WHOOP Podcast - How to Optimize Nutrition with Registered Sports Dietician, Angie Asche

Episode Date: November 26, 2025

On this month's edition of the WHOOP Podcast How To Series, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance, Principal Scientist, Dr. Kristen Holmes sits down with Registered Sports Dietician, Angie Asche to explore what it really means to fuel for performance as an athlete. Angie has worked with a variety of professional athletes in the MLB, NHL and more, optimizing their nutrition habits to perform at their peak.Angie outlines the importance of prioritizing the three macronutrients – carbohydrates, proteins, and fats – and how to ensure you’re getting the right amount of each. This episode dives into why the timing of meals is so important, explaining the impacts nutrition has on sleep and recovery. Angie and Dr. Holmes unpack the fine line between aesthetics and performance and how under-fueling affects both male and female athletes.(00:50) WHOOP Rapid Fire Q’s(01:50) Prioritizing Macronutrients As An Athlete(03:17) Under Fueling: Balancing Aesthetics and Performance(05:11) Common Symptoms of Under Fueling(06:58) Impact of Under Fuelling On Sleep and Recovery(07:42) Fasting’s Impact on Performance(09:42) Importance of Nutrient Timing(12:24) Late-Night Eating: How Does It Impact Sleep and Recovery?(15:39) Food Sensitivity Tests: Are They Worth The Hype?(19:02) Knowing Inflammation: Chronic Versus Acute(23:47) Do You Need To Supplement Nutrients As An Athlete?(27:16) Supplement Absorption and Daily Nutrition(32:35) Benefits of Prebiotics & Probiotics(33:57) Why Your Body Needs Fiber & Where To Get It(35:07) How To Track Macros(38:46) Intuitive Eating: What Your Body Needs & When(40:48) Long-Term Effects of Under Fueling(41:46) The Nutrients Many Female Athletes Are Missing(44:51) Nourishment Over Numbers: Changing Mindsets On Restrictive Eating(49:30) Metabolic Health: The Nutrients To Improve Your MetabolismFollow Angie Asche:InstagramLinkedInXWebsite Support the showFollow WHOOP: Sign up for WHOOP Advanced Labs Trial WHOOP for Free www.whoop.com Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

Technically, even if you're maintaining your weight or even if you're gaining weight, you can actually still be under-fueled. And it's really just a matter of that nutrient timing and not fueling your body in key moments when it needs it most. That can be under-fueling. So you are starting your practice or your game or whatever else under-fueled. And that in turn can impact your performance. Let's try to at least get some of the right nutrients and by the right nutrients,

and by the right nutrients, carbohydrates, protein, pre, during, and post. If we can at least get the timing spot on with that, then you'll, you'll, see a world of a difference with performance, with recovery, sleep, all of it. Angie Ashy, welcome. Thank you for having me. I'm so damn pumped to talk to you. You have such just a really interesting mix of experience, both with men athletes and female athletes, and we're just going to dig in to all of it today.

So I'm excited. You ready to go? Yes. All right. We're going to start with a little rapid fire icebreaker, which will come back to a lot of these, but feel free to, you know, expand at any point. So, true or false. Eating too little is more common than eating too much in high performers.

True. You should eat differently depending on where you are in your menstrual cycle. True. To an extent. True or false. Recovery shakes are mostly marketing hype. True. I can't wait to talk about all these.

Yes or no. You can't out-supplement a poor diet. Oh, yeah, you definitely cannot. Gosh, right, 100%. Wish we could be a lot easier, huh? It'd be so much easier just to take a damn pill. So I'm like, it's so hard to make meals and, yeah. True or false.

Carbs are essential for hormonal health. True. Oh, for hormonal health. I mean, I would argue more fats, but still true. Very true. Yeah, this is such an interesting point. I just talked to, do you know Dr. Benjamin Bickman? No, uh-uh.

He's a metabolic scientist. He's out of Brigham Young, and he was just talking about, and I think this is what I'd love to talk to you, you know, about today is just this idea of, you know, well, some of the differences between fueling for performance versus fueling for longevity. Totally. You know, he says basically carbs are not essential, which we've heard that argument, too. You know, when you look at it mechanistically, it's not true, you know, carbs are not essential, but obviously they play a role. And the conversation is very, we're going to focus on athletes that. We're going to focus on performance, mainly, and carbs are essential for performance. 100%.

Yeah. But, you know, fat and protein should be prioritized probably first for most humans. Mm-hmm. But athletes might be different. Totally. Well, and it's difficult because that true or false, I mean, it's not so much black and white because, of course, I'm thinking of my clientele, right? So I'm like, technically, if they're not consuming enough carbohydrates, then they're having to get those calories from somewhere else. They're dipping too much into the protein, too much into the fat.

So in the end, it's not going to be, you know, ideal for a whole. hormonal health, but obviously that fat is going to be the real key player there in your hormones. And if you're underconsuming fat, especially, you know, I think it's below 20% of your total calories from fat that can really, really start to impact hormonal health. Yeah. I just eat your brain function too. Oh, 100%. Yeah.

The linkages there are pretty strong. So if we're to think about performance versus aesthetics, you know, I think it's pretty easy to get caught between this, you know, tension of how you look and how you perform and And, you know, I know for field hockey, we wore, like, a singlet. Practically, you know, I mean, it was really tight. Yeah. I mean, it's hard not to think about aesthetics. Yeah.

What have you found in your experience in terms of just kind of getting over this hurdle between performance and aesthetics? You know, it's really hard. And I kind of speaking to what you were saying with field hockey is what you did. Yeah. I was a swimmer and a dancer. So talk about like all aesthetics. Yeah. Definitely underfueled a lot of my dancing and swimming career, too.

But I will say that, especially with athletes, they have this common misconception that the leaner you are, the faster you are, the better you perform. And unfortunately, what I'm seeing, especially even at, you know, and I think automatically have this hockey player and this MLB pitcher that I've worked with recently, where their main goal was to just get leaner. They just wanted to get under that 10%. They really want to be under 10%. And there really wasn't a reason why. It was just more aesthetic. Like they were mainly just trying to be lean for just to look better in general and be the leanest one on the team. And then they realized their performance started to suffer from it. Both of them will tell you it's the worst they've felt truly during a season.

And also they had a higher risk of injury. They did actually both get injured that season. And a lot of it just goes back to they assumed it meant to eat less, like to get as lean as possible how to eat less. In doing so, that kind of led them to that under-fueling cycle. They didn't have enough energy in the tank to really optimize performance, optimize recovery. So I think it's just a common misconception with, you know, to get as lean as possible, I need to eat less. I need to eat less carbs. And it ends up kind of resulting in under-fueling in.

