Clinical Coaching for Fitness & Image

The Foundations Of Athletic Performance

A holistic approach to health care looks at each individual as a whole, assessing the body as the dynamic interconnected structure that it is in order to treat disease – But did you know this same approach can be used to improve our athletic performance?

Power, strength, energy, agility, mental resilience, flexibility and cognitive performance are all so important to our performance within our respective sports. Training correctly is imperative but the level in which we benefit from this training largely depends on the competency of your body to take this stress and turn it into new and improved performance markers. In order to simplify this holistic approach to training, we have come up with four foundations of athletic performance, these include:

• Health
• Nutrition
• Recovery
• Training

Health

Potentially the most important of all our foundations is our health – and for good reason! Your health largely determines the way the other foundations will work for you. Because of this, clinical assessment and pathology testing is so important for assessing any underlying health conditions or deficiencies which may be impeding upon your performance.

Some areas of health that can effect your Athletic Performance:

• Gut health (SIBO, dysbiosis, malabsorption etc)
• thyroid conditions (hypothyroidism & hyperthyroidism)
• hormonal imbalances (PCOS, endometriosis, hypothalamic amenorrhoea etc)
• blood sugar dysregulations (insulin resistance etc)
• hypothalamic pituitary dysregulation (cortisol, over training etc)
• nutritional deficiencies (iron, vitamin D, protein etc)
• Mental Health disorders (anxiety, depression etc)
• other underlying conditions (gilberts syndrome, MTHFR, high acidity, high inflammation etc)

The use of pathology testing provides a sound biochemical picture so a targeted and measured approach can be established and maintained. We devote such a big portion of our lives to our sports, we don’t want to be playing guessing games! Once areas of concern have been found, the necessary steps can be taken to aid these conditions so athletic performance can be enhanced.

Nutrition

Yes, nutrition is  an important key to athletic performance and yet it is often very underrated.

Nutritional foundations for fuelling our performance include:

• Calories and macronutrient ratios
• Nutrient timing (different GI carbohydrates around training etc)
• Hydration and electrolyte balance

Although this is a great start, each of these points are very individual and just because one method works for one athlete, it may not necessarily work for another (even if they’re in the same sport or on the same team!). Factors of biochemical and genetic individuality, energy output, output type, output duration and recovery status are so important to consider when determining the correct nutrition plan for an athlete. It needs to work for the individual in practise, and not just in theory!

Going beyond the foundations, we delve into eating for wellness. This includes eating in a way that’s supportive of our health and any deficiencies or conditions we may have. Through diet we can target acidity, inflammation, metabolism and our body’s hormonal response to food. Eating for wellness also includes eating in a sustainable way that doesn’t make us view food in a negative light – Eating for athletic performance can still be interesting, delicious and fun! *phew*

Recovery

Recovery is vital in healing our bodies after a gruelling training session, so we can progress and feel refreshed to take on our next challenge. Recovering correctly from training means we are getting the biggest bang for our buck and therefore progressing quicker! Our health and nutrition are big players in the recovery game, but lifestyle factors also make a considerable difference.

Lifestyle Recovery factors include:

• Sleep quantity
• Sleep quality
• Active recovery
• Stretching & facial release
• Parasympathetic nervous system input (resilience to stress)

When we combine health, nutrition and lifestyle factors we can improve the rate in which we metabolise metabolic waste while aiding the health and recovery of our muscles and fascia. Once these recovery foundations are in place, supplementation can be utilised.

When considering supplementation, it is important to be aware that supplements can only improve a small percentage upon our foundations. If we don’t have the correct foundations in place, our supplementation will not be working as hard as it could be. Supplementation can be a great tool in revving up our performance and recovery, but only when used correctly!

Training

It’s no surprise that training is one of our foundations. Although nutrition and supplements can’t put in the hard work for us, they can increase our performance while training by aiding factors which may reduce our performance.

Overlooked factors that can reduce performance include:

• Fatigue (mental and physical)
• Anxiety
• Poor mental cognition
• Poor mitochondrial function

So What Is Clinical Coaching?

As with all the foundations to athletic performance, it takes a holistic multi-directional approach to build a solid base of each foundation. It takes a balanced synergy of ALL the foundations to get the most out of your training and become the best athletes we can be! Clinical coaching is a way of looking “under the bonnet”, your bonnet, and identifying areas that may or do effect you. Providing you with an approach to rectify these areas in a way that will not only improve your performance but improve your health and prevent future problems.