When Elinor came to see us she was transitioning from semi-professional rugby to full-time professional athlete. She was juggling the stresses and strains of a full-time job alongside training like a full-time athlete. She didn’t feel like she was progressing with resistance training as well as she would have liked. Elinor was also concerned about her overall health and wellbeing and wanted to support her body as well as she could.

After conducting a dietary analysis it was clear that her macronutrient intake was deficient compared to her exercise levels. This in itself was hindering her performance targets and needed to be addressed. On top of this, due to her stressful job she was burning through her stress resilience nutrients and was failing to replenish them sufficiently causing her to feel more stressed than usual.

Firstly we came up with creative ways to get 4 -5 feeds in a day during her working hours and in-between training sessions to increase her macronutrient intake. Secondly we had to prioritise plant based protein as excessive animal protein could potentially strain her kidneys which were under extra stress. Elinor felt like her body favoured the change of focus to plant based and welcomed this adjustment. Finally we increased her magnesium intake to support her nervous system during a stressful period at work and to support her muscles recovery allowing her to feel more refreshed and prepared for her training sessions. Elinor felt she had far more energy to complete her tasks and to compete at a high level whilst achieving more in the gym than she had ever done before.