Hunger
My favorite feeling is perhaps the empty hollowness of hunger. That statement, in itself, is a declaration of the privileged life I’ve led; it is borderline obscene to boast of such a thing in a world where 842 million people don’t have enough to eat. Nevertheless, being lucky enough to have been raised in America and just competent enough to hold down a job, I find myself in the enviable position of needing to invoke “discipline” in order to experience this sensation.
All that aside, I love feeling hungry, both physically and metaphorically. Physically, being hungry brings something primal out in me; there is an edge that awakens which feels dormant when I’ve eaten. I’m sharper, more alive somehow.
When I eat or drink too much, I feel it in my flesh; I feel the lethargy that comes with food everywhere. I feel it on my back, I feel it in my limbs, I feel it in my eyes – everything is weighed down and blurred. When I am overweight, I find I can go all day without eating and hardly give it a thought. When I’m training and riding well and my weight is down, I can eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner and never feel sated. That is the feeling of hunger to which I refer; not a desire to starve, but a physical condition where sustenance feels impossible to achieve. This is a beautiful state where everything feels alive and there is a sharpness and precision in every motion.
There is also a metaphorical hunger, which I don’t think we can achieve without the physical sort. The metaphorical sort is borne of desire and need. This is what drives us to achieve more than we normally would. Sean Kelly talks of this hunger in his book by the same name; in his opening chapter, he says he would rather fall into the any of the greenhouses below the sweeping hairpins along the descent from the Poggio into Sanremo than face defeat by Moreno Argentin. That is hunger in the metaphorical sense.
I am a better person when I feel hunger; I have drive, I have humility, I have courage. When hunger stirs, we come alive with an urgency we don’t otherwise find. Without it, there is no compulsion to act, to fight, or to endure.
Great stuff as always. I have two kinds of hunger here – after a shockingly cold winter here in WI, I’m ravenous to get some real, non-trainer miles in my legs. On the other hand, it was my anniversary at work today and I brought in cake. Needless to say, the gym will see me tonight. I do know what you mean though, because of work commitments, on Wed, Thurs and Fri of last week, a proper dinner wasn’t an option. I ate very little and didn’t feel any the worse for wear.
I’ve trained properly since the first of January climaxing in a tough early season sportif yesterday.
I was so hungry today that I could’ve eaten the snake that ate the crocodile:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/03/snake-eats-crocodile-in-queensland-lake
Amazing – I was only thinking to myself a few days ago, that I feel great with a slight feeling of hunger persisting within me. I have put some quality miles in the legs recently and I’m controlling my food intake in a bid to get closer to my climbing weight. The hunger feeling is like a voice of encouragement within me, a feeling that the winter blubber is starting to burn away. I’m starting to feel sharp and alive. 7 lbs to go, I guess – hoping that will be shed during March.
Great piece (always excellent to include a Kelly reference who epitomizes the hunger of that sort). Yes, metaphysical hunger separates the achievers from the non-achievers in all things in life,
and us from the animals (that and thumbs).
It’s March and I’m not at my climbing weight, therefore I’m on a pharmaceutical cocktail made up of Xenical, Lorcaserin, Phentermine-Topiramate, Benzphetamine, and Bontril Slow Release.
I only have the need to race again at the age of 47 — that will be next year. This will be a long hungering and satisfying year gone by — then I line up again.
Why is it that the last kg is the hardest to lose? Christ I’m fed up with bananas and tuna! It had better make a massive difference to my climbing, or I will be sorely disappointed (although I doubt I’ll be bothering any UCI sanctioned events!).
@Darren
Ditch the bananas – all 3 kinds of sugar! There will always be one last kilo, n-1.
@norm Crap!
@frank another good read.
Both sides of the hunger meaning here also. As stated, feel alot better when lean and mean, but that just leads me to eating, which makes me feel bloated. Vicious circle that I find hard to break.
