Back to Keep Fit

Phil’s Football Fitness Philosophy

1/ Diet

A young athletes diet should be based around high carbohydrate foods, where 60% of the total energy intake should be from carbohydrate sources, between 12-15% from protein, and 25-30% from fat. The carbohydrate intake should be modified if a player is injured or ill, to around 50% of total energy intake. Young footballers who are training regularly should have a daily target of 8-10g of carbohydrate per kg of body weight (e.g. player with 40kg of body weight = 40 x 8g = 320 g per day.

A diet that is high in carbohydrate and fluids, moderate in protein and low in fat will give athletes enough calories and nutrients to grow, train and compete. Below are some suggestions of recommended meals and snacks and foods to avoid before, during, and after games.

Pre-Match

Recommended Water Moderate portions Bread Rolls Bananas Fruit juice Muffins Sports drinks

Not Recommended High fat foods High protein foods Sweets Chocolate bars Doughnuts Hot Dogs Chips/fries Crisps Fizzy or carbonated drinks

Guidelines for water
All athletes should drink water before, during, and after exercise.
Before exercise: Drink 10-14 ounces cold water 1-2 hours before game. Drink 10 oz of cold water 10-15 min. before activity.
During exercise: Drink 3-4 oz of cold water every 15 minutes.
After exercise: Drink as much cold water as needed to quench thirst.
N.B. - Thirst does not indicate when an athlete needs to re-hydrate, if an athlete is thirsty then they are already de-hydrated, the trick is to monitor your consumption to avoid dehydration and thirst.

Breakfast

Recommended Cereal (without sugar) Bread Rolls Waffles Muffins Skimmed Milk Fruit Juice Water Oatmeal Wholemeal Bread Rice

Not Recommended Bacon Sausage Toast with egg or cheese Whole milk Pop Tarts Fizzy or Carbonated drinks Croissants Lots of butter or margarine

Lunch

Recommended Baked potato & chilli Bread Rolls Vegetables Salads Yogurt/Milk Shake (skimmed or low fat) Pasta (careful of high fat sauces) Cheese pizza Lean ham Turkey sandwich (brown or wholemeal bread) Roast beef Sandwich (brown or wholemeal) Fruit cup

Not Recommended Burgers Chips/fries Apple pies Fried fish Fried chicken Meat pizza Fizzy or carbonated drinks Mashed potato & gravy Lots of butter or margarine Biscuits Hot dogs Mayo and cheese

Between game snacks
Low fat cheese, peanut butter with saltine crackers Yogurt with bananas, apples, pears, nectarines, oranges, Frozen yogurt, milk, pudding, pretzels, Italian bread with low fat cheese or margarine.

2/ Fitness

Do Something every day

One of the first things I say to all players is ‘what is the one thing you see all footballers do? Answer = run around! So to be able to run around for an hour you need to have a certain level of fitness. We only have the players for one hour each week and we can’t get them fit in that time, so do try to get your kids to do a bit of what we do in training every day. Just a bit of running & stretching would do. Get a ball and practice your skills as well would be good.