be at risk of nutritional deficiencies as well as poor physical performance.General healthy-eating guidelines as well as specialist requirements for athletes apply to meat-eaters and vegetarians. You daily aim should be to base your meals and snacks

the glycogen more quickly.Some good post-event snacks are cereal bars, fruit and yoghurt, toast with nut butter, dried fruit, or cereal with yoghurt and milk. Some of the best carbohydrate sources are brown rice, whole barley, whole buckwheat, whole rye

.In Sports Nutrition for Endurance Athletes, nutritionist Monique Ryan notes that, "For endurance athletes they [supplements] are crucially important. Because of your training and the stress it imposes on your body, you may need higher amounts of vitamins

With three disciplines to consider, it's easy to make mistakes when you're eating and drinking during training and racing. That's the bad news. The good news is that it's easy to avoid triathlon's common nutritional pitfalls if you plan ahead

be hard to consume enough of the right foods. This is especially true for vegetarian athletes, as iron from fruit, vegetables and cereals is not as well absorbed as that from meat.If you are a vegetarian, increase your iron intake by eating plenty

supply of liver glycogen will stabilise your blood sugar as you train, keep your levels from spiking and ensure you don't run out of all-important energy.Change it: If time is your problem, stock up on just-add-milk breakfasts such as cereal and porridge

number of variables that will affect what your body needs for training and recovery and it may take some time to figure them out. The 2008 Sprint Triathlon Age Group (50-54) World Champion Jane Bell says her nutrition plan for her first year of triathlon

the simplest actions, such as standing up, and challenging activities, such as, well, triathlons. But it also needs nutrients to keep it in the best shape possible. So you need to be eating good food, not any food. The right amounts of vitamins and minerals

If transition is triathlon's fourth discipline, nutrition should be the fifth. Making fuelling mistakes could mean your race ends in disaster. And the longer the event, the more critical your food and drink strategy becomes. But it's not easy

to the bowl of pasta you were planning for lunch. You don't need a nutritionist to tell you that refined, processed foods such as cakes, biscuits and pastries have little nutritional value, but many complex carbohydrates are also refined, which complicates