10,000 calories a day!

spyrosmom

spyrosmom

Cathlete
I was watching the Olympics last night and they were doing a snippet on Micheal Phelps. They said that when in training mode he eats, sleeps and swims. Said he eats btwn 8,000-10,000 cals a day and still can't break 200lbs. Of course, they also said he spend 5 hrs a day in the pool. That is a lot of food!!! If I ate 10,000 cals a day I'd top 200lbs inside of a week. Wish I had that metabolism. *sigh*

Nan
 
I've read that the racers in the Tour de France eat close to that many calories as well.

Goes to show that "calories-in/calories-out" iis a valid concept (and a young male training that intensely for that long certainly burns a LOT of calories. Like you say, if *I* ate that many calories....first off, I don't know how I'd get that many in...and that's one experiment I'm NOT going to try, LOL!).
 
I'd be curious to see how many calories he burns during his workouts. I'd bet the #'s are huge after 5 hours in the pool at his intensity. I'm glad he is doing so well at the Olympics.

JJ
 
My husband is no athlete, but he has a metablism that burns everything he eats. I struggle to loose and he struggles to gain.

His doctor had him on a high cal high fat diet once and all it did was raise his bad cholesteral and make him feel ill.

I used to think I'd love to have his metabolism...but after being with him for 2 years...no thanks. I sure would like to have a happy medium.

I wonder what types of foods the athletes eat?
 
I'd love to have a sample menu of Michael's! I used to swim intensely in high school (well, of course nowhere NEAR Michael Phelps' intensity!) and I can't imagine being in the pool for 5 hours a day. We used to spend around 2-3 hours a day in the pool and I was a zombie all the time from working so hard for so long.

I'd love to see what he eats on a daily basis, though.
 
I'm not even sure what I could eat that wasn't deep fried in oil, breaded and then covered in butter to get to 10,000 calories. I'm guessing he eats a lot of pasta? Gosh when he says he basically eats, swims and sleeps he's not kidding!
 
peytonsmommy said:
I'm not even sure what I could eat that wasn't deep fried in oil, breaded and then covered in butter to get to 10,000 calories.
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The only really healthy things (at least in reasonable amounts) I can think of to get high calories are nuts, seeds and avocados. But still, 10,000 calories?

Just out of curiosity, I figured that 1 whole jar of Smucker's Natural PB is "only" 2940 calories. So 4 jars of PB should do the trick!

I just wonder how the intestinal tract and stomach fare with the amount of bulk going through them that must come with eating that much?
 
Part of me admires the discipline and dedication shown by Olympic athletes. But most of me thinks "Why?" :D

This thread, plus the one on oh... what's her name, the female swimmer with the abs (posted by LauraMax)... well, they just make me wonder. Do these people truly love their sports, or are they obsessed way off the deep end? I guess I'm just too lazy to ever understand that kind of dedication.
 
Wow Allison, I'm shocked by what he eats for breakfast :eek: When I heard that he consumes almost 10,000 cals I figured that he must take in a lot of those from liquid supplements or somthing. I would think that eating so much at one time would bloat him up and weigh him down...no fair :p

Chastity
 
crazystepr said:
This is all I could find: http://simononsports.blogspot.com/2008/08/michael-phelps-eats-entire-menu-for.html

Doesn't sound like he eats very healthy. But he's a 24 year old workout machine (plus he's male). He can get away with it for now, I'm sure. ;)
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Ewww! Not a healthy diet at all.
I wonder how much his overall fitness can compensate for whatever this may be doing to his insides?

And once you're used to eating this way, when you retire from competition---or even just 'get on' in age--how hard would it be to go to a healthier diet?
 
I have a friend whose DH is a competitive cyclist. The guy is a rail - 6'2 and weighs about 150 pounds. He eats 7000 calories a day when he's competing. He has a problem eating enough. Off season is a relief because he can eat normally again and is not always hungry. According to his docs, he's extremely healthy and he's in his late 30's now. I don't know if it's like that across the board, but I'd think all of that exercise would compensate for some of it.
 
I think when his swimming days are over he's going to be in for a very rude awakening if he doesn't gradually cut those calories as he cuts back on competing. Metabolism and fitness. I was just talking about this to a cute little young girl at work the other day as I watched her down ANOTHER large 3 Musketeers bar. Coming to fitness after having been fat for about 15 years, I'm filled with missionary zeal when discussing diet and exercise with young people. She had seen me munching on strawberries earlier and remarked that I "eat so healthy." I told her I used to be huge (which she couldn't believe) and gave her a rundown of why she'd better change her evil (nutrition) ways now, BEFORE her metabolism changes and she finds herself stuck in a body she never dreamed she'd wind up with.
 
