4 minute read
Sweet Potato with Almond Granola
4 Tips for Young Athletes
When choosing foods to fuel your body for optimum performance, here are four things Dikos recommends for all young athletes:
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Choose fresh and dried fruit, nuts and seeds, lean proteins, beans and lentils, avocado and other whole-food sources over prepackaged counterparts.
Plan ahead: Keep the pantry and fridge stocked, prepare food in bulk ahead of time and purchase ingredients such as plain frozen brown rice to keep meal time fresh, nutrient dense and convenient.
Eat balanced meals: Aim for a source of quality carbohydrates, lean protein and healthy fat with meals and snacks as often as possible.
Hydrate: As a sign of proper hydration, urine should be clear or light, not bright, yellow.
Photo courtesy the Indianapolis Colts
Almond Granola Sweet Potato
Recipe and photograph courtesy of Finish Line Fueling Here’s a simple, quick-to-fix option as breakfast, an afternoon treat, or even before a demanding workout or practice. Dikos suggests baking sweet potatoes in advance and storing in the refrigerator to make preparation easy, and fast.
1 large sweet potato baked 1 tablespoon almond butter ¼ cup plain grass-fed, whole milk yogurt ¼ cup buckwheat oat granola* Dashes of cinnamon, nutmeg, or allspice (optional) Drizzle of honey or maple syrup (optional) Salt to taste Warm a leftover sweet potato in the microwave. (If baking fresh, pre-heat the oven to 425° F. Wash a sweet potato, poke it with a fork on several sides, place on a baking sheet, and bake until it reaches the desired softness.) Slice potato down the center and top with almond butter and any spice desired. Top with yogurt and granola. Serve immediately.
—Indianapolis Colts’ nutritionist
As for breakfast, rather than get too hung up on a specific time when breakfast should be eaten, Dikos suggests viewing it more like a window of time when that first meal shouldn’t be missed.
“Breakfast,” she says, “can be used as a tool to support an early morning workout.” But, depending on the athlete, it might be postponed for after the workout and utilized as a post-workout recovery meal.
“An athlete with high-energy demands may need to consume virtually two breakfasts, one before the workout and another after,” suggests Dikos. “It supports great training and recovery, mental clarity throughout the day and makes the athlete a better decision maker in the food choices they make throughout the day.”
Improve performance and establish lifelong eating habits
Both Luck and Castonzo have been fortunate to have their hard work and athletic prowess award them the opportunity to play a sport they love and turn it into a career—but becoming a professional athlete, or even a collegiate athlete, isn’t a reality for most kids. Which is why it’s so vital that exercise combined with healthy lifelong eating habits be a priority regardless of their future in organized athletics. Through his partnership with Riley Children’s Health and the Change the Play program Luck encourages young people to make good choices about nutrition and exercise—choices that will help shape them into healthy adults.
The program challenges youth to “focus on fun ways to learn about exercise and healthy eating, both at school and at home,” says Luck. And fun is key.
“If it’s not fun, a kid’s not going to do it.” But, he says, that goes for young athletes as well—they too should enjoy their activities and have fun while playing whatever sport they’re involved in while maintaining balance.
“As an athlete,” says Luck, “you need to look for things that make you better, and moderation is important,” especially, he adds, when making food choices. And it’s that “looking for things that make you better” that can make all the difference in a young athlete’s performance, which is why Castonzo’s advice when it comes to nutrition is equally simple.
“Educate yourself,” he says. “Find out what’s in the food and how it affects your body.
“In the off season, I used to watch some of the young guys at the IMG Academy who were there training for the Combine. Some were so diligent with their diet,” he says. “Others, not so much.”
And of the guys who were indolent when it came to their food choices. Castonzo says no matter how good they were on the field, he guarantees none of them are still in the NFL.
“Fueling your body wrong will catch up to you,” he says. Quoting one of the Colts’ nutritionists he recommends everyone remember these seven words: “You can’t out train a bad diet.”
—Jackie Dikos, RD., CSSD., CLT. | NutritionSuccess.org
Additional resources for young athletes:
For recommendations from renowned sports dietitian Nancy Clark | SuperKidsNutrition.com
For advice from the “Biggest Losers” personal trainer Bob Harper, NFL MVP LaDainian Tomlinson and ’99 World Cup Soccer Champion Brandy Chastain | SuperHealthyKids.com
For a performance-based grocery shopping tips, and jumpers | USATF.com
*More nutrient-dense recipes—including one for buckwheat oat granola—can be found in Dikos’ upcoming book, Finish Line Fueling. The book, published by Skyhorse Publishing, will be available on Amazon and at Barnes & Noble this November.