Which macroducerent were they under-eating? So actually, both carbs and fat. They were doing well with protein. I actually do see most of my pro athletes do a pretty good job of protein. They know how important it is. But it's the carbohydrates and the fat that both tend to get neglected. You know, you mentioned it when we were talking. We weren't yet recording.

But you mentioned this idea that I think we think that women are the ones that are fueling. But clearly you're just talking about ice hockey player and MLB player who are underfueling within this kind of pursuit of being as lean as possible. Yeah. Are there different repercussions for women, versus men when they're in this kind of constant hypochloric state? Yeah, I would say, I mean, obviously with women, we run into more issues with loss of menstrual cycle.

So they're more at risk of, I feel like, more fluctuation with their hormones because there's so much going on every single month. We have, you know, the estrogen that takes off after the follicular phase and then you've got the progesterone. So I think there's just more at stake there with their hormonal health than there is for men. I think that with women, we can see that they're underfueling a lot sooner than with men, too. So that's why we assume, and this is just an assumption by me, that's why we assume that it's more common, more prevalent in women because, well, there's a loss of a menstrual cycle. So clearly she's underfeeling with men. You get this really clear signal. Yeah.

Like with men, I feel like they can brush it off as, oh, it's just been a long week and that's why I'm feeling tired. Or, oh, it must be because of X, Y, Z. and they often don't look at the fact that they are underfueling. They may just not have the education or, you know, just not be aware they're unintentionally underfueled without even really realizing it unless we can look at, you know, testosterone levels or see, you know, vitamin D and iron and take a look at different micronutrients and see what's going on there. Do you see markers of sleep and recovery shift? Absolutely, yeah, sleep definitely.

When someone is underfueled, it can have a huge impact on sleep. So typically what can happen is your, I'm sure you've heard of leptin. Obviously, leptin and grelin has talked a lot with appetite and hunger, their hormones. But we see decline in leptin when someone is underfueled. And so that can start to impact sleep. Obviously, cortisol. We see an increase in cortisol when athletes are chronically underfueled. So they are in a chronic energy deficit.

We see that increase in cortisol in the evening, essentially. So instead of that like natural decline that it has, it kind of spikes in the evening. So, and I mean, you can definitely speak more onto this too. with a sleep topic, but that's something that I think can absolutely be impacted by underfeeling. Well, I'd love to get your thoughts on this. Fasting. Maybe if you could just unpack, you know, the why people fast. So if you were to talk to all the clients that you work with, both men and women, you know, what is the impetus behind fasting? I guess that's the first question. And then what kind of impact do you see fasting has on performance? So to go with your first

question and you know it's interesting because i obviously my clientele is athletes but i also work with a lot of CEOs so i work with a lot of business executives um people that have very very stressful jobs um but aren't necessarily on the field right and so for some of those people i have seen fasting be very beneficial especially males it just helps with weight loss number one especially if they stress eat and late at night kind of stopping that that late night feeding or especially if they're drinking it's you know setting that set all right it's five PM, 6 p.m., whatever else I'm done. But it's also been helpful for their mental clarity. They just feel like it's had an improvement there. For women, I honestly have not seen as much fasting. I think, you know,

thankfully there's there's been some, you know, Stacey Sims, for example, has spoken on about it. But it's not been as promoted as much in women because we don't see the same benefits. So I want to say it's like more like if you do a prolonged past 12 hour window fast. Now with athletes, I think it gets a little bit tricky because you just, especially if you have such high energy needs, you're really just making it that much harder on yourself to get that many calories in. So for a shorter window. Totally. Yeah. So if you have a baseball player who's, you know, trying to get 4,800 calories in and you don't start eating until, you know, let's say they're doing a fasted window of, we'll say 12 and 8, 8, that's a common one, 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. Well, your game is at 7, so are you going to stop eating at

8 p.m. And then what are you going to do about postgame? And then, you know, it just, again, makes it really hard for you to actually hit your caloric needs in such a small window. So there's certain athletes, I should say, that really should not be doing intermittent fasting, especially if you're trying to maintain or gain lean muscle. So you think like the biggest downside is that, number one, you're just not getting enough calories. Is there any reason why we would want to distribute those calories more evenly across the day as opposed to kind of putting them, you know, consolidating them into a shorter window? Yeah, yeah. So kind of going back to that myth of underfueling only being in female athletes or only the case if you are losing weight.

Like I have a lot of athletes still, they'll come to me, you know, and I'll take a look and I'll be like, you know, you're really underfueling and they'll be like, what, what are you talking? Like how? And I'm like, well, technically, even if you're, even if you're maintaining your weight or even if you're gaining weight, you can actually still be underfueled. And it's really just a matter of that nutrient timing and not fueling your body in key moments when it needs it most. That can be underfueling. So you are starting your practice or your game or whatever else underfueled. And that in turn can impact your performance. So sure, by the end of the day, you hit 4,000 calories, but you did the bulk of it after. your body needed it, right?

So you're not going to get those same benefits that you would have seen had you spaced it out a little bit more appropriately. So the one thing that I really try to work on with athletes is, okay, let's try to, not necessarily saying every athlete needs to eat breakfast, but like let's try to at least get some of the right nutrients and by the right nutrients, carbohydrates, protein, pre, during, and post. If we can at least get the timing spot on with that, then you'll see a world of a difference with performance, with recovery, sleep, all of it.

And once you deploy this intervention, do you see mark changes? Oh, 100%. Yeah. Are the athletes happier, too? Like maybe talk about some of the subjective, just mood and emotional regulation. And we know, obviously. Right. Well, with underfeeling, I mean, a lot of the symptoms are signs that you see, they have poor energy.

So they have that, like, greater perceived exertion. So the same workouts, they feel harder. And I know I mentioned with you, you know, earlier right before we started recording. I was just talking about how, you know, some athletes, they get to June. in a baseball season, for example, and they feel like, I'm already gassed, you know, and it's like, well, it's June, like, we haven't even hit the All-Star break yet. And so it's, it's, it's, it becomes such a long season. And so you have to really prioritize your nutrition every single day, or it'll catch up to you with, with that rate of perceived exertion. Those same workouts will

feel so much harder. And so they do notice an improvement there. Obviously, it helps with the sleep. They sleep better when they're fueled and they don't, you know, they're not experiencing the blood sugar dips, things like that. So, definitely see some improvements cognitive health-wise too less irritable mood swings a little bit more focus because that can play a role too if you know you're underfueled and just help with with that cognitive health during workouts and games so when athletes again maybe have a much narrow window where they're trying to like cram in 4,800 calories or whatever you know based on their activity requirements throughout the day but when they're i guess pushing the timing really close to bed do you see

anything different versus like maybe loading a lot of the calories, you know, more so in the morning? Like, is there any benefit to either one of those approaches? Usually your cravings, your appetite is so much larger if you are in such a huge deficit. And I know I keep bringing up baseball, but it really is a key part of my clientele here. But what I see is typically they go all morning without eating. So then it's about 1 o'clock and that's their first meal in the day. And usually their appetite is kind of poor because they had a not great night to sleep. the night before, which we'll get to because it's a never-ending cycle here.

