If you like sweets, read this...

I usually eat healthy. Many crave sweets (simple carbohydrate snacks) . I prefer nutrient dense foods like, salad, lean protein, nuts, sprouted wheat bread, and fruit. These foods make me feel , peppy, energized, mentally sharp, and emotionally calm.

 I'm not a nutrition Nazi, I swear.  Seeing sweets makes me want to indulge a little. Sometimes a lot. I'm a former  ice cream and chocolate consumer . 10-15 minutes of euphoria quickly turns into , irritability, anxiety , and low energy. Basically I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck ! Several glasses of cold water help to revive me. 

 How does sugar affect you ? If you process sugar better than I do, you’re lucky. The average American eats 152 lbs of added sugar ( not created by nature), a year. I know…it’s hard to avoid sugar totally since it’s in just about every processed food.

Eating too much sugar can affect your tennis game and your life. Simple sugars , found in white flour, candy, and soda do provide quick energy , but you do crash fast. Your energy level plummets, and sluggishness follows.

I’ve found eating complex sugars (whole grains, pasta, fruits) help maintain better energy level .
The USDA recommends 40 grams of added sugar or less per day.

Check out sugar content ( from fitsugar.com). Wow!! Might actually be able to stay within daily limits

Slice of chocolate cake 30 g

1 oz. Dagoba organic dark chocolate 12 g

1 chocolate chip cookie 7 g

6 Oreo cookies 20 g

1 Starbucks chocolate hazelnut biscotti 10 g

1 Krispy Kreme glazed donut 13

20 plain M&Ms 9 g

1/2 cup serving of vanilla ice cream 21 g

10 oz. Coffee with 1 packet of sugar 2.8 g

12 oz. Coca Cola 39 g

12 oz. ginger ale 32.4 g

12 oz. Sprite 38 g

Quick ways to evaluate sugar content:

*Sugar should be the 4^th listed ingredient , not the first. 

*Under the carbohydrate section, compare sugar grams (carbs from sugar)  to carbohydrate grams (carbs if there were no sugar added)  

Carbs should outnumber sugar carbs by at least 3 to 1.

HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup)

Found research that this yucky ingredient (found in most processed foods) actually leaves you hungry. That’s true and I can relate to this, so stay away !!!.

 No problem for me since it also makes me ill.

Davis Cup facts

Last weekend the first round of Davis Cup, 2012 was played. Basically, a country takes its top male pros and forms a team. 5 matches are played using 4 different players. There are 2 singles matches, a doubles match, and 2 reverse singles match (same players compete but swap singles opponents).

The Davis Cup started in 1900, and is now the world’s largest annual international team competition. This year's event takes place over 4 weekends (February 10-12 First Round, April 6–8 Quarterfinals, Sept 14–16 Semifinals, November 16–18  Final .130 nations entered in 2011.The World Group has the top 16 teams competing in knock out elimination.

The remaining teams are put into regional zone groups. Upon achieving good results, the lower teams can get future promotion into a higher Zone Group or The World Group. The US has won 32 titles and Australia 28. In 2011 Spain beat Argentina for the title. For many pros it is a national honor to play. They are financially compensated.

The world group has the following ranked teams:

1)  Spain 2) Serbia 3) Argentina 4) France 5) Czech Republic, 6) USA 7) Croatia, 8) Russia 9) Germany 10) Kazakhstan 11) Israel 12) Sweden 13) Italy, 14) Canada 15) Switzerland, 16) Austria.

Here is the draw: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Davis_Cup

After this weekend, Spain, Austria, France, USA, Czech Rep, Croatia, Serbia and Argentina,  all advanced to the quarterfinals ( played April 6th)

The US had a good 5-0 victory over Switzerland. Go USA!! They next face France in the quarterfinals, in April. Let’s keep our fingers crossed!!

Prepared to fail

Sorry for not posting in a while. This nasty 7 day head cold has got the best of me.

I want to address fear of failure.

Ever had an experience where you’ve trained for a particular “crisis” and you know what the “appropriate response” is?  

You’re not 100% confident using this “appropriate” tool, so you resort to the old familiar, “safe” way of handling things.

The “safe” way makes you feel comfortable & secure.  But , “safe” is not getting the successful results anymore.

As the “crisis” unfolds, you're coming in second. A last attempt at the “appropriate response” is made. Now it is just too late. The damage has already been done.

 Last week Nicolas my 10 year old, played a 2 hour "crisis" match.

Gabe his opponent had the same playing style as Nicolas. Ten to thirty moon ball rallies were the norm. Gabe won the first set 6-3 in this manner, it became clear that he was the better pusher.

 In the second set Nicolas out hit Gabe using consistency and angles to go up 5-0. Nicolas then gets less aggressive.  The whole match, he is unwilling to take  high moon balls out of the air, and finish the point at net, using his overhead & volleys.

We’ve gone over this particular “put away” script many times. Nicolas has used it successfully in other matches.

Gabe fights back to 5-5. Nicolas starts being more aggressive and after a few unlucky points, looses the game to go down 5-6. In the final game Nicolas is pounding the ball from the back, and Gabe is in the corner moon balling back. This unfolds point after point.  Nicolas makes attempts to be more aggressive but is unwilling to exercise his “put away” game and eventually looses 5-7.

In tennis and life the right decision will, take you out of your comfort zone. Fear of failure, prevents us from making that decision, even though we know in our head it is the right one. At least from a strategic point, there will be no regrets for the looser.