and I think uh too uh just uh the way you talked about it, the way you got the information out there. I know talking about nutrition. For some folks, it might not always be you know the most fun thing, but the way you got it out there, I think people can take it in and uh like pretty easy to digest. I didn't mean to do that there, but yeah, it was uh it was a good time tonight.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:07

Yeah, I was super happy to do it. Uh, I think it's it's one thing if you have the information and the knowledge, but it's a completely different thing to be able to translate it in a way that is impactful and then and digestible, as you mentioned. So for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:22

Yeah, thank you for doing that for our community. Yeah, we appreciate it. Of course.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:26

And Melissa, thank you. You rocked it in the co-hosting. There is a big Steve Lurquin following, so Melissa's not permanently replacing Steve, but I think we'll be seeing more of Melissa throughout the summer here as well.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:39

You know, I would never pretend to like understand the sport. I you know, I've never been headlocked, so I don't get it.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:45

But you can certainly talk about the things surrounding the sports and and you've known Zach Pearson as long as you have, and you haven't been headlocked. I'm all I'm a little bit surprised. I think I'm special status. That's fair. Or I've been defense. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:01

So wrap the body, yeah. I'll probably walk out into the family room and he'll headlock me just to jinx.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:11

Yeah, I jinxed it. I'm sorry. Well, all three of us will chat for a moment after the show. And uh all the sources that Carson threw out there, we'll get that into the podcast description. So thank you everybody for tuning in. Rob McKenzie at Wisconsin Grappler is back. Uh you guys in most of the second half of the show. And uh thank you, Erica, for your question. And yeah, we will be going again next, uh, hopefully next week or two weeks from now. I'm sure Steve will be back by then. But yeah, glad to be back, everybody. We're gonna be starting getting back into the swing of things. So thanks for tuning in. Until next time, we will catch you on the flip.