Are food sensitivities real? Yes.
Can they impact your performance? Absolutely.
Are the tests to identify them accurate? Ahhh…debatable. Let’s dig in to what it means and how it could be impacting your performance.
Athletes may actually be more susceptible to symptoms of food sensitivities because the stress of constant training taxes the immune system. In other words, a stressed body will be less able to handle foods that are causing inflammation.
Impacts on the athlete:
- Increased inflammation results in muscle soreness and slows down recovery time
- Increases stress on the body leading to fatigue as the body needs more rest
- Prevents nutrients from being fully absorbed
- Weakens the immune system {easier to get sick after strenuous workouts}
- Causes weight gain
- Can impact breathing by inflaming the air ways
It’s not about eating healthy, it’s about eating foods that are best for YOUR body.
This means learning that milk actually upsets your stomach would make you think twice before swigging that high protein recovery drink or finding out honey is an issue could explain why one gel seems to work great and another leaves you with side stitches.
As said by NFL star Drew Brees:
Everything I do as an athlete, I think about maximizing performance. So anything I put in my body, I think about ‘how’s this going to help me perform at the highest level?” And, ‘how’s it going to help me recover the fastest?’ If you have an allergy to certain types of food and you are putting those into your body, your body is constantly fighting those foods as opposed to repairing muscle and helping you with recovery or performance.
WHAT THE TERMS MEAN
Food Allergy: The body has an immediate adverse reaction to the food which can be as minor as hives to as critical as swelling that closes the airway. We are not talking about this kind of allergy today.
Food Intolerance: The body lacks specific enzymes to digest a particular food. The two most commonly known are gluten and dairy which cause GI distress because the body cannot appropriately process the food, but are not life threatening like an allergy.
Food Sensitivity: Often lumped in with intolerance, a food sensitivity is exactly that…something which your body has an adverse reaction to from 45 minutes to 3 days after eating it. The estimate is that up to 80% of adults have some kind of sensitivity.
Cumulative dose is an important factor for most athletes. While 1 gel with honey may not bother you, that gel combined with 3 hours of body stress from running and a few other ingredients that your stomach doesn’t love could be what breaks you in terms of GI issues.
Could your slower paces be related to food sensitives? Find out more #bibchat Click To TweetTESTING OPTIONS
Doing everything right and feeling fatigued, frequent headaches, muscle aches…might be worth getting tested! There is the 100% free method and the totally not covered by insurance more expensive method.
Elimination Diet: The cheapest and most effective way to know if you have an intolerance is to do an elimination diet. Unfortunately it’s very hard for most people to stick to it for more than a week due to the highly restrictive nature or people forget to accurately record symptoms upon slowly adding foods back.
ALCAT Test: This is a blood test that measures food/chemical sensitivities based upon how immune cells react when exposed to the foods. It can be used for up to 300 foods, gluten, gliadin and milk proteins – whey and casein.
A runner’s guide to avoiding runner’s trots and other food impacts:
- Determine if you are having digestive issues only on the run or more frequently {signs of poor digestion}
- Try an elimination on your own of possible suspects (usually dairy, gluten, soy, corn, nuts). Add notes to your running log about foods and how you are feeling.
- Get tested through a professional
- Work with said professional to figure out a personalized nutrition plan
COMMON QUESTIONS
Can you get over food sensitivities? Yes. Turns out that as you heal your stomach {from removing inflammation causing foods} you will likely lessen severity of allergies and over time with complete healing could be totally free of any sensitivities. This is a LONG process though.
How reliable is the ALCAT test? This was a big concern for me and after reading A LOT of different things, I’ve come to this conclusion: it’s worth testing. There are advocates who swear it’s changed their lives and healed them by learning what foods to remove and scientists on the other side saying these tests cannot be accurate.
Scientists also don’t understand how acupuncture or Chinese herbs work for so many…but we all know at least on person who has felt better from using Easter Medicine that’s never been proven in a lab.
Existing Sports Nutrition Articles:
Sports nutrition who to work with and benefits
Is your workout causing you to gain weight
Understanding the impact of digestion on health
Advice for avoiding runner’s trots
Interested in taking the ALCAT? The ladies at Diet Diva are helping me with their specific food sensitivity and sports nutrition knowledge. You will take the test wherever you are located and then have at least 2 calls with them to guide you through the results and what to do next.
Have you ever taken a food sensitivity test?
What if you were restricted from your favorite food??
hint I’ll be talking about dealing with this! HELP ME
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I am actually looking into getting retested. I will most likely be getting a blood test to look at IgEs. Inflammation seems to be quite a hot topic at the moment. I didn’t know much about it, but it really does impact people with food issues. This was a great read 😀
Kortney // Allergy Girl Eats recently posted…Whole30 Day 10: The Hardest Days
Thanks so much! I have been reading so much about testing that now I’m torn on how useful it is, but I also know finding out the big one’s helped me a lot!