Long Rest Interval Promotes Durable Testosterone Responses in High-Intensity Bench Press :

It is the position of the American Dietetic Association, Dietitians of Canada, and the American College of Sports Medicine that physical activity, athletic performance, and recovery from exercise are enhanced by optimal nutrition. These organizations recommend appropriate selection of foods and fluids, timing of intake, and supplement choices for optimal health and exercise performance. This updated position paper couples a rigorous, systematic, evidence-based analysis of nutrition and performance-specific literature with current scientific data related to energy needs, assessment of body composition, strategies for weight change, nutrient and fluid needs, special nutrient needs during training and competition, the use of supplements and ergogenic aids, nutrition recommendations for vegetarian athletes, and the roles and responsibilities of the sports dietitian. Energy and macronutrient needs, especially carbohydrate and protein, must be met during times of high physical activity to maintain body weight, replenish glycogen stores, and provide adequate protein to build and repair tissue. Fat intake should be sufficient to provide the essential fatty acids and fat-soluble vitamins and to contribute energy for weight maintenance. Although exercise performance can be affected by body weight and composition, these physical measures should not be a criterion for sports performance and daily weigh-ins are discouraged. Adequate food and fluid should be consumed before, during, and after exercise to help maintain blood glucose concentration during exercise, maximize exercise performance, and improve recovery time. Athletes should be well hydrated before exercise and drink enough fluid during and after exercise to balance fluid losses. Sports beverages containing carbohydrates and electrolytes may be consumed before, during, and after exercise to help maintain blood glucose concentration, provide fuel for muscles, and decrease risk of dehydration and hyponatremia. Vitamin and mineral supplements are not needed if adequate energy to maintain body weight is consumed from a variety of foods. However, athletes who restrict energy intake, use severe weight-loss practices, eliminate one or more food groups from their diet, or consume unbalanced diets with low micronutrient density may require supplements. Because regulations specific to nutritional ergogenic aids are poorly enforced, they should be used with caution and only after careful product evaluation for safety, efficacy, potency, and legality. A qualified sports dietitian and, in particular, the Board Certified Specialist in Sports Dietetics in the United States, should provide individualized nutrition direction and advice after a comprehensive nutrition assessment.

Procedures for the preliminary screening of asymptomatic adults who wish to exercise are reviewed with particular reference to experience gained through the mass use of the physical activity readiness questionnaire (PAR-Q) and the Canadian Home Fitness Test (CHFT). It is argued that both a brief submaximal exercise test and a subsequent moderate increase of habitual activity are extremely safe tactics to recommend to a symptom-free adult. There are some useful minor modifications which could be made to the PAR-Q instrument, but its sensitivity and specificity relative to such criteria as medical examination, hypertension, CHFT completion and exercise-induced ECG abnormalities compare favourably with alternative self-administered procedures. The basic difficulty of screening an asymptomatic population (highlighted by Bayes theorem) is the high percentage of false positive and false negative test results. One remedy would be to stratify the population in terms of known cardiac risk factors and to restrict detailed pre-exercise screening to the high risk segment of the population.