The Michael Phelps Diet

Yeah, this was posted in the Olympics thread. But considering he swims a minimum 50 miles a week, he needs all the energy he can get.

The problem becomes when he stops swimming competitively and he still eats massive quantities of food. Hes gonna balloon up like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

Annnd the guy gets to train all day. It only makes sense that he needs to eat that much just to maintain his body composition - if we were all Olympic athletes who trained 8 hours a day, we'd be dying for that much. With my past blend of Crossfit and Chad Waterbury's Total Body Training program (which I still use geared variations of to this very day incorporating Olympic lifts an unilateral work) while bulking, I ended up getting about 3-4K calories/day, so I can't imagine eating what someone on his regimen would eat. I felt like a fucking feedcalf after breakfast, and that doesn't even count the pre-workout/peri-workout/post-workout intake. Though I did eat way more "clean" calories than he did.... French toast, mayo, white bread and choco-chip pancakes? Bleh.

EDIT: Dammit, Diva sorta beat me to it. What she said too. :P

EDITEDIT: For someone with his amount of physical exertion and output, I'd apply something like John Berardi's theory of G-Flux to someone who was training as hard as Phelps, which seems to be what's happening here. Just with way less clean calories. Then again, if you're a hardgainer, you need to eat everything in sight. Even Mark Rippetoe wants hardgainers to drink a gallon of milk and squat and deadlift every day. Plus his shit works. I learned a lot from his Starting Strength book.

What are grits?

I couldn't imagine this diet. I'm killing myself to stay at 1,500 calories a day right now, and trying hard to get to 1,200. Though, I look back at when I was in basketball and played at least 5 hours every single day, and my diet back then was pretty ridiculous. Probably 5,000 calories a day. So yeah definitely ballooned when that ended.

Astounding.

ADDENDUM: Also, BillyG, I think you're undereating badly. What's your current bodyweight?

312 as of last night. Goal of getting back to 220.

Also, I hate grits. I recommend hash browns with maple syrup on top. Yum.

Nope. Everyone else just calls it polenta.

Phelps needs all of these calories because of his fitness regimen, but what are eight eggs per morning doing to his arteries?

Just wait until he stops training. The diet is always the last thing to die.

What the hell's polenta?

Jake, know what poutine is?

Seriously though, I know Phelps needs to eat alot with his exercise regimen, but it's the unhealthy shit he eats that gets me: I could understand if he ate 100 egg whites and a big bowl of whole wheat pasta, but fried egg sandwiches, enriched pasta, pizza, chocolate-chip pancakes? Damn...

Grits.

Basically, yes, it's soft polenta. One can prepare firm polenta (little cakes or squares), but, even though a southerner would probably try to fight us on this, soft polenta and grits are the same thing.

It's Farina!

And we make good poutine in New Brunswick. We stole the recipe from a restaurant in Trois-Rivieres.

Stop your lies and propaganda right there Savage! Poutine is a heavenly meal regardless of location!

Grits taste like the corn nibblets found in Swanson's dinners. And It was I who mentioned the 12,000 calories a day in the olympic thread.

And judging from the shear volume of food, we are clearly talking about dumps that are larger than my head. And for those who have seen me. You know how big my noggin is.

Polenta is delicious if you cut it into little patties and fry it up on a pan OH GOD NO THIS IS BECOMING A FOOD THREAD

*Slaps Minsky*

GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF MAN!

Disgusting.

Martin, it's not like I turned the hose on him and started laughing. Not yet anyway. And btw I can't discern the difference between Cream of Wheat and Grits. Cream of Wheat makes great pancakes but they become heavy as bricks once eaten.

Eight eggs aren't too shabby. Eggs are generally considered a good fat, despite the cholesterol scare from a couple of years ago. I eat four eggs every morning, usually, or egg whites. If not more.

Poutine is sexual healing. And I agree with the unhealthy shit assessment - that's a lot of dirty calories, but then again he might just need that to maintain considering his training regimen and how hard clean calories are to come by.

