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Sports Performance

Ep. 189 – Dedication to Education: 1,500kcal Refeeds – What’s the Impact of Short-Term Overeating on Body Composition?

This week, we examine the short term changes in body composition following a three day ‘refeed’ diet. Many athletes include either planned or ‘social’ refeeds into their diet –this is sometimes aimed to rescue performance and psychological strain of low calorie dieting, or sometimes because they’ve ‘gone large’ on the weekend and over-consumed calories. Either

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Sports Performance

Ep. 188 – Dedication to Education: Low Energy Availability in Male Athletes (RED-S)

This week, we take another look at low energy availability (LEA) with a particular interest in male endurance athletes. Energy Availability (EA) = the energy available for normal physiological functioning once exercise energy expenditure has been accounted for. i.e. if you consume 2500kcal, burn 1,000kcal in training, you have 1,500kcal left ‘available’. LEA is the

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Sports Performance

Ep. 187 – Dedication to Education: Aggressive Dieting – The Impact of Low Energy Availability on Health, Sport and Life

This week, we review the impact of low energy availability (EA) in athletes and its consequences to the body, mind and sporting performance. The issue arises when insufficient calories are consumed to meet the body’s demands. Therefore, the mismatch between calorie expenditure and calorie intake becomes too high. Energy availability = the amount of energy

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Sports Performance

Ep. 186 – Dedication to Education: Glucosamine Supplementation for Athlete Joint Health?

This week, we explore the impact of glucosamine supplementation on cartilage health in athletes. The nature of training and competition causes large amounts of repetitive mechanical loading on the joint which may lead to degradation (breakdown) and function loss of cartilage over time. Nutrition supplements such as collagen, chondroitin and glucosamine have been used in

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Sports Performance

Ep. 185 – Dedication to Education: What’s the Optimal Approach to Fuel Endurance Sports?

Today, we explore whether a food first approach is better than a supplemental approach to fuelling endurance based exercise. Carbohydrate (CHO) recommendations during endurance based sports are based on duration and intensity. Of which, the greater the duration or intensity, the greater amount of carbohydrates needed to maintain work capacity. Current guidelines are as follows:

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Sports Performance

Ep. 184 – Dedication to Education: Muscle Mass Sparing whilst Dieting

This week, we explore ‘lean mass sparing’ during periods of calorie restriction (CR) in athletes. CR creates a catabolic environment (breakdown), where weight training creates an anabolic environment (growth). It’s been recommended to reduce training load during CR to better support recovery as there’s less energy available, which makes sense… However, is it wise to

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Sports Performance

Ep. 183 – Dedication to Education: Energy Compensation From Exercise

This week, we explore the compensatory effects in total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) in relation to the amount of exercise performed.⁣ In other words, if you burn 1,000kcal through daily training, do you actually burn 1,000kcal more within that day?⁣ You would expect so, however humans are highly adaptive. Perhaps this stems back to certain

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Sports Performance

Ep. 182 – Dedication to Education: Intermittent Fasting for Superior Health & Fat Loss?

This week, we examine whether intermittent fasting is superior for both fat loss and health when compared to a typical calorie restricted diet. It’s hypothesized that fasting imparts health related benefits such as improved cardiovascular health and insulin sensitivity. These health benefits are suggested to be independent of weight loss and a calorie restricted diet

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Sports Performance

Ep. 181 – Dedication to Education: Foods That Impact Mood [Mental Well-being and Performance]

This week, we explore the link between diet and mental well-being. From an athlete’s perspective, performing with excellence is mostly biased towards having the correct body composition, meeting fuelling demands and accelerating recovery. Although these are fundamental to success, we can’t maximise athletic performance without health and well-being acting as the foundation. Although the link

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Sports Performance

Ep. 180 – Dedication to Education: Fruit Supplements to Accelerate Recovery

This week, we’re continuing our theme of ‘ultra-fast recovery’ and exploring the impact of fruit supplementation on indices of muscle damage. During periods of strenuous training and competition, the muscle is placed under a high degree of strain, especially when loaded eccentrically. As a result, exercise-induced muscle damage (EIMD) occurs. This results in delayed onset

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Sports Performance

Ep. 179 – Dedication to Education: The 4R Framework For Optimal Recovery

This week, we explore the ‘4R’ framework to enhance post-exercise recovery in the hours and days following hard training and competition.Your recovery strategies increase in importance as the proximity to the next session decreases and the physiological stress increases. For timely recovery to occur there’s a strong relationship between nutrition and the restoration of physical

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Sports Performance

Ep. 178 – Dedication to Education: Is Cereal the Optimal Post Training Recovery Meal for Athletes?

This week, we examine a delicious recovery tool for the athlete’s toolbox: Cereal! Following depleting exercise, there’s an opportunity to accelerate glycogen replenishment when high amounts of carbohydrate are provided. Taking advantage of this first phase of glycogen replenishment increases in importance when an athletes next session is within close proximity – same day or

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Sports Performance

Ep. 177 – Dedication to Education: Combat Sport Athletes – Does Rapidly Gaining Weight Post Weigh-in Increase Likeliness of Winning?

There’s a strong belief amongst combat sport athletes that having a higher body mass than their opponent provides a competitive advantage, and therefore increases their likeliness to win. There’s emerging evidence that this theory may hold true in non-striking, grappling based sports such as judo when done safely (Reale et al, 2016), but is less apparent

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Sports Performance

Ep. 176 – Dedication to Education: Ironman Nutrition – Should Elite and Sub-Elite Athletes Eat Differently?

This week we explore the physiological differences between amateur and elite Ironman athletes and how it’s recommended they eat to best prepare for race day. A 2018 paper by Maunder et al named ‘Different Horses on the Same Courses’ has highlighted the following key considerations: 1) Top Ironman triathletes finish the ultra-endurance race in ~8hrs. The amount

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Sports Performance

Ep. 175 – Dedication to Education: ‘Train Low-Sleep Low’ For a Better FTP [Functional Threshold Power]

This week, we explore how daily carbohydrate manipulation can enhance endurance training adaptations in trained cyclists. More specifically, can cyclists increase their FTP (functional threshold power) by eating the same amount of daily carbohydrate, but timing intake differently? The concept of ‘train low’ has been around for a little while: The depletion in muscle glycogen during exercise

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