Blokfest. Nutrition.

Karolis Pipiras

So last weekend was Blokfest. Had to leave on Friday, because it is wayyy too long journey to travel on the same day. Thought I will have once again a miserable time on the bus, had few things prepared to do including some course work and randomly took a book from library... Eventually I was happy to be stuck in London traffic giving me more time to read the 'Little Brother'(soo good!)

Saturday. Had to get up pretty early cause other guys had to volunteer in 'the Castle '. It was the last Blokfest this year, so as expected quite a few strong climbers showed up including the regular ones. About 1 or 1,5 hours left till the start I began to get my psych up, went through the problems probably for the fifth time, that last cup of coffee, and doing all sort of things that I usually do and of course - getting nervous. I was so happy to roll along with my buddies Arta and Vaidas, so much easier to climb when you have someone to discuss the cruxes with. So we started crushing, doing fancy upside down starts and stuff from the beginning. At first we were able to do what we always do in these sort of comps when you play with the queues run from one to another quickly depending which one is the shorter, but after a while you had to wait for at least 5 min on every single problem. We were flashing quite easily, dropped once on dyno and didn't do 3 hardest problems. Finished with 217 (231 got you in the finals) and was sharing 16-19 places.

Can say that I am quite happy with my performance, had a chance to compare myself to others and can see some promising signs. Still a lot of things to develop and get stronger at though... Hopefully I'll continue climbing that ladder.

After AMAZING finals in Manchester, I left 'The Castle' really disappointed. Even though the wall and problems were 'entertainish' it didn't matter when you had columns covering half of the view. As well as atmosphere wasn't that very electric how I was expecting... Nevertheless overall good and exciting weekend.

Nutrition!

This is what I do, what I find best for myself, what I discovered is most suitable for me over the years.

I am not one of those people who can eat shitty food and stay strong, I know I will not perform at the highest level the next day after eating even slightly worst food.

Firstly, I don't eat meat or fish. (8 months now) Think that helped me to lower my body fat index, since I lowered the saturated fats consumption. Feature plan is to give it up entirely. Secondly, I try to avoid products with histamine since I found out that they don't help me and affect my certain muscles group that is responsible mostly for pulling up. That kind of might not be helping for my climbing. All these fullish years eating banana or some chocolate (that what I miss the most) before trainings or comps thinking 'yeah, that will totally contribute towards strength' or whatever... Thirdly, I try not to eat after 7p.m. Fourthly, water throughout the day. Those are my general rules about my nutrition.

*Breakfast. Basically any carbs (excluding wheat): rice, buckwheat, barley, oats... just boil it in water, pour some soy or regular milk and some sugar or salt. If feeling luxurious I might throw in some nuts, dry fruits or jam. mhmmm..

*Lunch. Depending on whether is training day or not I might skip it or just have a snack. If training I'll make something similar to breakfast menu because it's mostly carbohydrates, digests easily and keeps the energy high. If am not training I'll grab a flapjack, rice cakes, nuts or dry fruits and keep snacking while sitting in Uni or wherever else. The only time during the day I might eat wheat products is at the time of training, since it is so cheap, usually sugary and easier to find in shops....

*Dinner. If training, obviously, I'll need protein and for that I for the most part I'll cook some soy chunks (50% protein), or tofu (12-25%) along with any veggies. I will try not to eat carbs in the evening.

Two-three cups of coffee with delicious whipped milk foam on the top a day lightens up my brain and life. As well as fruits, at this time of the year you would see lots of pomelo peels in my trash.

Don't get me wrong, I do have those break downs from time to time, when you will see me buying pack of crisps, bad ass wheat cookies or a bag of butter croissants. I let myself enjoy that a two-three times a month.

Tips: eat fruits for deserts instead of any fat food. It is so much easier to keep good, healthy diet if you have goals. It can be anything - competition, route, one armer or anything else it just have to be motivating. Set the desktop picture to to that theme or open THIS or THIS link from time to time to see what strong buggas there are. You might as well go further and make it life goal (Nathan Phillips' tactics). If you find hard to do that, promise yourself to eat healthy just one week. Get through that one week and you will see how much easier it will be the next week. Home made food beats everyone's ass. :)

Stay strong!

Next up is BUCS in Sheffield, 'Climbing Works' this weekend.