EATING FOR WELLNESS
Time lost to illness is the biggest bugbear among the coaches we speak to. Fortunately, Danaher has some practical dos and don’ts for your immune system. “Long, hard hours of training depress the immune system for hours after exercise. It seems tempting and harmless to take a high-dose vitamin supplement like Vitamin C. Unfortunately, there are concerns that excessive antioxidant intake may impair exercise training adaptations. So, you may be helping your immune system but reducing the performance gains you’re working so hard for. Instead, match your energy intake to expenditure – eating enough calories to cover what your body is using. Make sure you replace the calories that you use up during training. Consume about 50% of your daily energy intake as carbohydrate (low-carb diets have been shown to reduce the immune system). Ingesting carbohydrate during prolonged exercise, and carbohydrate and protein after exercise reduces the rise in stress hormones and appears to limit the degree of exercise-induced immune depression. Ensure an adequate protein intake of 1.2 1.6g per kg of body mass each day. Taking a 1000 IU/day dose of vitamin D3 from autumn to spring to maintain can be helpful too (vitamin D helps to maintain the immune system). Finally, consider a probiotic if you are ill a lot or doing a lot of travelling.”