Shift work itself is like fueling for a marathon… 

Shift work by itself is like fueling for a marathon – How do you fuel for your shifts while at the same time realize you’re fueling for an ACTUAL marathon?  

One of the biggest questions other than “how do we find the time to train with our schedules” (we will talk about that in another post), is “what are we eating to sustain our training?” In this week’s post, we will go through a typical week of when and what we eat in relation to our workouts, during our long shifts, what we eat during our long runs, and how we stay hydrated.

Fueling properly and staying hydrated before during and after runs is essential to successful training. That being said, it’s a lot easier said than done! A few cookbooks we highly recommend and frequently use recipes from are: 

True Roots https://www.amazon.com/True-Roots-Mindful-Kitchen-Recipes/dp/1623369169/ref=asc_df_1623369169/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312104252832&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=6255482062855673260&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9007303&hvtargid=pla-434734342214&psc=1

Running on Veggies (blog & cookbook): https://www.runonveg.com/

Thug Kitchen: The Official Cookbook: Eat Like You Give a F*ck (https://g.co/kgs/Lr4VR7 )

ROAR by Stacey Sims https://www.amazon.com/ROAR-Fitness-Physiology-Optimum-Performance/dp/1623366860/ref=asc_df_1623366860/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312089933244&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=13747548147593460486&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9007312&hvtargid=pla-417622043463&psc=1

To get started let’s get into a little of the science behind proper fueling. We are nurses – it needs to make sense for us to follow it! As runners/athletes, we don’t intentionally neglect our nutrition – most of it stems from a lack of understanding how much and what kind of nutrition is actually needed for the amount of prolonged activity marathon training involves. According to the Internation Society of Sports Nutrition if you are doing moderate levels of intense training two to three hours a day five to six days a week a 110-220 pound athlete may need to consume 2000-5000 calories per day in order to support that amount of activity. So what do those calories need to consist of you might ask……. Carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. The ISSN recommends 5-8gm/kg of carbs per day, 1.4-1.8 gm/kg protein per day, and fats should be about 30% of your diet when training for a marathon. 

WHEN to eat:  

Long run / Track workout days:  From our own research and our own experience eating a small snack of carbs and protein one-two hours prior to your workout will help you complete the tough workout and give your stomach enough time to digest the food. Now your long run or tough speed workout is done when do you eat? Within 30 minutes of finishing your workout, you need a recovery snack of carbs and protein – as females, typically getting protein quicker helps with recovery. This is when your body is extremely responsive to nutrition and will use it to  build lean muscle, rebuild, and repair your sore muscles. SUPER IMPORTANT! YOU ARE READY TO RECEIVE NUTRITION AND WILL USE IT FOR PERFORMANCE! During your long training runs it’s important to get in the habit of fueling during the run (especially earlier on during the run). Runners world has an article about fueling and they recommend “fuel early and often.” We stand by this motto. Eating and drinking every three miles or every 45 minutes is what works for us. At mile three you aren’t generally hungry or thirsty but staying on top of your nutrition gets you to 26 miles not feeling completely depleted. 

Workday/ Easy workout day:  

You might not be putting in 2-3 hours of hard work today however your body is still recovering from your hard workout days. Three nutrient dense meals and three nutrient dense snacks will ensure that you are continuing to get enough calories even on the days you might not feel you need it (trust us: you do!!). We think of our “off” days as preparation days for our hard work out days. If we are unable to hydrate or eat enough at work, this affects our workouts in the coming days. Our biggest advice to ensure you have the right foods to eat especially on those busy work days is by setting aside a day or two to meal prep. Anyone who works in healthcare can relate to rounding for five hours and wanting to scarf down the entire box of donuts in the breakroom. In the short term, your blood sugar will spike. You will feel slightly more human again for an hour or so but then your blood sugar will drop and your hunger will no longer be satisfied. Having readily available prepped snacks is a life saver. Below are two sample menu’s for our work days and off days when we aren’t putting in our hard long miles. 

