Performance Nutrition Collective

05/03/2026

🔥 This summer has been next-level hot, and it’s taken me right back to basics.

Fatigue mechanisms.
Thermoregulation.
And how heat adds an entire extra layer of physiological stress to training.

Some of the athletes I’ve worked with this summer have been training in:
🌡️ 37–41°C ambient temperatures, which is honestly wild.

Others, up north?
Lower temps… but 🌫️ much higher humidity and wow, that’s a whole different stress load.

Here’s the part that often gets missed 👇
Heat doesn’t just make training feel harder.
It fundamentally changes what’s happening inside the body.

What heat actually does to performance:
🔥 Accelerates glycogen depletion → earlier fatigue at the same workload
🔥 Drives RPE up sessions feel harder without any change in pace or power
🔥 Reduces central drive the brain downregulates output to protect the body
👉 If it feels harder, it is harder.

So what does this mean in the real world?
Heat raises the cost of every session.
Same athlete.
Same training plan.
🔥 Much higher physiological stress.

Which means athletes training in the heat need:
🍚 more carbohydrate, not less
💧 smarter hydration + electrolytes
🧊 intentional cooling strategies
🛌 greater respect for recovery

Trying to “push through” heat without adjusting fuel or recovery doesn’t build resilience; it accelerates fatigue and maladaptation.
Summer training demands respect.
Fuel it properly.

17/02/2026

😂 Egg ick is a thing.
ALOT of athletes I work with tell me they just cannot do eggs in the morning. Especially post-training.

Good news:
👉 You don’t need eggs to recover well in the morning.
Not ever. Not even a little bit.
In fact, my own kids are way more into “normal food” for breakfast and honestly, it works brilliantly. It’s filling, grounding, and fuels the day well from the start.

If your child (or you) already has one training session banked by 8am, here’s the no-fuss formula I love:
🥣 Design-your-own recovery bowl
No rules. Just boxes to tick.

✅ Carb source
🍚 rice, potato, sweet potato, pasta, wrap
✅ Protein
🍗 leftover chicken, mince, steak, tofu
✅ 2–3 colours
🥕 corn, spinach, capsicum, peas
✅ Finishers
🧀 sprinkle of cheese
🥑 dollop of avo
🥛 Greek Yoghurt Dressing

That’s it.
Warm. Savoury. Balanced. Done.
No egg drama.
No “breakfast food” pressure.

Just real fuel that supports recovery and keeps kids full through the morning.
Egg ick = validated.
Dinner for breakfast = Elite behaviour 😌

08/01/2026

Your DNA is talking… but are you listening? 🧬
A few weeks ago, I introduced this topic and today I’m sharing a real example.
I ran nutrigenomic testing on myself to get a clearer picture of what’s influencing my performance behind the scenes, and to map out both my strengths and vulnerabilities. The insights were wild.
Exploring the “why” behind performance is something I’m deeply passionate about and nutrigenomic gene testing is one of the most powerful integrative tools for that.

My top insights:

🦴 Bone Health – Very High Priority
Genetic variants that impact bone turnover mean I need to prioritise bone-supportive nutrients, recovery, and load-based training.

⚡ Methylation Efficiency
This process influences energy production, inflammation, stress resilience, and even how genes switch on or off all essential for long-term health and performance.

💪 ACTN3 “Power Gene” (RR Genotype full expression)
Fast-twitch dominant built for speed, strength, and explosive performance. No surprise most of my athletic career was spent jumping and sprinting!

💨 VO₂ Max Response
My genes indicate a strong adaptive capacity - meaning I respond exceptionally well to consistent, progressive endurance training (despite hating it lol)

Now, I’ll be using this same testing with my daughter a teen athlete, who’s had a history of glandular fever and is transitioning between sports with completely different energy demands and performance profiles. The goal?

To tailor her nutrition, recovery, and training so she can adapt confidently to new performance demands, stay resilient, and continue moving forward without the setbacks she’s faced in the past.

This is where genetics meets sports science - precision, prevention, and performance 🔥

23/12/2025

17/12/2025

🍳 Can You Have Too Much Protein?

In short - yes.

And I see it all the time with many teen athletes 👀
They’ll sit down to breakfast with 40 g of protein and barely 10 g of carbs… then wonder why they feel flat at training later in the day 😴

When you’re going to school first and training after, that’s a fueling mismatch - your body’s running on protein instead of glycogen, which means:
💥 sluggish sessions
💥 poor recovery
💥 and sometimes, hello breakout city 😬 (we will cover this another day)
Protein is essential, but so is balance.
Think of it like this - protein builds, but carbs power.

