Diet of an AFL player

[SnappyHappy]

Hey all,

does anybody have any tips for dieting for football or know of any sites to get a typical diet plan of an AFL footballer. Dieting is obviously a large component of acheiving optimum fitness and is something that I want to have a go at in an attempt to lower body fat and improve endurance and overall fitness. A daily or weekly plan is what I am after, or am I better off visiting a dietician?

Cheers

 

[wceblog]

Not sure pro AFL players diet regimes would help you much - they'd need to be eating much larger volumes of food given their training and recovery requirements than neccesary for the amateur footballer.

There's plenty of plenty of good information at the following links to get you started:

http://www.fitfooty.com/p/nutrition.html
http://www.afc.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/208/newsid/27326/default.aspx
http://www.topendsports.com/sport/afl/nutrition.htm
http://www.ausport.gov.au/ais/nutrition
http://www.johnberardi.com/articles/nutrition/index.htm

 

[kaydub]

The Paleo Diet for Athletes is worth reading.

The Food Pyramid for Athletes found at http://www.nafwa.org/the-library/general-nutrition-topics/food-guide-pyramid.html is really good too.

http://www.sportsdietitians.com.au/ has some great factsheets some AFL specific

 

[mcuzzy]

Go to the richmond site and go to roar vision, go through the videos and you'll find one from a few months back called Foley and Jackson go shopping

(can't link to video sorry)

 

[wceblog]

Didn't watch it all, but it's up on youtube:

[youtube]6KKzvxDaxas[/youtube]

 

[cptkirk]

number 1 - don't use the word diet as diets don't work but nutrition plans do

different goals will require different nutritional requirements

if you are carrying excess then that should be your immediate goal as it will take the longest

5 rules of fat loss nutrition

1 - have solid everytime you eat (red meat, kangaroo, fish, chicken, tuna etc)
2 - keep all carbs except for veg for before and/or after training
3 - carbs from above to come from fruit and maybe liquid sources
4 - determine your current veggies intake and double it at least
5 - make sure to include healthy fats (fish oil, unsalted nuts, avocado, fish etc)

 

[Kong]

5 rules of fat loss nutrition

1 - have solid everytime you eat (red meat, kangaroo, fish, chicken, tuna etc)
2 - keep all carbs except for veg for before and/or after training
3 - carbs from above to come from fruit and maybe liquid sources
4 - determine your current veggies intake and double it at least
5 - make sure to include healthy fats (fish oil, unsalted nuts, avocado, fish etc)

2 - In the morning as well.
Rice, oats.

 

[cptkirk]

i think you "can" have carbs (fruit and veg not included) in the morning but for best results you shouldn't

 

[SnappyHappy]

Thanks for all the help so far, really appreciate it. I've found the sites provided really useful and after reading through most of it, I've devised a daily meal plan that I think could work. Before I finalize it I thought I'd post it here to get some feedback, just to make sure I haven't included any foods that I should avoid, or if I've overlooked an important source.

My aims are to get lean (lowest possible body fat), put on some muscle but not too much more and probably most importantly, greatly improve my aerobic capacity (solid running at least 5 nights a week)

Morning - Corn flakes with chopped banana in low fat milk, also a pink lady apple

Mid-Morning - Scrambled eggs on wholegrain bread with fried tomatoes, spinach and mushrooms (2 x omega-3 eggs and 3 x egg whites)

Lunch - Lean beef burgers with lettuce, tomato, avocado, cheese

Evening - Fruit platter (watermelon, rockmelon, pineapple, kiwi fruit, strawberries) or bowl of Veges or Yogurt

Dinner - Chicken breast or Lean steak with pasta and vegetables (broccoli, cauli, carrots, beans, peas, baked potato) OR spaghetti bol with heart smart mince OR fish

Water with all meals, powerade occasionally before or after training. Also take fish oil tablets daily.

 

[cptkirk]

cornflakes are no good, nothing actually real in them, if you're going the cold breakfast route then you'll need porrige, oats, museli or 1 of the high fibre cereals...for fat loss though i'd leave carbs out until training time though

eat the whole egg for goodness sakes

there's no protein with the fruit platter and a lot of sugar at once...ypoghurt is a protein source, it's twice as much carb then protein at best

you'll only want gatorade for running type training, not wts

 

[cptkirk]

cornflakes are no good, nothing actually real in them, if you're going the cold breakfast route then you'll need porrige, oats, museli or 1 of the high fibre cereals...for fat loss though i'd leave carbs out until training time though

eat the whole egg for goodness sakes

there's no protein with the fruit platter and a lot of sugar at once...ypoghurt is a protein source, it's twice as much carb then protein at best

you'll only want gatorade for running type training, not wts

 

[Kong]

i think you "can" have carbs (fruit and veg not included) in the morning but for best results you shouldn't

You're kidding aren't you?