So 1 o'clock might be that first meal today. And then they kind of get busy. They're doing stuff at the field. They may or may not even have a single snack, but they likely have one, if not two different coffee drinks. And so then they're having caffeine likely before that 7 o'clock game, which kind of, it's tough because obviously, you know, caffeine is such a great ergogenic aid, right? Like, it's so beneficial. But when you have those games every single night at 7, it's just kind of a, it's a double-edged sword. Like you want to have the benefit of the caffeine, but also it's, you know, now it's going to potentially impact your sleep if you're having that 6 o'clock, 7 o'clock at night.

Then they have that, you know, pregame meal. Maybe it's really light, especially what I see. I work with a lot of pitchers. They like to pitch on a light stomach. They don't like to have a lot of food. So now they're really underfueled. And then they go in and usually in the middle of the game, they're not really eating much, especially carbohydrates. They may have like sunflower seeds, which is great for the sodium, but not really a great source of carbs.

And then, of course, postgame is when they really overendul. in, I see a lot of ice cream post game. Well, when I say post game, I mean, like, once they get back home late at night, playing video games and whatnot, they do all the snacks, just really late at night. And then probably don't go to bed until 1 o'clock. So that starts to impact their sleep. A lot of them struggle with, you know, waking up multiple times or just taking a long time to shut off their brains after games.

And that high fat food, that excess amount of calories is really just making it that much harder for them to go to sleep. And then that cycle just continues over and over and over again. Yeah, I mean, I think professional athletes, you know, it's just a vicious cycle. These late games are really tough for, from a performance standpoint, you know, just kind of ironic. It is, especially when they're every day, every night. I know, I know. And then, you know, trying to wind down, playing the video games, all of a sudden at 3 a.m.

You know, and we know where that goes. Yeah. But, yeah. Yeah, I worked with an MLB pitcher who was addicted to video games. Oh, yeah. I wondered why his sleep was so messed up. I'm like, well, this is probably. why. Yeah. Yeah. And I get it. I mean, it's hard to shut off your rain. And it's just one of those

things that it can, it can really help to shut off your rain essentially, but like not that late at night. That's not, it's not ideal. It's tough. It's really tough. Just under one week left to take advantage of our best offer of the year. You can get up to $60 off annual memberships plus save 30% on 5.0 and MG accessories and apparel. Get it now before that sale ends on December 2nd. again. Let's talk inflammation recovery and gut health. I love your take on this. Are the gut biome tests beneficial? So, I mean, I think, you know, yeah, there's lots of tests that can kind of that claim the GI mapping and give you. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm just a little skeptical of them because they seem to lack standardization and some clinical validation. Yet they seem so widespread.

Right. And everyone's using these, you know, kind of tests as some sort of diagnostic. I don't really see the evidence for that. So I'm so curious to get your thoughts on. I never have ever used them. I have had some athletes come to me because maybe they outsourced and they went to someone and they want me to analyze the results. So I have looked at results myself. But to me, I feel like it's almost just a little bit. The marketing has just been far, far, far quicker than any of our research.

It's outpaced the science. Yes, it's outpaced the science. Yes. And so for me, it all comes down to, you know, every time I've seen the results, which I want to say it's mainly only been three or four times probably, Max. Every time it's, oh, you need more prebiotic fiber and, oh, you'd benefit from a probiotic. Okay, cool. Like, did we need you to send your stool sample in to get this? Like, you know, we could have looked at your diet history. We could have even looked at blood work to see if there's

any underlying issues of, you know, unexplained micronutrient deficiencies, things like that, to see that your gut's not working properly. Or if you're, you know, constantly getting sick, you're getting respiratory infections and colds all the time. And that can be a sign of poor gut health, too. So do I think they're necessary? Absolutely not. I don't run them. I don't. I don't fully trust the accuracy of them either. I think it would be great to see more research. And I've changed my mind, you know, over the years of certain things that, hey, if more research comes out and proves me wrong, then great. Like, let's do it. But for now, I don't. It's the same with food sensitivity testing. I don't, I don't do the IGG testing either. So, yeah, yeah. Maybe say a bit

more about that. Yeah, well, at least in my experience, IGG testing has not been very accurate. This is, I'm specifically talking about the at home one drop of blood test. that some athletes have done. And it's always come back as the foods that they, like, just had the night before or within the last 48 hours. And then we've flagged the sensitive. Yes. Mm-hmm.

So it's like a false positive that has come up for them because those antibodies are just currently in their system. And then you get it in your brain that I'm sensitive to these foods. And they're like, oh, my gosh. Well, no wonder. I love sweet potatoes, no wonder. And it's like, well, you just ate it, you know, yesterday. And then we'll introduce it back in.

And then it's almost just creates this, like, false fear over very nutrient-dense foods that's unnecessary. So I always recommend they meet with an allergist, get a little bit more actual, you know, professional advice there. And then we can always run the test, too. But for one example I like to give is the athlete that took the IGG test. And then, you know, three months later, it came up with completely different foods that came up as sensitive. They didn't even change anything really about their diet. So it's a static test that are kind of measuring one point in time. Yeah.

And that one point time is very much influenced to your point, what you just ate, how you slept, what you train, how you trained that day. Any other supplements you might have taken? Yeah, 100%. Yeah. Yeah. Nutrition is complicated. And I know, you know, with this, all the, all the research you do, it's really complicated to research. I mean, I'm not an nutrition scientist. We do, I do lots of type of, you know, nutrition research, but I'm not a scientist in this area. So I really appreciate your perspective. You know, I think inflammation is a word that gets thrown around a lot. You know, what does inflammation mean in your world? And how do you think about it in terms of nutrition you recommend? Yeah. And how you think about recovery. Yeah. To get your thoughts. So you're right that it's thrown around everywhere on social media.

And, you know, it's like people think and see the word inflammation and they automatically think like, oh, it's bad. I'm inflamed. And there's acute and there's chronic. And really that acute inflammation is actually kind of a good thing, especially for athletes. It's helpful for that training adaptation. a seeing progress. And as you know, it basically takes place right after a hard workout. You have a little bit of that acute inflammation that happens.

