Your Health is Your Wealth

Hello!


Hey awesome lady volleyballers!  My name is Sarah and Carolyn did a very good job introducing me in her email about the blog.  I just wanted to say a few things about myself before you start reading and taking advice from some random girl who lives in Colorado :)

I swam for 7 years for an Olympic coach in high school, trained about 35 hours a week, and usually ate more food than my entire family combined.  I ceased swimming in college due to having double shoulder surgery- but still enjoy being active, but mostly with outdoor sports.  I graduated from Penn with Carolyn with a major in Health and Societies (public health concentration), a minor in biology, and a minor in nutrition.  I became fascinated with the Obesity Epidemic (yes, this is a true epidemic and politically correct term).  I cannot go into to much depth, because this post would be infinitely long... but I would just like to say that eating healthy in America IS HARD, so I feel your pain and confusion!!!  Fast food joints are on every corner, most chain restaurants are pretty much the equivalent of a fast food restaurant (without the cheesy plastic booth seating and a creepy clown mascot), and most products in the grocery store are..well... wait for it.... BAD FOR YOU!! I know, stinks, right?  When I realized this, it was a sad, sad day.  Food food everywhere, but not a bite to eat. So, if you can start to make good habits for yourself at a young age (kind of like brushing your teeth), you will be on the right track to not only perform better at volleyball, but to set yourself up for a disease-free life (which really, is the most important bottom line!).  Also, eating healthy will help you accomplish more in your everyday life (make you smarter, happier, and stronger...like the HULK!!)

Believe it or not, most American's are mal-nourished.  'Mal-nourished' is a term you usually see when reading about starving villages in rural developing countries.  But America?  We have NO excuse!  We have access to every food that was ever invented.  Mal-nourished American= not choosing to eat fruits and vegetables and other important whole grains.  Lastly, food in America is REALLY inexpensive compared to the rest of the world.  Spend the extra $$ on yourself, this is not a category of your life to skimp on.   Your health is more important than anything else.  Your health is your wealth.


Here is my first set of tips to phasing more health into your life.
1. Eat as many green things you possibly can in a day (vegetables, not things dyed green)
2. Eat as many green things you possibly can in a day
3. Eat as many green things you possibly can in a day.

Simple enough, eh?  Try it this week! try eating at least 3 servings of vegetables every day.  It is not as hard as you think.  One serving of leafy greens is about the size of a baseball (raw, not wilted) so when you wilt a leafy green, it is much easier to get 3 servings, or more!



Honey, who shrunk the Spinach?


Ingredients
Spinach (baby, organic if possible)
2 tbsp Olive Oil
Honey
Sea Salt
Pine nuts/nuts of your choice

Directions
Heat large saute pan over medium heat with 2 tbsp olive oil, place spinach in the pan.  Pile it on.  Cover with lid to expedite wilting process.  Fold spinach over so it begins to wilt evenly- if it is not looking like enough, add more spinach!  When spinach is wilted to your liking, add a pinch of sea salt, drizzle with honey, and top with pine nuts/ chopped nuts of your choice.  Enjoy!

Confessions of a former Gatorade-aholic: Tournament Nutrition

Tournaments are HARD, particularly in the nutrition category. As a player, figuring out what to eat during a grueling three days of volleyball took time and research. 

After not eating enough in the morning at these three days, I inevitably trudged over to the snack stand, starving after the first couple matches, to grab whatever snack was closest. Of course, most of these "snacks" were fried, and the beverage selection was slim: Gatorade and Soda! So, liquid sugar it was and, believe me, I drank Gallons of Gatorade back then with all those salty snacks. But I came away from those weekends feeling heavy and lethargic, aching from playing and weighed down from the food I was demolishing left and right.  

Now let’s be serious, I was playing a LOT of volleyball, so who cares how much sugar I drank or what I ate, right? Wrong. I felt distracted while playing because my stomach was so full and constantly thirsty or pasty mouthed. Then I realized that plays I would normally make seemed just out of reach after these snack stand stints. It was so frustrating! So, I developed a set of rules to eat by my later high school years and into my college career. Who knows, maybe if I started earlier I would have been a better player.