Yeah Hillary Swank had a couple dozen eggs a day when she was training for million dollar baby.. she drank most of them and even got up in intervals throughout the night to make sure she got the protein.. that's how she gained 19 pounds in like three months?
.. and while on the topic you know why gymnasts are so short??
all their calories are used in their expenditure.. they go innto their thick, solid muscles and there arent alays enough for growth (upwards :)
Rarely will you find a female gymnast over 5'4
 
I know this is a little offtrack but I watched a program last year on climbing Everest and the people who were at the first base camp had to eat something like that a day just because being at that high of an altitude was burning that many calories. Great diet idea. Just go hang out for a week and don't eat...;):D:eek:
 
LOL Kathryn at 4 jars of PB :eek:

It was funny when DH and I were watching last night and they were mentioning Michael's breakfast foods my DH, who eats high fat high carb was wondering how he could eat that much. Honestly DH could down most of it, but he probably wouldn't eat the rest of the day. And honestly, DH would never make an hour in the pool much less 5 !

Just thought it was funny that someone who eats quite a bit was amazed.

Kinda reminded me of how much I ate in high school when I was playing volleyball and basketball. For VB we did 6 hour days during the summer, half training and half playing/drills. During the season we'd go out after a game and I'd eat an entire medium sized pizza on my own. I was about 15 - 20 lbs heavier than I am now, a 1975 sized 11 - 14. So happy to be healthier now.:D
 
I LOVE MICHAEL PHELPS!!!---You gotta wonder are we what we eat???? and is a calorie just a calorie?? My local news is saturated with reports about how some obese people are healthier than non obese people. I love ballet and saw something which killed me about a New York City Ballet dancer, male who ate just as much if not more than Michael Phelps, and we're not talking lettuce and tomatoes here. We're talking Mc Donalds, and more Mc Donalds, and this guy was all muscle flexibility, and pure grace on the dance floor. Man I gotta say if I could eat all that stuff and be as fit and awsome as these guys are I'd take it as one of the best Christmas present ever!!!!
 
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janie1234 said:
I LOVE MICHAEL PHELPS!!!---You gotta wonder are we what we eat???? and is a calorie just a calorie?? My local news is saturated with reports about how some obese people are healthier than non obese people. I love ballet and saw something which killed me about a New York City Ballet dancer, male who ate just as much if not more than Michael Phelps, and we're not talking lettuce and tomatoes here. We're talking Mc Donalds, and more Mc Donalds, and this guy was all muscle flexibility, and pure grace on the dance floor. Man I gotta say if I could eat all that stuff and be as fit and awsome as these guys are I'd take it as one of the best Christmas present ever!!!!
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But the difference is in their massive amounts of training which burn massive amounts of calories. If you're an athlete and your job is to train all day long and you work out hard you could probably eat like that. If they ate like that without all the hard physical labor they'd be human pin cushions, like so many of us became without exercise. What I want to know is does their heavy training counteract the bad effects (hardened arteries) of eating massive amounts of non-clean calories in a way it doesn't for the rest of us?
 
i don't know. i find that really hard to believe - that he actually eats 10,000 calories a day. i swam in college and was nationally ranked as an under 16 and went to 'zones'. i swam between 5:30-7am and 3pm-6pm including 30 min of weights 3 times a week. it was grueling, but your body becomes very efficient and i was eating around 2200-2500 calories a day at 150 pounds (and i actually gained weight if i ate more than that). i realize i wasn't in the same league, but i have trained with 2 male swimmers that went to the olympics in 88 and i never knew anyone who at even near that amount...just my viewpoint.
 
SRP said:
Part of me admires the discipline and dedication shown by Olympic athletes. But most of me thinks "Why?" :D

This thread, plus the one on oh... what's her name, the female swimmer with the abs (posted by LauraMax)... well, they just make me wonder. Do these people truly love their sports, or are they obsessed way off the deep end? I guess I'm just too lazy to ever understand that kind of dedication.
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I love to swim, and I love to train, so if I did not have a job, I could really see enjoying pushing myself to whatever limits I had. As far as the calorie intake, I know when I push myself hard in swimming, and swim a tiny bit of what these athletes do(15,000 a week), my weight stays down quite nicely.
 
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