CONTENTS

Foreword

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1: FUELLING BASICS

CHAPTER 2: TRAINING – THE ROAD TO VICTORY

CHAPTER 3: WHAT’S YOUR SPORT?

CHAPTER 4: FINE-TUNING YOUR BODY

BREAKFASTS

LIGHT MEALS

MAIN MEALS

SNACKS & PORTABLES

DESSERTS

Glossary

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

FOREWORD

As an athlete, I am always looking at ways I can improve my performance and this is how I was lucky enough to find Renee McGregor.

I started working with Renee back in 2010, in preparation for the European Championships in Barcelona, after striking up a friendship through our local running club. Sharing a passion for good food and running, we quickly became friends. I had been to see various other sports nutritionists over the years, but it took me no time at all to realize that she was the real deal. Renee is incredibly knowledgeable and thorough with her research; she will leave no stone unturned to get all the information before coming up with an answer. Her nutrition plans have been tailor-made to fit into my lifestyle and requirements, with practical strategies on meal ideas, snacks and race nutrition, helping to turn theory into practice. This has resulted in success for me over the marathon distance, and more recently in ultra events.

Renee helped me to understand that how I fuelled my body had a direct influence on my training and recovery. Tailoring my nutrition around my training sessions helped me take charge of my performance goals. Knowing exactly what to eat and when really helped my energy levels and accelerated my recovery time. We also worked together to create a bespoke fuelling and hydration plan for all of my major races – these ranged from road marathons in extreme heat and humidity to mountain ultras at high altitudes – again with great success. Renee’s food plans are practical and realistic, which is what I was drawn to. She gives you real food choices and examples of what your meal should look like, making it easy to plan your week: invaluable for the busy lives we lead.

I can confidently say that this book is ideal for anyone looking to improve their way of eating to benefit their sport. It gives you practical, evidence-based advice on how to fuel your body to maximize your training, as well as offering lots of delicious recipes.

Holly Rush

GB Endurance Runner

INTRODUCTION

This book is for athletes of all levels, elite or recreational, young or old, experienced or new to sport. It is for those of you who want to:

>>>  Achieve your sporting goals, whether that’s improving your half-marathon time, completing your first triathlon, becoming a more powerful tennis player, or bettering your personal-best time in swimming.

>>>  Stick to a training plan while also trying to earn a living and juggle family commitments. For example, you work late but still need to eat appropriately to get the most out of the next morning’s spinning session, or you’re a busy parent trying to fit your training session in before the school run.

>>>  Improve your knowledge of nutrition. You may well know, for example, that you need to eat carbohydrate for energy and protein for recovery, but struggle to understand what that actually looks like in real food terms.

>>>  Increase your confidence by knowing you are eating the right foods to fuel your body and maximize your training so that you can excel in your chosen sport.

When the opportunity arose to write a book about training food, with practical recipes and evidence-based nutrition, I was delighted. There is so much information about nutrition available but not all of it is backed up by science. As a registered dietitian and sports nutritionist, I have to ensure that all the advice I provide is evidence based – that is, there has been reliable research around the subject to make the claims credible and accurate.

No matter who I am working with, I see it as a collaborative journey. I first help athletes to understand the fundamentals of good nutrition and then, with practical suggestions, piece it all together to develop a nutrition plan that works for them. This is what I am offering to you here – a practical, easy-to-follow but scientific book about sports nutrition that you can tailor to your individual sport, which includes delicious, easy-to-make recipes.

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

The reason I enjoy my job so much is because every day is different and I work with athletes of all levels and disciplines. My job is to make the science accessible. Through researching all the latest studies, and interpreting them into practical application, I produce recipes and nutrition plans that work for all lifestyles and budgets. I have used the same step-by-step approach in this book.

Chapter 1 is a practical guide of what to eat, when to eat and how much to eat. We also look at how your body metabolizes the food you eat into fuel, and how it can adapt to provide fuel for different levels of training intensity.

