Hi Everyone! I am a dietitian who is looking to start working exclusively with swimmers in private practice. I grew up a swimmer and waterpolo player throughout college. I am confident in my own knowledge and experience as a swimmer/polo player growing up, but want to reach out and learn more about other people's experiences with the sport.
What are your goals with swimming? Do you want to improve performance? Get faster? Stay in shape? Etc?
What struggles do you experience when it comes to food and nutrition that affect your ability to accomplish what you want to achieve with swimming?
What struggles do you experience when it comes to food and nutrition that affect your ability to accomplish what you want to achieve with swimming?
My goal is to swim better
My biggest nutritional challenges are the planning of meals, sometimes the cost, eating enough, maintaining weight, and shopping. About 50% fat/ 25% protein/ 25% carbs
Oh, wow. I guess the first question I'd ask is swimmers at what age - specifically younger swimmers like HS or college aged, or older ones like us Masters folks? Because I think you'll have two different sets of answers.
For my kids (15), the answer is as much willpower as anything. They are girls, and anecdotally, the girls on our team are much less willing to embrace the whole nutrition thing than the boys. My girls still think that all food should be a treat, rather than approach it like a fuel. And for 3 years we've been fighting this until the coach had to have a meeting with one of them and my wife, to tell her that if she didn't fix her issues, she wasn't going to be able to keep practicing (this is a kid being recruiting by over 30 D1 schools, so a very high level swimmer). That kind of woke her up, and she added a little protein back to her diet. But we are still nowhere near enough. And she and 67Queen have found one source that pushes carbs for swimmers and does not quantify protein needs, and are using that to justify not getting anywhere near the 1.3g/KG needed at a minimum. She just flat out refuses to talk to me about it, and just rejects what the dietician has told her to do. So if you can fix that, I'd be all ears!
For me, there are two problems I face. And until COVID, one was not a problem, but it has become one that probably warrants some discussion. I gained a bit of weight over the COVID thing. Appetite just did not go away, and I had swum enough to not have to worry about it. Well, I'm not swimming as often as I should, but I'm training for a 10K swim this fall. So I'm doing longer stuff, be it runs or swims or cyclling or whatever. With that comes the need for fuel. So.......the big issue I face now is how to ensure I'm getting enough fuel to properly train while trying to lose a few more pounds? And the second is related, what is teh right stuff to eat througout the day when training for endurance stuff?
One of the biggest issues that I have no idea how to get around is how to eat a special diet when meals are all with the family, and the matriarch and youngest kid aren't keen on special diet (note, we eat pretty healthy, but not necessarily the right stuff for athletes).
Two suggestions for the original poster. *** 1) It's a question about diet and weight. Please don't label the topic a "general question." *** 2) There is a section for non-swimming related questions. It's valuable for this type of question. *** That being said, until I turned 35 (or actually until they closed the pool I swam in at 34 years and 6 months) I was always (unsuccessfully) trying to gain weight and get my weight up to the 160's. After I turned thirty five (or actually 34 years, 9 months, when they reopened the pool and the locker room with the scale), I was always (again unsuccessfully) trying to get my weight DOWN to the 160's.
