Not the kind of diet we’re used to reading about, Olympian swimming champion Michael Phelps downs a massive 12,000 calories a day.
The world champion could begin a career in competitive eating next. Phelps balances his massive diet with a five hours-a-day, six days-a-week exercise regime. Thanks to the New York Post, we have Phelps’ daily menu below. No, he doesn’t choose from this, he eats it all.
None of us mind taking out the cereal or making a bit of scrambled egg for our man in the morning, but imagine putting all this together.
Breakfast:
Three fried-egg sandwiches loaded with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, fried onions and mayonnaise.
Two cups of coffee.
One five-egg omelette.
One bowl of oats.
Three slices of French toast topped with powdered sugar.
Three chocolate chip pancakes.
Ok, time for a snooze. But no, he motors on and lunch offers him:
One pound of enriched pasta
Two large cheese and ham sandwiches with mayonnaise on white bread.
Energy drinks worth 1,000 calories.
I can feel my stomach pleading with me. “Enough is enough!!”
But the evening meal has yet to be had, and for it Phelps dines on:
One pound of pasta.
A pizza.
More energy drinks to add another 2,000 calories.
Michael Phelps, the owner of 22 Olympic medals-the most decorated Olympian of all time.
Sports medicine doctor Mark Klion does the basic maths and says that an athlete like Phelps, who is constantly exercising up a storm, has to worry about eating enough to replenish the mounds of calories he has burned, not the opposite.
Klion says on first glance the foods don’t even seem healthy, but because of Phelps’ caloric demands, he can probably eat whatever he wants to. Klion also makes the point of if it is necessary for Phelps to eat so much, it may as well be food he likes.
Well, all we can say is the supermarketing would be an absolute nightmare.