Maybe those damn vegans are onto something
Kelly-Argentin never gets old:
10-4 to all the results described from eating and drinking too much. I get to do it often. The job includes traveling and entertainment = very good meals. Big ones. And nothing like a lotta good miles on the bike to turn the body in to a furnace. I’m amazed at how much I actually want to eat when I’m really enjoying long summer days, riding all week long with the occasional racing on weekends. Always that special hunger… It is a very cool thing. Daylight savings time can’t come soon enough! RC
Great timing on this article for my annual hunger fest. You nailed it. Lent is on the immediate horizon and it is just the catalyst any cyclist needs to drive the hunger bus. Delete alcohol, sodas, sweets, coffee and tea (merely vehicles for sugar and milk for me, anyway), then ride your ass off for the next 45 days. The physical hunger this creates is only satisfied by large heaping helpings of the V. You will find yourself determined not to waste the opportunity. As long as you are foregoing all of these creature comforts, you don’t want to be ridiculed as the twat who gave it all up and then was 5 pounds heavier. By Easter, voila!, 10 pounds gone. Oh, and the feast at Easter, after the morning ride, is heavenly. If you are not an observer of Easter or Lent, just do it for the Merckx of it!
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sStK1KG8lnA
@wiscot
I’ve heard many a tale of the winter you guys are having out there. I’ll tell you that after a few days – let alone months – or riding on a bike effectively bolted into place, you will giggle with the joy of a child at the feeling of leaning your bike through a corner.
After the holidays, I remember going to work and wondering at that strange feeling in my stomach – I was hungry for the first time in days.
@Darren
I don’t know, man, but I hear you. Change up your regime (bananas a tuna, I hope that’s a joke!) and your body might respond to it. Or ride through lunch, forcing you to skip a meal and kick up your metabolism.
@Barracuda
I heard an interesting discussion on NPR the other day where a dietitian was discussing that people overlook fats because of their reputation for making us…well, fat. Anyway, she pointed out that fats are often what help us feel sated and without them, we’ll eat more than we need of other things in order to feel the same level of satisfaction from less food with a slightly higher fat content.
Frank, this is beautiful. Really. I love this article.
@Nate
Repost on that.
@wilburrox
Yes! Those long rides are my favorite for that. I’m due for one; I’ll just take one cliff bar as emergency bail-out and go all day with no food, just to feel that deep, hollow feeling.
@piwakawaka
Sugar is sugar, it’s all carbs. It doesn’t matter what form beyond how/when it’s absorbed.
The reason weight loss plateaus is because, I believe, the body has begun to take further measures to protect itself. Your body has made some changes to slow the weight loss down, so you’ll live through this famine and survive! Try mixing it up a bit. Do a mini carbo-load for a day, change what you’re eating, go a day with low carb or something. Personally, if I find a mini-carb load does the trick to get things moving again.
@chipomarc
COTHO ” Sometimes you have to miss a meal”
Huh? I don’t know how old that video is, but we know better now. You eat enough carbs to fuel your training with a small deficit. Note: small, 500 Cal max my coach keeps telling me. Don’t eat enough, your peformace suffers in the same way he describes it suffering when you bonk. Take it too far, and you start loosing muscle! Skipping a whole mean? No way! Not unless you ate too much the meal prior.
Speaking of bananas, it took me over 40 years to do it right!
I use to eat before a one hour ride. Like out of bed, kit up, stretch, eat – banana or bowl of oats or bananas, go. Wouldn’t carry food in the pockets at all. Now I get up, kit up and go ride up to two hours on the meal on the night before. Since doing the later, held off six kilo’s. Six more to go!
@sthilzy video was to be in the above post.
In the interests of Rule #19…
My name’s Tom. And I’m a cycling addict. As an Aussie (and only a Pedalwan at that), I’ve been fortunate enough not to know this hunger for much of my life. However, a recent broken arm has meant 6 weeks off the roads and on the turbo trainer. Fair to say I now understand what @wiscot is talking about – I’m counting down the days until I can get back out there again!
