Nutritional Considerations for Performance in Young Athletes

Nutrition is an integral component to any athletes training and performance program. In adults the balance between energy intake and energy demands is crucial in training, recovery, and performance. In young athletes the demands for training and performance remain but should be a secondary focus behind the demands associated with maintaining the proper growth and maturation. Research interventions imposing significant physiological loads and diet manipulation are limited in youth due to the ethical considerations related to potential negative impacts on the growth and maturation processes associated with younger individuals. This necessary limitation results in practitioners providing nutritional guidance to young athletes to rely on exercise nutrition recommendations intended for adults. While many of the recommendations can appropriately be repurposed for the younger athlete attention needs to be taken towards the differences in metabolic needs and physiological differences.