Chapter 2 goes into more detail about training and how making the right nutritional choices around training sessions of different intensities will benefit you. This section also includes sample menu plans, using the recipes from the book to demonstrate practically how to make appropriate choices.

Chapter 3 tailors nutrition to your chosen sport, looking at the different fuelling requirements for different events/distances. Again I have tried to make this as practical and applicable as possible by using case studies of clients I have worked with.

Chapter 4 highlights the importance of maintaining the well-oiled machine we call our body. Often individuals ignore niggles, going into denial that anything is wrong, and this leads to further complications. This chapter ensures you go through a mental checklist before you embark on training or competition in order to avoid any long-term injury and explains how nutrition can be used in injury prevention and recovery.

Throughout the book there are also ‘info boxes’ and ‘fact boxes’, as well as quick tips, which help to make the book fun and practical, while still delivering up-to-date and evidence-based sports nutrition.

MY JOURNEY

Nutrition – and sports nutrition in particular – is my passion. It was an interest of mine from a young age and led to me becoming a registered dietitian. After working for the NHS for 10 years, mainly in paediatric nutrition, I felt it was time for a change.

I have always been an active and sporty person, and had completed challenges such as the London to Brighton Bike Ride before having children. To combine my favourite pastime with my work, I studied to be a dietitian and sports nutritionist. With the help of my amazing and extremely supportive husband I also launched my own freelance business and brand, Eat Well, Feel Fab. Ultimately this is what I had always wanted – to help people to eat well, without fads or deprivation, and feel fab for the rest of their lives.

I had started running with Team Bath Athletics Club and through this I had a place in the London Marathon. I trained hard and put my sports nutrition into full use. I was a perfect case study – a busy working mum attempting her first marathon! Race day arrived and it was an incredible experience. I finished in 3 hours, 17 minutes, much faster than my goal of 3 hours 30 minutes! Since then I have continued to be my own guinea pig, trying out nutritional theories and strategies. Last year I completed my first ultra-marathon (Classic Quarter, 44 miles on the Cornish coastal path) with a top 10 female finish, followed by the highlight of my running career to date, a 7-day multi-stage race in Nepal, climbing up to 5,162m/16,935ft of altitude (Manaslu Mountain Trail Race).

At Team Bath AC we are very privileged to be coached by Martin Rush, Head of Endurance at England Athletics. He is married to Holly Rush, GB marathon runner and ultra-runner. Holly and I have become good friends and work together; I provide her with nutritional support around all her key races and she coaches me – it’s a great set-up.

I became a sports nutritionist at Bath University in the runup to the London Olympic Games, working with the GB Rhythmic Gymnastics squad, the GB Beach Volleyball team and with individual athletes. It was an exciting but challenging time, with each sport needing a different approach relating to their ages, their experience and also the demands of their training.

So it is drawing from my professional experiences as a nutritionist and personal experiences as an endurance and newly converted ultra-runner that I have written this book. I hope it helps you to achieve all your sporting goals.

CHAPTER 1:

FUELLING BASICS

FROM NOVICE TO OLYMPIAN

There is so much hype around sports nutrition these days; the science is evolving, with an increasing number of studies proving that nutrition plays an important part in performance gains. This chapter will help you to understand why correct fuelling around your training is important to achieve your goals and optimize your performance. Whether you are new to a sport, a young athlete with energy and growth demands, or a regular on the marathon circuit, getting to grips with the basics of sports nutrition can make all the difference to your results.

