Football Nutrition

Matt Lovell is currently the Sports Nutritionist for the England Rugby Team.

Matt provides specialist sports nutrition advice for professional football players.

There are many similarities between the sports nutrition requirements of a football player

and a winger or full back in rugby.

5 Comments

Mark
October 15th, 2009 at 3:20 pm

Hi,

I am emailing for a small bit of career advice and would be very grateful if you could spare a second of your time to answer a query I have. I am currently pursuing a career in Sports Science, having completed a BSc Psychology, Sport and Exercise degree and a Masters degree in Sports Science I am at present trying to gain further qualifications and work experience. I have a large interest in Sports Nutrition and consider myself to have a reasonable knowledge of the area as I read around books and publications, however during my degrees I have only completed select sports nutrition modules at undergraduate level. Although I feel I have a reasonable practical knowledge and would like to pursue the area as a career option in the future, I think I may be necessary to gain some extra qualifications in the area. I have seen many Level 3 Diploma or Level 3 NCFE Award certificate in Sports Nutrition courses that would allow me to gain further qualifications at the same time as working or completing more work experience. However, I am not sure of the merits of these courses and how they are looked on in the profession. If possible could you advise me on if in your opinion these courses would be of value to me and if they are worth completing or not.

I would appreciate any advice you could provide,

Regards,

Mark

Matt
October 19th, 2009 at 10:08 am

Hey Mark,

I would contact the BANT – and the Nutrition therapy council – it depends a bit on whether you want to just be a sports nutritionist or if you want to be a clinical nutritionist dealing with other health issues and joe public.

You’ll need professional insurance which ever way you go – you can get this as a PT or S & C guy and get nutrition as part of your cover – or you can train up clinically – but it’ll be alot more studying.

The bodies above have lists of approved courses, i’d stick to one of them if I were you.

Also there’s a olympic certification in sports nutrition which is remote and very good

Good luck mate.

Mark
October 19th, 2009 at 12:48 pm

Thanks a lot for the advice,much appreciated. Ill check out thoes societies and see where that takes me.

Cheers,

Mark

Ben Aston
January 21st, 2010 at 3:58 pm

Hi Matt

My name is Ben Aston; I am a trainee journalist currently studying at Bournemouth University.

For my final year I have to write a series of feature pieces on topics in the public interest.

I am writing one feature in the style of FHM, it looks into the relationship that men have with food and how this compares to a woman's relationship with food.

It will be a light hearted piece with an aim to entertain the reader but also to inform them on male food habits and how to act on these in order to maintain a healthy diet and physique.

As a sports nutritionist to professional footballers I feel your input in the piece would be invaluable.
Would you be up for a quick telephone/email interview on this topic?

I am not looking to publish the feature, it is purely for educational purposes.

Thank you so much for reading this email and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Kind Regards,

Ben Aston