Performance Chefs

Every sport has it’s own unique area of expertise and many of these become areas of excellence that influence and inspire progression across other sports.

Training and Nutrition in Sport

In professional football, fitness and sustained physical output for 90 minutes dominates the game and many sports marvel at the performance levels these athletes achieve across that period of time, often running well over 10km a game. As a result, the training facilities and sports science behind training in the sport of football are second to none.

So professional football heavily focusses and excels on the physical element of training to ensure their athletes are developing an engine that allows them to compete on match day and sustain their performance for up to 90 minutes.

Alternatively, in bodybuilding the output of an athlete is judged purely on their physique and these athletes have learned that nutrition is the leading factor that delivers this output and success. So whilst the training they do may only take 5-10 hours per week, the largest time investment of their week is preparing and consuming meals which includes measuring macro nutrients down to the nearest gram.

Physique competitors understand that if 5% of their nutrition is wrong then this will have a significant impact on their physique and how they look and perform on stage.

So whilst training and nutrition is both essential to footballers and bodybuilders alike, the time investment and priority of these two areas varies.

We know that getting both training intensity and nutrition correct, regardless of the sport, will provide the best outcome. If either area is sub optimal then output will be sub optimal. However, the reality is that both take a mental and physical toll on athletes and it therefore likely that one element will be prioritised over another unless the athletes have support.

In football, whilst a 5% error in an athletes nutrition can be just as detrimental physically on the players measurable output as for a bodybuilder, it is less visual and therefore harder to identify.

The result is that athletes can and do go under fuelled and it is the main focus of the role of a performance nutritionist at a club. Fuelling players is the most important focus for a performance nutritionist and one that is very difficult to control when 50% of what the players consume is outside of the football club.

Periodised Nutrition in Football

Football players are provided with a provision by their club whenever they are at the club training or playing. Depending on the club this provision will vary but importantly it can be controlled by the club.

However, other than the offer for players to take food home from the canteen, no club in the UK provide players with a food provision outside of the club e.g. when they are at home. In an average week, over 50% of the meals consumed by a player will be outside of the club and as a result, there is a possibility for a footballer to get at least 50% of their nutritional requirements wrong.

Nutrition is a complex science and creating a meal plan for an athlete is often the job of a performance nutritionist with a PHD. But even if an athlete is fortunate enough to have this provided for them each week, there is then the job of implementing this plan which is where many players can fall short.

The ideal nutritional outcome is to have an athletes nutrition tailored around their training intensity each day meaning they are fuelled correctly for every session and recovering optimally whilst maintaining optimum body fat levels.

This is the solution Meals focusses on through it’s athlete meal prep service.

The Performance Chef Solution

When we consider the impact nutrition has on performance, whether your output is visual or physical, the first question for an athlete to answer is what is optimal for them. Everything from your sex and weight to training schedule and intensity is going to be a factor which means your nutrition should be tailored to you.

Then once an athlete has a plan, it’s having the time and expertise to implement this plan long term and keep it enjoyable. Unfortunately, traditional meal prep services are not adequate or designed for athletes.

At Meals, we understand that very few individuals, if any, have the capabilities to create tailored, periodised nutritional plans for athletes and then physically implement this for the players and so we have built a team that brings together the relevant expertises and as a collective deliver a complete performance chef solution.

This means that the end product an athlete receives through Meals is almost impossible to replicate by any singular individual, but at the same time it allows the meals service to be cost effective due to the efficiency of having the right people doing the right jobs.

How Does it Work?

At Meals we are science led and are nutritional department is run by a leading UK sport scientist and performance nutritionist. We have build a system that allows us to periodise and tailor the nutrition of any athlete and deliver weekly plans that match their goals and schedule.

Next, our food team take the science and get creative in the kitchen, developing hundreds of meals that can be tailored around athletes needs and tastes.

Then, we have our chefs who are hand picked by our private chef division at Dineindulge which ranks as the no.1 rated catering service in the UK.

Finally, we bring all of this together through the technology of the Meals.co.uk platform, which makes everything from managing your weekly meals and schedule seamless.

In addition to this, we have a dedicated player care team who are able to manage everything for the athlete so their time investment, outside of consuming their meals, is reduced to zero.

Summary

Through Meals, for the first time athletes, clubs and their nutritionists have access to a service that brings together all the expertise required to deliver periodised nutrition for athletes at an affordable rate.

Athletes, such as professional footballers, can have all their meals each week prepared for them by performance chefs in their own kitchen and for these meals to be completely tailored to their needs each day, so they are perfectly fuelled for optimal performance.

Athletes spend on average £250/week to have all their meals tailored for them, including chef time and ingredients, and they can have their meals periodised and fully managed for them for an additional £45/week.

As importantly, clubs and their nutrition teams now can influence and monitor player fuelling outside of the club to delivery the most powerful athlete fuelling system in sport.

Click the button below to explore our performance chef hire service for yourself and email athletes@meals.co.uk to request information on our performance chef services…