You will probably have some idea of the basics of good nutrition – for example, eat carbohydrate for energy, protein for repair, fat for absorption of important nutrients, and vitamins and minerals for a healthy immune system. In this chapter we will look at these factors in more detail and I will explain how the quality of these nutrients, and when you consume them, plays a fundamental role in sports nutrition. I will also explain how fuelling right will:

>>>  Encourage enhanced recovery

>>>  Optimize hydration

>>>  Help you to achieve and maintain an ideal body weight

>>>  Reduce the risk of illness and injury

Some days I work with elite, national-level athletes, other days I spend with juniors within talent development squads. Sometimes I work with the members of a football academy, and still other times I spend with recreational athletes – for example, those who do sport as a hobby but who often have a goal in mind, such as a marathon or an Ironman event. No matter who I’m working with, the journey is a collaborative one that begins with the fundamental principles of good nutrition. In fact, these principles are applicable to us all, regardless of whether or not we intend to become athletes. What is certain is that whether you’re a novice or an Olympian, you need to begin with a strong nutritional foundation that will enable the more detailed nutritional plans to work their proper magic. This will make you stronger, fitter and more able to meet your performance goals.

BEFORE YOU READ ON...

When working with sports nutrition it is normal to calculate the nutritional requirements for each macronutrient to ensure that training fuel demands are being met. These are converted based on your weight in kilograms, so throughout the book I will be referring to grams of nutrients per kilogram of your body weight, or as you will see it displayed: ‘g/kg BW’. Therefore, a great starting point would be to calculate your weight in kilograms. Most home scales will have conversions. Using metric values ensures greater accuracy.

THE SPECIFICS OF SPORTS NUTRITION

The main difference between healthy eating and sports nutrition is the attention to detail and the fine-tuning of nutrient delivery. In healthy eating, the ultimate goal is to promote long-term good health and fend off increased risks of disease, while maintaining a balance so that food is still enjoyable. In comparison, sports nutrition, although still based on healthy eating guidelines to an extent, is performance driven. It is about getting the best out of your training, whether that’s running for 45 minutes three times a week or training to compete in an Ironman event. Making the right nutrition choices to suit not only your specific sport but the intensity of that activity within your given training session will ensure that you have:

1 >  Put the right amount and type of fuel into your body to meet the demands of your session, allowing you to perform to your best ability

2 >  Made the correct choices after your training session, which will allow your body to adapt to your training and make it stronger within your chosen sport

We will go into more detail about this when we discuss different intensity levels of training in Chapter 2 and individual sports in Chapter 3.

The key to good sports nutrition is preparation and organization; fundamentally, to achieve your goal you need to tailor your nutrition to the exact training session. It’s not just about energy in and energy out. I have lost count of the number of athletes who think they can get away with eating poor nutrient-dense foods just because of the amount of training they do. They may well maintain their weight and have the energy to train but what they don’t see are the adaptations (see page 98) that they should. So what should they see? To a degree it will depend on the chosen sport but some general gains should be:

>>>  Increases in strength and lean muscle mass

>>>  Improvement in performance within their chosen sport

>>>  Good consistency between training sessions so that each one can be conducted to the best of their ability

>>>  Good sleep patterns, good mood and high energy levels

By just meeting energy demands, you may be able to carry out all your training but you may not see any actual improvements in your day-to-day training and overall performance.

TRAINING NUTRITION

So what types of food should you eat before a training session? Remember training is the stimulus that sends messages to your muscles to work at a specific level. In order for this stimulus to work effectively, you will need to feed it appropriately. What you feed your body before training will very much depend on what the session is and its intensity.

Like most people you probably eat carbohydrate before you exercise, to give you energy. However, do you ever stop to think about how much carbohydrate you really need, for example, to go for a 45-minute run? Would this choice be different if you were going out to run 45 minutes hard or if you were just going for a bit of a plod as a social run with some friends? The reality is that you would need a lot less carbohydrate, in fact probably none, if you were just going for a plod but your body would struggle to maintain a high intensity of exercise for 45 minutes of hard running, without carbohydrate.

Carbohydrate is stored within our muscles and liver as glycogen (see page 18) and when our body signals that it needs energy, for example during exercise, it will convert this glycogen into glucose and transport it to the working muscle to ensure that the level of activity can be maintained. Although your body could get energy from fat stores, the subsequent processes to convert fat to glucose take too long and so it would not support high-intensity exercise. This is why it is so important that you fuel your body with carbohydrate prior to a hard training session.