Now, with chronic inflammation, that's something a little bit more, more serious, more in-depth going on. It's almost like how, like I would compare it to like with underfueling. You can do underfueling here and there maybe one day, two day, three-day. But once it becomes chronic underfueling, that becomes low energy availability, which then becomes reds. That's the same with like acute inflammation. If you don't manage it, you don't do anything to it. now it's chronic. And then that's where chronic inflammation can then turn into so many other health issues down the road. So Reds relative energy. Yes. Yes. Is this just women or men, men can

experience Reds too? Yeah. I feel like that gets just bucketed into the female issue. Yeah. And when I was in college, it's interesting. When I was in college, it was still the female athlete triad. So it was basically that that female athletic triad that then turned into red ass relative energy deficiency in sport because it's not solely just women. It's also in men, too. So, yeah, I know kind of backtracking a little bit. But so with inflammation, it's going to be more so about managing it from a nutrition standpoint when it becomes chronic.

So again, that acute inflammation, I wouldn't be concerned about that. That's important for, you know, adaptation. So you don't want to introduce nutritional interventions or protocols to try to reduce inflammation per se? For that acute, no. And that's actually a really good point you bring up. And we see research where supplementing with. like, say, large doses of vitamin E or vitamin C immediately after a workout is actually detrimental

to the recovery process. Same with ensades use. Like, I see a lot of pictures. They're just, you know, popping Nsades. And that can also interrupt that acute inflammatory response, which you want. It's not like an ibuprofen. Yes. Mm-hmm. Yeah. We actually see when folks, so just at population levels, when folks report using Nsides, they have a shocking, almost 15% decrease in sleep efficiency. Really? Yes. Huh. And I wonder what the mechanism. It's kind of like gut biome, right? Like some sort of... Oh, it's such a huge ear tint to the gut, yeah.

That somehow is not allowing you to drop into these deeper stages of physically. I don't know exactly. That is interesting because I know, I mean, it definitely is a gut ear tint. So, yeah, I wonder how that impacts it. So maybe just pause there because I think that a lot of athletes, I mean, I know when I was an athlete, when I was coaching, I mean, I look back on my student athletes and I'm like, they were popping and said literally all season long. And, you know, I just, I feel so bad that I didn't have the knowledge to be able to be like, whoa, okay, we're probably over-training because your sodium sore all time. Yeah. You know, how do you, like maybe just talk a little bit about.

Sure. Well, yeah, if you're, and I think it is used, yeah, it's used as a crutch. Like, oh, this muscle soreness is so intense. Like, I need something to help with it. And so they reach for that insaid. And I think that's where like, okay, aha, light bulb moment. Like, I think something else is going on. We need to address nutrition.

And could it be under fueling that's causing it? Absolutely. or it could also be the types of foods you're fueling your body with that are not very anti-inflammatories. So that's why I really preach, and my athletes like, we'll roll my eyes at it. But fruits and vegetables are so key here because they are so rich in antioxidants. So if we can get things like berries and leafy greens and nuts and seeds and things like that in your diet, it really does make such a big impact, things that are rich in vitamin C and vitamin E. And just, you know, different types of polyphenols will be so helpful for inflammation.

What kind of quantities do folks need to eat in order to get the benefits that you're talking about in terms of just helping with systemic inflammation? Gosh, so the general guidelines are five servings of fruits and veggies a day. And I would say the bulk of our pro athletes are eating like at least 12 servings, if not some are eating like closer to 15 servings. Just because, I mean, in general, their calorie needs are so much higher too, that it's easier. Like, it sounds like a lot. You're like, holy cow, but a cup of fruit is one serving. and then you've got, you know, two cups of veggies that you're putting into a smoothie. Then you've got, you know, let's say a little bit of orange juice or some type of fresh juice.

You've already got four servings right there in a smoothie. So it's a lot easier to get than you think. But, yeah, I'd say if you can get at the very, very beer minimum five, if not more, that's ideal. When you think about anti-inflammatory supplements, is there anything that you recommend for your athletes? So I would say that omega-3 fatty acids are probably the one that I do often recommend. Is it a timing component to that? I haven't found, I mean, especially with food, like a meal that contains fat, yes. But as far as, you know, taking it in the morning versus taking it at night, I would-workout, post-workout.

I'd say whatever's most consistent. Like when it's kind of like with creatine, like creatine, people will say, you know, does it matter when I take it? Like, sure, around your training, like either pre- or post. but it matters more so that you are consistent with taking it daily and to the same sense, omega-3 fatty acids. So whenever you are most likely to remember taking it and also with some sort of fat because it needs that fat to be absorbed. I want to say it's like 10 grams of fat is ideal in a meal to help absorb the omega-3s.

And the reason I recommend that is that there was a study done, gosh, it's been a few years now and I am blanking on the actual percentages, but a large number of their collegiate athletes weren't even coming close to the recommended omega-3s daily. What would be you recommended for an athlete, maybe just break it down, males and females, what would you recommend per day? Probably about two grams per day of omega-3 fatty acids. And, I mean, which is a lot easier than you think. If you can get eight ounces of salmon in a week, I'd say salmon because it's prevalent pretty much everywhere. But, you know, mackerel, sardines, any fatty fish, I love halibut. Those cans are like a godsend. I know that there's probably

something with a can that's not good for you. It's giving off some sort of plastic. Nothing is good for you anymore. I know. I'm like, what is there? Anything that we can eat? But, I mean, mackerel, I mean, I throw that in everything. I think I have a can a day at least. The cool thing about the canned salmon, and it sounds kind of gross.

But if you get the salmon with bones, it's actually an excellent source of calcium, too. So for women that, like, don't eat dairy. And it's just ground. Well, because they're, like, absorbed. You know, they basically, like, not disintegrate, but they basically, like, absorb into the salmon. So if you get salmon with bones, in the can. They're a fantastic source of calcium. So it's so funny, I've avoided that because I thought it was going to be just the bone in there. I was like, I don't want to be choking a bone.