For example, I'm on a carb cycling plan right now, and my Fridays call for 3450 calories with 50 grams of fat, 500 grams of carbs, and 250+ grams of protein. I just started it last week and have dropped eight pounds, but the carb-up day kills me. On that day, I have:

-six whole-wheat bagels
-1.5 tbsp whipped cream cheese
-two chicken burritos with 1 cup brown rice, 1 can vegetarian refried beans
-1/2 cup monterey jack cheese, and 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
-1.5 cups of whole-wheat angel hair pasta with organic sauce and lean
-ground beef with two slices of low-cal garlic bread
-1 cup of steel-cut Irish oats with 1/2 cup blueberries
-1 protein shake

That's a fucking lot of food, especially with the bagels. It's depressing how many carbs I have to eat, but the results are astounding. Friday is my high-carb day, followed by equally-geared days throughout the week, and as long as I hit my caloric minimum with respect to the fat/protein/carb split, I'm golden.

It's still really tough shit, so I can't even imagine having to eat 12K calories per day.


ADDENDUM: Fuck this, grits are amazing. And Hocken's head is very large, so there's that.

Ahhhh poutine. Brings back memories when I stayed in Nova Scotia. That was some damn good stuff.

Re: Jake

I like you say you "have to" eat all that. You choose to. Not that there's anything wrong with that. :P

Grits are great, Diva be crazy.

This diet doesn't surprise me. I read Bale ate some similar things to bulk up for Batman Begins. Bodybuilders eat anywhere from 16,000-18,000 calorie a day diets too. But then they aren't burning off those calories so what they eat is strictly monitored.

Grits with butter, pepper, and a dash of salt: manna from heaven.

Plain grits: deadly poison.

Some idiot is going to try and eat all of this and put in on Youtube. Mark me words.

"The truth is like grits, you don't serve it up plain." - Shane Vendrell

That's always stuck in my mind for some reason. And grits are great.

Basically, hating grits is like hating America. And/or the natives we annihilated and appropriated the recipe from.

Good call. It's not like the Gluttony murder from Se7en or anything, but I feel damn close on Fridays.

Grits are FANTASTIC with cheese mixed in. FANTASTIC.

But as far as this diet, why doesn't he just eat a ton of healthy food? I mean, he eats a whole pizza? A LARGE one? That has to do a number on your arteries even if you exercise a ton.

I'm going to say odds are this is a sample day. I imagine some nights he eats a whole pizza, some nights 5 cheesesteaks, some nights a ham. You know, variety.

Next Question: Would the ham come out of the can or would he take it off the bone ala Fred Flinstone?

Great camping food: Grits mixed with bacon (& bacon grease)
Eat with eggs cooked in bacon grease to really kick it up a notch.

I ate an entire UNO pizza last night. And i'm not training for a damn thing.

I think the scare about eggs is mostly BS, drummed up by the cereal companies. As far as I know there is noting bad in eggs and most of the fats and Cholesterol in eggs are the good one your bodies need. That said I hate eggs, and need lot of bacon to wash them down with. Which is what real problem with most people I believe, and eating eggs.

Also I'd be worried more about all the sugar he is eating that is going to harden his arteries faster then bacon will. The only things worse is the artificial fats, like hydrated fats. Artificial fats, Sugars, and processed cabs is what is killing the US eater and me. It leads to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and maybe even Alzheimer.

Fixed.

true, but diedly

How do you decide which of the 6 bagels gets the 1.5 tbsp of cream cheese?

While in Louisiana every breakfast item came with a side of grits. I had never seen this before, so I naively asked a waitress what they consisted of.

Her response was classic.
"Grits is grits."

When I was a teen I had 5% body fat with 128 Cholesterol. got a blood test one day, and that is how I know what my Cholesterol was. The doctor said I should up my fat content. When I told him what I was eating. He said, "my God that would kill most people in a couple of years, were all that fat going?" The answer was I was riding a bike about 12 miles a day, lifting, and play with big waves and white sharks at shall beach two or three hours a day and a lot more on the weekends. Fuck that water was cold. My balls still feel the pain of it, and the balls were in the wet suite, unlike my hands and feet. Nothing burn calories like hypothermia.

Even though I can't handle bacon anymore. I whole hartedly agree with that statement.

I have to agree with Chris here. This could be his "cheat" day as far diet goes. Where he gets to eat whatever. And I find it hard to believe he eats all this one sitting.

Huh, 2,700 is average for a guy now? I keep thinking 2,000.

it depends on your size and other facters.