What you should eat after you train

Sports Performance Bulletin

To M.Olaru

Today at 12:56 AM

Dear mircea, What you should eat after you train We hope you've been finding these free emails useful. But if you're really serious about taking your fitness, skills and strength to the next level, we'd urge you to snap up one of the members-only trial places on our Peak Performance service.  This is an advanced source of training techniques and strategies as used by professional athletes, coaches and sports scientists. You'll get cutting edge breakthroughs, exercises, drills and techniques every week, saving you hours of time that you'd normally spend researching or planning your training sessions. Best of all, if you respond quickly you can get it all for less than the price of a cup of coffee.  To find out more, click here: http://secure.newsletters.co.uk/pponline/pound/getinpeakcondition.asp How to Eat Yourself Fitter Okay, so today's tip is all about protecting your immune system so you can perform at your best all year round. The key is, quite simply, what you eat... especially AFTER you're been doing exercise.  Truth is, you can follow all the fancy training programmes you want, but if you're laid up with coughs and colds each winter, you're never going to reap the rewards of all that hard work. So you need to ensure your body gets enough of those nutrients that support your immune system, including:  •  Vitamin A - well supplied in liver, eggs, all orange and red fruits and vegetables such as carrots, sweet potatoes, apricots. •  Vitamin C - found in citrus fruits such as oranges and grapefruits, kiwis, all the berries, also well supplied in tomatoes and peppers. •  Vitamin D - good sources include eggs, milk, butter, cod liver oil and some other fish oils. •  Essential fatty acids (i.e. omega-3 and omega-6 oils) - good sources include all the fatty fish (trout, sardines, herrings, salmon, mackerel, pilchards, etc.) as well as unrefined whole grains and nuts and seeds, especially, hemp, flax, walnuts and pumpkin seeds. •  Zinc - a vital immune nutrient; good sources are high quality, lean cuts of meat and fish and shellfish; also found in whole grains and some nuts and seeds, such as walnuts and pumpkin seeds. •  Selenium - well supplied in unrefined whole grains (eg wholemeal bread), all seafood and some nuts and seeds, especially Brazil nuts. But as well as the above, you need to consider a post-exercise nutritional strategy.  What you should eat AFTER you train  In recent years, studies have shown that low carbohydrate consumption is associated with increased levels of stress hormones and poor immunity.  Why? Because when your carbohydrate stores are low, vigorous exercise starts a process called 'catabolism'. That's where body tissue such as muscle is broken down in order to provide energy. Catabolism is associated with higher levels of stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, which lowers immunity.  So you should keep your carbohydrate levels topped up at all times, so that you're not training with depleted levels of muscle carbohydrate (glycogen).  Here are some guidelines that will help you do just that: •  Dietary carbohydrate - Ensure your daily diet provides an ample supply of carbohydrate at all times, with around 60% or more of calories from carbohydrates (unprocessed, whole grain breads, pasta and cereals, rice, corn, all types of fruits and vegetables, beans, peas and lentils). If you train in the evenings, make sure you consume sufficient carbohydrate both at breakfast and lunchtime. •  Carbohydrate drinks - For longer (60+ minutes) or more intense training sessions, you should consume 500-1000mls of a 6% carbohydrate drink (around 60 grams of carbohydrate per litre of water) each hour during training. This will help to reduce the extent of carbohydrate depletion during exercise. If you'd like more nutritional advice, based on all the latest scientific evidence, then we'd urge you to take up a place on Peak Performance, the world's number one research newsletter on stamina, strength, speed and fitness. In each issue, our team persuade top coaches, physicians, sports nutritionists, physiologists, and psychologists to share their winning secrets . This is the kind of high-level information that's usually kept to closed circle of top athletes and clubs. However, if you click here now you could try it out for 2 issues in a special members-only starter package... for just 97p. Click here for more top-level nutritional secrets  http://secure.newsletters.co.uk/pponline/pound/getinpeakcondition.asp   Helping you become the best you can be, Sports Performance Bulletin Sports Performance Bulletin Meadow View Tannery Lane Bramley Guildford Surrey GU5 0AB T: +44 (0)1483 899330 E: sportsperformancebulletin@pponline.co.uk Warning! By clicking the link below you will be permanently unsubscribed from this newsletter including any upcoming training drills.