I want to preface this blog entry first of all by claiming, I am not a doctor, nutritionist or anything to do with medical. The closet I have gotten to studying nutrition is taking non-major biology and food and people (where we did not eat-go figure). What I am is a female competitive (alright DII) runner. There is something that has been on my mind lately and that is the occurrence of eating disorders in distance runners.
According to the Alliance for Eating Disorder awareness, 1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder. 90% of those are between the ages of 12 and 25. Up to 19% of college aged women in America are bulimic. Bulimia often occurs in athletes such as gymnasts, wrestlers, dancers, horse jockeys, football players, and runners. 2% - 5 % of the American population experience Binge Eating Disorder. These statistics are a bit frightening. Basically, every fifth woman you meet is wrestling with some sort of eating disorder. So I suppose it is not surprising that sometimes when I line up, I feel like I am the only one feeling out my spandex shorts.
There is so much pressure in society in general to look like the models on the cover of the magazines. You would think that being an athlete would make us exempt from this pressure, we know that a body should look healthy. There is a pressure to look like the athletes in that sport. My younger sister who is naturally thin is trying to put on weight so she looks like a soccer player and not to get shoved off the ball as much. As a runner, we are expected to look fast which happens to be thin and lean. Sprinters and even middle distance runners have more upper body strenght and larger muscles while distance runners look leaner. It is not just in the head’s of the athletes, they might not know what they are doing but others such as teammates, spectators and even coaches will comment on how much faster the athlete looks.
Most of us know that everyone has a weight that they race better in. Take for example, Lance Armstrong weighs a certain amount before he starts a grand tour and he weighed significantly less this year than he did when he was retired. I have a friend who cannot beat her PRs from high school but all during high school she battled anorexia. Thinner does not mean faster. The body needs some type of fuel to function and eventually without it, the body will fail. Knowing that you run better at 100 pounds compared to 105 can put pressure on an athlete to weigh a certain weight.
Then there is the meaning that we attach to foods. Salads are good foods and cookies are bad foods. We begin to think that there is no way we can eat the bad foods. When in reality, as my food and people Professor puts it, “There are no bad foods just bad diets”. My high school coach always hammered into our heads that “everything is ok in moderation”. One cookie will not make you a minute slower.With all these different pressures it is easy to fall into some form of an eating disorder.
Of course, there is another side of this. Many runners tend to be slight; our bodies were just not made for ball sports. Many of us could be considered runts of a litter. I will use myself as an example; I have always been in the 90% for weight and height. I have never weight more then 106. 106 was when I was out for an injury for over a month. So when my weight is around 102, I know I am normal. During the season, it is not unusual for me to get to 100. But my BMI is healthy. I just eat when I am hungry and try not to pay much attention to what the scale says. It frustrates me sometimes when I see comments on running boards about girls needing to eat a candy bar or that they have an eating disorder. They might not; it might be how they are built.
My point is not to make assumptions either way. If you are a coach or parent or have anyone in your life that is a runner just make sure that they are eating correctly. As a runner, one needs to know how and what to eat. There are plenty of books on the subject. If you see drastic changes in a way a teammate eats ask why. I eat most meals with at least one of my teammates and if we notice that someone does not have enough food on a plate or is lacking protein, vegetables or carbohydrates, we point it. We make sure that each others is healthy so that they can perform at their best. Eating disorders are a real problem and not something that happens to people we do not know.
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