And when we get that mix right?
We see glowing skin ✨, sharper focus, and faster times on the board 🏃‍♀️💨

Because my goal for every teen I work with is simple:

Beautiful skin. Powerful performance. Happy gut.

15/12/2025

As I wrap up 2025, I just want to say a huge thank you to every athlete, parent, coach and supporter who has been part of this big year 🤍

It’s been a huge one behind the scenes while I’ve been deep in postgraduate study 📚💪 refining my clinical skills and expanding how I support athletic performance and long-term health goals.

I’m incredibly grateful for your continued trust and commitment throughout the journey 🤍
You’re truly the reason I love what I do 🙏✨

Clinic Update 🗓️
My last day in clinic for the year will be December 18th.
I’ll be offline and in holiday mode 🎄☀️ with sporadic emails until mid-January, so if you need any last-minute prescription updates, supplement requests, or plan tweaks, please send them through ASAP 📩

For those training or racing over the holiday period
fuel well 🍞🍌, train smart 🔁, and recover like it matters… because it does 💤🧠

I can’t wait to help you lock in your 2026 goals and continue building stronger performance, better health, and long-term resilience 🚀

Thank you again for an incredible year 🤍

11/12/2025

I talk about this a lot… and I’ll keep talking about it particularly as racing and training schedules hit their peak, because RED-S shows up quietly… until it doesn’t.

The signs can be so subtle you can miss them - or mistake them for “random teen stuff.”
But the body always whispers before it screams. 👀

When fuel is chronically too low and training is high, the body slips into survival mode.
It can look like… 👇

🍽️ Loss of appetite
(Your body is slowing everything down to conserve energy.)

🐢 Slower bowel transit - constipation and bloating
(When the gut doesn’t get enough fuel, it literally powers down.)

😴 Fatigue that doesn’t match the training
(Even on “easy” days.)

🤯 Irritability or mood shifts
(The brain needs carbs too - not just the legs.)
📉 Training flatness
(Effort up, output down.)

These can look like “normal” changes… and you can almost talk yourself out of them -
especially in a high-intensity training cycle when everything already feels a bit weird.

But these are the subtle signs the body gives before the louder ones arrive. 🚨
When energy intake falls, the body starts choosing what to shut down first.

And it will always prioritise survival over sport performance.
Fuel like an athlete. Fuel before the whispers become screams. ⚡️

09/12/2025

Hard training weakens your immune system.
✅ Newer Research (Walsh, 2019):
Shows intense exercise does NOT directly suppress immunity.
Rather your immune cells shift from the blood into your tissues - a normal, protective response.
So, what makes athletes so prone to illness?

🚨 THE REAL DRIVERS OF ILLNESS IN ATHLETES
1️⃣ Underfuelling (Low Energy Availability)
This is the #1 cause of reduced immune resilience.
When athletes don’t eat enough:
Cortisol increases
Mucosal immunity drops (↓ IgA)
Gut barrier weakens
Inflammation rises
➡️ More colds. More fatigue. Less progress.

2️⃣ Low Carbohydrate Intake
Constantly training in a low CHO state increases stress hormones and puts pressure on your immune system.
Research: Carbs before/during long or intense sessions blunts the immune-suppressive stress response.

3️⃣ Poor Sleep
Consistently

03/12/2025

Beyond Macros: Getting to the Root Cause

Yes, I talk a lot about what to eat, but when we’re chasing that extra 1%, we also need to understand what’s happening inside the engine room 🔬

That’s where metagenomic gut sequencing comes in - one of many integrative tools I use… this one maps the whole microbiome and uncovers what’s really driving performance, recovery, and resilience 💪

For athletes dealing with digestive complaints like
💨 bloating
💩 diarrhoea
🚫 constipation
🤕 abdominal pain
🤧or repeated illness,

there are often telling markers such as low Secretory IgA 🛡️, which can indicate a weakened mucosal immune defence.