So what happens if, for example, you have a bowl of porridge/oatmeal and then head out for a slow social plod with friends? Your body will still use the carbohydrate provided by the porridge/oatmeal as it is still the most available source of fuel. What is so bad about that, you might ask? Well nothing really, unless you want to lose some body fat or you want to become fat adapted (see page 84).

For you to use fat as fuel, you will need to work at a moderate to low intensity (we will be discussing intensity in much more detail in Chapter 2). This is because this level of activity is slow enough to allow your body time to provide the energy it needs from fat stores. So if you have a few pounds to shift or are trying to become a bit leaner, this type of training session can be useful and as long as you do it in a fasted state or ensure that your last meal did not contain carbohydrate, this is what will happen.

Some of my athletes, particularly endurance athletes, like to become ‘fat adapted’ – this means that their body becomes more efficient at using fat as fuel and so can help ‘spare’ glycogen stores in long endurance events that last longer than two hours such as the marathon, Ironman or cycling sportive. So when you think about training nutrition, the main questions you need to ask yourself are:

1 >  What type of session is this going to be? High, medium or low intensity?

2 >  How long is this training session going to be?

Answering these questions will help you to choose the correct fuel and the correct portion size.

CARBOHYDRATE

Most people who partake in sport will be aware of the need to consume carbohydrate as fuel for training sessions. Indeed when you look at health promotion tools such as ‘the Eat Well Plate’ or ‘the Food Pyramid’, the carbohydrate component makes up a large proportion. But do we always get the balance right? In order to answer this, we need to know the difference in the types of carbohydrate as some are more desirable than others!

In general terms, your carbohydrate requirement will depend on your activity level; it is the key fuel source for exercise as it is broken down into glucose and utilized by the body to provide energy. Carbohydrate is stored as glycogen within the liver and muscles. It is this source within the muscle that is the most readily available energy for working muscle, releasing energy more quickly than other sources. However, this storage facility is limited. If the muscles are inadequately fuelled, it will lead to fatigue, poor performance and potentially lower your immunity, putting you at greater risk of illness.

So if you are doing any sport, it is really important to plan your carbohydrate intake around training sessions; the amount you require will be dependent on the frequency, duration and intensity of your training. So on days when you have a high-intensity training session, you will need more carbohydrate and on rest days or lower-intensity days you will need less. This is summarized in the table opposite and is addressed in more detail in Chapter 2.

To help you meet your needs, it is important to understand the difference in the types of carbohydrate that are available. Over the years, carbohydrates have been classified in many different ways; the most common types are simple and complex, but you may also be familiar with high GI (glycaemic index) and low GI. The glycaemic index (GI) is a ranking of carbohydrate-containing foods based on the overall effect on blood glucose levels. Slowly absorbed foods have a low GI rating, while foods that are more quickly absorbed have a higher rating. Most recently, sports nutritionists have started to use the terms ‘nutrient dense’, ‘nutrient poor’ or ‘high fat’ types of carbohydrate. Nutrient-dense carbohydrates are food options that provide carbohydrate as well as other nutrients; examples include bread, fruit and dairy. Nutrient-poor carbohydrates provide carbohydrate but no other useful nutrients; some examples include energy drinks and sugar. High-fat options provide carbohydrate but also a high percentage of fat, and these foods should be kept to a minimum; examples include chocolate and pastries. These are summarized in the table below:

TABLE 1.1 Types of carbohydrate

It is difficult to quantify what percentage of your overall diet should be formed of carbohydrate, which is why no matter who I work with, a recreational or an elite athlete, I use the guidelines in the table below. However, be aware that these are ball-park figures and will vary from individual to individual. Additionally there is a gender difference: women in general utilize a much lower amount of carbohydrate. For example, if a man and a woman sit at a desk working all day, the man will be utilizing a much higher ratio of carbohydrate for energy than the woman, who will use more fat for energy. For this reason female requirements tend to be around 10–15 percent lower than those stated here.

