1. Sleep – ensure that your athlete is getting the proper amount of sleep for their age. The body needs that down time for repairs and re-energizing.

2. Fluids - make sure your athlete gets plenty of water, milk and vitamin rich fruit juices in their daily diet. Steer clear of sodas and other drinks high in sugar and artificial sweeteners.

3. Fruits & Veggies – Fresh fruits and vegetables are the absolute best source of vitamins and minerals that you can give your kids. Be creative or be fun, but get them in their daily diets. The best vitamin sources are strawberries, papaya, cantaloupe, blueberries, tomato, broccoli, spinach, sweet potatoes, apricots, carrots, mango and bananas. Check out USA Swimming’s list of the top 5 foods to build immunity for more ideas.

4. Reduce Sugar and Sweeteners – Sugar suppresses the immune system. The fewer sugary foods you can give your athletes, the better. Sugar is the main ingredient in so many convenient processed foods. Many of the artificial sweeteners on the market today are not much better, really. Aspartame can cause headaches and more serious reactions in some. Splenda is known for causing stomach and intestinal issues. Our family doctor recommends that parents give their children Splenda when they are constipated (we have tested this one and it works).

5. Yogurt – The enzymes in yogurt are great for restoring balance in your child’s digestive tract. Look for yogurt with active cultures as they are the ones that help restore the good bacteria in your system (especially after being on antibiotics). Yogurt is also high in calcium – good for strong bones. One note – steer clear of the candy colored, high sugar yogurts.

6. Good fats - Your body needs a certain amount of good fats in order to stay healthy. Many types of fish, like salmon, are naturally high in Omega 3 Fatty acids. Another good source of Omega 3 is flax seed oil. You can easily add flax seed to oatmeal and other hot cereals and your kids will never know they are there. We use Coromega Omega-3 Supplement in the Orange Flavor. They come as little squeeze packets my kids love and they taste like orange cream with no oily residue either. I blend them into smoothies in the morning for the kids and they love it.

7. Vitamins - Vitamins B and C are two of the most important when it comes to boosting the immune system. Our pediatrician recommends a good multivitamin just to fill in the gaps in your athlete’s diet. Vitamin C is available in many forms from fresh fruits, fortified in many foods, and vitamins. Personally I love Emergen-C. It is a powder that you add to water to make a fizzy, fruit flavored drink high in vitamin C and other vitamins and minerals.

8. Supplements - Sometimes athlete’s just need a little extra boost. Low doses of zinc have been shown to boost the immune system and reduce the severity and duration of colds and other viruses. Probiotics are important for restoring balance to the intestinal tract – especially following antibiotic use. Many of the vitamin/supplement companies are now making children’s formulas of their products (never give children the standard adult dose of a supplement and always check with your doctor first).

Building your athlete’s immune system all year long will help keep them on the playing field, in the pool, on the court or in the gym when everyone around you is looking for the box of tissues!

Click on the image to download the Are You Hydrated poster as a PDF file.

Let’s face it, as parents and coaches we can not be with our athletes 24/7, and as they get into Middle School and High School, our influence becomes less and less. As a result, I am a huge advocate for educating athletes from a young age to take an active role in their training and game day preparation (yes, I know they don’t always head our advice, but we have to try!). One area we can easily educate our athletes on is hydration.

Why Do You Need To Be Hydrated?

Put bluntly, athletes who are not properly hydrated before practice or competition are not going to perform as well as they could be.  In other words, what you want to get out of your body, you have to put into it!  Your body needs a combination of fluids, carbohydrates and electrolytes in order to perform at its best. In a recent Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI) study, they found that 70% of high school athletes show up to practice dehydrated. And the consequence of dehydration is lower performance.

How Can You Tell If You Are Properly Hydrated?

