At 6 feet 3 inches tall and 300 pounds, two-time Olympic champion Ryan Crouser needs a lot of food to fuel his quest for gold.
The shot put star, who won gold medals in his event at both Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020, needs to eat about 5,000 calories a day to maintain his size and strength.
A typical breakfast might consist of a five-egg omelet with cheese and a quarter pound of turkey sausage, followed by two servings of oatmeal and a cup of blueberries. For his two lunches, he eats a pound of lean ground beef or chicken and 12 ounces of rice. Dinner, meanwhile, he splits with his girlfriend.
“We follow a recipe for a family of four. She has one serving and I have the other three. A normal serving for most dinners is about 400 calories, so three servings gives me 1,200,” he says.
In short, Crouser is used to paying high grocery bills at his local Sam’s Club.
“It’s definitely going to be expensive. I’m on $200 to $250 a week just for myself,” he says. “The way I look at it is it’s a significant investment in my athletic performance.”
The current world record holder, who spoke to Make It while promoting his partnership with Thorne, doesn’t cut corners when it comes to buying the best ingredients he can. He’ll stick to organic, grass-fed beef, even if it costs him “30% to 40% more” than the alternative.
“If I get better quality food, I get better quality training,” he says. “I can say without a doubt that I train better and perform better. As an investment, it makes financial sense.”
As he hopes to take home gold again at the 2024 Paris Olympics, self-coached Crouser spoke to CNBC Make It about his approach to training for the Olympics.
The importance of setting ‘micro goals’
Matthias Hangst | Getty Images Sports | Getty Images
Crouser is now 31 and his body no longer recovers as well from the grueling workouts in the gym, on the track and on the track as it did in his early 20s.
“As you get older, the cards keep getting stacked against you,” he says. “Eventually, time will win.”
But Crouser has found new ways to keep improving, even if he has to adjust his attack plan. Instead of “going hard” every day, he has found ways to conserve his energy.
“Just because I can’t do that 700-pound squat today doesn’t mean I can’t put that energy into the technical side of things,” he says. “It’s about putting myself in a position where I can come back tomorrow and do the work over and over again.”
Crouser achieved his personal best last year, a feat he never thought possible as a youngster.
“If you had asked me at 24 or 25 if I thought I could still be breaking PRs at 30, I would have said, ‘No way, there’s no chance of that,’” he says.
At his age, Crouser doesn’t motivate himself by setting new records, but by setting smaller, achievable goals. Even if it’s just adding a few pounds to a lift, Crouser is giving himself something that’s not too far out of reach.
“[I set] those small goals and see that progress day after day, week after week, instead of thinking ‘I want to set a PR,’ he says. ‘Find those small victories when that big goal is getting harder and harder to achieve. Have enough of those small victories and you’ll get where you want to be, even if it seemed impossible when you started.’
How he battles burnout while chasing Olympic gold
Crouser won his first Olympic gold medal in Rio 2016.
Ryan Pierse | Getty Images Sports | Getty Images
Crouser says it can be tough to avoid burnout when you’re dieting, tracking your workouts, measuring your progress and pushing your body to the limit day in and day out.
“It’s easy to burn out and think, ‘Why am I doing this? What am I doing this for? I don’t like this,’” he tells Make It.
He tries to give himself one day a week to unplug and spend time outside, away from his training responsibilities. If that’s not enough to get his mind right, Crouser has a technique to get himself back on track.
“When I’m struggling with the mental aspect, I ask myself, ‘Well, what else would I do?'” he says. “I would be working in an office as a financial advisor. And I would much rather be doing this. It’s gotten me through a lot of trouble. [hard] time.”
Even when he’d really rather just stay on the couch and watch TV, Crouser tries to remind himself that if he weren’t an athlete, that wouldn’t be an option.
“The alternative is, if I’m not going to work out, I’m not going to sit on the couch and watch Netflix. I’m going to work in a cubicle,” he says. “I try to keep in perspective how lucky I am to do what I do and to have a job that I love.”
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