Good golf starts with a good healthy body. Don’t forget the importance of a good diet to help develop a foundation. Establish good nutrition to promote good muscles, help guard against injuries, keep your mind sharp on the golf course, and achieve top performance.
There are many diets and fads out there. If you can sustain that diet for a lifetime then it is not a fad, if it can be sustained it will eventually leave you. Understand your nutrition so it does not leave you. Again the purpose of the section is not to sell a system or theory it is to provide a good understanding. The philosophy of Cause & Effect Golf and getting to the root cause of your swing issues. Similar to the Cause & Effect understanding of golf, I am applying the philosophy to healthy. It is beneficial to understand why of for example you are getting tired on the course or why your muscles are sore after a simple round of golf.
I have included some general information that is good reading and may provide a basic understanding of how proteins, carbohydrates, and water play such an important part in our health. Please enjoy the reading it may be some good information for you.
After turning 60 in spring this year, and suffering a stroke during Christmas 2020, life has taken on some new meaning for me. To return back to hitting golf shots that I so thoroughly enjoy, my health will play a big part in that. Golf shots are coming back but it has been a lot of work and literally relearning some of the moves. The mind is an incredible muscle and I am learning the different ways it works to find something that was once thought to be so easy. My mind, body, and spirit are now telling me how important they are to hitting a great golf shot.
There is a lot of information below and it is not done to overload you, rather be a good reference when you feel like reading up on what is going on in your body.
Special thanks to Pamela Black, Holistic Certified Health Coach for this valuable information.
PROTEIN
The protein belongs to a class of nutrients called macronutrients, they are called this because our body requires large amounts of them. The proteins in our bodies perform a number of different functions essential for sustaining our lives. To ensure that our bodies contain the proper amounts of protein to perform these functions, daily protein intake should be between 75% – 100% of body weight in grams of protein per day. Protein is made up of a chain of amino acids. Nine to ten out of 27 amino acids are essential to our bodies.
Amino Acids make enzymes and anything that’s made in our body is facilitated by an enzyme…and that enzyme is made up of protein. It helps make muscle, tissue, blood cells, skin, hair, nails, etc.. The amino acid tryptophan found in protein-rich foods you eat converts into 5-HTP. 5-HTP converts into serotonin, and serotonin converts into melatonin so if sleep issues are your problem, make sure to eat enough protein at each meal.
One of the most important roles of protein is to provide support to all of our body tissues, enabling us to stand and move. The most abundant protein in our body, collagen, is a component in the bones, tendons, and ligaments that form our joints. Our muscles contain two proteins, actin, and myosin, that allow your muscles to contract properly.
Proteins are essential to maintain fluid balance as well as acid-base balance. Our smallest blood vessels, our capillaries, contain proteins that attract fluids. These proteins help pull water into the capillaries and prevent fluid from accumulating in our tissues. This not only helps regulate body temperature but also helps prevent a condition called edema, which is characterized by fluid buildup in our tissues.
Many people who go on weight loss programs greatly reduce their protein intake. This is a big mistake. Our muscle tissue is comprised of amino acids from protein. If you do not maintain adequate protein intake, you will lose lean muscle tissue instead of body fat. When the diet is finished, lean muscle tissue will not be replaced by lean muscle tissue. It will be replaced by body fat. That’s why we see people yo-yo dieting and getting larger and larger each time. Digesting protein also helps increase our metabolism as it takes more thermo energy to break down protein than fats or carbs.
And, on the other hand…the single most important nutrient for gaining healthy weight is protein. Again, muscle is made up of protein and without it, most of the extra calories you are consuming to gain weight may end up as body fat.
Proteins also help alter the pH of our blood to help maintain the proper acid-base balance. The normal pH of our blood is approximately 7.4. If the pH of our blood changes, even slightly, it can lead to life-threatening conditions. Proteins act as buffers in our blood. If our blood becomes acidic, proteins remove excess hydrogen ions. If our blood becomes too alkaline, proteins deposit hydrogen ions.
A transport protein is a type of protein in our body that attaches to nutrients, waste products, and electrolytes and carries them throughout our blood. Proteins also form an opening in our cell membranes that allow sodium and potassium to travel in and out of our cells when necessary.
When our body comes into contact with a foreign substance, such as a bacterium or virus, our immune system creates and releases proteins called antibodies. These proteins attach to the foreign invader in an attempt to neutralize it and prevent it from causing disease or infection.
Because protein contains calories, it can serve as an energy source when needed. Because protein has so many other vital roles in our body, however, we should not rely on it to meet our energy needs. Our body prefers to obtain its energy from the carbohydrates and fats in our diet (more about these in later topics).
We get our high-quality sources of protein from all animal sources (preferably hormone and antibiotic-free), yellow peas, quinoa, eggs, beans, nuts, and seeds.
GOOD MOOD FOOD – FATS!