TABLE 1.2 Carbohydrate intake requirements for different training intensities

So for most moderately active 60kg/132lb adults, who like to go for a 30–45-minute run at an easy pace three times per week, this works out to be 3 x 60g = 180g of carbohydrate a day. I recommend that this requirement is solely made up from the nutrient-dense list of foods (see Table 1.1, page 19). Even within this group, certain foods will be better as they will make your carbohydrate go further, so for example 100g/3½oz rolled oats provides 60g of carbohydrate but 100g/3½oz of butternut squash only provides 20g of carbohydrate, so you would need to eat 300g/10½oz of butternut squash to provide 60g. Here are some other examples:

>>>  100g/3½ oz wholemeal bread will provide 60g of carbohydrate

>>>  100g/3½ oz dry-weight pasta will provide 75g of carbohydrate

>>>  100g/3½ oz beetroot/beets will provide 20g of carbohydrate

>>>  100g/3½ oz mango will provide 20g of carbohydrate

>>>  1 banana will provide 25g of carbohydrate

>>>  400g/14oz drained can of chickpeas will provide 39g of carbohydrate

So by using more of the vegetables, fruit and legumes as your carbohydrate source, your allowance will go a lot further.

In one of my favourite examples of different types of carbohydrates, I compare jelly babies to sweet potatoes. Ten jelly babies provide 60g of carbohydrate. But a 300g/10oz (medium) sweet potato or six large carrots provides the same. It is obvious which option will be the more filling. This example also demonstrates how easy it is to over-consume simple carbohydrates – most people could polish off a big 190g/7oz bag of jelly babies, which would provide in the region of 152g of carbohydrate but could they consume the equivalent in sweet potatoes or carrots in one sitting?

Having said that, in certain training situations, jelly babies may be the preferred fuel. For example, you might be training for a triathlon and doing a BRICK session (bike and then straight into a run), which is going to last over 90 minutes. By fuelling up with nutrient-dense carbohydrates, such as pasta, bagels or oats, you will have built up good glycogen stores. However, these stores tend to only last between 60–90 minutes, depending on the intensity at which you train. So you will find it useful to ‘top up’ your stores by choosing foods from the nutrient-poor group. This is where foods such as jelly babies, dried fruits, energy drinks, jam sandwiches made with white bread or energy gels can be very useful. We will look at this in more detail in Chapter 3. Immediately after your training session is over, you will need to replenish your stores and this is the ideal time to consume something like flavoured milk, which is high in carbohydrate.

So remember, as athletes, it is important to consume carbohydrate to help fuel your training sessions. However, it is essential to choose the right type, at the right time in the right portion. We will look at this in more detail later on in this chapter.

PROTEIN

Proteins are often called the building blocks of the body. Protein consists of combinations of structures called amino acids. There are 20 amino acids and these combine in various sequences to make muscles, bones, tendons, skin, hair and other tissues. They serve other functions as well, including transporting nutrients and producing enzymes.

Eight of these amino acids are essential and must come from your diet. They are found as a complete source in animal-protein food such as dairy, meat, fish and eggs. They are found in an incomplete source in plant-based proteins; that is, they will be lacking in one or more of the essential amino acids. Examples include vegetables, grains, nuts and legumes. If, however, these are combined in the correct way you can make a whole source of protein. Some good combinations include baked beans on toast; rice and dhal; and wholegrain bagel with peanut butter. (See also pages 47–51 for information on vegetarian and vegan diets.)

In general terms, most moderately active adults, so those of you who walk the dog daily or stroll down to the shops and take one exercise class a week, will meet your protein requirements without any problems. The suggested amount is around 0.8–1g/kg BW per day, with women needing the lower end and men the upper of this range.

Think about your daily intake of food: chances are you will have had milk on your breakfast cereal, maybe meat, fish or egg at lunchtime and most likely the same again for dinner. It’s also important to highlight here how small a portion you need to get a decent amount of protein.

