That’s a fair bit of feeding in just the one day.
Ever notice that it’s actually your skinny friends who eat the most? That’s usually, apart from the odd case of a lazy lad with a high metabolism, because of the amount of exercise these skinny ones pack into a day.
And when it comes to elite athletes, these lads are a law unto themselves. Their lives are based around training. They don’t have sessions three or four days a week, they often have sessions twice and three times a day.
Fuelling the tank is key for finely tuned, hard working athletes and the majority of them eat like absolute horses.
Remember Michael Phelps claimed to have been eating up to 12’000 calories when he was in his pomp a couple of years ago.
Irish modern pentathlete Arthur Lanigan O’Keefe is one of this country’s finest, most competitive athletes right now. He’s a two-time Olympian, having recently represented Ireland at London and at Rio, and he’s ever improving.
Back in May, he won a World Cup gold medal and more recently in July he was in the top 10 in the European championships.
For those uneducated on the sport, the modern pentathlon is a discipline that comprises five different events – fencing, freestyle swimming, equestrian show jumping, and a combined event of pistol shooting and cross country running (3200m).
O’Keeffe’s training is in full flight right now as he bids to make it to Tokyo 2020 and he shared a video of his daily lifestyle on his Youtube channel Arthur LOK recently.
The video offered a fascinating insight into a typical training day in the life of an elite athlete, and the most interesting part was his daily diet.
7.00
Coffee and Banana
8.50
Oats with fruit
11.00
Poached eggs and rashers, more fruit
12.30
Feed of a dinner
15.30
Protein shake
18.40
Another big dinner
19.30
Ice cream
20.30
Brown bread and tea
By bed-time, he has over 5420 calories consumed in a day. Some going.
Watch the video here.
