How to Fuel Youth Athletes Ep 38

Every endurance athlete remembers the moment when things finally click. Your swim feels smoother, your pacing makes sense, your fueling works, and suddenly the sport feels not only easier, but more fun. And for many athletes, that moment happens at training camp. That's exactly why we created the Endurance Edge Triathlon Training Camp happening April 22nd through 26th at Lake Jocassee in South Carolina. For 4 incredible days, you'll train in a small group with expert coaches, sports nutrition support, and sports psychology guidance, all designed to help you train smarter, race stronger, and finally connect the dots in your performance. We swim in crystal clear mountain water, ride beautiful and challenging roads, run scenic trails, and spend the rest of the time recovering, learning, laughing, and eating some seriously amazing chef-prepared food.

Mm-hmm.

Camp is intentionally small, just 20 athletes, so you get real coaching, true connection, and amazing breakthroughs. So if you want an experience that can transform your entire season, we invite you to join us. Head to theenduranceedge.com and click training camp and reserve your spot with just a $100 deposit. Come train hard, learn a ton, and leave stronger than you ever imagined.

I'll see you there. Okay, welcome back to the Find Your Edge podcast. I am your host, Christina Fiumara Newport, and I am here with one of our newest dietitians, Marissa, and she is all about some youth fuelings. That is today's topic. But first, Marissa, I would love for you to introduce yourself to the world.

Hello world, I'm Marissa, and yep, I'm the new dietitian to The Endurance Edge. Super excited to be here. I guess real quick about myself: born and raised in South Florida, was a competitive soccer player my entire life, went to school at Florida State University where I got my undergrad in dietetics and chemistry because I'm a nerd, and then I got my master's in exercise physiology and Sports Nutrition. From there, I went through my dietetic internship, became a registered dietitian, and then my first full-time job was the director of performance nutrition at Appalachian State University, who just crushed Texas A&M. So gotta give a shout out to App State. I was their first full-time dietitian and first dietitian actually in the Sun Belt Conference. So that was really a fun experience of learning as I went, but I oversaw the entire athletic department. And then from there, I went to Florida State University again, because I obviously missed it so much. I went back to Tallahassee and I was their director of performance nutrition for 3 years. I oversaw the athletic department when it came to nutrition, had a staff, worked primarily with football, softball, swim and dive, baseball, tennis, oversaw basketball with my other staff, all that good stuff. And then now I'm in the greater state of Kentucky, where I live in Louisville, where I am working at a private performance facility. Where it's kind of a mixture of youth athletes, Major League Baseball players that come there during their offseason, your everyday general population, to triathletes who are trying to get in some conditioning or cross-training. The other half of my job, I also work at a Division I school called Bellarmine University. So still working with the collegiate setting, but also honing in on that youth setting. That's kind of in a nutshell where I've been. Not only am I a registered dietitian, but I'm also a certified specialist in sports dietetics. So it's just a really fancy way of saying I have a specialty certification in performance nutrition. So yeah, happy to be here. Very cool.

Love it. So we love working with our youth athletes. This area in particular where we are in North Carolina is very rich in soccer and hockey and swimming. We are based out of Triangle Aquatic Center, which there's 12,000 swimmers there. But we love helping youth athletes and their families too, to fuel properly. So this has been kind of a thing that's been, we've been seeing quite a few patients for, so we figured it would be a great intro to do a podcast with you all about how do youth fuel properly for their competition days. Lead us off, Marissa. What are some of the main concepts that people should remember? And then we'll start getting into like the nitty gritty of like timelines and stuff.