These insights help us move beyond surface-level symptoms to develop more personalised and effective strategies 🎯

Beyond digestive health, this assessment can also reveal insights into:
💫 Immune function
🔥 Inflammatory load
⚖️ Hormonal balance and stress response

Even when diversity looks “normal” 🌿, subtle microbial shifts like high methane- or hydrogen-sulphide-producing microbes, can quietly hold athletes back by affecting gut integrity, energy, and recovery ⚡

Once we address what’s happening underneath, everything shifts:
⚡ Faster recovery
📈 Better HRV & sleep data
🥗 Improved food tolerance
🦠 Fewer colds & stronger immune resilience

Fuelling is vital, but fixing the system that absorbs, defends, and recovers from that fuel is where real performance begins.

Because a well-functioning gut doesn’t just support training, it drives the adaptations 💥

Interested in getting to your true root cause? Get in touch today to book an appointment.

01/12/2025

The integrative edge: looking beyond bloods 🧬

Athlete life is tough long hours, early mornings, travel, pressure, expectations, and endless training cycles. 🏋️‍♀️🚴‍♀️🏊‍♀️

What I see, time and time again, is athletes walking a fine line between peak performance and complete burnout.

This is why I blend integrative testing tools alongside traditional blood work to understand the whole athlete, not just the surface markers.

Because performance isn’t only about macros and meal timing 🍽️

It’s about the invisible systems driving recovery, resilience and adaptation:
🧫 The microbiome that fuels, protects and modulates inflammation
🧬 The genes influencing how athletes adapt, recover, detoxify, handle stress and even how robust their bones and connective tissues are under load
🩸 The biomarkers revealing stress load, nutrient status, immune function & inflammation

Over the next few posts, I’m taking you behind the scenes into the integrative tools I use every day from advanced metagenomic gut testing to nutrigenomic genetic profiling.

These are the frameworks that uncover what’s really driving (or limiting) an athlete’s performance - the hidden levers behind energy, recovery, resilience, gut function, immune strength and adaptation.

If you’re an athlete who feels like you’re doing everything right but still not performing the way you should…
…these next posts are for you. 🚀🔥

This is where performance nutrition meets integrative practice.

When we understand the whole athlete, we can fuel smarter, adapt faster, and stay stronger for longer. 💪

14/08/2025

Can young athletes thrive on a vegetarian diet? 🌱

Absolutely, but it takes smart planning. While vegetarian diets can fuel growth and performance, they also come with unique challenges for youth athletes.

🏃‍♂️ High-Intensity Performance Risk
Low-carb vegetarian diets may downregulate carbohydrate metabolism, compromising performance during intense training (Burke, 2015; Thomas et al., 2016). Prioritise grains, legumes, and starchy veg for fuel.

⚠️ Higher Risk of RED-S
Vegetarian athletes may be more prone to Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S) due to low energy-dense, high-fibre food choices paired with high training loads. This can reduce energy availability, disrupting s*x hormones (like estrogen and testosterone) and impairing reproductive and bone health.

🧠 Omega-3 Imbalance
Plant-based diets are often high in omega-6s but low in omega-3s. Add flax, chia, walnuts or consider a DHA-rich algae supplement (Geppert et al., 2005) to support cognition and recovery.

🩸 Watch out for these nutrients as vegetarian diets may lack:
• Iron
• Zinc
• B12
• Vitamin D
• Calcium
• Iodine

While they shine in potassium, folate, and antioxidant-rich vitamins (A, C, E, K), filling key gaps is essential , especially during growth spurts. Bloodwork helps guide supplementation.

🥦 Bottom line? Vegetarian diets can support athletic growth but require intentional fuelling and nutrient monitoring.

📌 Save this for your plant-based athlete checklist!

11/08/2025

Before protein powders and sports supplements, there was chocolate milk, and it's still a GOAT for refuelling 💪

Here’s a quick, clean, and kid-approved version you can make at home:

DIY Chocolate Milk Recipe
🥛200 mL milk (cow’s or plant-based alt)
🍫1 Tbsp (7 g) unsweetened cocoa powder
🍯 1 tsp honey or maple syrup
🧂 Pinch of salt (for electrolytes)

👉 How to make it:
1️⃣Whisk cocoa + salt into a few tablespoons of milk to form a smooth paste
2️⃣Stir in the rest of the milk + honey
3️⃣Serve chilled or gently warmed

Why it works:
✅ Carbs + protein combo = ideal recovery
✅ Calcium, potassium, and electrolytes
✅ Budget-friendly + gut-friendly

Perfect for young athletes after sport or as a nourishing afternoon boost.

Hit SAVE on this post and share with your training buddy.