Let’s take a 57kg/125lb woman: based on the calculation 0.8g/kg BW per day, her daily protein requirement will be 46g/1½oz of protein. The following food portions provide 15g of protein:

>>>  2 large eggs

>>>  75g/2½ oz portion of chicken

>>>  75g/2½ oz portion of salmon

>>>  150g/5oz pot of low-fat Greek yogurt

>>>  400ml/14fl oz of milk

By choosing just three of the above choices, she will have met her daily protein requirement.

Things are slightly different when you are working with an athlete. Athletes need protein primarily as a response to exercise rather than as a fuel source. Protein has been a huge area of research for many years, with the most recent findings demonstrating how important protein is in the recovery phase. During all exercise, including endurance sports such as running and cycling; team or power sports such as netball, football, tennis or resistance training (using weights); an increase in the breakdown of protein in the muscle has been shown. By ensuring good protein choices throughout the day, you will help to counteract this. Exercise acts as a stimulus for your muscles; it develops the muscles so that they work optimally in your chosen sport.

Let’s take football as an example: a specific training session may involve doing repeated sprints to prepare your muscles for a match-day scenario, where a high proportion of your game is made up of sprinting. By ensuring good protein choices around your training, your body will promote muscle growth and repair to support this training session and encourage your muscles to adapt for when you are playing a football match. We will go into more detail about this in Chapter 3.

So how much protein does an athlete actually need? Some recommendations are based on g/kg BW a day. However, just like with carbohydrate, where you need to alter the amount you consume depending on your level of training, there is a similar approach with protein. As I have already mentioned, one of the key roles of protein for athletes is to stay in a positive protein balance (so there is more protein available than will be broken down during training), with a good supply of amino acids available that the body can draw from to prevent a breakdown (catabolism) of the muscle.

The latest guidelines recommend something called protein pulsing, where protein is consumed more frequently throughout the day rather than as a large amount straight after exercise (you may have seen those pictures of athletes, particularly strength athletes, tucking into plates of chicken and eggs after training). The recommendations are that an athlete should consume 0.25g/kg BW 3–6 times a day. From a practical point of view this all might sound quite daunting but if you weigh 80kg/176lb this will translate as 0.25g x 80kg = 20g of protein at each sitting. The number of these protein portions will depend on the type and frequency of exercise but also on overall goals. For example:

>>>  Do you want your muscles to get bigger (muscle hypertrophy)?

>>>  Do you want to increase muscle strength so that it can power your chosen sport more efficiently and effectively?

>>>  Do you have body composition goals (see page 58)?

>>>  Are you a young athlete going through an active growth phase (see page 28)?

A 20g portion of protein would look like this:

>>>  3 large eggs

>>>  75g/2½ oz (half a 150g/5oz can) tuna

>>>  100g/3½ oz salmon fillet

>>>  130g/4½ oz cod fillet

>>>  130g/4½ oz mackerel fillet

>>>  85g/3oz halibut fillet

>>>  100g/3½ oz pilchards in brine

>>>  175g/6oz peeled prawns/shrimp

>>>  200g/7oz tofu

>>>  80g/2¾ oz portion of pork loin

>>>  4 pork sausages

>>>  600ml/21fl oz skimmed milk

>>>  200g/7oz cottage cheese

>>>  60g/2oz nuts – any unsalted

>>>  70g/2¼ oz crunchy peanut butter/almond butter

>>>  1 x 240g/8½ oz (drained weight) can chickpeas/kidney beans

>>>  1 x 400g/14oz can baked beans in tomato sauce

>>>  100g/3½ oz dry-weight lentils

>>>  100g/3½ oz fillet chicken

>>>  60g/2oz Cheddar/feta/mozzarella

>>>  57g/2oz skimmed milk powder

>>>  25g whey powder

Eating any more than this figure of 0.25g/kg BW will have no extra advantage – it will not mean that your muscles will grow bigger quicker! The only time I will encourage a slightly higher figure of 0.30g/kg BW is if I am working with an athlete who weighs more than 80kg/176lb.

