Nick Saban eats Oatmeal Creme Pies for breakfast every day
To figure out how much a man of habit Alabama coach Nick Saban is, you don't need to look any further than his daily choices for breakfast and lunch.
Saban's dietary intake is mentioned in the massive profile in the September issue of GQ; a profile that calls him the "Scariest Man in College Football." What are Saban's food staples? Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pies and a turkey iceberg lettuce salad. Seriously.
Saban is a fit 61, owing in part to regular pickup basketball games with staff, a frenetic pace on and off the field, and a peculiarly regimented diet. He doesn't drink. For breakfast, he eats two Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pies; for lunch, a salad of iceberg lettuce, turkey, and tomatoes. The regular menu, he says, saves him the time of deciding what to eat each day, and speaks to a broader tendency to habituate his behaviors.
While the salad makes sense, the Oatmeal Creme Pies seem quite un-Saban, don't they? Given the coach's focus on process and execution, focuses of the article about him, Saban would seem to be the type to worry about eating a balanced breakfast of carbs, fat and protein. Maybe he is somewhat normal after all. He likes sweets for breakfast. (If you live in Alabama, you may want to now prepare for a Little Debbie shortage as Tide fans rush to stock up before the season.)
The feature that's well worth your time also talks about the roots of Saban's perfectionism; his father. His dad, also named Nick, coached Pop Warner football in West Virginia. Nick was the quarterback. The Black Diamonds once won 36 games in a row and during one season, never conceded a point.
Now that he's won three national titles in four seasons at Alabama, maybe an undefeated and 14 shutout season is next on Saban's checklist? It wouldn't be incredibly surprising if it was.
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