USD Football 1993

TOUCHDOWN ILLUSTRA.TlD

College football teams are learning that in the link between diet and performance there is more than meats the eye.

not fat kids. "When I was in school, you came away with no idea about lifelong nutrition and health. Now we're doing a better job as coaches, educating our guys how to eat." No matter how healthy his team, Gilbertson can't keep his job if low-fat diets lead to low- victory seasons. But, at Ca l and across the country, carnivorous coaches and players have learned a high-carbohydrate diet leads to high performance. "What they have to understand is what their muscles use for fuel , and they understand it when they start fading in the third and fourth quarter," said Ellen Coleman, a dietician affiliat- ed with the S.P.O.R.T. Clinic in Riverside, CA, and a consultant to college and professional teams. "When you turn it into a performance issue, they become really interested. When they try performance-based nutrition and see they do better, they're all for it." Said Gilbertson: "Track and field led the foot- ball people into that, eating carbohydrates before you compete as opposed to eating a steak the morning of the game. We're all looking for peak performance."

T he tall tale's told of the three he-man football players barking out orders for their slabs of steak. Says the first play- er: "Give it to me rare." Says the second player: "Give it to me raw." Says the third player: "Just run it by me and I'll rip off a hunk." No more. You'll stil l hear col lege football coaches describe a freshman as "beefing up," but they don't mean it literally any longer. Twenty years ago, the Saturday morning pre- game meal featured steak and eggs. Today, with a generation of input from conditioning coaches and nutrition consultants, game day dawns with a breakfast of pancakes and frui t. "I think you're seeing football players in better shape year-round," Un iversity of California coach Keith Gilbertson said. "Guys are bigger and stronger and they weigh more, but they're

Gttys are bigger and stronger and they weigh more, but they're notfat kids. -Keith Gilbertson

Why steak, then? Did Amos Alonzo Stagg believe his teams needed some beef every day to reach a bowl game every year? " It had nothing to do

with diet," said Robb Rogers, strength and condi- tioning coach at Baylor University. "I think it goes back to the stereotype of males: 'Give me 24 ounces of your best T-bone because I'm a man.'

Illustrations by John McKinley