 

[cptkirk]

for pure fat loss, no

if you train in the pm why do you need sugar/energy in the morning?

 

[mcuzzy]

I always thought carbs in the morning were a must?

If I don't get carbs in the morning I feel slow and empty

 

[cptkirk]

again, for PURE FAT LOSS, no

 

[mcuzzy]

fair enough, what if you did an empty stomach walk in the morning then ate just a bit of carbs? or is that pretty much the same?

 

[SnappyHappy]

Either that or he has no idea.

The OP doesn’t sound like a porker who wants to lose weight, he wants to train hard and keep body fat to a minimum. Carbs are essential when you train. They are the energy your body needs to burn. The idea is to stay away from Simple Carbs and load up on Complex Carbs otherwise your body will just burn out.

Spot on Bazzar. Weight loss is not a concern for me, I was more referring to lowering body fat % just to get leaner. I have altered the meal plan I posted and changed Corn Flakes to oats/muesli in the morning and the Evening meal will now be Diced chicken breast in mountain bread with avocado, tomato etc.

Accompanied with 5+ nights of solid running training and probably 3-4 nights of weight training, will this meal plan be effective?

 

[cptkirk]

fair enough, what if you did an empty stomach walk in the morning then ate just a bit of carbs? or is that pretty much the same?

walk on empty stomach is fine but nothing else....you wouldn't need carbs after it though, its walking after all

Accompanied with 5+ nights of solid running training and probably 3-4 nights of weight training, will this meal plan be effective?

if you want to drop bodyfat then i suggest going at it as hard as you can for 28 days and do it properly and you won't need to worry about it again...that will putting other goals/training on hold too

Either that or he has no idea.

The OP doesn’t sound like a porker who wants to lose weight, he wants to train hard and keep body fat to a minimum. Carbs are essential when you train. They are the energy your body needs to burn. The idea is to stay away from Simple Carbs and load up on Complex Carbs otherwise your body will just burn out.

for a short time (like 28 days as i posted above) you can easily train hard without carbs without burn out...i've done it and many others have too..just because you haven't or can't because you'e not discipline enough and it seems too hard for you, doesn't mean others can't

 

[cptkirk]

post 1 - he says i wanna lose lower body fat

i suggested keeping carbs to around workout time, not eliminate them completely

then it was posted that you have to carbs at breakfast and that is what we'e up to now

as i have also posted, if the goal is PURE FAT LOSS, then carbs need to be limited for a short time to get the quickest results

if he wants to do that he can, if he wants to keep up his 5 runs and 4 wts program then i think you can even work out that he'll need carbs

maybe you should read the whole thread baz

 

[swiftdog]

Carbohydrate intake prior to training squashes fat metabolism. The body chooses to metabolise glycogen/glucose (carbs) before fat during exercise if it's there, especially in the untrained. It's a continuum, the fitter you are the more fat you'll be burning at any given relative intensity (e.g 70% HR max). One mistake people often make is that they think they're either burning carbs or fat. It doesn't work like that, you're predominantly burning one or the other. Protein is only used as a fuel as a last resort.

Why shouldn't he have carbs for brekky? You can only get energy from carbs, fat or protein. Protein's a s**t fuel source and you wouldn't want a breakfast high in fat..

 

[mcuzzy]

Sorry for the big bump.

From people I've spoken to, the players generally don't actually eat an insane amount food. It's usually just 3 meals per day with 1 or two snacks including drinks like white coffees and sports drinks. Found this pretty surprising as I imagined they'd be going out of their way to have 5 or 6 meals per day to maintain and/or gain weight.

 

[cptkirk]

they're not maintaining huge amounts of weight like a rugby or gridiron player but i'd assume they'd load somewhat pre/post game but they're on a fair bit of supplemantation too

 

[mcuzzy]

Carb intake higher before game and after game with some leeway for a few cheeky treats.

Supplementation containing cals like whey,dextrose etc. isn't as common as I thought either, but they come under the snack category anyway.

 

[Mofra]

Sorry for the big bump.

From people I've spoken to, the players generally don't actually eat an insane amount food. It's usually just 3 meals per day with 1 or two snacks including drinks like white coffees and sports drinks. Found this pretty surprising as I imagined they'd be going out of their way to have 5 or 6 meals per day to maintain and/or gain weight.

It depends on their goals - each player is on an individual nutrition plan.

In his second season Ayce Cordy mentions that adding weight was a major focus and in one interview he notes that he'd buy 7 x 2l milk bottle every week, use part of the 2l for a PWO shake then sit on the couch and drink the remaining 2 litres daily as a way to add weight.
I'm guessing someone like Stewy Dew would have had a substantially different plan.

 

[Andre]

I'm guessing someone like Stewy Dew would have had a substantially different plan.

Stewy was on 2x 7L of milk a day.