Yeah, try not to get into the weeds of these things. I think if you keep it simple with your youth athletes, the better, right? There's no need to get into the science and all the crazy stuff of what can be done with nutrition when you're working with the 14-year-olds. Like, let's just make sure first and foremost they're refueling after they exercise, they're eating enough calories for their performance so they can recover. Are they hydrating properly? Are they sleeping well? Are they on video games till 3 in the morning with their friends? Or are they getting a good quality sleep? Are they eating breakfast? Are they skipping meals? Like all of those kind of basic foundational nutrition needs that we need is the most important thing when working with youth athletes. First and foremost is, are we getting enough calories? If we got that down, which parents may not know, that's why working with a dietitian is great, 'cause we can tell you if you are or not. Once we get the calories down, what calories are we eating? What do we need to focus on? Do I need more protein in my diet? Do I need more color in my diet? Do I need more carbohydrates to help my energy performance throughout my workouts? Once we get those macros down, then we can even get into the micronutrients. Like, okay, like my youth athlete doesn't eat broccoli, but he'll eat spinach. Like, okay, we're making sure we're getting a bunch of nutrients in again to help that recovery process. Once we get that in, let's talk about nutrient timing, right? So we kind of build it up kind of like a pyramid scheme, but not the ones that you avoid, the ones that you like. Where we go calories, macros, micros, nutrient timing, and then even supplements if that's something that we're interested in talking about. But that's the big foundation. If we're not refueling, rehydrating, sleeping, recovering, you're not going to perform at 100%. You're not going to be able to push yourself where you want to go, for sure.

Awesome. I like how you broke it down. Super simple, really easy. And I think so many parents are like, uh, sure, I think he's eating enough, or she's eating it.

How do you know?

You really— that's the power of a dietitian. Haha.

Yeah.

Okay, cool.

Parents know everything, but maybe not when it comes to this. Yes.

And that, and that's always an interesting challenge of like, well, the parent might want it or they see it and the youth may not, or vice versa. So we also have the lovely challenge of dealing with those sorts of like family dynamics.

But yeah, yes, exactly.

I know you're really good at that, Marissa. Okay. So we went over the foundations, but today we're really going to dive into like, what do you do on competition day? Because so many people are here, we are leading into the fall. So many people have their cross-country meets, they've got their swim meets, they've got their football games, they've got their whatever meet or game. So let's walk through some of those micronutrients and macronutrients and nutrient timing leading up to game day or meet day?