@Puffy more a compliment to the banana, the perfect power food, in a biodegradable package as well, if you’re racing I reckon shove down whatever works, but in training, water only, unless its a hard ride of more than two hours.
I tried to watch that video, but I just kept thinking “what the f*ck do you know? all your numbers are screwed by doping” All your experiences are tainted by the cheating COTHO.
Starting my 2014 Season Fast on 13 Oct 2013 (http://www.trainingpeaks.com/ui/public/profile.aspx?p=TURTLE%20Training%20Program). With the Jedermann (Everybody) season opener here in Germany set for 9 Mar at the Schmolke Carbon Cup (http://www.schmolke-carbon.de/carbon/scc2014/), I hope to feed the craving in my legs. Never have I trained so consistently as I have this Winter; yet I could have trained better. Regardless next Sunday is the first exam and a breaking of the fast . . . thanks for the reminder to stay hungry until the start gun fires.
Having over indulged in post ride recovery beverages last night (without the ride to earn it!) and over indulged again this morning on pre ride sausages, I simply cannot comment on this article today…I have strayed from the path of enlightenment lord Merckx help me.
On the plus side I am starting the season 7kgs lighter than last year so salvation may be at hand!
@frank
+1 for riding through lunch: No lunch but some crudités is the ticket. Tack on no beer (boo), no meat, and 250km per week, and the kilos melt away.
Very nice piece, Frank!
I research food, eating, health all day long right now, and likely for the rest of my career. It is very, very tricky as a life-long athlete and now a cyclist. For me, food & weight are very, very simple. Eat to ride, sometimes to celebrate or for pleasure (parties/holidays), that is it.
But, then you get out into the world and things get in the way for lots of folks. I still haven’t been able to figure out Fat Acceptance Studies and that whole movement…or lack of movement.
@sthilzy
Cheers to that. I’ve never been much of a regular breakfast eater. Breakfast is like a volume switch for my weight. I rely on coffee to keep the pangs away and give me just the right amount of sugar through the morning hours. I try not to eat until well into the ride. Once I’m moving I hardly think about it.
@wiscot
Good lord, +++++++1 on that sentiment. I’ve done all I can on the trainer/rollers, but it was negative-13 (f) at my house two nights ago, and we’ve had 5 inches of fresh powder in the past two days. Even when we get a clear day, it’s either (a) too cold, (b) absolute shit condition on the roads, or (c) all of the above. There are no shoulders left on any roads in Fond du Lac county, and most of the roads are caked with hard-packed ice and snow on the driving surface. It’s not even an option to ride down the middle of the road in most places. Hell, my driveway has three inches of ice from when we had a day of rain a few weeks ago that instantly flash-froze when the temperature dropped from 33(f) to negative-10(f) in the space of a few hours.
My guns are feeling good, my cardio is terrific, and I’m at close-to-climbing weight, but I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll even remember how to take a corner once I finally get out there.
Grrrrrrrr…
@ChrissyOne
I’m off and on with breakfast. In the past I’d usually skip it and go with the coffee, too. Recently, however, it seems that eating a light breakfast (e.g. some fruit and a granola bar) mid-morning helps me to even out my eating later in the day. Without breakfast, I’d have to eat lunch, and then I’d go home and eat an entire frozen pizza along with a couple of beers, and then promptly go to bed. With a light breakfast, I’ll often either skip lunch or have a salad, and be able to control my portion-size for dinner as well. This also has the side-benefit of giving me enough energy to go down in the basement for an hour of pain on the rollers later in the evening.
I’m a firm believer that you can shrink your stomach. A few weeks of slowly scaling back the intake and pretty soon I simply can’t stomach what I had been eating.
I also try to eat every three hours. It keeps things steady, it makes eating a chore so by the time you don’t feel full, you have only 45 minutes to go until you have to do it again. Feel overly stuffed is a good way to force yourself into not eating more than you need.
