College-aged Athletes and Healthy Diets

A healthy diet is essential to college-aged athletes, not only so they perform well during games, but also so they have enough energy to get them through daily practices, classes and late night studying. The nutritional needs of college athletes are much higher than the needs of the average college student.
Athletes tend to use more energy than non-atheletes and need the
proper nutrients to build and repair muscle tissue since they are
under more bodily stress than students who are not in college athletics.

According to a study done at Penn State, varsity college athletes work out an estimated four to five hours a day. Compared to most non-athletic students who, on average, exercise 30 minutes per day, the energy expediture is considerably higher. Providing young athletes with healthy food choices is one of the keys to helping them meet their full athletic potential. And for most of these athletes, we hope their healthy food choices will stay with them for the rest of their lives.

On average, college-aged athletes burn up to 3,500 calories per day, and they need the right balance of calories, carbohydrates and protein to stay healthy. College and university foodservice directors across the country agree that all the right food is available daily for these student athletes, they just need to know how to make healthy choices and the nutritious snacking choices. The snacking occasion offers a terrific opportunity to add good nutrition to a student athlete’s diet. Healthy snack choices for young athletes include whole-grain ready-to-eat cereal such as Kashi^® Granola Snack Pouches, low-fat fruit flavored yogurt, peanut butter on whole-wheat toast or graham or animal crackers such as Keebler^® Animal Crackers.

Knowledge is the key in order to get these active students to make the nutritious choices for their bodies. Consider holding a seminar each semester in your cafeteria with all the coaches, athletes and athletic director. Have your school’s nutritionist on-hand to discuss the right meal choices these athletes can make daily and why it is important to make these choices. By shining the light on how readily available healthy nutrition is on campus, college-aged athletes will have a better chance to perform at their fullest and stay healthy year-round.