Athletes’ dietetic behaviour

Performance pressure characterising competitive sports encourages athletes to do their best to maximize their performance by nutrition. At the same time sports where appearance is important the problem athletes have to face is pathological habit formation regarding body weight.

It has been highlighted that competitive athletes eat healthier food than others who do not compete. Cavadini and co-workers (2000) pointed out that athletes tend to develop healthier nutritive habits; they eat more vegetables, diary products fruit, fibrous food and salads unlike others who do not do any physical activities. The data of this study are backed up by Lagowska et al (2011) who examined Polish teenagers. They found that athletes accepted professionals’ suggestions regarding nutrition, Keresztes and Pikó (2008).

By contrast Resch (2007) stated that 23-25% of the athletes struggle with eating disorders. Most often these are the athlete Triad (anorexia, amenorrhoea and osteoporosis) symptoms. These symptoms occur when athletes should be slim as less weight may enhance their performance and when the emphasis is on aesthetics low body fat is advantageous. Muscle dysmorphia is a type of eating disorder in connection with bodybuilding. It means that athletes are not satisfied with their appearance in spite of their muscle mass therefore they tend to use bulking agents. Fat body phobia attitude is an irrational fear of dietary fat (Robinson et al, 1993). Orthorexia nervosa is an eating disorder characterised by an extreme or excessive preoccupation with avoiding foods that is perceived unhealthy. Athletes follow a diet which cannot provide enough nourishment and they often refuse to eat (Segura-Garcia et al, 2012).