Diary of a champion: Instagram influencers, cheesecake and beating the men in training races
Hong Kong cyclist Ceci Lee is in Australia with her teammates preparing for the National Games. Here she talks about food as fuel and reward
I am sharing a room here in Perth with three of my teammates and when we get back after training, we rarely talk about cycling.
The main topics of conversation are the latest key opinion leaders on YouTube and Instagram, and what we are going to eat.
A lot of athletes are very enthusiastic about food. Firstly, what we put in our bodies is so closely aligned to our performance and recovery, but eating is one of our biggest pleasures too.
My diet does not change too much during a training block like this one. I get up at about 7.30am and have eggs and bread for breakfast, then we have our main training session from around 9am.
Most people in the squad will be competing on the road and track at the National Games, so we are switching our bike sessions between indoors and outdoors, on top of our gym work. In a regular week, I have more than 20 hours on the bike and roughly six hours in the gym.
After training, it’s time for recovery and massage, then we are all ready for lunch. I need protein and carbohydrates, so I keep it quite simple and have either chicken or steak with rice and vegetables.