What I Eat As A Poor Athlete
This year has been tough for everyone and I am no exception. I have had three jobs in 2020 (long story) and I am finally now, in December, feeling comfortable financially again. I spent the first half of the year living with my wife and newborn baby in a spare bedroom at my grandmother’s house. We lived there because I was only making $40k per year and couldn’t afford our rent. My next job was a short stint as a retail manager for a new store in my town. That didn’t work out well and I was laid off when the owner couldn’t pay her employees. I spent about two months without a steady job and did construction to try and make ends meet. We emptied our savings to pay the rent in our new apartment (the one was rented when I was offered the previous job) and used whatever money I could make to buy groceries and keep the AC on during the hot summer months in Arizona. Finally, I got a steady job that is paying the bills but for the majority of this year, I was poorer than I had ever been.
One of the only things that stayed consistent throughout this entire year was my fitness. I teach cycle classes at a local gym and I am a runner. The following is a pretty typical day of eating for me as a runner well-below the poverty line. This is an actual day of eating that happened on November 13, 2020.
5 am — run 13.1 miles @ 7:17 per mile
6:30 am — drank some water
7:00 am — took a shower but didn’t have time to make breakfast because I was already running late for my job. This was Friday and we were almost out of groceries for the week anyway. I could have eaten the last banana or made a piece of toast but then my one-year-old daughter wouldn’t have had anything to eat.
7:30 am — stop at the gas station to try and find something quick and cheap to eat before going into the office. Couldn’t find anything healthy that also was super cheap so I bought a 44oz Dr. Pepper because it was only $1 and at least the sugar and caffeine would give me a boost through the morning.
Lunchtime: didn’t bring lunch because I was running late in the morning due to the longer workout but also I just couldn’t stomach another PB&J. I don’t think we had any more bread anyway. I went to McDonald’s because on Friday they do a free large french fry if you order in the app. I bought one spicy chicken sandwich for $1.19 and got a free large fry.
8 pm: work ran long because it was the last day of open enrollment at the office and I work in HR. I am starving at this point but I have had a ton of water.
9 pm: my mother in law was in town and she paid for my wife and me to go out to dinner for date night and we got some Chinese food.
Total food intake for the day: 44oz Dr. Pepper, Large French Fry, Spicy Chicken Sandwich, Orange Chicken with Rice, ~1 gallon of water.
This was not a super typical day but it isn’t too far off of what normally happens. Trying to be an athlete with a very low budget and very little time because of a demanding job has been incredibly difficult. I have definitely felt the influence of a poor diet in my running and I can’t wait till I can afford to eat better.
Conclusion
I am afraid that a lot of athletes are in a similar situation as me and have had poor performances in workouts or races due to the lack of affordable, nutritious food and a rigorous work schedule. In my experience, I have found that the more money you make, the more free time you have. The more free time you have, the healthier you are because you are able to prioritize things like fitness and nutrition. For those of us teetering on the poverty line have to choose sometimes and as a runner, I almost always prioritize fitness over nutrition. This isn’t new for me, though. I ran cross country and track at a community college that didn’t have the budget to help athletes financially and I was delivering pizza 40 hours per week while going to school full time and running 50–60 miles per week. Most of my meals included pizza and I still was able to run national-qualifying times in my races. I often think about how much faster I could have been running if I had the opportunity to focus all of my time and effort into running or if I simply had the money to pay for better food and the time to shop for it.