You don't have your little like things to pick it out. Yeah, no, thankfully they're like pretty absorbed in there. Okay. So if I were going to try to hit your recommended amount of omega's per day and let's say, and I know it's going to vary by kind of weight and high and all of that. But just a general recommendation, how much salmon would someone need to have? How many ounces of salmon would someone need to have to hit those requirements? To hit the requirements. You wouldn't even have to do it every single day. I'd say salmon twice a week, four ounces each. And if you want to go more than that, you want to do six ounces or maybe, you know, to hit your specific protein and fat goals, you need a larger portion. Eight ounces is great too, but that bare minimum

would be four ounce portion two times per week. Now, if you're not a fish eater, you would have to eat a larger amount of plant sources. So walnuts are a great source. Chia seeds, flaxseeds, hemp seeds, getting like a variety of seeds in there would help. But otherwise, yeah, it gets a little trickier. So that's why I do recommend because in college athletics, we just, we don't see a lot. I see this in the minor leagues too, not a lot of fish consumption. So that's where omega-3 is come in handy for sure, that supplement. Quality fish in like, you know, those settings, especially where you've got packaged meals that you're kind of getting on the go and it just becomes tougher. Yeah. What do you, just as a nutrition scientist, you know, if you can give the audience

myself a rundown of, you know, what supplements are easily absorbed versus not? And what affects absorption? Timing, other foods, you know, this seems like the Wild West to me. It is. It is a wild west. And there's, I mean, a lot of things that I'm not even aware of for sure. It kind of just depends on, so it depends on the supplement because obviously you can have something that is inhibited by other nutrients, like I'll give you the example of calcium and iron. So they compete for absorption. So if you have a multivitamin that you're taking that, like give the example of a prenatal. I always thought it was fascinating to me that I would have this, you know, prenatal and it would say it has 18 milligrams of iron, but then it also has 1,000 milligrams of calcium. So

it's kind of like they cancel each other out, right? So you have to, I would honestly work with, you know, a sports dietitian or someone to help pinpoint what supplement specifically you're trying to take and why, so that you know that you're not also taking it at a time when it's going to, you know, inhibit absorption. Same going back to iron again. If you're having it with, say, a cup of coffee, like that can also inhibit absorption too. So, but then there's certain things like, say, vitamin C that increase absorption. So kind of depends on the supplement or the nutrient and, yeah, what you're taking it with. So we can't rely on companies to put out products that are not going to cancel each other out.

Yeah, definitely not. No, unfortunately, you can't rely on supplement companies for much. And I will say, I mean, if it's a really, you know, trustworthy company, like I'll say, I love to see, like, a collagen supplement that has the vitamin C already added to it. Like, they've done their research. They know, oh, vitamin C is, you know, a precursor to, you know, collagen production. So that's going to help and helps with absorption. So, like, cool, they've done their research.

Yeah. Versus, like, the prenatal that has the iron and the calcium together. Right, right. So I remember sticking in my head. Dr. David Sinclair said, he was talking about his own personal regimen in terms of how he thinks about supplements. And this guy takes hundreds of pills, right? So this is not the direction I would ever want to go down personally, or I think you'd probably recommend for anyone. But it was interesting because I always had this thought that I need a certain amount of, oh my guess, every single day.

I need, you know, vitamin D, vitamin C. But it's, but how you're talking about is it's more about what you're getting over the course of a week. 100%. Maybe just talk a little bit about that as a principle because I know I had like this really, I think, incorrect assumption that I need to be having everything every single day. And maybe what do we actually need to be having every single day? Oh, I mean, I love this because I do as a dietitian, I look at an entire week when I do a nutrient analysis. So one day shows me like, sure, like a little snippet.

But as you know, it can vary so much day to day. Maybe you were traveling that day or, you know, it was a birthday celebration or something. So it matters more so the course of what you're doing over seven days. so you can see just a little bit more of an average number. And I feel like you probably know this too with all the data. You have at whoop and looking at sleep and strain and seeing it's definitely is more helpful to see a full week, probably for you, than just one off day. And so I would say what one thing should you do every single day?

I think if you can get as close as you can to say your carbs, protein and fat goals, that's where to start for sure. So hit those macros. Yeah, hit those macronutrients. I don't even worry so much specifically about like calories, per se first. I'd rather look at, okay, are you getting enough protein? Are you getting enough carbs? Are you getting enough fat? And then from there, you know, your vitamins and minerals may be slightly off. So maybe one day you were a little bit under on vitamin E, but then the next day

you were over 100% vitamin E. Again, that's why it matters more so what you did on the whole week. Plus, you're getting hopefully a variety of foods every single day. So if you ate sweet potatoes one day, like your vitamin A may be great, and then you didn't eat them the next, but instead you ate a huge, I don't know, kale salad. So your vitamin K is great. You know, so again, by the end of that week, you've got sufficient amounts of all vitamins and minerals. So, yeah, there definitely is this pressure.

And the tissues and they're in the bone, you know, like they kind of, right? It's not like you just have one day and they're gone. Yeah, like, yeah, exactly. So you would be fine if you don't get, say, enough of, you know, vitamin E in one day and then you do the next day. Like you're, you're going to be, you're going to be all right. Same with, you know, magnesium, your body will be able to have an amount of magnesium until you, you know, eat some more the next day too. So it's just hopefully you're getting some of it. And that's why the week really matters because if we go a whole week goes by and you're only

at 50% of your magnesium, like, all right, that's an issue, you know, versus like, oh, one day you didn't eat enough magnesium. Like, oh, but then the next day you ate like three large handfuls of almonds. Like, I think we're like more okay than we thought we were. what's up folks if you are enjoying this podcast or if you care about health performance fitness you may really enjoy getting a whoop that's right you can check out whoop at whoop dot com it measures everything around sleep recovery strain and you can now sign up for free for 30 days so you'll literally get the high performance wearable in the mail for free you get to try it for 30 days, see whether you want to be a member. And that is just at whoop.com. Back to the guests.

What are the benefits of a prebiotic and a probiotic? And is that something you recommend supplement? Or food? Or food? So I always say food first when you can, especially since a lot of Americans, we just do not get enough probiotics to begin with in our diet. So if you can start incorporating more from food, there's just something to be said for that synodic. synergistic response that comes from eating whole foods, right? So when you're having something like Kiefer or yogurt, like not only are you getting those probiotics, those life cultures, but you're also getting calcium. You're getting a little bit of vitamin D or getting protein. Like you need those nutrients anyway. So I hate to just have that be a supplement. Now, for some people that are, say,

traveling overseas, they may benefit from something like a like a probiotic supplement to kind of in the meantime. But it just depends on the person, what's needing to be a, if there's something else going on with their gut that they need a specific strain. And then in the case of prebiotics, I really, really recommend food as much as you can. I actually think just in general people struggle with getting enough fiber. I want to say the average American gets 10 to 15 grams a day when they should be getting at least 25, if not, to like 38 grams for men daily. And so that's something in general that if you get more of those fiber-rich foods in your diet,