Additionally it is important to always ensure that one of these protein pulses comes immediately after exercise as a recovery choice but we will look at this in more detail on page 51 when we discuss recovery nutrition.

THE YOUNG ATHLETE

Like adults, young athletes need to fuel their bodies to reach optimum performance. But, unlike an adult, the body of a young athlete is still growing and changing, meaning that the nutritional demands on it are, in some respects, even greater. Many young athletes ‘find’ their sport just as they reach adolescence – you may even have bought this book because you are a teenager who is just about to start training for competitive sport (or are a parent who has a teenager doing so). If so, that’s great because you have just taken the first step to ensuring that you fuel your body in the right way to be the best you can be during this important time of transition into adulthood.

Without adequate nutritional intake and energy stores, a young body can stop developing in the right way. This can mean slowing down the rate of growth of your bones (meaning among other things that you might not grow as tall as you could), as well as having low body fat and low weight (these aren’t good things, by the way – see pages 58–60 to understand why), and for girls it can also mean delaying the start of their periods.

The consequences of inadequate energy are particularly severe for adolescent athletes. It is a rapid time for development and growth, particularly bones, which are developing in size and density. A restricted diet means a lower intake of essential nutrients such as calcium. This combined with the fact that overall energy availability is low means that your body needs to prioritize providing energy to live, move and breathe over reproduction, resulting in a reduced amount of sex hormones circulating in your body. These three factors result in your bones not strengthening properly, making you more susceptible to stress fractures in future years. However, all is not lost, because numerous studies show that, although it can take several years, taking positive steps with your nutrition so that you normalize your energy levels can reverse any negative impact on your body so far. Though, of course, it’s better to get it right from the start! In most cases, when your nutritional intake meets your training needs, your body composition (see page 58) will follow suit.

If you are a young athlete, your energy demands are significantly greater than someone who is undertaking the same amount of exercise but who lives a sedentary lifestyle. This is partly because your body is growing and needs energy to do so, but also because you are likely to be far more generally active than someone who has a desk job during the day. Think of the times you have to climb the stairs at school, or the amount of curricular and extra-curricular sports you do in addition to your specific training schedule. It is important that the need to increase total energy intake is not seen as an excuse to fill up on energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods, such as takeaways and junk food.

First and foremost, eating and drinking must be a priority! Three main meals with snacks in between should be the aim – it’s easier to eat more often than it is to eat more in one sitting. Try to plan ahead so that you always have access to suitable food and drinks when you need them most. I encourage my junior athletes to top up their kit-bag essentials. Foods such as dried fruit and nuts, fruit breads, sweet and savoury oatcakes are all good pre-training options; pots of milk puddings such as custard or rice pudding and long-life flavoured milks are suitable recovery foods. For training sessions that last longer than an hour, it may also be necessary to top up energy levels with foods such as bananas, dried fruit, jelly babies (see page 21) or diluted fruit juice (see page 37). For those of you with small appetites that struggle to eat before and after training, energy-dense drinks are a great ‘top up’ snack. Good choices include fruit smoothies and milkshakes (see the recipe section for some great ideas). These also help address your hydration needs; studies have shown that a 2 percent level of dehydration can affect performance and concentration by up to 10 percent. In a 50kg/110lb athlete this looks like 1kg/2lb loss in weight and means you have actually lost 1 litre/35fl oz of fluid. All this advice is remarkably similar to the advice I give adults – and that’s the key. If you can follow the advice given throughout the book, including the advice for your particular training schedule and sport, you will be on the road to optimizing not only your performance, but your growth and lifelong health, too.

