Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition

  "No thank you." Whether you’re hungry or not, it can be difficult to say those three words when you are in a social setting. For this reason, it's very common for people to overeat at Thanksgiving, birthday parties, events and other social gatherings - especially in an effort to fit in or to make other people feel more comfortable. In a previous newsletter, I discussed the importance of mindful eating and how it can improve your relationship with food. Mindful eating is being aware of your body's hunger and satisfaction signals. It involves eating slowly, tasting your food, appreciating your meal and savoring each bite. When you are alone, you may find it easy to be conscious of what you are putting into your body. But in a social setting, it's easy to get distracted by friends/family/entertainment. Additionally, if you are worried about hurting the feelings of another person or frequently put the needs of others in front of your own, you may give in to social ...

A lot has been studied on the topic of weather and productivity. Interestingly, the results vary. But this shouldn't come as a surprise since human beings are different and react to various conditions differently. For example, I find myself much more productive when the weather is rainy. When the weather is nice, all I want to do is play outside. If you are the same, a primary reason for the bad weather-productive connection is that you are less distracted, more focused and work more efficiently when the weather is bad. The idea of being outdoors is not very attractive so you may as well get stuff done inside.  However, for some people, a gloomy day can lead to a dreary mind. It's hard to get stuff done when you are feeling down. Although most people would agree that weather that looks and feels good puts you into a good mood, and you are more likely to be productive when you are feeling good, you can't get much done in life if you plan your productivity around the weathe...

  On Friday afternoon, I asked Karel what his plans were for training on Saturday. I mentioned to him that a small group was riding at 8:30 from the parking lot at North Greenville University (a popular meet-up place for cyclists, around 20 minutes away) but I really wanted to go gravel riding. Karel was excited for the off-road adventure so he planned a route that included a mix of grave and road. He wanted to show me some of the segments that he covered during the Belgium Waffle Ride .  We decided to leave from North Greenville University and it worked out great that we started our ride with a few of our friends that were riding on the road. The first ~60-minutes was mostly climbing as we headed toward the Watershed and the up the Hendersonville side. We accumulated around 1500 feet of elevation gain on the road, while chatting with those in the small group. The time went by fast and sometimes I forgot that I was on my gravel bike. That's the nice thing about having a grave...

~18 years old On Monday, as I was about to dry my hair after my early evening swim, I overheard three young girls (~9-11 years old) talking to one another by the bathroom mirrors. I didn't think much of it until I heard one of the girls talking about her body. Still in her swimsuit, she stood in front of the mirror and was telling her friends about her body. She first said that she liked how she looked from the front but she didn't like how her butt looked in her swimsuit. While "fat talk" or self-degrading, negative body-related comments have sadly become somewhat normalized among adult women, it saddened me that these young girls were taking part in body shaming.  I started swimming when I was 10 years old. Although I really enjoyed being in the water, I always looked forward to swim practice because it was an opportunity to be around my friends. There was no social media to make us feel dissatisfied with our bodies so any negative body talk would have been learned ...

Height, hair color, eye color, skin color. We can't control or determine these things when we are born. Yet we are taught that we can (and should) force our bodies to achieve a specific shape, weight, size and appearance. We are fed information that our weight matters, even if it comes at a cost of our mental and physical health. But not all bodies are set to be at a specific body composition. Every human has a specific weight range for their body to function optimally. If you've forgotten or failed to learn the importance of maintaining a healthy weight, you may be familiar with the difficulty and frustration of restricting food in an effort to change your body composition. Trying to achieve or maintain a body composition that goes below your body's set point often by restricting energy or over-exercising impairs the functioning of your body. No matter how hard you fight, your body will fight back to stay within a range where your body operates and functions optimally. The...

Food is often viewed as a tool to manipulate the look of the body. From a very young age, diet tricks, hacks and tips are introduced as a way to change the way that you look, to improve health or to gain control over eating. While some of these strategies can be helpful, many are unhealthy and sometimes hazardous to your health and well-being. When food goes from being pleasurable and nourishing to serving as the primary method to manipulate body composition, you no longer have a healthy relationship with food. Your thoughts about food matter. Seeing food as an enemy can make it difficult for you to eat for fuel and nourishment. In our diet-crazed society, constantly eating too little, eating too much and always eating with fear (or guilt) can cause serious mental and physical health issues. Undereating and a cycle of restriction and binging can have serious mental effects, especially when this style of eating becomes a way of life. This is the time of the year when it's so easy to...

Back in March, I crashed twice within two weeks while riding my gravel bike - the first in a race and the second in a training ride. Both falls left me with a good amount of road rash. Thankfully, nothing was broken and after both crashes, I got back up and kept on riding. A comeback is defined as a return to a previous state. On Saturday, Karel took me to Walhalla, which was my first real gravel ride since March. It was my courageous comeback. I wasn't sure what to expect as I had never been to this area. Karel had ridden there twice (once on a group ride and once by himself) and he thought it would be the perfect place for my first real gravel ride since March. I say "real" because I have been on my gravel bike a few times (mostly on the paved road) over the past 7 months. He felt like this would be a good area for me to ride because it was scenic and the route was not extremely technical.  It took about 50-minutes to drive to Walhalla and we parked at an elementary sc...