Here is the crazy part! Figuring out if you are properly hydrated is a super easy process – even a 5 year old can tell you if they are hydrated enough when given the proper information. In the language of our kids – if your pee looks like lemonade, you are good – if it looks like apple juice or darker, then you are dehydrated. Easy peasy. To make it really fun and visual, Gatorade created this very simple poster (or as the Gatorade Sports Moms called it – a Pee Chart) you can hang in the locker room or share with your athletes. Click on the image above to download the poster as a PDF.

Another way to measure fluid loss – which is not always as accessible – is to have your athlete weigh themselves before exercise and after. If they are properly hydrated there will be no weight difference. For every pound of sweat they left on the field, they need to replace it with 16 ounces of fluid consumed slowly over the next 30-60 minutes. Again, pretty simple stuff.

What to Drink Before & After Exercise

Before exercise your athlete needs to:

• Drink ~5-7 ml per kg of body weight four (4) hours before exercise
• Drink ~3-5 ml per kg body weight two (2) hours before exercise

For example – if your athlete weighs 130 lbs., they need to drink about 10 oz. of fluid four hours before workout and another 4-6 oz. two hours before. Now this is a rough estimate and by monitoring their urine color, athletes can determine whether they need more or less fluid intake.

After exercise athletes need to drink 16 oz. for every pound of weight lost due to sweat.

With school schedules and our generally busy lives, it is not always possible to follow the pre-exercise hydration schedule exactly, but with basic hydration knowledge our athletes can better prepare to perform at their best.

This information was gleaned from the notes I took during a presentation by GSSI scientists given to a group of Sports Moms in a recent Gatorade sponsored event. The GSSI was founded to help athletes optimize performance and well being through research and education in hydration and nutrition science.

Today I am just going to give you a quick overview of our day with the Gatorade team. I literally took PAGES of notes on the how, why and when of fueling our athletes, how Gatorade fits into that and my thoughts on the Gatorade products which I will be sharing with you in more detailed posts over the next few weeks. Be sure to like the Sports Girls Play Facebook page or follow Sports Girls Play on Twitter so you don’t miss a thing!

We started our day with introductions and breakfast with the President of Gatorade North America, Sarah Robb O’Hagan. Sarah is a sports mom of three, a runner and super smart business woman. We had a great time sharing our own backgrounds, including how many kids we each had, the sports they play and what our websites were.

Next we met with their marketing department and got background on the history of Gatorade and its branding. Basically Gatorade was developed in 1965 in an effort to help college football players at the University of Florida (thus Gator – ade) maintain athletic performance throughout practice and games (watch the history of Gatorade commercial on YouTube – love it!). In Gatorade’s early years they focused primarily on athletes – testing them, finding out what they needed from a sports drink and formulating Gatorade to help. As the sports drink market grew, Gatorade in their own words kind of “lost its way” – marketing itself broadly to the general consumer and as a result, sales stagnated. After all, Gatorade is formulated to aid the body in the preparation, during, and immediately after EXERCISE. Gatorade is not formulated as a drink you kick back and consume during a movie or as a replacement for water. In the past few years Gatorade has re-focused its efforts on athlete and education of the athlete’s core team – the coaches, trainers, and while they are young – the parents.

One of the new Gatorade print ads aimed at Sports Moms

Throughout the course of our sessions with the marketing team we shared our preconceived impressions of Gatorade. We shared with them how we do or don’t already use Gatorade in our kids’ daily lives. We asked them tough questions about High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS – which, oh by the way, Gatorade no longer has), sugar, dyes and not knowing which product would be good for our kids when, how much, and why. Gatorade was hoping for those types of questions from us and responded giving us the ability to ask our hard questions directly to the scientists and product developers.

At lunch we met with Wanda Pratt, the Mother of NBA rising star Kevin Durant. You can watch her video spot as part of the Gatorade Become campaign below:

Wanda’s presentation to us was very inspirational and I loved how she shared stories of her son’s younger days. I especially liked the one where he stormed out of practice because his coach gave him conditioning he didn’t like. He walked to his Grandmother’s house and by the time he got there the coach had already talked with Wanda who had talked with his Grandmother. The way the coach and the parent handled the situation was right-on the money and about an hour later – after his Grandmother mentioned something about how piano might be a good thing to take up – Kevin returned to practice – and did every one of the tasks coach had asked for.