you will be getting prebiotics in yeah we should have 30 grams of fiber a day right ideally so it's yeah I mean general recommendations are like 25 for women 38 for men um which I would assume a lot of that is like mainly on body size which I know Stacey Sims has talked a lot about too it's like well I feel like a lot of women would benefit for more like 38 grams but yeah I would say I mean if you can get 30 grams at least it's a lot easier than people think and once I shouldn't say supplement because it's technically, it can be a food or a supplement. One that I do recommend is Cillium husk. Cillium husk is amazing for people who are wanting to get more fiber, but it's also been

really helpful for cholesterol. We're seeing benefits with reducing LDL cholesterol with Cillium husk. And you can take it. I mean, it's at the grocery stores, like, next to the flax seed and the chia seed and those things. So you don't have to, like, take a Cillium husk pill. You can literally just do like a scoop of it in smoothies. You would definitely have to put that in a smoothie because it's a pretty gross taste on

its own. Oh, is it really? Yeah, it's pretty bad. Oh, interesting. Yeah. It's like eating the outside of a corn husk. Yeah, yeah, essentially. Yeah, you'll get tired of it real quick if you just like mix it in water. Good to know. That's amazing. All right. What's the best way to keep track of all of this, you know? I mean, I think for for me, I mean, that's why nutrition is so hard and why I love physiological data is I can, I can see your interview over the course of the week and I can calculate your coefficient of variation and I know how you're adapting to load. Like, yeah. It's just so much. straight so like straightforward how do you do it how do you how do you how do you help folks track and kind of keep you know know if oh wow you need more vitamin E oh you need more magnesium yeah yeah well

that's what I'm here for um so I try to take all that pressure out of uh of it for them so especially I mean during I try to take as much like because it's just an added mental load for them so if they're in the middle of the season they like they don't want to be tracking you know how much vitamin D they ate from food and versus supplement like they just basically send me food photos. My phone is like just full of food photos. That's what I find the easiest. Some will like track in like a notes app. Some go as far as using something like chronometer. But very few athletes actually like put that much work until like, you know, actually tracking themselves, which hey, I don't blame them. It's a lot. And so the food photos are really helpful because then I can see

right off the bat immediately like, hey, you know, this meal is missing this. And then and my goal is that eventually, which it sounds weird, but my goal is so that they eventually don't need me anymore. Like I I want them to... That's coach becomes obsolete. Right. I want them to feel so confident in their nutrition that they don't have to rely on me, you know, to get through a whole season again. And if they are, you know, constantly having to come back, then, you know, it means I need to hopefully provide some more education. Now, I shouldn't say, like, you know, hopefully they come back to me at the beginning of, let's say, every off season or at the start of every season, just to kind of like, you know, touch base, make sure that their goals are aligned with, or their nutrition is aligned with their new goals for the season. But my hope is that eventually, you know, they feel confident in making food choices without me. So for the layperson who might not be able to afford a nutritionist, you know, what's your

recommendation in terms of where to start? Like if you're like, all right, I really, you know, I suppose tracking macronutrients and there's lots of great online calculators. You can kind of figure that out pretty quickly. I'd say chronometer is a good one for that. It's, I think it's much more accurate than something like a My Fitness pal where you can go in and you can at least get a baseline target energy needs. It won't be completely accurate, but it'll at least give you a good idea of where to start.

It's just putting some information, your weight, your activity level. You will have to log. And I will say it's so much easier if you don't go out to eat because there's so much variation that can happen with even like Chipotle. Like if you're looking, if you type in that you had a Chipotle burrito bowl with chicken, rice, and cheese, like that can vary by hundreds of calories depending on which Chipotle you went with. And if they were very generous with their helpings or if you were.

if they were really stingy on their helpings, right? So, like, you could be off quite a few hundred calories if you got to eat. I have a Chip. Oh, okay. What's your tip? So if you want more protein, don't tell them you want two serving. Double protein until they give you the first protein. And then say, oh, I want double protein.

And then they'll do it again. Okay, okay. And you end up with more protein. Interesting. Okay. Did you hear that baseball players? Because this is a good, I mean, my son. My son literally, I'm like, dude, bro, we need, no more DoorDash, yeah.

Be like, can I have a little bit more pro? Oh, and also I want double. Yeah. Yeah. And then, yeah, and then you get the. Oh, very smart. Yeah, so I will say it's so much easier and more accurate. And if you're like, me and I've been tracking and I don't know why I'm not losing weight.

Like, it's, again, if you go out to eat, this could be why. Because those estimates are just, they can just, you know, be so far off. So you would say, I mean, I think for, I know, I know for. for me when I was trying to figure out, this was after I had my daughter, so it was my second child, and I was like trying to get back on track. And I really started tracking. And I'm more of like an intuitive eater nowadays. But I think I'm able to be an intuitive eater because I did track and weigh my food pretty religiously for like six months. Yeah. And now I really don't need to. Yeah. And I guess is that what you'd recommend? I, you know, like I don't, I know it's hard for women,

just or anyone in general. We don't want to get obsessive, right? But I think there is something to just understanding what your body needs. Oh, for sure. And the path to that is just being. Knowledge. It's, again, about having a little bit of that nutrition knowledge. If you have, you know, no, like, let's say you're trying to make improvements to your body composition.

You're not even trying to, you know, necessarily, like, become the fastest person in your crossfit class or whatever else. Like, you just really want to start seeing a little bit of improvements to your body composition. But you have no idea what you're eating in a day as far as, like, protein, carbs, and fat. I would absolutely start with trash. just for a week to kind of get an idea. It's so, I think it's so eye-opening. And even with my clients on their very first meeting, I'll have them fill out like this assessment form. And they won't even take pictures. They'll just write things down. And they'll be like, wow, this was so eye-opening just to write it down and realize, like, it's almost like they could, they could kind of see why

they weren't reaching their goals already without even meeting with me just from like, and I think it's just, we get so busy throughout our day. We don't even realize, you know, kind of what we're eating. It's just not a priority for us. And so I think if it's, if you can track even for just a little bit. And like you said, weigh things without, you know, it becoming an obsession. The way of food was like a game change. Right. It's helped a lot of my clients, too, for sure, because they just, they didn't know.

And it can go in both ways. Maybe they're like way overestimating their food or way underestimating. And so if you can weigh it even just a little bit, like, you'll be like, oh, wow, I going back to that like significantly or unknowingly underfueling, like, oh, wow, I'm not even close to how much, you know, X, X, X, I need. So. So when people under. under fuel, why do they not lose weight? Or does that happen? Oh, it does. Yeah. So it can go, it can go one of three ways, right? So you can be underfueled and lose weight unintentionally. You can be underfueling and maintain and still be maintaining the same weight or underfueled

and actually be gaining weight. And again, the underfueling and the example of maintaining or gaining weight would be because you are underfueling at those key moments when your body needs it most. So essentially you are underfueled for performance, and so you're not necessarily in a caloric deficit per se. Like you're still hitting your calories, but maybe you're underfueling in carbohydrates or protein or fat or a combination. You know, maybe it's just that macronutrient distribution is off or the nutrient timing is off. So that's where providing that nutrition education so they know it's way more than just calories, but also timing, macronutrient distribution that makes a difference. Amazing. For women specifically, what do you, what have you seen with your client population?

