Ed McCaffrey (52:26)
Well, I think as a pro athlete and you know, even before that in high school and college, I always. Your body's your temple, right? That's what you're going to battle with. Football's a tough physical collision sport and you need to be at your best if you want to play at a high level. So even in high school, you know, I tried to do what was right. I don't know if you guys remember, you know, Weeders weight gainer, but I would take like, you know, the Weeders protein in the Weeder's weight gain or not knowing what I was doing necessarily. That was one of the few products out at the time. And I would load it with peanut butter. I was drinking raw eggs like Rocky. I was trying to do all the things I thought I was supposed to do right. So it was important to me. But I might, maybe I wasn't as informed then in height. In college, you know, they tried to move me to tight end multiple times. And today tight end would be a great position at the time at Notre Dame and Michigan, you're blocking, right? You're blocking DMS for most of the game. And I'm thinking it's a little more fun to play wide receiver. So I really had to lose weight and I had to go from about 238. I got down to 224 when I showed up at Stanford. And then they tried to still try to move me to tight end. So I got down to 197. So. So that was probably not a healthy weight for me. But I learned about, you know, tracking my grams of protein, carbohydrates and fats, staying hydrated, you know, eating high protein foods. A lot of times they were not very tasty foods. You know, you're eating very low fat or non fat turkey and chicken and cutting the carbs and not eating any desserts and then monitoring your calories. So I. And then working out like crazy four or five hours a day. So I did that to get an incredible shape, probably, you know, 3 to 4% body fat at the time, but I was probably too skinny. So, you know, I erred on the heavy side, aired on the light side. And eventually I just came to the conclusion that the best way to fuel yourself is to do it intelligently and with moderation. So for the most part, eat healthy foods if you can. Right? You know, five to six meals, believe it or not, spread out every two to four hours. Fruits and vegetables and healthy protein sources and minimal carbs and definitely low glycemic carbs if you're going to eat them. And then unfortunately, like, we can't all walk around. Some. Some pro athletes do, right, with their own chef. Not everybody has their own chef. Not everybody can walk around with Tupperware, with all their chicken and turkey that's cooked up for them and eat that, you know, four or five times a day. So it's really important to have some kind of additional food intake when you're on the go. And that's why we came up with our protein bites. And so they're super healthy plant based protein, low calorie, high protein. Again, very easy to digest if you're gonna, you know, take them before a sport or at halftime or post game. And, and the timing of your food intake is important as well, in addition to what you're eating. So, you know, if you're an athlete especially, but really anybody, you don't really want to go more than four hours without eating. I know people will debate that, but you start converting food to fat, if you go too long without eating, your body goes into starvation mode. So you don't need to consume huge meals five times a day, but you do need to consume something to keep your body balanced and so that you have ongoing energy. So that's why the protein bites can be, you know, I eat them at least once or twice a day, usually before lunch and dinner. When you go through that long stretch, you start feeling hypoglycemia, you start getting tired. If you're in class, if you're at work, you know, that low you hit in the middle of the afternoon, that's where they come in really handy for me. But I've also substituted them for a dessert because they taste really good. But I mean, that nutrition's always been important to me. You know, if we want to go further back, I think the time that was really a difficult time for me in terms of weight was when I was in little league before I got moved to offense and defensive line because I was a big kid, wasn't really fat, but I was a big kid. I got put on pretty much the Atkins diet. I was eating hot dogs and sauerkraut. That's what I had for almost the whole football season. And it was crazy, I mean, because I had to make weight. And then I remember my coach and family, they'd all be waiting with like candy bars and all this other kind of delicious food after the weigh in. Because in Pop Warner you weigh in every week. But by that time, you know, you're so starving you can barely even eat candy. It'll make your stomach ill. And so after going through about a year and a half of that, I remember my parents tried to use a little verse psychology on me and they said, you know, what if you don't want to make weight, then go ahead, eat whatever you want. And I took them at their word and I ate whatever I wanted. And I showed up about 15 pounds overweight the next week. And my coach, who I think was trying to Jerry rig the scale, was just shocked. He's like, what? The scale can't be right. And it was right, no matter. There was no amount of Jerry rig in that scale that was going to get me to make weight. So then I was the kid who sat for the rest of the season. I'm on the sideline with my jersey turned inside out because I couldn't play. I played the last game of the season because they let all the heavy kids play. It didn't make weight, but I mean. So Even as an 8 and 9 year old, I started to become aware of the fuel that I put into my body, and I wanted to make sure we're moving forward. I continue to try to learn more and more about proper nutrition, and it becomes increasingly important the further you progress as an athlete. But it's really important for everybody. It affects people's moods. Any parent knows that their kids, right, they're. When they act up, they're usually, what, tired, they didn't get enough sleep or they're hungry because they went too long without eating or. And. Or they ate, you know, bad foods that made them. Made their stomach upset. Or today there's so many allergies out there, they eat something that they had an intolerance to. So it's always been important for me. It's important for my wife. Lisa, who was a college. College athlete is important for our kids.
