Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Emergency Rations and nutrition

One side of refereeing that I don't think I have covered well up to now is what to eat while at the games. When you have a 4 game set or something like that, you are bound to get hungry. While I try my best to arrange to have a cooler with a sandwich and such, many times I have come to a field and don't have enough to eat so I had been racking my brain to figure out something that can stay in the trunk of my car for a long time in case I need something to eat and drink and don't have enough with me. Kind of like an emergency stash of some sorts.

The other requirement is that it has to be able to withstand cold and heat. Originally I had energy bars. And they worked fine if it was 70 degrees and cloudy, but would become rock solid if it was 40 degrees out and would melt if it was 90 degrees out.

So this is what I have come up with as emergency rations to have in the trunk of a car for those days when you just need something in your tummy:

-Bottled water (duh!) - Even though experts do not recommend plastic bottles that have been heated up by the sun too much because of the toxins that can seep from plastic to water, it still makes the most sense to have a case of water.

- Canned nuts - They don't seem to be affected too much from cold or heat and provide some nutrition like the energy bars but without the melting factor. I found cans of peanuts at Walmart for $1 each. They are perfect because they fill you up with just a couple.

- Saltines - For when you need something else other than peanuts. They shouldn't go bad too easily, or stale that quickly if they are in the stay-fresh packs.

As a side benefit, both salted peanuts and saltines have some sodium that you are losing via sweat, so it compliments water quite well. This mini list works well for me in this region of the country, where there is cold and heat to deal with. Those in Florida or Barrow, AK might have other recommendations.

What do you have as emergency rations should you be called at the last minute to a field?

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