First off friend, 15 pounds is amazing and life changing. It's incredibly hard. Every single pound is an accomplishment worth celebrating because let's face it, it's a hell of a lot more fun gaining weight than losing weight.
As for your question, that has actually changed quite a bit over 3.5 years. In the beginning, it was purely about my heart because I didn't want to die. Now if I could only track one thing, it would be protein volume and amino acid profiles versus the intersection of raw athletic performance and recovery time. If I want to set a PB, I can usually hack that with nutrition. If I want to increase my weekly mileage, I can always hack that with nutrition. But at this point, I can only do one of the two (or else I poop my pants).
Edit - I forgot the most important question. My two favourite baseball teams are the New York Yankees and whoever is playing the Boston Red Sox. :)
Edit 2 - I wish that I was joking when I said 'or else I poop my pants' but I'm not.
Edit 3 - If I just wanted to create a baseline for how fit I am, I would likely use either burpees per minute or perhaps how far I can walk on my hands. Walking on my hands is a very good predictor of everything from swimming to running performance. Or maybe I'd use how many pukers I can bang out in two minutes? A single puker is one chin up followed by one burpee, both with perfect form. If I ever want to train people, I should come up with a better name than a puker but hey, I talk about pooping my pants on HN so what have I got to hide?? :)
My cholesterol was extraordinarily high when I was in the hospital so lowering that was a major priority. Consequently, I started going more plant based. At this point, my diet is primarily plant based.
This has worked very well for me, but I've had to seriously up my knowledge of nutrition, particularly around the concept of whole proteins. A whole protein contains nine essential amino acids. My body performs and recovers best if I plan my daily nutrition around between .75 and 1.0 g of whole protein per pound of body weight (120 t0 160 g at my current weight).
As I get deeper into training, I'm starting to see some data about how timing of proteins impacts my performance. I used to use raw oats by themselves as a meal before short (up to 12k) runs and speed training. Raw oats are amazing but they don't have enough lysine to be considered a whole protein. Adding dried mangos to my raw oats or carrying some in my run bag completes that protein. I don't see immediate results from completing the protein, but I do see long term results from consistently not completing it. I don't have to complete a protein every single meal - in general, as long as I complete it within that day's nutrition, I'll be okay. But my body seems to recover faster if I complete proteins between pre-run and the end of my run.
Now, let's talk about branch chain amino acids. If I want to go longer than 12k or make significant gains in my weekly base, I perform and recover better if I add sources of leucine, isoleucine and valine before and after I exercise. Meals like brown rice, beans and tomatoes are excellent before/after a workout.
As I train my gut for longer races, I keep learning more about what works and what doesn't. With some luck, by this summer, my gut will be trained enough that I have more personal bests and no more personal bursts. To put it euphemistically, bad bad bad things happen if I'm running a long (90+ plus minute) hilly course, pre-load with rice and beans and then add glycogen via gels.
As for your question, that has actually changed quite a bit over 3.5 years. In the beginning, it was purely about my heart because I didn't want to die. Now if I could only track one thing, it would be protein volume and amino acid profiles versus the intersection of raw athletic performance and recovery time. If I want to set a PB, I can usually hack that with nutrition. If I want to increase my weekly mileage, I can always hack that with nutrition. But at this point, I can only do one of the two (or else I poop my pants).
Edit - I forgot the most important question. My two favourite baseball teams are the New York Yankees and whoever is playing the Boston Red Sox. :)
Edit 2 - I wish that I was joking when I said 'or else I poop my pants' but I'm not.
Edit 3 - If I just wanted to create a baseline for how fit I am, I would likely use either burpees per minute or perhaps how far I can walk on my hands. Walking on my hands is a very good predictor of everything from swimming to running performance. Or maybe I'd use how many pukers I can bang out in two minutes? A single puker is one chin up followed by one burpee, both with perfect form. If I ever want to train people, I should come up with a better name than a puker but hey, I talk about pooping my pants on HN so what have I got to hide?? :)