Omega-3 Fats
Omega-3 Fats are by far the best good-mood fat and its first home is your brain. If we add more omega-3, we can quickly raise a potent natural antidepressant brain chemical called “dopamine” by 40 percent! That translates to mental and physical alertness, focus, and excitement. And, after eating or supplementing with Omega-3s for a few months and your brain’s needs are met, the omega-3s will move into the linings of your arteries and remove any plaque that has built up in your body’s botched efforts to repair its linings without enough of its preferred omega-3!
Where do we get omega-3s? They come in two forms: a ready-for-brain-use form found only in wild fish and a cruder form found in flaxseeds and some other nuts and seeds. Flax oil is a shorter form of omega-3, alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), and some of us cannot convert its ALA omega-3 fat into DHA and EPA. It has to be worked over by certain enzymes that two-thirds of us don’t have and that decline with age. By far, the best sources of omega-3 fats are wild salmon, sardines, herring, anchovies, and mackerel. They have at least three times more omega-3 than other fish and five times more than flaxseed oil. Their good-mood fat is concentrated in and under the skin. Farmed fish is fed grain high in omega-6, therefore very low in omega-3 fats. Supplementing with 2 grams a day of fish oil (combined DHA and EPA) and eating wild fish at least two times per week should make your omega-3 quota and help you enjoy a more stable mood, more energy, more focus, and healthier arteries!
Omega-3s are our ANTI-INFLAMMATORY fats and Omega-6s are our INFLAMMATORY fats. Our body needs both, but the ratio between omega-6 and omega-3 fats in the average American is very unbalanced. The ratio should be between 1-1 and 7-1 but in the U.S. the actual ratio is now over 22-1! This is because we are now consuming too much of the omega-6 vegetable oils and trans fats in processed foods. This results in our increasing rates of depression, heart disease, inflammation, skin issues, and cancer.
Saturated Fats
Think of these as the “SATisfied” fats. All saturated fats are complete in their molecular structure and are the preferred energy source for your heart because they burn at such a reliable pace, much steadier than carbs do. One mood benefit provided by the creamy fats we’ve been avoiding all these years is that they support the function of the omega-3s in our brains, reducing the negative effects of the excess omega-6s.
You can safely cook with SATs and they don’t toxify. The SATs build protective cell walls in your brain and body. They keep damaging UV rays from penetrating and keep moisture in your skin. They also slow down the entry time of refined carbs, protecting you from diabetes and they keep your blood sugar levels rock-solid…which keeps your mood solid, too. The crucial fat-soluble vitamins A, D, and E cannot be absorbed into our bodies without their carrier, saturated fats. And this is where you will find a good source of CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) that may be a potent cancer fighter. CLA is a healthy fat that has been shown to fight obesity, cancer, and diabetes in lab animals. Human studies are now underway.
Where do you find the SATs? We find SATs in organic grass-fed butter, cage-free chicken skin, organic avocado oil, organic coconut oil and coconut milk, and omega-9 fats like olive oil and nuts. Cashews and macadamias are the highest in omega-9 (but low in omega-6) and peanuts, almonds, and pistachios are next in line.
Grass-fed Butter (no hormones, no antibiotics) is so packed nutritionally….it has ten vitamins, ten minerals, eighteen amino acids, and eleven kinds of fat! It’s tremendously high in vitamin A, which it helps deliver to your eyes (night vision is critically dependent on an adequate vitamin A supply). Vitamin A also regulates the female sex hormone progesterone providing many mood benefits as well as fertility. Butter also has a fatty acid called butyrate, the fastest burning of all fats. Butyrate is used extensively in your brain and serves as a base for making GABA, your natural Valium (GABA stands for gamma-aminobutyric acid). It can also protect you from colon cancer and is used as a medicine in precancerous colon problems.
I recommend an excellent butter imported from Ireland by the Kerrygold company. The butter is made from cows that are raised on pasture or grass silage, making it five times higher in CLA and also higher in vitamin E and beta carotene than commercial butter, whether organic or non-organic.
Coconut milk and oil contain powerful antiviral and antifungal fat and are a bit more saturated than butter (think satisfying, satiating, and rancidity resistant). It is very safe to cook at high temperatures.
Organic extra virgin olive oil has mostly omega-9 fats, a little saturated fat, and almost no omega-6 fatty acids. Although it’s low in omega-3s, the omega-9s are very supportive of the omega-3s, and they specifically help promote serotonin’s antidepressant activities in your brain.
Up to 60% of your brain must be fatty! It needs to be composed of specialized fatty substances that have to be replaced constantly and have very complex mood-related duties that cannot be performed by French fries or corn chips. You must feed your brain regularly with only the best fatty foods in order to feel your best. Happy omega-3 fats from wild fish, saturated fats from foods like chicken skin, grass-fed butter, and organic avocado oil are primary fat sources for some of the healthiest people on earth! We need fats!!
Pamela Black, CHHC