She answered all our questions and reassured us that one day, our athletes would thank us for all our support and everything we have done for them in order for them to follow a dream.

We spent our afternoon in sessions with scientists from the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI), where they have tested over 10,000 athletes! The majority of the scientists at GSSI are former athletes and coaches – like the two who did presentations for us – Lindsey Baker and Lisa Esposito.  Lindsey has a Ph. D. in Exercise Physiology from Penn State and she knew her stuff! Wow! The sessions on Teen Athlete Insights and Nutritional Needs as well as the Science of Gatorade were fascinating and this is where I took the most notes. Even if you take Gatorade out of the equation, the information the scientists shared with us is VITAL stuff for coaches, athletes and parents! If you want your athlete to succeed, you have got to pay attention to what is going in their bodies. For example – how do you teach your athletes to determine if they are dehydrated or not?? Check back on a future post for this really easy way!

My Gatorade creation and other product samples

Finally we finished up the day in the sampling room. We made our own Gatorade flavors – like mine at the right, which is Char’s Cherry Berry Pomegranate Potion – and learned more about the research that goes into coming up with new Gatorade products. We learned about each of the various Gatorade product lines and who they really are for – like the new G Series FIT which is more for the older athlete (ahem, 40 something Moms) who work out but don’t need all the extra calories that a college soccer player may need. We tasted them all and told the team exactly how we felt about each product – trust me, there were some serious faces being made and the honesty was on the table!! We told them if we would buy them or not – I found two products that I was completely unaware of that are excellent solutions for two of my own athletes (more on that in a later post) and fell totally in LOVE with the Gatorade Natural line.

Speaking of the Gatorade Natural line, they are natural versions of the Gatorade Thirst Quencher line and low-calorie G2 that are made with all natural flavors, colors and ingredients! And they taste AMAZING. Unfortunately they are only available in certain markets and only through Whole Foods stores. If you want this line available in more areas and outlets, please let the Gatorade team know. All the moms in our group did!

Like I said, I took so many notes and have lots to share with you about sports nutrition and your kids over the next few weeks, so check back in. In the meantime, feel free to check in with the other Gatorade Sports Moms and read their accounts of the experience, too.

The Gatorade Sports Moms are: Char Polanosky from Sports Girls Play (that’s me) with 3 kids,  Lorraine Williams from Track Mom with 1 daughter, Lori Falcon from My Wooden Spoon with 3 boys, Carmen Staicer from Mom to the Screaming Masses who has 6 kids, Lisa Douglas from Crazy Adventures in Parenting also with 6 kids, Kimberly Kauer from Tippy Toes and Tantrums with 2 kids, Alyssa Banko from Mommy Warriors who has 4 kids (two sets of twins!) and Stephanie Wagner from And Twins Makes 5 with 5 busy kids.

Disclosure: I’d like to thank Gatorade for this truly educational opportunity! Gatorade provided me with all my transportation to and from the event, my lovely stay at The Wit Hotel, my delicious meal at Spiaggia and some nice Sports Moms swag. However, all opinions and insights shared in this post are my own derived from the information provided to us and my own experience.

Giving your kids the right nutrition is tricky enough, but when they are bodies in constant motion – also known as athletes – not only is it tricky, but it is really important, too!

I recently wrote a piece on Kids and Fiber for the Kellogg’s Snackpicks website based on some really interesting information I found on the Kellogg’s Nutrition website.

Fiber is important in your child’s diet because it  helps to keep the digestive system healthy so it can absorb nutrients and turn food into energy, prevent constipation, and maintaining a healthy population of gastrointestinal bacteria. All of these are essential for athletes!

