Protein Challenge: Week 1 Update

There's a lot more of this in my future. #eatbeef

So for the past 7+ days I have been journaling my food intake to keep track of how much protein I consume on a daily basis. I thought as a meatatarian, I would have absolutely no problem eating 30 grams of protein at every meal, for a total of 90 grams daily.

Boy, was I wrong.

Turns out, breakfast is difficult. Like, really difficult. Even on a protein-heavy day I may only be getting about 20 grams at breakfast, another 15-20 at lunch and then I am trying to amp it up at dinner to meet the 90 (and I'm falling short, often). But I have come to some cool conclusions, thus far:

1 - I am not craving snacks in the middle of the afternoon like I used to before starting the #proteinchallenge. I chalk this up to my increased protein keeping me feeling fuller, longer.
2 - I have gone running seven times since I started the challenge and I can honestly say that I'm running faster than normal. To be clear, I'm not cutting 30 seconds off of my average mile pace but I am noticing that my usual average of 8:45 per mile is now a lot closer to 8:37. I know, you're saying "whoopty do - 8 seconds/mile no big deal." But if you stretch that 8 seconds out over 13 miles it comes out to almost two minutes off of a half marathon! And I even ran at that faster pace while I was in Denver this week, where it was MUCH hillier and the air is a lot thinner (i.e. less oxygen) than in Kansas.
3 - We are running out of yogurt, string cheese and eggs a LOT more quickly than normal.

So, I'm really looking forward to the next 20 days of the challenge and I hope to be able to keep this lifestyle and diet change going long after the challenge is over.

If you want to sign up, you can EASILY do so by clicking here. The challenge is 30 days, starting from the day you sign up. So you could start today, next Thursday or even in mid-May and it would run for the following 30 days.

Who out there is also doing the Protein Challenge? How are you feeling?

Until next time,
~ Buzzard ~