  • Breakfast: Overnight oat’s is the easiest thing to have ready and to be able to eat at 0500. When we arrive to the hospital no telling what the day will bring so we always make sure to eat prior to arriving.
    •  Easy Overnight Oat Recipe: In a mason jar fill with ½ cup quaker oats, 1 tsp chia seads, 1 tsp hemp seeds, raisins, strawberries or bananas (depends what is in the fridge), ¼ cup oat milk,  fill the rest with water until just above the dry ingredients, then add a dash of cinnamon and mix together. Let sit in the fridge overnight and they are ready and delicious in the morning! You can heat them up in the microwave if you want or have them cold, either is great! 
    • COFFEE, COFFEE, COFFFE, the day doesn’t start unless the coffee pot is prepped and brewing when that early am alarm goes off. 
  • Snack: Honey crisp Apple with Peanut butter 
  • Lunch : Is either last night’s dinner leftover’s or a large salad with all the goodies. 
    • Salad filled with all the goodies: Base of kale, arugula, and spinach (trader Joe’s has great mixed bags of greens). Salad filling consists of tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, beets, roasted broccoli or brussel sprouts, and either chickpeas or lentils. Anna doesn’t eat meat so she looks to get her protein from these super food salads. Lentils, chickpeas, broccoli, brussel sprouts, the list goes on and on are ALL great sources of protein. For those of you that want to change things up remember you don’t need chicken in every salad 😉 Dressing is always something easy and healthy. Olive oil , salt, pepper, and garlic powder all mixed in then a fresh lemon wedge to squeeze on top when its time to eat! 
  • Afternoon Snack: 13 hours shifts are long so its surprise we are starving again at four or five pm.  Any non-dairy yogurt mixed with fresh berries is always a great pick me up! 
  • Dinner: The key to consistently eating healthy for us is it to keep it interesting but also not too complex. Somedays we have the energy to make an overly complex healthy dinner but let’s be honest no one feels like doing that every night of the week. Here is one of our favorite easy go to dinners.
    • Fish tacos: Tilapia is a great white flakey fish that tastes great! To cook the tilapia sprinkle some season salt & pepper on top and bake @ 350 for 10-12 minutes depending on the size of your fish filet. After the fish is cooked squeeze some fresh lime overtop and its ready to go. Thats the hardest part of this recipe. You can make it super easy and buy pre made pico de gallo and pre made guacamole from your local grocery store. Whatever your preference of taco shell go with it! A great option is corn tortillas, super easy to throw them in a pan with a little water and just like that they taste like are freshly made! Keeping with the theme of  easy, healthy, and delicious a good pairing with the tacos is a yummy coleslaw. Trader Joes has a pre cut coleslaw mix that is the best! For a dressing instead of the standard mayo (unhealthy dressing)  use this https://pin.it/6Po96Ip recipe from Pinterest. 
  • After dinner snack: Berries, oranges, grapes , any fruit is a great way to satisfy that post dinner sweat tooth. 
  • Ways to get easy carbs: If you feel like you’re struggling keeping up with intake, another way to fuel is making a few cups of white or brown rice in the beginning of the week to add to your protein or vegetables and expand your meals.  Rice can be boring but it’s an amazing carb – easy on the stomach as well! Sometimes we will also add chopped fresh herbs to the rice to spice it up as well (basil, cilantro, dill, parsley). And a little rice goes a long way!

Long run or Track work out day:

  • PRE RUN Breakfast: The over night oats discussed early are a go to. Oats are a great meal pre long run or track workout. Probably the most important thing about oats is they are very easy on the stomach! The next best thing is oats have a high soluble fiber content, they are high in complex carbs, are a good source of protein AND have a low glycemic index! What does that mean? It means they provide a sustained release of energy into the bloodstream during your run! 
  • POST RUN breakfast/it’s probably lunchtime:  Gut-Healthy Brown rice bowl with Kimchi and egg. This recipe can be found in the cook book Running on Veggies by Lottie Bildirici. Not only is it delicious and easy to make, but  the kimchi helps improve your gut health and improve your immune system. Running on Veggies: Plant-Powered Recipes for Fueling and Feeling Your Best: Bildirici, Lottie: 9780593231715: Amazon.com: Books We can’t recommend this book enough! 
  • Afternoon Snack: If you want to keep it simple, Go with the honeycrisp apple and peanut butter again. Besides the fact that honeycrips apples are amazing and who doesn’t love peanut butter, they are a great source of nutrition for any athlete. Apples contain natural carbohydrates and peanut butter is a great source of fat, combined they work together to help you recover from your run and help you control your hunger throughout the day. 
  • Dinner: Dinner can be any version of carbs/ fats/ proteins. Its important to eat real food during this journey! We are all busy and don’t have a lot of time. On the theme of keeping it simple, a sheet pan chicken with vegetables is SUPER easy and is also a yummy leftover. This one pan chicken is our go-to. If you don’t have sumac, don’t sweat it – you can sub sumac for lemon juice! https://www.cookinglight.com/recipes/sumac-chicken-cauliflower-carrots
  •  