And it’s easy to determine how much fiber your athlete needs – simply take your child’s age plus 5 grams of fiber each day. So if you have a 12-year old, she needs 17 grams of fiber each day.

Getting the fiber into your athlete’s diet takes a little planning, but like everything else in their athletic schedules, it quickly becomes routine! Head on over to the Snackpicks article on Kids and Fiber to get some simple ideas from this busy Mom (that would be me) on how to incorporate more fiber into your athlete’s diet.

Did you know that according to the Gatorade study seventy percent of moms are raising kids in competitive sports, creating a group of “Sports Moms” nearly 13 million strong? Or that Sports Moms spend one-third more time and more than twice as much money across their children’s entire span of extracurricular activities than moms without kids in sports? Despite this, 79 percent of Sports Moms report that it’s “no problem” balancing these added demands with their other responsibilities, further reinforcing their commitment to their kids’ sports.

Gatorade has created a new website for sports moms to help give us the resources to make our jobs a little easier – especially when it comes to nutrition. Sports nutrition is tricky stuff - especially when you are dealing with athletes of different ages, types of sports and genders. For example, my 14 year old son who swims a 2 hour workout needs a different kind of fuel than my 12 year old daughter who does gymnastics 12 hours a week, and that is different from what my 9 year old who plays field hockey 2-3 times a week and swims 2-3 times a week needs. But regardless of what sport they do, they all need to keep hydrated. Knowing how much fluid to give them and when keeps me on my toes and requires that I take the time to educate them, as well.

The Gatorade Moms web site is already packed with great articles by leading experts in the sports nutrition field and they are definitely worth taking the time to read and share with your teammates. Some of the more useful articles, in my opinion, are:

• Protein for Athletes, A Practical Guide
• Hydration: Critical for Performance
• On the Road Again: How to Choose High-performance Foods When Traveling

What’s your take? Is being a Sports Mom (or Dad) a role you enjoy or is it just too much?

This is the first week of morning practices at gymnastics for the summer and rather than taking the time to eat breakfast, pack a snack or make her lunch … like her Mother (that’s me) asked her to, my daughter (who is almost 12) decided to take her time getting ready, fix her hair, and turned her nose up at the breakfast selections I had for her. I made a whole batch of cranberry orange muffins this morning – which two of my three kids gladly ate – but, no, she did not like them. She also decided the banana she was offered would not work either.  She passed on the eggs, too.

So around 10 a.m. – one hour into her 3 hour gymnastics workout, she tells me she is feeling tired, weak and sick to her stomach (I coach at the same gym, but don’t coach her). Hmmm, maybe you should have had some of that breakfast. I offered her some of my pasta salad that I had packed. Nope, not interested. A teammate shared some pretzels and grapes with her and she came and got some money to get an energy drink, and then she perked up.

The moral of this story – picky eater or not, it is absolutely critical to fuel your body for the sports you do – especially if you have a long, morning work out!

As a parent it is can be difficult to make sure your athlete is getting everything they need and is properly fueled – and picky eaters don’t help matters any. After practice we had a little discussion and talked about the foods she likes and doesn’t and decided that planning her pre-practice meals ahead of time might help prevent this from happening again.

Sports Nutrition Resources:

• USA Swimming has a fantastic sports nutrition resource center on its website
• Feeding your child athlete
• American Youth Soccer Athlete Nutrition Notes
• The Athlete’s Plate: Real Food for High Performance
• Nancy Clark’s Sports Nutrition Guidebook

Don’t forget to hydrate, too! While water is the best for hydrating your athlete, there are times when sports drink (recipes to make your own sports drink) does come in handy – for extra calories, a quick burst of energy during a long work out, and for picky athletes. I do like the new lower sugar options – like Powerade Play (which we recently had the opportunity to review) – the flavor is light, not too sweet and the extra electrolytes and calories do come in handy for long practices, outdoor practices and games.

