James Morehen, Sports Scientist for Nutrition X and Sports Performance Nutritionist at Widnes Vikings, writes his third and final blog post of a series about rugby nutrition, explaining why what you put into your body is so important in its recovery after a big game.

You can find the previous two articles in the series here.

An 80-minute competitive rugby game puts the body under extreme mental and physical stresses. Not only do players have to be highly focused, agile and skillful, but also they repeatedly engage in high impact collisions. For anyone who has played rugby, you can feel your body suffering after a tough game with little knocks and bruises. Additionally, it is comprehensibly shown that following a game of rugby, blood markers of muscle damage within the body are elevated well above baseline levels. Taken together, an in season 80-minute rugby game really is the toughest training session of the week and hence why we prepare 24-48 hours in advance for it, typically manipulating our lifestyle, mind, sleep and nutrition.

To this end, recovery post-exercise is fundamental to any player in an attempt to arrive at the next training session prepared. Desirable recovery involves a complex profile of adaptive processes: stress management, sleep, massage, and most importantly nutrition.

The main recovery areas surrounding nutrition are:
• Restoration of muscle and liver glycogen stores
• Replacement of fluid and electrolytes lost in sweat
• Regeneration. The repair and adaptation process following the catabolic stress and damage caused by the game

Restoration

Although there is a plethora of evidence showing the deliberate manipulation of carbohydrate (CHO) intake post exercise to enhance training adaptations, when in-season and recovering from a game the muscle and liver glycogen stores should be restored as quickly as possible. As we have already discussed, rugby is a highly intense sport and so the role of glycogen is key for rugby performance.

The post-match meal should include high GI foods and drinks to replace the glycogen depleted from the game. Ideally this should be at a rate of 1.2 grams per kg of body weight per hour and an example carbohydrate strategy is shown below:

For a ~90kg player, ~105-130g CHO in the first hour:

Typical recovery shake – 69g
Hydration drink – 10g
Banana – 14g
Wholemeal Spaghetti – 35g
Total – 128g

The day after a game, players should look to carry on this replenishment but at a rate of 4-6 grams per kg over the course of the day. This should include a mixture of low GI and high GI foods and fluids to replace muscle glycogen stores.

Protein ingestion should also occur as soon as possible after the game to aid the restoration of protein synthesis. The body will be in a severely fragile and sensitive state post game so it is important to consume around 20-30g of high quality sources of protein following the final whistle to aid recovery. To get the greatest rate of muscle protein synthesis it is advised to consume whey-based proteins over soy or casein due to the speed in which whey increases blood amino acid concentrations.

If you are going to reach for the convenient commercial protein shake, ensure it has a high leucine concentration as leucine plays a key role in stimulating muscle protein synthesis, acting as a metabolic regulator.

Replacement

It is not uncommon to see body weight losses of up to 2-3kg following a rugby game, especially in the summer months or when playing abroad in a hotter environment. Therefore, a challenge for players post-game is to replace the fluid loss and restore fluid balance. Every individual is different and some players simply do not want to consume too many fluids due to the feeling of sickness, others may prefer a sweet palatable drink to ingest easily. It is important to remember that just because you have finished the game, this doesn’t mean your sweat loss reduces straight away, in fact, it will continue for a period afterwards – we have all been there when you put your clothes back on but are still sweating.

Carbohydrate and electrolyte combined drinks are best to consume post-game as this will help replace glycogen levels at the same time. The goal is to replace the fluid lost from the game performed and it is important not to over consume in an attempt to gain mass. The time scale post game will decide on the best strategy to allow for adequate rehydration, with current guidelines suggesting 1.5kg of fluid for every 1kg of body mass lost induced from the game.

Regeneration

The restoration of habitual practices post game should be adopted as soon as possible. Planning the correct nutritional strategy post game and on recovery day are crucial to allow the mind and body recover from the toughest training session of the week. In rugby, typically at lower standard levels, the culture of the sport dictates that a few, or many beers are consumed. The knock-on effect of this is that the intoxicated player is likely to be distracted from sound recovery strategies related to nutrition, sleep and post-game soreness treatment. Further, there is evidence that alcohol also inhibits the replenishment or glycogen storage, protein synthesis and also hydration.

It’s inevitable that after a game you are going to have soft tissue injuries and muscle damage due to the nature of the sport. Typically, you may adopt rest, ice, compression and elevation strategies to overcome these symptoms utilizing vasocontrictive techniques. However, since alcohol is a potent vasodilator of cutaneous blood vessels its has been suggested that the intake of large amounts of alcohol may cause or increase undesirable swelling around damaged sites and impede the repair process.

The last 3 blogs have been a series by which I have attempted to highlight the key areas I believe are fundamental and important for the elite rugby player. By no means is this the perfect answer for every single player, but I have written the blogs based on current and relevant literature in and around the arena of sport and exercise science and sports nutrition. Some of the opinions spoken about are reflections of my own time as a PhD researcher within the field of Sports Nutrition and also my time working with elite rugby players and I appreciate and understand that every applied practitioner has his or her own opinions within their own club or team.

James Morehen is part of the team who have developed Nutrition X’s range of Informed-Sport certified products, which have become the No.1 choice of sports nutrition for numerous elite athletes, amateur sports people and casual gym users alike. For more information, or to discuss your sports nutrition requirements, please contact James via www.nutritionx.co.uk