Training & Recovery Diet

What's best to eat for recovery after a hard workout? Here's how, as the parent of a hungry athlete, you can help them choose an optimal recovery diet.

MomsTeam nutrition expert Nancy Clark reports on the latest research from the ACSM Annual Meeting on the importance of physical exercise, nutrition for the injured athlete, and creatine safety.

Pre-season is a time when training is tough and calorie demands are high. It's also an important time to tackle any nutritional habits that can interfere with peak performance during the season, says a leading sports nutritionist.

Among the research findings presented by exercise scientists, sports dietitians, physicians, and health professionals at the 2010 annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine in Baltimore was that a standard sports drink was preferred by athletes to coconut water to replace fluid lost through sweating because it tastes better.

The calories burned during a soccer game, much less a two-day tournament, require soccer players to literally be eating all the time, so parents need to feed youth soccer players a high calorie diet for peak performance.

There is a general movement among many soccer players and other athletes to avoid salt. However, this is not always necessary; in fact, if your child or teen is a heavy sweater, or craves salty foods, he may benefit from the extra salt. 

Endurance sports athletes can improve performance by consuming a variety of carbohydrates during exercise and a balance of carbohydrates and protein after sports as part of a training and recovery diet.

If all the ads for sports drinks, energy bars, energy drinks, electrolyte replacers, and sports candies are to believed, they are a necessary part of a sports diet, particularly if a child is participating in endurance exercise such as training for a marathon or a triathlon.  While there is a time and a place for engineered sports foods (particularly among kids who train at a high intensity), in most cases sports-active children can get their needs met with a wisely chosen diet.