That’s why the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office on Women’s Health (OWH) launched Best Bones Forever!, a national bone health campaign for girls ages 9-14. Best Bones Forever! focuses on friendship and fun–and encourages girls to “grow strong together, stay strong forever.”

The new campaign empowers girls and their BFFs (best friend forever) to build strong bones by choosing snacks and foods with calcium and vitamin D, and getting an hour of physical activity a day.

Campaign materials such as journals, posters, magnets, tattoos, book covers and a Web site (www.bestbonesforever.gov) get girls excited about growing healthy bones! Parents can get important bone health information from a brochure in both English and Spanish, and a Web site: www.bestbonesforever.gov/parents.

As a gymnastics coach I see girls with repetitive use injuries, injuries that occur from a small error and other injuries that I feel could often be prevented through better nutrition and conditioning. If you are a parent of an athlete, I highly recommend to take a look at the Best Bones Forever site and its sister site, GirlsHealth.gov to get more information on ways you can help your daughter get the proper nutrition and make the appropriate lifestyle changes to keep her bones healthy!

Many parents of athletes ask ,”With prices on everything going up how do I provide quality sports drinks on a budget?”

I have written many times in the past about Homemade Sports Drinks. I frequently receive requests for these recipes, here are a couple of quick and easy recipes. Over the course of a year, you can save hundreds of dollars on sports drinks. (an average bottle of 16oz Gatorade can be almost $1.00 each.)

Sports drinks like Gatorade ™ can be very useful for longer runs and races. Unfortunately, they are also very expensive and full of High Fructose Corn Syrup (Gatorade no longer contains HFCS as I learned in my recent trip to the Gatorade HQ). I’ve found a couple of ways of making sports drinks that are effective and cheap. The ideas for the recipe, like most good running ideas, first came to me from The Dead Runners’ Society.

Gatorade ™ has worked hard to come up with what they feel is a good balance of carbohydrates and electrolytes for extended physical activity – it is actually the most researched sports drink on the market. Most researchers agree that the optimal concentration of carbohydrates in a sports drink is about 6%. This concentration actually allows the water to be absorbed more quickly in the body than plain water alone.

Gatorade has a formulation that gives the following for an 8oz serving:

• 14grams Carbohydrate (5.9%)
• 110 mg Sodium
• 30mg Potassium
• 52 calories

Assuming that is a pretty good formula, we can get close by using one of the following recipes:

Homemade Sports Drink Recipe #1

• 10 tbs. sugar (5/8 cups or 120 grams)
• .75 tsp Sea salt (4.2 grams) or Morton’s lite
• 1 package of unsweetened Koolade mix for flavor
• Water to make 2 liters

The recipe will give a total of 124 grams of solute which in 2 liters water gives a total of 6.2% concentration. For an 8 oz serving this gives:

• 14.2 grams carbohydrate (6%)
• 53 calories
• 103 mg Sodium
• 121 mg Potassium

You’ll notice that the amount of potassium is quite a bit higher than Gatorade, but the rest is pretty close. If you wanted to reduce the potassium, another option would be to use 1/2 tsp. each of regular sea salt and the Morton Lite Salt. This would change it to:

• 104mg sodium
• 40mg potassium

Homemade Sports Drink Recipe #2

If you wanted to reduce the amount of potassium, or simply didn’t want to buy some Morton Lite Salt, here is another option.

• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 9 tbs. Sugar
• 3/8 tsp Salt
• Water to 2 liters

One of the biggest challenges for parents, athletes and their coaches is determining how much water an athlete needs at different times in their day and training.

If the athlete’s urine is dark and scanty, it is concentrated with metabolic wastes and the athlete needs to drink more fluids. When the urine is pale yellow, your body has returned to its normal water balance. Your urine may be dark if you are taking vitamin supplements; in that case, volume is a better indicator than color.