What to eat while you’re running: 

We already discussed how we follow the rule of eating every three miles/45 minutes and hydrating every 15 minutes, but what are we eating at that time! To start eat whatever your stomach can handle. This is why your training runs are so important – anything you read will tell you this is the time to experiment – NOT race day. Here is a list of our snacks during our runs:

  • Stingers gels
  • Peanut butter sandwich
  • Apple Sauce pouches

HYDRATION DURING LONG RUNS:

We can’t stress the importance of hydration enough. Hydrate early and often. You will absolutely hit the marathon wall if you don’t do it. Our rule of thumb: take a couple of sips of electrolyte enhanced water every 15 minutes. This works for us – you’ll figure out what works for you. Highly recommend investing in a vest that will hold water bottles/hydration pack. We use this one:

It’s perfect – holds your phone, holds your snacks and it doesn’t cause too much chaffing. Nuun and OSMO are our go to electrolyte additives (you have probably seen us advertise them before). So worth it to buy!

HYDRATING AT WORK (the biggest challenge!!!!)

This should be simple right? It’s the hardest part. There’s so many reasons why this is hard and all nurses know it – you never have time to pee so you don’t want to hydrate too much at work. You forget when you’re immersed in your day. Also, we are in and out of patient rooms constantly and out at the work station and so we’re constantly losing our water bottles! Just try to do the best you can – ideally, you should be taking in 2-3L of hydration (half can be food). Chia seeds are a great way to keep hydrated from food. Some days, this will be impossible (we know, we’ve been there) but making it a priority will actually make you feel better, you’ll think better, and you’ll train better.

Workouts for the week: 3 easy miles, 4 easy miles, 7 miles with intervals (2 miles easy, 8x400s, 2 miles easy), 0-3 easy miles, 4 miles with hills, 10 mile with 4 miles at tempo/10k pace (3 miles easy, 4 tempo, 3 easy). 28-31 miles total

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Week 6

Anna: 

Acceptance is a pivotal part of allowing your body to recover. Accepting that some days you feel awful and going for a run just isn’t in the cards. Accepting that your work schedule is not ideal this week and you have 3 days to get all your hard workouts in. Once you get it in your mind that the training plan is a plan, not something written in blood I think things get a little less stressful, at least they did for me.  

Week 6’s workouts: 3 easy miles, 3-4 easy miles, 8-9 miles with 6 x 8000’s @ 3:40 pace ( 3:30 for Jess), 0-3 easy miles, 4 miles hills, and 10 miles with 2 miles at tempo. 

Tuesday: I worked late last night so I wasn’t sure how my run was going to go. I was feeling pretty good once I got outside and moving and ended up doing a 6 mile run at a 9-minute pace. I am aiming for a 9-minute pace for the marathon and so far it hasn’t felt too bad, I actually find myself running too fast on most runs and will have to consciously slow myself down (thank god for my  Garmin watch). Post-run I rolled out my legs and did a 20-minute yoga workout that was focused on hip-opening stretches. 

Wednesday: Track workout Day!!! : THE SUN WAS OUT! Recovery isn’t just resting, fueling, and stretching for me. Recovery is remembering why you love being outside with the sun on your face, recovery is killing 6 800’s with your friend and feeling good when you finish, recovery is reigniting a fire that the gloomy winter months have been trying to dim. My 800’s needed to be run in 3:40, for someone who hasn’t run on a track in years that’s fast! I was able to keep pace for each of my 800’s and didn’t feel completely dead at the end of them. We started and ended our workout with an easy 2 miles filled with lots of chatting, venting, and laughing! After our workout, we went back to Jess’s house and she made me a delicious meal filled with all the goodies needed to build back up our muscles (Jess breaks down the meal below). 