Well, the fueling and the hydrating when it comes to competition day does not start on competition day, right? It starts the week up. You got a Saturday football game, you're starting Monday with making sure we're refueling after every practice, we're getting that recovery. It goes back to what I was just saying. Like, if you're not doing that throughout the week and you just do it on competition day, you can't expect to perform at your best in optimal performance, right? So, once we got— let's just say we have all that intact. Hydration also, like we're not chugging water right before the game because we don't want our stomach to be sloshy or have to run to the bathroom 2 minutes before kickoff. We want to make sure that we're gradually drinking water so that way our body can actually take it in and use it for hydration versus just peeing it right out. So, that's the first thing, especially when it comes to hydration. It's like, don't chug. Do not chug. We're not chugging. We're going to gradually drink throughout the entire day, and honestly, when you get closer and closer to game time, you're drinking less and less because you don't want that sloshing around your stomach. Something also when it comes to hydration is it's not just water. Please don't drink just water. I know water is the best thing for us, but we also want to incorporate electrolytes into our hydration regimen. So that could be like a Gatorade or sports drink, a Powerade, coconut water if you're trying to find something a little more natural. Or those ORS packets or like Drip Drop, Liquid IV, all of those are going to be great sources of electrolytes. And something that you can ask yourself or your child, your youth athlete, is, are you a heavy sweater? Are you a salty sweater? If they either answer yes to one or both, then you know you definitely need to incorporate those electrolytes throughout the day for sure. And that can even consist of having pretzels before or something high in sodium or salting their food, right? So that's hydration on competition day. Just remember, don't chug, gradually drink throughout the entire day. Once we get closer, let's start tapering off that water. When it comes to nutrition, obviously there's so many different types of athletes, different types of sports, different type of times, noon kickoff to a 7 PM kickoff. They all kind of have the same idea, it's just that timing that we were talking about. Unfortunately, I always like to give keep it simple and say competition day should be really boring when it comes to your nutrition. We don't want any crazy colors, or like, you don't want to have a giant chicken Alfredo pasta with garlic bread and broccoli and all this stuff. That's super heavy. So we want to keep it really boring and simple. I say that, and then I also say we also want to avoid F-words. And competition day can feel a lot of F-words, but not these, um, fat, fiber, and fried. So we want to avoid foods that are high in saturated fats. Like I said, that chicken Alfredo sauce can be really heavy on our stomach. Anything fried is going to increase inflammation in our body. So that's not going to help our performance, but also may not make you feel the best. And then fiber is just going to kind of slow you down and may honestly make you run to the bathroom. I don't know about you guys, but when I eat a lot of fiber, I have a pretty regular situation going on. So we want to avoid those on competition day. So let's say we have a noon kickoff. Our breakfast can look like maybe egg sandwich on English muffin, a bowl of fruit, and a glass of low-fat milk. Something that's going to get you all of your nutrients. Our plate should be essentially high carbohydrate. So that's going to be your potatoes, your rice, your pastas, your bread, moderate protein. So that way we're still having that protein to kind of keep us full, but also help that recovery even up to game time, right? And then a little bit lower on that fiber, that color. So green beans is a great example of a vegetable that's kind of higher in water content and lower in fiber. So we can have that maybe. So if we have like a lunchtime pregame meal, for example, we got about 3 hours before competition, we definitely want to have something substantial. So that could look like a chicken breast, pasta with light marinara sauce, maybe a dinner roll, right? So really simple, not the best tasting thing in the world probably, but it's going to give you that nutrition and nourishment that you need for competition. So like I just said, we want that kind of 3 hours before as like a pre-game meal. So if we have a 6 AM run, are we going to wake up at 3 AM to eat? No. So something to think about is your dinner the night before, making sure that we're having again that high carb, moderate protein, low fat, fiber, fried meal. You can have the dinner the night before, that way your tank is kind of full. And then when it comes to right before competition, we just top off our tank with some simple carbs. So 3 hours before high carb, moderate protein, low fat, fiber foods. When we get too closer to competition, we want to top off our tank. Like I said, we want to have simple carbohydrates, which is exactly how they sound. They're simple. They're easy to break down, go into our bloodstream and be used for energy. Right? So real quick, that's some gas in our tank to get us going, making sure we're good to go. So that can look like applesauce, a chewy bar, a banana, Fruit snacks. If we have kids who just refuse to have any awesome fruit, fruit snacks, Rice Krispies, are they the best thing in the world for us? No, but they serve a purpose, and that purpose is fueling our youth athletes before their competition. So, parents, it's okay to keep some fruit snacks in the house. I always tell my college athletes, have your Reese's Pieces before exercise. Obviously, it's not the best thing in the world, but you really want it, have it before that. So we got 3 hours, we got the 30 minutes, and when it comes to how much we should have before that 30-minute mark, I always say 30 grams of carbs 30 minutes before. So like I said, that looks like a medium banana, 2 chewy bars, 2 applesauces like the GoGo Squeeze. Those are great options. Now let's say we have a halftime and it's an hour and a half in. We definitely want to make sure we're having something during our game. Obviously not while we're running to home plate or running to the goal and scoring, but when we have a halftime, when we have a break and we're able to get something in, utilize those simple carbohydrates. If you're someone who doesn't feel like they can eat in the middle of the game at halftime, have a Gatorade that has carbohydrates, not the Gatorade Zero, right? Have an apple juice, have applesauce because it's kind of like a liquid but nothing crazy. Sometimes, like when I was working with football, even like a half a turkey sandwich, something that's maybe even a little more substantial. If you're a bigger guy, you're an O-lineman, a tiny applesauce may not do it for you. So think about that also, is how much you're working out and then how big you are. If you're a little bit bigger, maybe a little bit more. But yeah, we want to keep it simple during that time also. Again, would you rather have fruit snacks or a bowl of broccoli? You probably don't want that broccoli because that may upset your stomach. So have that simple simple carb during competition also. If you're a multi-event athlete, whether it be a swimmer, track athlete, we want to make sure we're still eating throughout the entire day. Sometimes you may have an hour, 2 hours, 3 hours in between your events. Remember, that 3-hour mark, you can have a meal that's really simple, easy for you to digest. Avoid those F-words: high carb, moderate protein. And then the 30-minute mark, just have your quick carb. So if you can kind of keep it consistent where you think 3 hours, decent meal that's pretty simple. 30 minutes, really simple. During, even more simple. Then you're pretty good to go when it comes to the competition day. Obviously, throughout this entire time, we're hydrating with water, a Powerade, kind of a mixture of both, so we get those electrolytes. Because a lot of people don't realize that electrolytes help us stay even more hydrated because it retains the water that we're drinking. So if we're just drinking water, we're gonna be sweating it right out. So if we have an electrolyte beverage with our water, we're able to retain that water a lot easier. When it comes to after a game, let's say we got a W. We always want that W, right? We won first place, we won a nail-biter of an event. I like to consider this the celebratory meal. Like, I want you to enjoy yourself. Obviously, I want you to start that recovery process immediately. So if we have, let's say, from game time ending to dinner, we have 2 hours. Get a quick protein shake in, something that just starts that recovery process immediately. Get a carb in because you just used a lot of carbohydrates for energy, so we want to make sure we replenish them for practice the next day or conditioning this week, right? So we always want to kind of start that recovery process immediately. But your dinner with your family or your lunch after a game, you should be excited and happy. You just crushed it on the field or whatever field of play you're on. You should have that cookie if you want it. It's okay. Your body deserves it. You had an awesome time. You got the W, like I said. But again, just be mindful. Doesn't need to be as simple and as boring as during the entire day, but definitely make sure you're getting some protein to help that recovery process and your muscles regrow, repair. Get those carbs to replenish all the stores you just used, and then have some fun. Very cool. I love it. That's kind of comp day in a nutshell.