All athletes must drink water before, during, and after exercise. Follow the basic guidelines below to be sure that a child is drinking enough water throughout an exercise session.

• Before Exercise: Drink 10 to 14 oz. of cold water 1 to 2 hours before the activity. Drink 3-6 oz.of cold water or diluted fruit juice 15 to 20 minutes before the activity.
• During Exercise: Drink 3 to 4 oz. of cold water every 15 minutes.
• After Exercise: Drink 2 cups (16 oz.) of cold water for every pound of weight loss. With no weight loss still drink the minimum of 8oz of water.

You must watch and see how much water a young athlete actually drinks. Supervision is essential because children do not instinctively drink enough fluid to replace body water losses. Children may not recognize the symptoms of heat strain, and they may push themselves to the point of heat injury. Young athletes can use non HFCS sports drinks, especially during activities lasting lore than 90 minutes (such as Football or  Soccer). These drinks should contain between 6 and 8 percent carbohydrate or 15 to 18 grams of carbohydrate per cup.

Other tips include:

• If products labeled “sports drinks” do not meet these guidelines, they may need to be diluted. Water is adequate for most children.  However, some youth athletes are more likely to drink sufficient amounts if you give them flavored fluid; sports drinks or diluted fruit juice are appropriate choices.
• Be sure to dilute fruit juice at least twofold: 1 cup of water for every 1 cup of juice.  Tell children not to drink carbonated sodas or undiluted fruit juice as a fluid source during exercise. These beverages are too rich in carbohydrate (which can cause stomach cramps, nausea, and diarrhea).
• Caffeinated beverages (such as tea, coffee, and cola beverages) will dehydrate the body even more.
• Athletes can also replace their body fluids with foods containing a lot of water, such as oranges, watermelon, apples, grapes, and tomatoes, along with water. These foods provide water and carbohydrate, and they are good for replacing lost water and lost energy (glycogen) after exercise.

A few years ago a friend of mine, who is a registered nutritionist, gave us a great list of healthy lunch box and snack ideas. I keep this list posted on the inside of the cabinet in the kitchen for quick reference.

• Tuna sandwich on whole grain bread
• Egg salad sandwich on whole grain bread
• Smoked or roast turkey breast on whole grain bread
• Lean roast beef on whole grain bread
• Natural peanut butter and all fruit spread on whole grain bread
• Whole wheat pita topped with pizza sauce and mozzarella cheese (not the Lunchables)
• Starkist Tuna Kits
• Roll-ups – fill whole wheat flour tortillas with refried beans and shredded cheese; tuna fish; smoked turkey breast with shredded lettuce and cheese; or make your own combinations
• Hot soup in a thermos
• Fresh fruit – apple slices (drizzle with orange juice to keep from turning brown), small bunch of grapes, banana, orange slices, strawberries, blueberries
• Container of unsweetened applesauce
• Container of reduced fat yogurt – stay away from the ones with sprinkles or added toppings
• Fruit roll-ups or fruit leather made with real fruit puree
• Raw carrots, broccoli or cauliflower with ranch dressing
• Mini salads – place cut up romaine or other dark, leafy greens in plastic container with lid. Place croutons in aluminum foil to be added and put salad dressing in small container with lid .
• Celery with peanut butter and raisins
• Mozzarella cheese sticks
• Raw almonds, walnuts, pistachios, cashews and peanuts (if there are no peanut allergies in the class)
• Trail mix made of dried fruit (raisins, dried cranberries, dried cherries), raw almonds or other nuts, sunflower seeds, mini pretzel rings or sticks, goldfish pretzels, popcorn, etc
• Baked tortilla chips and salsa
• Natural peanut butter on whole grain crackers
• For more ideas, check out Lunch Boxes and Snacks: Over 120 healthy recipes from delicious sandwiches and salads to hot soups and sweet treats

With a little planning and some creativity, you can give your athlete the fuel her body needs and avoid unhealthy stops at fast food restaurants, too.