And maybe what even what have you experienced yourself in terms of where do women go wrong most of the time? Are there specific nutrients where female athletes tend to be most efficient? Well, you know, it's funny because if you were to ask me this, I'm thinking back of, you know, I've been in this for 11 years now. And looking back, I think I would have initially said protein, but I think there's just been so much. much larger of an emphasis on protein now, that it's almost kind of become a little bit more, again, on carbohydrates and fat. And it kind of depends on what the environment is around them and who they're getting their information from on whether they're going to be, like, inadequate on carbohydrates and or fat. In the endurance population, I still significantly see

under fueling on actually fat just because, you know, they do know, okay, I need carbs before, I need carbs during, I need carbs after, but where does that leave room for fats? And so these These women are just not getting enough fat. It's starting to impact their hormones, obviously, because fat plays a huge role in that. And so I think, gosh, yeah, it just really depends. And you need fat to burn for fuel. Oh, 100%. Yeah, especially if you are an endurance, like a long endurance athlete, you know, and it's, yeah.

Because you're going to use up the carbs and you need the fat. Yeah. Do you think that there's a perception of, you know, if I eat fat, I'm going to get fat? I do. And, you know, it's sad because I feel like we. were almost like past that a little bit. And now it's kind of coming back a little bit. Yeah.

Yeah, there is a fear over fat. And a lot of that just I think has to go to the fact that it's so calorically dense compared to carbs and, you know, per gram compared to carbs and protein. So, I mean, for those that don't know, like per gram, carbohydrates have four calories, protein has four calories, fat has nine calories. So for someone who is, you know, trying to cut calories specifically or get lean, a lot of the times fat is the one that goes out the window. Like I have one client in particular I'm thinking of who is not an athlete and is like scared to eat more than like a small handful of cashews because it's so caloricly dense.

And I'm like, but you need those nutrients, all those minerals. And so yeah, I think it's definitely come back with females. Is there anything else that you've learned with females specifically over the years that you just feel like our women listeners need to know with regard to fueling and performance? Yeah, I'd say and I say this to almost every. single one of my female athletes. We are not, because most of the times it's, they are not eating enough. Again, it could be in key moments or just by the end of the day. And I always tell them, you know, we're not eating more to gain weight. We're eating more to, we're fueling better to perform better and recover better. So I think once they get that out of their mind of, I'm not

eating more to just to put on weight, right? Like, because they have that fear of when I increase their calories of, oh gosh, this is, you know, this is going to make me gain weight. Like that, that's the goal here. We're really trying to eat more to fuel your body in the right way. Yeah. I feel like, you know, you're as much your nutritionist, but you're also a mindset coach in a lot of ways. Maybe talk about that part of the job. Because that's huge. You know, just hearing you talk, like I can hear you kind of working through those conversations. You have to show empathy. Yeah. Yeah. You really have to understand the why. And I've worked with a lot of females who have become very restrictive towards food, have different restrictions.

Is this like all or nothing kind of? Yeah, well, and I shouldn't just say even females because I've worked with several males with this too in different sports. But yeah, I would say they have like an all or nothing mentality. They maybe they were told by a coach, like I'll give the example of figure skating. I've worked with a lot of figure skaters where they just have some not great information from, you know, the people that are closest to them. And so it takes, it takes a long time for me to.

build trust with that person. I can't just come out, and I have before one time, give the example of just coming out way too hot on the first meeting and way too blunt and then kind of like they were kind of turned off by it because I was basically like, what do you need carbs? But they, again, just had so much trust in this coach who they have their whole life that if they're telling them like, hey, you can only eat 1,200 calories. And then I'm coming in like, what, they're crazy. you just have to like start to understand the why, build that empathy, and really try to

build that buy in with them so that they do start to trust you. And with these athletes in particular, I try to do different challenges, try to kind of like get them to push past the restriction, but it takes a long time. It takes a long time. I mean, some of these athletes we work with for years, for, you know, two, three years until they really, really are like, okay, I can go off on my own now. But it's- I mean, habits and mindsets from food are entrenched. Yes. from the moment, from the toddler, you know? I mean, it's...

Yeah, and now as a mom of two girls, it's just so important for me to, like, make sure that I have a positive, you know, outlook on all foods and because I would hate for them to have to go through, you know, that restrictive mindset around food. I know, and it's hard because, I mean, you can do everything right in your home, too, and, you know, your children still can develop, you know, TikTok and, yeah, all the social media and the peers around them and, yeah. I know. It's really challenging, you know. And I think, you know, I think your lens is a really interesting one because, you know, you work with a variety and you work with men and women. And it's rare. You know, usually people are very, have a very, you know, I guess a niche, I suppose that they operate in. So it's really cool that you're kind of working across both men and women. I suppose when you, when you think about some of these entrenched mindsets, you know, you mentioned empathy and kind of. of meeting them where they're at, you know, is there, is there anything else that you've found helpful

to get a person thinking beyond just the calories? Yeah. So I, in my book, I have a book, Feel Your Body, came out a few years ago. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. But, writing a book is really hard. It's hard. It is. It's a lot of work. But there's a chapter in there, a very short chapter about nourishment over numbers. So I talk about this a lot with, again, you know, female athletes specifically that have built such a restriction and obsession over the calories and the macros. But it's basically talking about how food is so much more than calories or so much more than macros that goes beyond that.

And it's, you know, how is this nourishing me mentally and physically? So when I talk through that with them and talk about, you know, like, hey, an avocado isn't just because they'll look at a food and be like, that's too much fat, you know. Like so I try to educate them from a sense of like, hey, did you know? that this actually has, you know, it has fiber. It's got vitamin E. It's got antioxidants. Like, and this is why it's helpful. Your skin health and your brain health. Totally. Like, and so how can we, you know, and then that's where I do, I actually have them write down their fears, like in one of our first meetings. And so that's where we try to push past, you know, and we don't ever go through all

the fears, you know, right? It takes a long time, like I said, but try to push back that, you know, through one fear at a time. And they feel so proud, like, once they can do it. And then they're, and I always say like, okay, and what happened after? You know, like, did you die? No. Like, really, like. Did you gain 30 pounds every night?