When I got home I rolled out my legs with a foam roller and did a little more stretching. Once my muscles cool down is when I feel my tightness so I try and do a stretching session immediately post-run and one before bed or a few hours after my workout. One of my favorite recovery tools is my foam roller. Foam rolling is a love-hate relationship, it hurts so good is how I describe it to people. The pain gets better over time as you loosen up! Fascia and underlying muscle tissue within the body can become stuck together. This is normally what somebody will call a knot. These adhesions “knots” result in restricted muscle movement. With this comes a reduction in flexibility, and muscle efficiency, and if untreated can lead to pain and injury. Long and short of all of that if you stick with it I promise it gets better. This is the foam roller I used from Amazon:  https://www.amazon.com/TriggerPoint-Roller-Instructional-Original-13-inch/dp/B0040EGNIU/ref=sr_1_6?crid=14C1REN8SU193&keywords=runners%2Bfoam%2Broller&qid=1644531524&sprefix=runners%2Bfoam%2Bro%2Caps%2C626&sr=8-6&th=1

One thing I do recommend when purchasing a foam roller is to get one with a plastic core. They are a little bit more expensive but they last forever because they won’t bend from the weight of your body over time like the ones that are all foam do. 

Thursday: This week I have 3 days to get the big workouts in so, today was my long run. It’s not recommended to do your hard workouts back to back because you don’t give your muscles enough time to recover. I made a deal with myself last night that If I woke up feeling fatigued I wouldn’t do my long run today. To my surprise, I woke up feeling great! Today was a 10-mile run with two miles at tempo pace. I was able to run my first 5 at 9-minute mile pace, my 2 tempo miles at 8-minute miles pace, and my last 3 at 9-minute mile pace. Today’s run is a testament to following a running plan and fueling my body properly. Post-run I did a 10-minute lower body yoga flow and made some avocado toast seasoned with Trader Joe’s everything but the bagel seasoning!

In preparation for my next three days of work, the rest of my day was spent meal prepping. 

My weekend meal prep includes:

  • Coffee pot prepped and timer set (this is probably the most important!)
  • 3 mason jars of overnight oats: raisins, oats, cinnamon, oat milk, & water to right above the dry ingredients. 
  • If you don’t have the cookbook “THUG Kitchen, Eat like you give a f*ck” you need to get it! I made their mango curry over whole-grain rice…. wow is it good. I separated this up into 3 containers and will eat this every day for lunch.
  • This week rounding snacks will be grapes and sumo oranges.

As I sit here and write this week’s entry I am wearing my RE Athlete Air Pro compression boots. If you have never tried compression boots I highly recommend them. The benefits of compression boots are improved circulation, they boost lymphatic fluid movement (which reduces swollen feet/legs),  removal of lactic acid which reduces muscle fatigue, boost oxygen distribution, and to be totally honest they feel AMAZING. There are so many recovery methods available to athletes today. The ones I mentioned are just a few that I consistently use and find very helpful. 

Jess:

Week 6’s Workouts: 0-3 easy miles, 4-6 easy miles, 8-9 mile workout, 0-3 easy miles, 5-6 miles of hills, 10 mile tempo run

This week was a good one, I think because I got a day with Anna!! I also have some other recovery secrets I’ll share!

Monday: rest day (except I was on my feet for 13 hours…). Needed this day after this weekend of hills!!

Tuesday: Opened up my hips with a pre-run warm-up on Peloton (still tight from the weekend) and slip-slided through my neighborhood during my easy hill miles (I did 4). The sidewalk was frozen solid and I was lucky I didn’t fall. THE WINTER KILLS ME. Strength/stretch came after. Then I had a wonderful afternoon at a recovery studio in Philly called “Konect.” I have gone here in prior training cycles. It is amazing. They provide compression boot sessions if you don’t own them (the ones Anna described), IV hydration, massage, cryotherapy, sauna, etc. I typically do cryo→sauna back to back. I did a 3 minute cryotherapy session followed by a 25-minute sauna and WOW. Cryotherapy (cold tanks) are incredible. So are ice baths. Once I’m getting close to 40 miles/wk, I have to do some sort of cryo or ice bathing.  When you are pounding your legs against the ground, you are causing some trauma to your muscles, ligaments, and tendons. Ice and cold will help it heal quicker (Just like when you ice a swollen muscle/joint but it’s your whole body!).  Then you follow it up with a 25 minute sauna and wow. You just take this wonderful exhale and your entire body just relaxes. I got Anna to sign up and I’m so excited for her to try it!

Wednesday: THE BEST DAY!!! Anna and I got a killer workout in. The sun was out and we felt so comfortable easing into our paces for those 6x800s. I am getting so excited for track workouts now which is weird. Anna is so motivating and having a friend with you just makes it so much easier. She came back to my house and I treated her with an awesome breakfast bowl I tried out a few days before. I got it from the Running on Veggies cookbook which I highly recommend: https://www.runonveg.com/book/

We hung out and brainstormed for a bit. It’s so hard being a nurse practitioner and having conflicting schedules but it makes the time we have to run/plan all the better.