Yes. So let's do a quick summary. So beforehand, you had that really fun saying with your Fs. Remind us of those again.

So avoid the F words— fat, so high-fat foods like that Alfredo sauce, right? Fiber, so fibrous foods like dark leafy greens, broccolis, whole wheat bread, whole wheat pasta, stuff that's going to kind of make you feel heavy and may have to go to the bathroom. And then fried, those are going to be high in those saturated fats that only increase inflammation in the body and also just kind of don't make you feel your best. Competition.

Great tips there. And one thing that's good to note is everybody is different.

Yep.

Right? Like you had suggested, like, oh, have that glass of milk, you know, beforehand. Well, if you're lactose intolerant, obviously that is not a good choice. But yes, you got to try a lot of this stuff out and practice it.

I'd say definitely experiment on your practice days. If you've eaten anything before you exercise, you don't know what to do, try a couple different things. Even half a chewy bar. See how your body responds. Once you find your thing, stick with it. Don't need to change it.

Yes, cool.

I love it.

And then beforehand, we're looking at roughly a 3-hour mark and then a 30-minute mark. So just drive those home.

So 3 hours, keep it boring, keep it simple. We want high carbohydrates. So like, let's say 2 cups of rice or 2 bagels for breakfast. And then we want something moderate in protein. So at least getting that 20 to 30 gram amount. So if everyone that's listening put their hand up, their palm is roughly the size of roughly 20 grams of protein. So that looks like a chicken breast, 2 or 3 eggs. So if you can kind of always make sure you have protein the size of your palm on your plate, you're good to go there. And then the rest of your plate can just be maybe some fruits and high water content vegetables that aren't super high in fibers. Like I said, green beans, anything like that. And then that 30-minute mark, even more simpler, find out what works for your body. 30 grams of carbohydrates 30 minutes before. So a banana, half a bagel with some peanut butter on it, 2 apple sauces, a chewy bar, fruit snacks, Rice Krispies, anything is better than nothing. Because if we're not eating before we exercise, our body is going to start breaking itself down and using energy from our muscle. And then what's the point of working out? We're breaking down our muscle to work out. Making sure we eat is so much more important because I'm sure everyone listening here has gone to practice or done something on an empty stomach and absolutely hated it. Needed it. We're trying to avoid that.

