It’s midday on a Wednesday, and offensive guard John Wojciechowski, 280 pounds of well-muscled professional football player, is stoking up before practice. Is he devouring a side of beef? An extra-large pizza? No, this bear of a Chicago Bear is eating a turkeyburger.
And the Sunday morning before the Chicago Bears recent home game against the Los Angeles Raiders, there was not a pastry in sight at the team buffet at the Chicago Hilton & Towers, where the Bears are sequestered before each game at Soldier Field.
“The coaches want to keep sugar out of their diets before the game,” Hilton chef Jeff De Backer says. “It provides a temporary rush of energy, but then you have an opposite reaction. They want maximum utility from food as an energy source.”
Welcome to sports nutrition in the ’90s. In addition to the traditional X’s and O’s players face in learning plays, they are being asked to cope with a triangle-the Food Guide Pyramid, a graphic representation of the building blocks for an ideal diet. It’s built on a base of bread and grains, with fruits and vegetables recommended in large quantity daily. It contains far less fat, red meat and dairy products than most Americans-not only football players-consume.
The nutritionists who formulated the pyramid say that following it holds a promise of longer life and heightened daily alertness and performance.
All of this intrigues the Bears coaching staff, eager for a competitive edge wherever one can be found. Head coach Dave Wannstedt is a paid-up member of the “you are what you eat” school of health, as is his physical development coordinator, Russ Riederer.
Riederer, lean, well-muscled and intense with a military-style crew cut, looks the part of a fitness trainer. But it is only recently that in addition to banks of exercise machines a football coach would have a copy of the nutritionist’s tome, “Food Values,” on his desk and a collection of vitamin pills in the drawer.
“The players are professionals. They try to improve their performance in many ways and better nutrition is one of them,” Riederer says. “They don’t necessarily eat perfectly, but we try to guide them toward eating right, not just in training camp or before a game, but all year long.
“We want them to get plenty of calories. They burn those off. And we want them to consume food that’s easy to digest, that has less fat and more carbohydrates. It helps them do better in practice and during games and can improve their recovery rate from injuries.”
Another incentive, Riederer says, is the possibility that better diet may counter the high rate of death from heart disease among former players, which researchers have linked in part at least to excess weight and high-fat diets.
“They need weight to play,” Riederer says. “Football is a game of power. But we stress the relationship between weight and body fat. The key is balance, and we keep track of the players through the season to help them keep that balance.”
While former coach Mike Ditka supported Riederer’s initiatives in team feeding, Wannstedt, newly arrived this season, is said to be a cheerleader for it.
“He’s been tremendously supportive,” the Riederer says. “He understands body fat and the relationship between proper nutrition and performance.
De Backer, the Hilton’s executive sous chef, is in charge of feeding the team.
“The attention to the food has definitely increased with the new coach,” he says. “It used to be at the Saturday night buffet the players could eat whatever they wanted. Cheeseburgers and fries are still available, but the grease is out, excessive sugar is out. There are more vegetables and fruit. We’ve expanded the salad bar items too. I punch every recipe up in our computer to analyze the nutrition content.
“I make a spicy fried chicken that I fry at a higher temperature than usual to seal in the juices but minimize the time the chicken is in the fat. Then I drain it and it goes into the oven to bake the rest of the way. It’s not greasy at all when you eat it.
“The meat, fillet of beef, is cooked to medium-well. No sauce, just cooking juices. If you were served this in a restaurant, you’d probably shoot the chef.
“On Sunday, we make omelets with various fillings. They can have scrambled eggs, too, or go to the baked potato bar. But there is no more chili before the game. With pasta, if there is sauce, it will be tomato marinara, nothing with meat or cream and the desserts-cakes, pies, pastry, the help-yourself ice cream bar-are all gone. Instead there is a lot of fresh fruit.”
