Chia Head

I have been read­ing the book Born to Run over the past few days and have been absolutely mes­mer­ized with all that I’m dis­cov­er­ing in it. One of the “learn­ings” (quotes because the rea­sons aren’t new, just hit­ting home through the run­ning topic of the book) is that so many of the top ultra­run­ners eat liv­ing food (unprocessed) and are veg­e­tar­i­ans. I work best — actu­ally, I kind of only work — when I have a clear goal that I am work­ing towards. Some­thing that excited me and is a bit of a chal­lenge. The goal that excites me to no end right now is becom­ing an ultra­dis­tance trail run­ner. I’ll start with becom­ing a trail run­ner, but I would love to be able to run the long distances.

Read­ing about the Tarahu­mara Indi­ans in the Sierra Madre moun­tains of Mex­ico in the won­der­ful and eye-opening book Born to Run has added fuel to the fire burin­ing inside of me, the desire to run. Learn­ing in the book that evo­lu­tion­ary biol­ogy research has shown that we evolved to be run­ners, not walk­ers, and that is why we sur­vived and the Nean­derthals faded into extinc­tion, has helped remind me of how much I loved to run. While I was hik­ing in the Alps I’d bound down the moun­tains, jump­ing off of the rocks, like a moun­tain goat. I used to love climb­ing to the top of the peaks in the Sierra Moun­tains in Cal­i­for­nia. And I enjoyed hik­ing some of the rim trail around Mt. Rainier, run­ning as often as I could. The book has also helped me regain a con­vic­tion to eat a much more healthy diet.

To that end, I went to Whole Foods last night and bought some ground chia seed, the pow­er­food for the run­ning Tarahu­mara indi­ans. I made a pro­tein shake last night with soy milk, soy pro­tein pow­der, a banana, a cou­ple frozen straw­ber­ries, and a table­spoon of ground chia seed. It was quite good! The chia seeds smell a lit­tle like wheat grass and add a slight grassy taste to the shake, but I liked it. The fresh scent made it feel like I was drink­ing liv­ing good­ness — I could imag­ine the power being absorbed into my blood and mus­cles with every sip, and whiff. This morn­ing I added a table­spoon of the ground chia seeds to my bowl of Opti­mum brand blue­berry cereal, with a few table­spoons of non­fat plain yogurt. The taste of the chia seed was stronger in the cereal than the shake, but it was kind of sweet, so ok. Not bad at all, actually.

I have yet to try mak­ing the “chia fesca” that the Tarahu­mara indi­ans drink when they go on long runs. Appar­ently, to make it you just mix the chia seeds in water and let sit for about 30 min­utes, then add some lime juice and drink it down. Once I start run­ning again, I’ll try tak­ing the chia fresca on the trails with me.

The chia is loaded with tons of vit­a­mins and min­er­als, includ­ing Omega 3/6. It’s sup­posed to also help with diges­tion because it slows down the absorb­tion of sugar into the blood stream. It also helps the body retain water. All of these are excel­lent prop­er­ties for run­ning fuel, of course. I can’t wait to give it a try.

Have you tried chia seed in any form? Have you noticed any pos­i­tive results?

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