Evaluation of Factors Influencing Food Choices Among AUB Weightlifters and Football Players

Abstract

General sports recommendations state that athletes need a balanced nutritional diet to optimize their performance, prevent nutrient deficiency, and reduce chronic diseases. Although the current literature focuses on energy and macronutrient content, athletes often make poor choices. The most reported factors influencing food choices include food sensory, psychological, economic, nutrition knowledge, beliefs, and convenience. Since the athletes' food choices are multidimensional and are influenced by their sport, training period, and nutrition knowledge, specialized nutrition plans should be tailored to each athlete to optimize their performance.

This study aims to assess the food choices of athletes, specifically weightlifters and football players, on rest and workout days in a free-choice environment during lunch. Factors influencing the athletes’ food choices in terms of performance factors, nutritional knowledge, food sensory factors, and emotional influences were evaluated. Moreover, the athletes’ usual dietary practices during their rest and workout days were investigated through a 24-hour dietary recall interview in order to evaluate the quality of the athletes’ diet and food intake.

With a convenient sample of 60 AUB athletes (30 football players and 30 weightlifters), the project took place at T-Marbouta on AUB premises over a period of one week per participant. The subject were asked to participate in four experimental sessions. During the morning visit, the anthropometrics and a body composition analysis (BIA) were measured and a 24-hour dietary recall was documented. During the afternoon session, the athletes reported back to fill in a food choice questionnaire. The same procedure was conducted on a rest day as well as on a workout day where athletes were rewarded a monetary amount of $20 ($10 for a free lunch meal and $10 as a compensation) on the Sayrafa rate of 70,000 LBP, which was equivalent to 1,400,000 LBP per experimental day. Analysis of the four 24 HRs was done using the Nutritionist Pro (NutriPro) software (version 7.1.0, 2019, Nutritionist Pro, Axxya Systems, USA) to estimate energy and macronutrients’ intakes. The data collected was analyzed using SPSS software.

Results showed no significant differences in the NI of both sports during the rest day and significant changes in their protein intake during their workout day with 184.88±229.13 g in footballers and 178.94±58.71 in weightlifters. When comparing the NI of weightlifters during both experimental days, significant differences were found in terms of EI (2998.23±706.43 kcal during the workout day and 2536.78 ± 716.36 kcal during the rest day), protein (178.94±58.71 g during the workout day and 144.96 ± 54.46 g during the rest day), fats (134.32±49.01 g and 103.93 ± 42.94 g respectively), as well as SFA, MUFA, PUFA, K, Ca, and vitamin D. As for the football players, significant differences were only observed in terms of EI (4077.69±6589.82 kcal on the workout day and 2745.21 ± 984.06 kcal on the rest day) and protein (184.88±229.13 g and 131.59 ±52.99g respectively). As for the factors affecting the food choices of participants, weightlifters' food choices varied between rest and workout days. Nutritional attributes (32%), sensory attributes (25%), familiarity (19%), emotional influences (8%), health awareness (6%), exploring new food (5%), and following a nutrition plan were the main factors. On workout days, these factors were also significant. As for football players, the meal choices were influenced mainly by familiarity (33%), nutritional attributes (23%), sensory attributes (21%) and health awareness (11%) during the rest day and by the meal’s nutritional attributes (34%), followed by the meal’s familiarity (22%), meal’s sensory attributes (19%), and exploring new food (7%) on the workout day.

This study revealed a significant difference mainly between the rest and workout days in both group categories in terms of energy and protein intake, which can be linked to the finding of the food choice questionnaire. Both weightlifters and football players were more likely to base their food choices during their workout days on the meal’s nutritional attributes compared to their rest day, which was reinforced by their NI that showed that they generally consumed more energy and protein on their workout day compared to their rest day. The studies exploring this certain topic are limited and more studies including a larger sample size are needed to further confirm the results of this study.