Are you not only actively involved in sports but also highly ambitious in achieving your training progress? Perfect, then you've surely already noticed that your diet plays a huge role in your performance.
You can definitely gain some advantages if a few basic rules regarding the timing of food intake and nutrient composition in connection with sports are followed.
Advantages of proper meal timing in sports nutrition:
• Conscious meal structure around training
• Planning energy intake to match training
• Supporting personal training goals
What to do when time is short?
Not everyone has a lot of time to whip up a gourmet meal between a full-time job, household chores, and their training. That's why there are three quick meals you can eat before your workout.
Meals before training (3-4 hours beforehand):
Your pre-workout meal should provide you with energy, not deplete it. That's why it's important to consume complex carbohydrates and high-quality proteins and to avoid fatty meals. Fat slows down digestion, which can negatively impact your workout.
You can try:
• Rice with vegetables and tofu/meat or various bowl options
• Muesli with oats, fruit, and seeds
• Pasta with light vegetable sauce
• Whole-grain bread with egg, salmon, cottage cheese, or chicken breast cold cuts
If you get hungry shortly before your workout, you can opt for small snacks like protein bars, nuts, or bananas.
Before an intense wakeboarding session, I've found it beneficial to eat my lunch about 3 hours before training and to make sure it's no more than a small bowl with rice, vegetables, and protein from chicken or pea-based vegetarian/vegan products.
You should pay attention to this.
Most people don't function well with a full stomach before training, as your body needs time and rest to digest food. If training is scheduled for the morning, you can try to get by without breakfast. However, for me, this only works for light exercise. For intense sports like wakeboarding, it doesn't work. I definitely need to have eaten something before sports. Easily digestible carbohydrates like bananas or muesli bars, which don't sit heavy in the stomach, are suitable.
Hydration & Electrolytes: often underestimated in sports
You'd be the first person not to sweat during exercise. And with sweating, you lose valuable electrolytes, which you can replenish with sodium-rich mineral water. That's why regular drinking breaks are extremely important. Your body will thank you if you don't let it dehydrate. Anyone who starts training while dehydrated will notice it sooner or later. Because sweat loses minerals like sodium, magnesium, and calcium (magnesium and calcium contribute to normal muscle function, magnesium also to normal nervous system function).
Tip: In my experience, plain water is perfectly sufficient for wakeboarding. It becomes interesting if you engage in excessive endurance sports like marathon running. Because even a water loss of 2% of body weight can already impair endurance performance [1]. That's why you might want to look into electrolyte drinks/isotonic drinks.
Sufficient water is therefore important for your body. That's why you should ensure adequate intake even before exercise.
Overdrinking
Overdrinking sounds strange at first, but yes, if you drink too much, you can poison your body. Apart from that, you'll have a water belly, and no one really likes that. For endurance athletes, therefore, no more than 900 ml per hour is recommended during a marathon run [2].
Eating after exercise
After sports is before sports. Because your body burns calories afterward, it's important to eat protein-rich food for muscle maintenance and regeneration. The afterburn effect is scientifically known as EPOC (Excess Post Exercise Oxygen Consumption). After intense physical exertion, oxygen consumption is increased as the body tries to normalize body temperature, eliminate lactate, and replenish energy stores. Approximately one hour later, your body begins to regenerate. During this phase, protein utilization is high, which is why it is recommended to eat protein-rich food [3].
You should also pay attention to your calorie intake. Depending on your training goal, it may be beneficial to eat not only protein-rich but also calorie-rich food. In extreme sports, it's about the demands of the sport, not about losing weight.
The role of micronutrients
Micronutrients, i.e., minerals, vitamins, and trace elements, as well as certain amino and fatty acids, can partly not be produced by the body itself and must be absorbed through food. A balanced diet covers the requirements in most cases. Mineral water additionally provides magnesium, calcium, and sodium. The body absorbs vitamin D through sun exposure, which is usually not a problem when wakeboarding.
What do injuries have to do with nutrition?
In many extreme sports such as wakeboarding, snowboarding, BMX, and combat sports, the physical strain is high. Injuries are inevitable. Those who train intensively regularly have a higher protein requirement than an averagely active person. Therefore, conscious protein intake is part of sports nutrition for many athletes [4].
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Sources
[1] Schröder, Wagner: Trinken beim Sport: individuell und zielorientiert. S.11. https://www.thieme-connect.de/products/ejournals/pdf/10.1055/a-0971-0665.pdf
[2] Schröder, Wagner: Trinken beim Sport: individuell und zielorientiert. S.10. https://www.thieme-connect.de/products/ejournals/pdf/10.1055/a-0971-0665.pdf
[3] DAK Onlineredaktion: Nachbrenneffekt nach dem Sport: Gibt es ihn? https://www.dak.de/dak/gesundheit/bewegung-und-sport/sport-fakten-wissen/nachbrenneffekt-mythos-oder-fakt_14136
[4] Wienecke (2009), zitiert nach Schulz-Ruhtenberg: Mikronährstoffe und Aminosäuren. https://sportaerztezeitung.com/rubriken/ernaehrung/2474/mikronaehrstoffe-und-aminosaeuren/