KT:Kenpo and nutrition

[Clark Kent]

Kenpo and nutrition
By KenpoVzla - 06-01-2009 09:52 PM
Originally Posted at: KenpoTalk
====================

Just wondering if Mr. Parker ever mentioned anything about nutrition for a martial artist. I know that this is not what Kenpo is about, but just curious anyway as I like to learn anything I can about nutrition (not to call it diets because that will lead us to somewhere else!), or also if you teach your students anything related to nutrition.

My sensei used to tell me things here an there, mostly on what to eat when a tournament was close or before an intense training. But I'm not sure if these were his own ideas or they were passed down from his instructor Oscar Gonzalez which was a student from Ed Parker.

...also as side anecdote, I remember one time during one of those "before class ends talks", my sensei was talking about what to eat and such and then he suddenly asked a couple of his students what they had eaten for lunch. I wasn't expecting for him to ask me, but he did all the sudden and I immediately said "a hamburger!" which was true and I was just being honest, or call it an instinctive response.
Anyway, the look from my kenpo friends and sensei left me feeling pretty embarassed...That shameful look of "You eat a hamburguer and then come train Kenpo???"...something along those lines . The irony of it is that I do try to eat healthy most of the times, this was just bad timing.

Jose Garcia


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[Xinglu]

*Disclaimer* Before I step into this, I want to explain where I'm coming from. I have a MS in Nutrition, what I say here is my opinion not a prescription or diagnosis and is intended as educational only. This opinion comes from eastern medical philosophy, not western medical philosophy. I in no way mean to imply that the eastern methodology is superior to the western, but I present it here because that is my area of profession and in my personal opinion I feel it is better suited for martial artists. */disclaimer*

Nutrition is the foundation for just about everything else your body does, what you eat nourishes your xue and qi (blood and vital energy) or damages it. We should each seasonally in a manner that balances the wuxing (5 phases) and strengthens the organs associated with the wuxing.

The martial diet cannot be the same from person to person, as each body has different patterns or excess and deficiency and one students training is always different from another depending upon their personal strengths and weaknesses. It also differs based on the goals of the student as well.

The short answer here is that there is no cookie cutter answer. Also, MOST instructor don't give dietary advice because they are unqualified to, and in some states (not all), you can be prosecuted for practicing medicine without a license if you do so (which is why there are things like RD's running around).

Good question BTW.

 

[Flying Crane]

I think that back in the 1950s, 60s, and even 70s, nutrition was probably not something that people needed to think extra hard about. Home-cooked meals were prepared with real food and were probably much more nutritious than what many people are eating today. Fewer people ate out at fast food joints, and fewer foods were heavily processed and packaged around quick convenience.

Now, it's all speed, convenience, and heavily processed and pre-packaged food. Most of it has questionable, at best, nutritional value. Much of it has been so heavily processed that it's hard to even call it food anymore.

We've got entire generations now growing up in the West, who have no understanding whatsoever about what nutrition is, or even what real food is.

Nowadays, it seems more appropriate to ask questions about nutrition. I think a few decades ago, it just wasn't necessary to ask these questions. Most people understood it, because they had been raised in an environment where good cooking and eating habits were more the norm.

I suspect that if some people from the 1950s could be brought forward in a time machine and dropped down on today's date, they'd look at questions like this and think that we must all be fools, or insane.

 

[Xinglu]

This reminds me of a study done a few years ago. Back in the 50's when nutrition was first being measured in fruits and vegetables they measured the nutrient content on select farms and in the food grown on them. A Few years ago they redid the analysis using one of the same farms. They discovered that the soil had significantly less nutrients and that the fruit showed 55% less nutrients then those studies in the 50s.

The point is, even home cooked meals are less nutritious then they used to be, because modern farming with all of it's chemicals destroys the nutrients in the soil. The less in the soil, the less in the plant.

Addressing the point you are making though, Chinese masters have typically been very well training in TCM, so they did teach their students about nutrition.