We’ve talked about nutrition for dancers before, but there is a lot to say. Today, we’re going to look at the basics on an important topic: carbohydrates.

Carbo-Phobia

Recent diets–Atkins, South Beach, and others–have caused people, including dancers, to fear

carbohydrates. Depending on where you get your nutritional advice, you might have learned that carbohydrates are the enemy of fitness. But this isn’t true, especially for dancers.

If you’re afraid of carbs, it’s time to get the right facts.

What are Carbohydrates Anyway?

Carbohydrates are energy. When you eat carbohydrates, your body creates glucose (blood sugar) from those carbs. Glucose is a sugar that gets stored in your muscles as glycogen, and glycogen is your muscles’ main energy source.

Without carbohydrates, you won’t have enough glycogen to produce energy. Without energy, you won’t dance well.

“Good Carbs”

Nutrition gets confusing when we use words like “good” and “bad” to talk about foods. It’s nearly impossible to classify any single food as entirely bad. But, because most people talk about “good” and “bad” carbs, we’ll use the same terms. Just remember that proper nutrition is about moderation.

“Good” carbohydrates are more correctly called “complex carbohydrates.” They are “complex” because their chemical structure is made up of three or more sugars that are linked together. To break down a complex carbohydrate, your body splits the linked sugars apart. This happens during digestion, and it’s a time consuming process.

Because your body slowly breaks down a complex carbohydrate and slowly turns those sugars into glycogen, a complex carbohydrate gives your muscles a stable, long-lasting source of energy. And because you don’t get a huge dose of glycogen all at once, your muscles can use up more of the glycogen as it’s made.

With complex carbohydrates, you don’t end up with a lot of extra glycogen. This is good, because at some point, your body begins storing extra glycogen as fat. With complex carbohydrates, glycogen is used more efficiently, and less ends up as fat.

You can find complex carbohydrates in potatoes, dry beans, peas, brown rice, pasta, corn, lentils, oatmeal, many vegetables, and whole grains.

“Bad Carbs”

When people talk about “bad” carbohydrates, they’re usually talking about “simple carbohydrates.”

Simple carbohydrates include sugars that are naturally found in foods (fruits, vegetables, and milk products all naturally include sugars). Simple carbohydrates also include sugar (like table sugar) that is added to food during processing and refining. When foods have added, refined sugars, the food itself usually contains fewer nutrients. (The topic of “sugars” requires a conversation all its own. For now, we’ll stay focused on carbohydrates.)

Simple carbohydrates are called “simple,” because your liver quickly breaks them down and turns them into glycogen for energy. Soon after you eat, the glycogen is available. If you don’t use the glycogen (by using energy) your body will store it in your muscles as an energy reserve. The problem is that your muscles can only store so much glycogen. When they can’t absorb any more, your body turns the glycogen into fat. And that is why carbohydrates get a bad name.

Spotting Simple Carbohydrates

You can tell if your favorite snack contains simple carbohydrates. Just read the label.

Look for any of the following ingredients: brown sugar, corn sweetener, corn syrup, dextrose, fructose, fruit juice concentrates, glucose, high-fructose corn syrup, honey, invert sugar, lactose, maltose, malt syrup, molasses, raw sugar, sucrose, sugar, syrup. These simple carbohydrates are very common.

If your food contains any of those ingredients, pay attention to where it’s listed on the label. If your granola bar lists “corn syrup” as the first ingredient, then it’s a main ingredient in your snack, and that’s not great. But if “corn syrup” is listed last, then it might only be present in small amounts.

So How Many Carbs Are Enough?

Since carbohydrates are basically energy, you can figure out how many carbs you need each day by taking a look at your activity level. Consider the following guidelines for dancers from the International Association for Dance Medicine (IADMS).

Carbohydrates should make up about 55-percent to 60-percent of a dancer’s diet. During times of heavy training, a dancer’s carbohydrate intake should increase to about 65-percent.

55-60-percent. That’s easy to remember, right? But, how do you figure out the amount of carbohydrates in your diet? Is your diet made up of 30-percent carbs? 50-percent? 80-percent?

Carbohydrate Calculations for Your Body

Follow these steps to calculate the number of carbs you should eat. Don’t worry–the

math is easy.

Example:

I’m a dancer with a daily recommended calorie intake of 2,000 calories. (We’re going to use 2,000 because it’s a simple number. We will cover the issue of finding out how many calories you need in another post.)

I want to follow the IADMS recommendation and make sure that 60-percent of my 2,000-calorie diet comes from carbohydrates.

Step 1: Find 60-Percent of 2,000

To find 60-percent of 2,000, I multiply 2,000 by 0.60

2000 x 0.60 = 1200

This means that 1,200 calories of my total 2,000 calories should come from carbohydrates.

Step 2: Figure out how many grams of carbohydrates I need

Carbohydrates are measured in grams. When you read a food label, you will see how many grams of carbohydrates are in each serving of a food.

There are 4 calories in each gram of a carbohydrate, whether it’s a simple carbohydrate or a complex carbohydrate.

To figure out how many grams of carbohydrates I should eat, I need to divide 1200 (the total number of calories I need from carbohydrates) by 4 (the total calories in each gram of carbohydrate).

1200 / 4 = 300

Final Answer:

As a dancer who wants 60-percent of my 2,000-calorie diet to come from carbohydrates, I should eat 300 grams of carbohydrates each day.

Why All the Commotion Over Carbs?

Dancers need energy. Period. Without it, you will have low muscle glycogen levels, and you won’t perform well. Your practices will suffer, and your performances won’t have power.

If you’re feeling sluggish, tired, or shaky during practices, take a look at your carbohydrate intake. If you’re severely restricting your carbohydrates, that might be why you don’t have enough energy. Try following the IADMS recommendations, and see if your performance improves.

Remember that your body is your tool. Take care of it. To learn more about carbohydrates and nutrition, check out any of the following sources:

• “Fueling the Dancer: Fact Sheet” by IADMS
• Carbohydrates by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention
• Calculating Your Carbohydrate Needs by LifeClinic
• Carbohydrates for Athletes