Eight hours in the gym, 12 hours asleep, and more protein than you can imagine.
Last updated on September 24th, 2024
20-year-old Olympic Champion Karlos Nasar has an absolutely bonkers weightlifting diet. Nasar, who won gold for Bulgaria at the 2024 Olympics in the 89-kilogram division, takes every aspect of his training and recovery to the extreme.
- “American weightlifters would not last a week in Bulgaria,” Nasar joked of his training environment during a recent podcast interview.
But the real kicker is what the habitual world record setter eats on a daily basis. He may not be a bodybuilder, but Nasar’s weightlifting diet would make some of the competitors at the Mr. Olympia blush — or vomit, maybe.
Interview: Karlos Nasar’s Weightlifting Diet
“If I told you what I eat, you would collapse,” Nasar said with a grin to Bulgarian podcaster Stefan Chefo during a Sep. 14, 2024 interview. The pair discussed Nasar’s origins in weightlifting, his mindset as a competitor, and, in detail, his dietary, training, and recovery habits.
- “I don’t count calories or macronutrients,” Nasar remarked during their conversation. We’ll try to estimate the calorie content of his daily diet based on the foods he describes.
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Karlos Nasar’s Weightlifting Diet: Breakfast
“I wake up at 7:00 a.m.,” Nasar said. “By 8:30 a.m., I’m in the gym.” For breakfast, Nasar said he usually consumes some combination of:
- 10 tuna meatballs, 700 calories
- 10 eggs, 700 calories
- “Milk with oatmeal,” 500 calories
“You can consume a huge amount easily,” Nasar noted of his preference for oatmeal with milk. “It’s how I get my carbohydrates in the morning.” The clean & jerk world record holder also said he takes a cup of coffee with breakfast to provide a jolt of energy before his morning workout.
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Karlos Nasar’s Weightlifting Diet: Lunch & Dinner
“Lunch and dinner are the same,” Nasar told Chefo. “Veal meatballs are mandatory,” he continued, but Nasar didn’t specify portion sizes, so we’ll leave them out.
- Greens salad with two hard-boiled eggs, 200-300 calories
- Salmon steak, 400-600 calories
- Spaghetti or rice with minced meat, 600-900 calories
“Then I go again with the meatballs,” Nasar added with a grin.
In total, Nasar’s weightlifting diet probably adds up to at least 5,000 calories per day, based on very rough approximations of the food sources he described. Interviewer Chefo was in stitches by the time Nasar finished describing his eating habits.
- Chefo: “How many cooks do you have, man?”
- Nasar: “One, he’s a chef at a restaurant.”
Having a personal chef is one way to ensure your meal prep operation runs smoothly, even if he doesn’t track each and every calorie. “It’s a high-carb diet, but it’s not really a diet,” Nasar said.
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Nasar said he sleeps 12 hours a day; he takes a two-hour nap around midday after his morning workouts and aims for a solid 10 hours of sleep at night as well. Couple that with his eight-hour weightlifting workouts (broken up into multiple sessions), and Bulgaria’s superstar doesn’t have spare time left for much else. He doesn’t mind it much.
- “My training doesn’t have an end. My training is in my food, my training is in my sleep,” Nasar remarked of his mindset regarding both his physical workouts and the outside-the-gym habits that have powered him to the top of the weightlifting world.
Diligence, whether he’s got a barbell in his hands or not — along with enough meatballs to feed a family of five, we’d wager — helped Nasar win his first Olympic gold medal, which he hopes to add to in coming years.
On Sep. 16, 2024, Nasar told Bulgarian media he’s eyeballing another Olympic victory in Los Angeles 2028: “My wish is to become Olympic champion once more, and why not a third or fourth time?”
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Featured Image: @litkov / Instagram