Yeah, definitely. I think we tend to see a lot of people who are like, oh, you know, I feel like my child is really drained when they walk in the door, or they just seem like they're complaining about not having enough energy. And I know we're talking about competition day, but sometimes it's hard to test some of these things out. Like, for example, some athletes might get out of school and then literally turn right around, and they haven't had anything to eat since like 10:30 or 11 o'clock. So they get out of school like 3, they haven't had anything to eat since 10:30, and then they're going to practice for another 2 or 3 hours. So it's like, now we have a logistical challenge, which I think can also tie into competition day when you're traveling. Tell us a little bit about how we deal with some of those challenges and what would be some of your suggestions.

That's when I would I speak directly to the parent and I'm like, all right, this is what we got to do. If our kid, our youth athlete is eating at 10:00 AM and their practice is at 3:00, they definitely need to eat something around 12:00, 1:00. That's where I challenge the parent to potentially pack in an extra turkey sandwich with cheese in it that they can keep in their lunchbox. They just know you have that on the bus coming home, right? Something like that. So it's really just preparing and planning. That's the most important thing. That's a lot of people. Once they have the knowledge and what to do, they can plan and prepare, right? So now I'm telling you, all we got to do is maybe pack that one extra sandwich, pack that one extra fruit to go with the sandwich, and have them have that, whether it be in between classes. I know sometimes some teachers don't like you to eat, which is— for athletes, we need to tell the teachers they need to eat. But at least maybe on that bus ride or right after school when they have a little bit of time to get some food, and then Again, that 30-minute mark on the way to practice, whatever it may be, maybe just keep a couple, just give them a bunch of fruit snacks to keep in their bag and just trust they don't eat them all, or at least one a day. Just keep something in their bag when you know, like, they're good to go, they have something there. So my biggest thing would be planning and preparing, trying to have something available for them in those tiny amount of times that they have. And then when it comes to traveling, again, plan, prepare, have a cooler filled with a bunch of awesome snacks like hard-boiled eggs, cheese sticks, yogurt, some high-protein snacks like that, and then some performance carbohydrates. So, you know, some whole wheat crackers, a bagel, some bread, you know, where they can make a PB&J or something like that. Something that you can keep in your cooler and always have on you, because I know on the road it's really easy just to drive through a Burger King— and is Burger King still a thing? McDonald's or whatever it may be— and then get something real quick, which is fine, but you just gotta be mindful of what you're choosing there. Remember, avoid those fat and fried. So if we want to go to McDonald's, maybe get a grilled chicken sandwich with a fruit as the side versus fries. Just being more mindful, maybe looking at the menu beforehand. If we know our team's going to Olive Garden, maybe not get that chicken Alfredo, maybe get some pasta marinara sauce and grilled chicken on top. It's just being more mindful when we're on the road because again, we're not completely in control. Right? And sometimes if the coach is driving or if we're with the team and they just stop at a gas station, it is what it is. That's what we got. So I always try to keep snacks as a protein and a carb. You don't want to just have an apple. You want to have an apple and a cheese stick, right? We want to keep them together because get that protein in for recovery, get the carbohydrate to make sure you have that energy. And then also that carbohydrate is going to be high in micronutrients to help you even more with vitamins and minerals. Minerals. Road can be difficult, but plan ahead if you know where you're going. Look up the menu if you can, and then pack some really good snacks that are going to be satiating. So like those high protein snacks, even like pre-made protein shakes like Muscle Milk, Fairlife. I don't know if everyone has a Costco near them, but Costco has a bunch of those Core Powers, stuff like that. They're shelf stable. Fairlife is lactose free. So anyone who wants that can have it as well. If you just hate that, then soy milk is fine too. Just make that extra trek to the store, pack a cooler, and you're good to go on traveling days too.

That's cool. Yeah, we've definitely talked about Sheetz on the podcast before because it's like my favorite place to like walk in.