And water! I drink a lot of water, some black or green tea throughout the day. Fill up yer belly on liquids and you can’t fit anything else in.
@Puffy I know folks that swear by that idea: never let the body plateau as a result of regular diet. In other words if they operate on 2500 calories a day one week, the next week it’ll be 2000/day. I can appreciate the concept of changing it around a bit between carbs and protein too. I guess our bodies are wonderful machines that continually adapt to stresses in order to normalize or something like that. Me personally, I just eat whatever I want and try to ride ride ride… I do know I drink a whole helluva lot less alcohol on w/e’s than I did before I started riding the bike and wanting to cover miles on early Sat mornings and racing on Sun’s. More than anything that’s been good for my weight and health I’m guessing. RC
Granola! Any warnings against eating good ole fresh granola in place of heavier meals? I’m assuming that this choice is safe. Ordered from Bob’s Red Mill and having a box of granola delivered to my desk is different.
[Bananas are freaking magical…just sayin] I like to think about the big hunger – whatever our ‘A-race’ might be. Having a big project on the horizon keeps us hungry, and keeps us honest in our work to get there.
In the video ‘The Road To Paris’ Lance eats a banana with his hot tea when he had to stop due to snow while out doing a mountain recon.
@chipomarc
It certainly may have “looked” like he ate a banana — who knows… ??
@chipomarc
Dude seriously quit COTHO trolling under this nice article. You were told to piss off on more than several occasions on other forums and you’re here now. Do yourself a favor and wake up from the Lance nightmare you continuosly living in. Your links to Lance activities are really valid and important only to you. Wish I could recommend somebody to help you but it’s hopeless. It has been going on for so long all over the net that I begin to think you’re the COTHO himself in disguise.
I don’t think it’s borderline obscene to discuss hunger of any kind. It’s a natural function and instinct of the body. It may be obscene to over eat, which most of us probably do in the west. It takes discipline to go hungry or work at fitness and such. These disciplines are all things we should take the time to think about whenever possible. Nice words Frank, made me think.
@TommyTubolare
Gianni, now may not be the time!
If I can control my hunger to be roadside at the 98th Giro d’Italia, then next year I’ll be there — witnessing the Giro — experiencing cycling/racing culture in Italy.
Food, starving oneself, what to eat, when, how? Y’all are missing probably the bigger point of the article, hunger to achieve a goal. The metaphorical hunger that drives us to participate in this insane, beautiful sport. The same kinda hunger to succeed, to get to and over that plateau (which can also be literal or metaphorical).
Anyway, fab article penned at the exact right time of year, especially for those of us living above the 45th Parallel N. Find that hunger, feed it, but satiate it very rarely. We need it.
@Puffy
This is such total bullshit. Your body burns the easiest fuel it can find; it won’t start on muscle until you’re in a hunger camp.
By this reasoning no one would ever lose weight or starve to death.
@sthilzy
This is the way to go. Early morning long ride on espresso only. Instant weight loss, despite the fads.
@Tom Mc
Carry on mate and welcome. That first ride back will be so sweet you’ll hardly notice the suffering.
@Deakus
We are all friends here. Just put down the fork and the pint and climb on the bike until you feel that burn in your belly again. All will be right, pedalwan.
@unversio
I eat some of that regularly with yogurt and flax seed. Too much yogurt will also fatten you up, but the probiotics help you digest and it seems on balance to help me keep trim(ish).
@piwakawaka
I hate the guy as much (or more) as anyone, but the twat still had to be fucking trim and fit to do what he did, drugs or no.
Having doped through his career (and after!) doesn’t mean he didn’t know how to diet and train.
@scaler911
Plus one badge to you, matey.
@frank
T. McGoats. That was what made the article so good.
Oh my Merckx, I’m a level one, I feel so cheap…
@meursault
Heeeheee. Maybe yes, maybe no.