He lists some provisions provided for a typical Saturday Bears’ buffet. (Coaches and staff will increase the number of people eating to 60 to 65):
Six chafing dishes of lasagne, 200 pieces of chicken, 36 pounds of beef tenderloin, 45 cheeseburgers, 15 pounds of catfish. Add to this an unspecified amount of steamed broccoli and cauliflower (without sauce or butter), pasta and garden salads, and sliced fruit.
“We make tons of food,” De Backer says, “but the image of the players eating like the characters in `Animal House’ isn’t valid. They are very gentlemanly when they’re here. They eat more than normal quantities, but they don’t eat extravagantly. Not many are too interested, but it astounds me that they do know what they are eating. They are aware of the basic food groups, of what they are supposed to eat.
“There’s a check-off list to make sure they come to breakfast on game day. The timing is very strict. But it’s not prison. They have access to butter, sour cream and other condiments. Some of them actually need to gain a few pounds. But the customer’s not always right here. Before we make anything special, like waffles, I check with Russ or the coach to be sure it fits into the scheme.”
During the week, at the Lake Forest practice facility, most of the Bears are signed for the three-times-a-week lunches prepared to Riederer’s specifications by ARA Services at nearby Lake Forest College. One day earlier this month, an assortment of young men in various states of dress were eating turkeyburgers, pasta (with or without meatless tomato sauce) and a cakelike bread containing dried fruits that cornerback Maurice Douglass said “is my treat today.”
Riederer began the lunch program last season. The cost of lunch is deducted from each player’s paycheck. Previously, players were on their own for lunch, and fried chicken and pizza were frequently on the menu. No wonder, Riederer says, some of them were logy and unattentive at practice.
Not all the Bears revere the diet program. “If it’s there, I’ll eat it,” says tight end Keith Jennings. “My choice is Snickers bars.”
Bob Christian, the fullback who did his college eating at Northwestern University, took no sauce on his pasta.
Is this a super-strict diet? he is asked. “No,” he responds. “I’m not big on tomato sauce.”
He’s also “not crazy about” the recommended diet routine, and says, “I can’t tell the difference too much.” Then he adds, “I have to keep my weight up, but I do it mainly with carbohydrates (instead of steaks) because the body can only use so much protein at a time and the rest goes to fat.”
Douglass says the mid-week lunches “make your body feel better, less sluggish than when we used to eat ribs and pizza. You can’t have a 31-inch waist if you eat fast food.
“The guys may not admit it, but eating turkeyburgers and baked chicken gets a little old. I’ve made it a yearlong thing because eating healthy is in our best interest.
Says Wojciechowski: “Russ and the coach have talked to us about nutrition and I picked up some ideas of my own taking health classes in college. I think what they say about a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet makes sense. I’m a big chicken eater and like rabbit, which has a high-protein, low-fat content. They monitor our weight and body fat every week and that helps keep your mind on it. I’m not as religious about it as I should be, but I won’t eat a whole bag of potato chips like I did a few years ago.”
Here is the recipe for spicy chicken De Backer prepares for the Bears.
CHICAGO BEARS LOW-FAT SPICY CHICKEN
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 25 minutes
Yield: 8 pieces
1 chicken, cut into 8 pieces without skin
1 teaspoon each: chili powder, cayenne pepper, salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 cup safflower or corn oil for frying
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. If using whole chicken, cut it into serving pieces and remove skin and excess fat.
2. Combine the chili powder, cayenne and salt. Rub each pieces with this mixture. Sift the flour and paprika together, then coat the chicken pieces throughly.
3. Heat oil in a deep skillet or wok over medium-high heat until very hot (385 degrees). Add chicken in a single layer, working in 2 batches if necessary, and fry only until exterior of each piece is crisp and golden, about 5 minutes. Remove and place on a bed of paper towels to absorb surface oil.
4. Transfer chicken pieces to an ungreased baking pan. Bake until cooked through, about 20 minutes.
Nutritional information per piece: 204 calories, 15 g protein, 22.4 g carbohydrate, 5.6 g total fat, 29.4 mg cholesterol. Calories from protein, 30 percent; carbohydrates, 45 percent; fat, 25 percent.