I'm like, oh, look at all the snacks.

I'm like, yay. And this is certainly as a collegiate dietitian, I know you did this a lot, but that's one of those things that we can help with as dietitians with parents is Okay. You know, you're going to X location. Let's look it up on Google Maps, see what's around, because they might be in a food desert. You might not know where to go. So I always try to have people know what they can get. If it can either be at any grocery store, if there's no grocery store, what can you get at a gas station? Like what's a default thing? Like I have a lot of people who like those Lance cracker sleeves.

Oh yeah.

They can just have like one of them and like, it's not going to upset their stomach if they're like headed right into to a meet, and then they can have a couple more in between, and then— and it's not refrigerated. I always kind of joke that the junk food aisle and the gas stations are for athletes, you know? Like, yeah, finding, finding what it is that's gonna work for you that you know you can get no matter, no matter what.

Gas stations have come a long way. They really have. The Wawa, the Sheetz, the Busy Bees— I mean, they're like luxury gas stations now. You have restaurants in there, so even like there's sometimes a Subway there that you can always grab a sandwich, which is perfect. But just be mindful when you're going through all the snack aisles. Obviously, like I said, the F words, just always have that kind of in your head. There's snacks that are super high in fat, maybe avoid that on competition day or around your fueling so you don't have to worry about an unfortunate occurrence.

Yes, we, we definitely don't want those unfortunate occurrences. Okay, very cool. This was super helpful. So if you were to have people walk away with like 2 or 3 things that are now stuck in their brain, whether it be for a parent or for youth athlete themselves, what would be some of the things that you wanna make sure they walk away with?

I think for sure that pyramid that I said in the beginning, like don't, get into the nitty-gritty and all the little details of nutrition if you're a child or if you're not eating enough. Definitely remember, like, calories in is important right now as we're competing, then what we're eating, then when we're eating it, and then we can maybe talk about supplements. So I think first and foremost, before you even dive into anything else, let's make sure we're eating enough calories for our performance. And again, plug in, meet with the dietitian, They'll help you every step of the way. You don't have to do everything, Mom. You don't have to do everything, Dad. We got you there. That's probably the first thing. And then the second thing is definitely on competition day, like, don't just drink water. I think that's something that everyone just thinks, oh, if I just chug water, I'll be fine. I'll be hydrated. Please don't. I think if we just know we need to drink water, maybe have 2 sips of water, 2 sips of Gatorade, go back and forth between both of those, you'll be in a lot better position when it comes to your hydration status than just chugging water, right? For. So gradual, slow drinking. Don't just drink water, have some electrolyte beverage with you. And then the third thing, as I've said about 15 times, is avoid those F-words. I'm telling you, like, we already have pre-competition jitters and potentially bathroom issues, and then we don't want to put a high-fat, fiber-fried meal on top of that. You're not going to feel good, and you want to feel your best, right? You've been training all the way up to competition day, to game day, to match day. The last thing you want to do is have to deal with running to the bathroom and telling coach you can't do it because your stomach hurts. So avoid those F words, fat, fiber, fried, and keep everything on competition day simple. And then the last thing is after that W, enjoy yourself and start that recovery process quickly, but then have an awesome dinner with friends and family and have a good time.

Fantastic. Great tips, Marissa. Thank you so much. That was awesome.

Very well.

And if you guys want to make an appointment with Marissa, make sure to head on over to theenduranceedge.com and book a free nutrition consult and we will get you guys all set. All right, Marissa, I'm sure we will have you back again.

Love it.

For more podcasting.

And, uh, yeah, thank you.

Thanks for listening to the Find Your Edge podcast. If you like what you heard, don't forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so you never miss an episode. And if you're interested in learning more about our endurance coaching, sports and wellness nutrition, metabolic and sweat testing, triathlon training team, or our triathlon training library, be sure to check us out at theenduranceedge.com. And don't forget to follow us on social media at The Endurance Edge. Thanks again. And we'll catch you next time.