Thursday: I nailed this post-work treadmill run. I don’t even know how. I had literally one of the worst days I have had in a while at work. Overwhelmed with patients, I walked into 3 different shitshows, and at the end of the day, my admission looked terrible. I think I just took all of that negative energy and repurposed it. Got on the tread and finished 4 miles after work which is UNHEARD OF for me. Training with a partner is truly working!!

Friday: Rest day – I wasn’t feeling it. I was ready to get home, eat and get to sleep. I was super nervous about my tempo run the next day so I leaned into my headspace and took a breather.

Saturday: 10 mile tempo – 5 mile warm up, 2 miles at ~ 7:00 pace, 3 miles warm down.

I was determined today. I have not been running on flats and the weather for my long runs have just sucked. I took this one to a flat river run and wow the weather was perfect. My “easy” was one minute faster than I usually run and my heart rate still stayed down. I got to the 2 mile tempo and I just took off. 6:50 and 7:05 for the two miles!!!!! I am getting so motivated and excited for the races coming up. I thought I could get away without fuel but that was the wrong thing to do. I felt a bit woozy at the end so slammed a bar I brought with me. Standardly, if I am running any more than 45 minutes I bring fuel. Either way, I felt like a total badass.

My recovery after this was spending the entire evening with my immediate family. I haven’t seen them since the holidays and we had the best weekend. We had so much food and just laughed all day. It was the best emotional recovery. I turned my brain off and just hugged my nieces until they were blue in the face 🙂

Sunday: 50 degrees yesterday and 3 inches of snow today. This weather shows no mercy. Training in the winter is unreal. I feel prepared for any weather that comes my way in April. I did a backwoods run in my hometown in New Jersey.  I’ve talked about Strava before but I’ll bring it up again. It is so useful if you are traveling and can’t find a running route. If you go to the “Maps” and then “Routes” option you can put in your location and find running routes people have saved. I did some nice easy 5 miles in the light snow and it was wonderful. Awesome week!

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A Day in the life!

A Typical Day:

Anna: Arrive to work around 0515/0530 am. Attempt to speed review patients’ events from the night. Rounding starts at 7:45/8 am I will present on 8 ICU patients. The other nurse practitioner or physican assistant I’m rounding with will present on another 8 . We will end rounding around at 2 or 3 pending any major interruptions of rounds (interruptions being, ya know,  small things like patients coding, self extubations, urgent admissions, etc.). Depending on how many procedures we need to do should we attempt to get a little food down our throats or try and get something done then attempt eating. 

Did I drink water today? I filled up my 1L water bottle at the start of my shift, drank half and now is the time to finish and refill.

I attempted to snack during rounds but #covid has made snacking while rounding slightly less acceptable while rounding outside patient rooms. I leave the hospital around 7:30/8 , when I get home I always make sure to have a large glass of water and eat some dinner.

Jess: I arrive at work around 5:45-6am and immediately hit the ground running.  I host anywhere between 6-12 patients across the floors/ICUs.  RAPID rounding happens from 6:15-7:00 with the surgery residents where I perform assessments, make care plans, put out any fires, and prep for admissions/discharges. Then I round again [typically multiple times throughout the day – yes, very efficient 🙁 ] with the attendings.  Between the hours of 8am-9:30am is when I bang out as many notes as I can and then prioritize the discharges. 9:30am-10:30am is when I round with the bedside nurses where I make the plan of care for the day.  Immediately after that I get in touch with physical therapy to prioritize my patients who need to be discharged. Did I eat? Did I drink water? Who knows… but wait! My first admission is already on the way from the PACU at 10:45! And then two other patients need to be discharged and need their meds delivered from the pharmacy.  Then a rapid response happens and my whole day is interrupted.  Then an ER admission with COVID needing emergent surgery on an ischemic limb.  I’m typically always keeping snacks in my pocket and eating on the go. I’m always setting alarms on my phone to remind myself to drink water too.  By 2-3pm I have a break and update discharge documents and then round again independently on my patients to ensure my care plans have been carried out [sometimes these rounds take longer because I can finally do my favorite thing – talk to my patients one on one and get to really know them :)]. 6pm I sign out to the night resident and usually chug a water as I’m walking out the door, especially if I’m trying to squeeze in a post work run or strength workout.

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