Abstract
Background: Dietary intakes can impact an athletes health and performance. Although evidence exists about what an athlete should eat, an athlete's nutritional intake is influenced by many factors. The limited research available suggests the main barriers preventing optimal nutritional intakes reported by athletes are lack of time, food accessibility, poor cooking skills, costs, taste, and time spent in “off-season.” Although these factors have been shown to influence dietary intake they remain relatively unexplored in Rugby Union. This study aimed to describe the nutritional influences on dietary intake amongst Rugby Union player's.Methods: This was a qualitative study utilising in person individual interviews with all participants. Participants were Rugby Union players (n = 30) for either a Super Rugby franchise or one of their development squads in New Zealand. Participant's undertook recorded face to face interviews, which were later transcribed. A thematic approach was used to code the transcripts by the primary coder and the themes were subsequently evaluated by the research team.Results: Childhood upbringing, organisational skills, time and food security also emerged as barriers. Body composition and sport nutrition knowledge emerged as both barriers and enablers to nutritional intake. Influence on performance was an enabler to optimal dietary intake. Fully professional rugby players have access to dietitians, whereas development and semi-professional rugby players only have limited if any access, and they were more likely to seek nutritional information via social media.Conclusion: This study suggests a need for greater nutrition education at developmental levels with an emphasis on affordable food choices, meal planning and skills for interpreting online nutrition information.
Highlights
Optimising nutritional intakes is an important component to maximise performance, promote physiological adaptations to training, assist in recovery, alter body composition and protect overall health of athletes (Beck et al, 2015; Devlin and Belski, 2015; Black et al, 2018)
Each participant identified a number of barriers and perceived attitudes that they believed to influence their capability to eat an appropriate diet or maintain an optimal body composition
Participant’s in the current study report barriers to optimal nutritional intake which could be classed as either sport specific or general themes; childhood, body composition, nutrition knowledge, time management and food security, which is in line with previous research studies in athletes (Heaney, 2011; Birkenhead and Slater, 2015; Stokes et al, 2018; Bentley et al, 2021)
Summary
Optimising nutritional intakes is an important component to maximise performance, promote physiological adaptations to training, assist in recovery, alter body composition and protect overall health of athletes (Beck et al, 2015; Devlin and Belski, 2015; Black et al, 2018). Heaney (2011) explored influences on dietary practises of elite-level athletes, coaches and sports dietitians from the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) They identified that the barriers to healthy eating included lack of time for food preparation, financial limitations, inadequate cooking skills and difficulty with living arrangements. The limited research available suggests the main barriers preventing optimal nutritional intakes reported by athletes are lack of time, food accessibility, poor cooking skills, costs, taste, and time spent in “off-season.”. These factors have been shown to influence dietary intake they remain relatively unexplored in Rugby Union. This study aimed to describe the nutritional influences on dietary intake amongst Rugby Union player’s
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