FAT

Contrary to popular belief, not all fat is bad for you! In fact, it is vital that everyone eats some fat to help absorb fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K and to provide essential fatty acids that the body cannot make. These nutrients have important roles to play within the body. However, eating too much of a particular kind of fat – saturated fat – can raise your cholesterol, which increases the risk of heart disease. Saturated fat is the kind of fat found in butter and lard, pies, cakes and biscuits/cookies, fatty cuts of meat, sausages and bacon, cheese and cream. It also encompasses trans fat, which is often found in processed foods. It’s important to cut down on this type of fat and choose foods that contain unsaturated fat (see below). It is also important to remember that eating too much fat leads to weight gain, as foods high in fat are high in energy too. For example, 1g of fat provides 9 calories in comparison to 1g carbohydrate, which provides 3.87 calories and 1g protein, which provides 4 calories. Being overweight will also increase your risk of getting certain clinical conditions such as type 2 diabetes.

Most of us eat too much saturated fat – about 20 percent more than the recommended maximum amount.

>>>  The average man should eat no more than 30g of saturated fat a day

>>>  The average woman should eat no more than 20g of saturated fat a day

To put this into context, by having butter on two pieces of toast, cheese as a sandwich filling and a bar of chocolate, you can clock up around 35g/1¼oz of saturated fat.

We should aim to eat more ‘good’ fats or unsaturated fats. These include:

>>>  Oily fish, such as salmon, sardines and mackerel, which are an exceptionally good source of omega-3 fatty acids

>>>  Nuts and seeds, including their oils and butters

>>>  Sunflower, rapeseed/canola and olive oils

>>>  Avocados

When I work with athletes, I like to encourage them to use these good fats as much as possible in their diets over saturated varieties. However, it is important to point out that these good fats still have a high-energy value and should be eaten with that in mind.

I generally recommend you take on around 1g/kg BW fat in total a day and that the majority of this comes from good fats. So for a 60kg/132lb athlete this will be 60g. I give all my athletes a list similar to the one opposite and encourage them to choose servings off the list to make up their daily requirements:

>>>  25g of nut butter (14g of fat)

>>>  100g/3½ oz avocado (15g of fat)

>>>  20ml of rapeseed/canola oil (18g of fat)

>>>  25g sunflower seeds (13g of fat)

>>>  1 mackerel fillet (16g of fat)

So for a 60kg/132lb athlete this would be two slices of toast with 25g peanut butter; avocado and sunflower seeds in a salad; and a portion of mackerel with their evening meal. This leaves no room for saturated fats but the reality is that most people will also consume some in the form of butter, cheese, yogurt or milk.

In certain situations this recommendation of 1g/kg BW may need to be increased. Usually this will be linked to a training demand/adaptation or increased energy requirements. For example, athletes who train at high altitudes and cold temperatures, such as cross-country skiers, have huge energy demands while also contending with harsh conditions. For these athletes, increasing the overall percentage of energy from fat calories may be necessary.

MICRONUTRIENTS

Don’t be fooled by the prefix of ‘micro’ as it relates more to the fact they we only need to consume them in ‘micro’ amounts. They are essential nutrients. Examples are:

>>>  Vitamins – A, B, C, D, E and K

>>>  Minerals – calcium, iron and phosphorus

>>>  Electrolytes – sodium and potassium

>>>  Trace elements – iodine, zinc and magnesium

Micronutrients are essential for many metabolic processes within the body, but you can’t make them yourself; you need to get them from your diet. Most function as co-enzymes or co-factors within the body – that is, they aid enzymes and proteins in their function. For example, the B vitamins are very important for carbohydrate and fat metabolism, while vitamin C, along with zinc, is important for a healthy immune system, and magnesium and calcium are needed for muscle contraction. So you can see each and every one has a huge part to play.

So do you need to supplement your intake to make sure you meet your requirements? The bottom line is that if you eat a well-balanced diet that includes wholegrains, vegetables, meat, fish and dairy you will have no problem in getting everything you need. In fact, in certain cases it is pointless taking on more; your daily vitamin C requirement is 60mg, which you can easily get from eating a large orange. As vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin, you cannot store it and so any excess will just be excreted via your urine! In the same way, there have been cases reported where individuals have caused zinc toxicity by over-consuming what they need.