Optimal strategies

Download the free RugbyMax pdf guide to nutrition strategies, or see below for a summary.

Rugby nutrition science has two elements to it:

  • Nutrient dietary intake
  • Performance nutrition

Get the best from your nutrient dietary intake

Optimising nutrition will enable you to achieve your performance goals, help minimise injury-risk and stay healthy.  Many players don’t give this area enough attention but with a bit of knowledge and application it is neither difficult, nor a chore.   Rugby places extreme demands on the body and mind.  If food choices and quantities don’t meet the demands the body makes, physical development and performance will inevitably suffer.   

There are a few basic principles that you can follow that help to get the best from your diet:

  • Make your diet practical and enjoyable
  • Vary what you eat
  • Take smaller more frequent meals
  • Hydrate frequently
  • Include the right proportions of the major food groups
  • Consume sufficient calories for your weight and training demands
  • Ensure you have carbohydrate, protein, fibre and fat of sufficient quantities and type
  • Include micronutrients in sufficient quantities

Get the best from performance nutrition

Players and coaches need to understand what can be gained from performance nutrition.  It is important not to see this area as any kind of substitute for proper diet.  In fact, a significant amount of what players expect from supplementation is more effectively delivered through the diet.  

However there are some performance nutrition elements that can’t be obtained from the diet.  RugbyMax is designed with this in mind, for rugby and in accordance with independent research.  

It's a good idea to record what you eat, and then determine if there any gaps that you need to fill, preferably with your dietary intake or you can obtain some extra nutrients through supplementation.

Our advice is to get your regular nutrients from dietary intake and use performance nutrition to give you the elements you can’t get from your diet.  RugbyMax works best alongside a good diet.  When using performance nutrition products, use them according to instructions and be consistent.