Yeah. No, actually, it felt amazing, you know? So it's really cool once they kind of have that, like, click that happens when they realize that food is so much more than just, just numbers. Yeah, I feel for you. It's a hard job. When you think about the short-term versus. versus the long term in terms of kind of your overall metabolic health.

What are some things that folks can do today that will contribute to their short-term performance, but also ensure that they're healthy years down the road? I mean, I think about some of the, just the statistics on just metabolic health globally, and it is just really bleak when you're talking just really, by the year 2024, I think it is predicted that a billion people will be suffering from some sort of metabolic dysfunction. So we're kind of in like a pretty big crisis mode, I think. So how do you, you know, so if we think about like this long term kind of, you know, problem, how do you think about setting someone up in the very short term in a way that's sustainable that will allow them to kind of have lifetime?

metabolic health. Oh, gosh. I mean, this could go so many different ways. I, the first thing that comes to mind is, obviously, movement. Like, we know how important movement is, whether it's actually going to a gym and getting a workout in or literally just going for a 10, 15 minute walk. Like, if you can walk, I think that is so powerful. If you can walk outside, even more benefit, you're getting that, you know, outdoor time to. But from a nutrition standpoint, I think, you know, I'm seeing two things going on. I'm seeing us become very phone obsessed, very screen time obsessed. and then also relying so much on convenient foods and so much on ultra-processed foods because we don't have time. But I thought of this, you know, actually on my flight over here when I saw like everyone on their phones.

And I thought, I'm so curious what everyone's screen time is. You know, you can like swipe over and see what your daily screen time is. So I would give a challenge to listeners. And I would say, go look today what your screen time is and specifically your social media, your average weekly social media or social network time. and let's say it's one hour. So challenge yourself to cut that in half. Yeah, which is probably a lot more than that. But challenge yourself to cut that in half

in whatever time that you spent on social media. So let's say it's an hour. So half of that, 30 minutes, you have to devote to some sort of meal prepping, cooking, something that involves doing things with like actual whole foods versus ultra-processed foods because you can't use time as the excuse when you've had three hours on TikTok, like you just can't.

So if you are able to devote even just half of that time to even just 30 minutes to chopping up some veggies so that they're the first thing you see when you open the fridge. Or making five, like I could make five yogurt parfaits with like a plain Greek yogurt, a little drizzle of honey, some chia seeds and flax seeds, and then like some berries on top. And look, like you have snacks ready to go for, you know, a whole week in a few minutes. So, and this is something I, like, I myself need to listen to as well because I'm not an innocent one here. I spend too much time on social media, too, and screen time. But I think it's just if we can.

Right, right. Right. Right. But, yeah. Exactly. So I think, you know, if we're able to, number one, devote more time to movement. And number two, less time to the screens and ultra-process convenience foods and spending more time on that going back to whole foods. Those would be helpful not only in the short term, but gosh, in the long term.

so much in the long term and fiber i just again i know i've talked about fiber but i cannot stress that enough if we can get more fiber in our diet it's going to be so helpful for so many reasons yeah i think fiber you know we're kind of obsessed talking about protein but fiber doesn't doesn't get enough air time it doesn't hopefully it does hopefully it's you know this is same with like creatine when i was being interviewed on podcast like six seven years ago people were like you got to be the spokesperson to creatine like it's such a bad rap and now it's like everywhere and i know okay great i know is that part of the stack that you recommend? Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Love creatine. It's great. So, but yeah, hopefully fiber has

that moment. And unfortunately, like, fiber is being put into things, like the pops that are like prebiotic sodas and the, I'm from the Midwest, so I say pop. The soda. Soda that's, you know, it's, you know, prebiotic. Like, that's not a great place to get your fiber. It's not like eating a cup of raspberries. You want to get it from whole foods. Right, right. Yeah. And there's so many, like, really tasty foods that have lots of fiber. Yeah, exactly. You kind of skipped it. I think you were going to say it and you kind of skipped over it.

But muscle. Just when we think about glucose control and muscle and, you know, I just feel like that has to be part of the strategy, right? The diet, you know, the long-term metabolic health strategy. Oh, for sure. Yeah. If we're able to do some sort of weight training. Your muscles are sponges.

Oh, my gosh. Yes. You've got to do some sort of weight training and especially females. Like, it just blows my mind. how just I feel like it has been improving, especially with people, you know, like the women are not small men type movement and getting more popular there. But it's just really sad to me how, you know, few women, especially as we get older, are scared to lift weights. And when we hit, you know, perimenopause and menopause, like it becomes even more important. Our estrogen's

declined. We've got to find a way to help with that. For sure. No diet changes. Yes. Just really frightening. Yeah. It's very scary. So, and I mean, our bone mineral density, everything else. So it's just if you start lifting weights, walking, lifting weights, you don't have to, you don't have to be running marathons, you know, like you just do some things in home, at your home. Get some kettlebells, walk with them. Yep. If you're uncomfortable. Get your kids, little kettlebells. Hire, get a, get a personal trainer for a couple times or go to go with your friend to a, you know, some sort of like, you know, fitness class together. And yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think about how much just the general American population, you know, spends on coffee drinks,

You know, specialty coffee drinks, you know, like you could just save a couple of those per week and literally see a trainer. Yeah. Well, and I'm the dietitian for Center. So Center is an online platform. They have an app and a lot of, I mean, fantastic at home workouts, which require some that have no equipment at all. Yeah. Some that have very minimal equipment like dumbbells. So, you know, not a plug to center, but kind of, yes, a plug for center because they are amazing.

I mean, anybody can do them and you can start from very, very, very beginner to, you know, an extreme advanced wanting to do a center power program. So many online resources. Yeah. For folks who are trying to get their nutrition on track and are looking for resources, I know folks can follow you online. What's your Instagram handle? Elite nutrition. Elite nutrition. So E-L-E-A-T nutrition.

Oh, I love that. Late nutrition, yeah. Take me a second. Yeah. That's amazing. Great. So folks can go there. Obviously, you'd follow you and all your good work.

Andy, thank you so much for all your wisdom and insight today. Just phenomenal. Thank you. Thank you for having me. If you enjoyed this episode of the WOOP podcast, please leave a rating or review. Check us out on social at WOOP at Will Ahmed. If you have a question was answered on the podcast, email us, podcast at Woop.com. Call us 508-443-4952.

If you think about joining WOOP, you can visit Woop.com. Sign up for a free 30-day trial membership. New members to use the code Will, W-I-L-L, to get a $60 credit on W-U-A-accessaries when you enter the code at checkout. that's a wrap folks thank you all for listening we'll catch you next week on the woof podcast as always stay healthy and stay in the green