It’s safe to say that no athlete enjoys being sidelined by illness, especially while we’re in season. There’s nothing fun about staying home, unable to play while watching our teammates play the sport we love. While getting a cough or runny nose is inevitable, there are certain things we can do as athletes to minimize our chances of getting sick, and one of these things is dialing and prioritizing adequate nutrition.
If done correctly, nutrition can be our secret weapon in making sure that we maximize our playing time during season. We spoke to VIS Expert and sports medicine physician, Amy West, MD, who gave us her guide on nutrition for immunity.
The Impact of Nutrition on Our Immune Health
First, it’s important to understand how exactly nutrition impacts our immune health. As West says, “Nutrition is the foundation of health.” We need to keep our bodies adequately fueled for our sport to make sure that we’re not overtraining and under-fueling. If there’s not enough fuel in our bodies, our stress levels increase, which takes away crucial energy from some of our body’s systems — including the immune system, leaving it without the proper ability to fight off infection.
Along with eating enough food, West also states that there are specific parts of nutrition that are essential for maximizing the function of our immune systems. Consuming a sufficient amount of macronutrients – which includes carbs, fats, and proteins – is essential for supporting our immune health. Proteins, our bodies’ building blocks, play an especially key role. They help build and repair cells in our bodies, including the ones needed to keep our immune system functioning.
“Nutrition is the foundation of health.”
What Foods Should We Eat?
West recommends that we try to make our snacks high in protein if we want to maximize our immune health. Some examples of these snacks can include:
High protein jerky
Yogurt
Hard boiled eggs
West also suggests that we try to make the majority of our nutrition consist of whole foods, as they are full of a wide range of micronutrients that can boost our immune health. Being mindful of the amount of highly processed foods that we eat is also beneficial because large amounts of these foods can interfere with how our cells produce energy and function properly, reducing our bodies’ ability to fight off infection.
Other Key Strategies to Prevent Illness
Beyond dialing in on our nutrition, West shared that getting an adequate amount of sleep on a daily basis is very important when it comes to preventing a bad cold. When we sleep, our cells are in full-function mode. Sleep is a crucial time for cell turnover and recovery, which helps our bodies repair itself and strengthen its immune defenses. Cell turnover is the process in which old, damaged cells are replaced with new, healthy ones.
This process is not only essential for keeping our muscles and skin healthy, but also for keeping our immune system functioning at its best. If we don’t get enough sleep, our bodies are robbed from this critical process, leaving our immune system at a disadvantage. This in turn can lead to increased stress on our bodies, raising our chances of getting sick and simultaneously making it harder to recover from illness.
It’s clear that while getting a bad cold may sometimes be inevitable, there are many things we can do like dialing in on our nutrition, and focusing on getting enough sleep that can prevent illness as well. By focusing on these basics, we can give our immune systems a real boost, helping us stay healthy during the season and play our best. At the end of the day, the best thing we can do to enhance our athletic performance is take care of our bodies.
