• Question: Which is the best diet for a swimmer?

    Asked by Berta444 to Stephanie, Helen, Andrew on 11 Nov 2016. This question was also asked by carmeen.06, 895sprg29.
    • Photo: Helen Hanstock

      Helen Hanstock answered on 11 Nov 2016:

      Swimmers tend to do a lot of training hours per week so burn a lot of calories! So their diets need to reflect this to make sure that they are not using more calories to train than they are eating.

      Carbohydrates will help to provide energy for hard training sessions and keep muscle glycogen stores high which is great for fast sessions such as sprints. Perhaps having a sugary or sports drink on the side of the pool could help to maintain carbohydrate availability during longer sessions.

      Protein in the diet will help with recovery from training sessions and to build and maintain muscle – both in sprinters and longer distance swimmers.

      Some fat is also good as it can provide an energy source for long, slow training sessions (fat is good for long slow exercise but we can’t use it fast enough to give energy for sprinting).

      Then I would expect to see them eating lots of fruit and vegetables to get all the vitamins and minerals that they need, including iron-rich foods like leafy greens and nitrates from greens and beetroot.

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