Performance Nutrition

We work to support athletes using what they eat and drink to optimise their wellbeing, growth/development, adaptations to training and performance while minimising illness and injury.

What is Performance Nutrition?

Nutrition helps athletes/parent, coaches and practitioners understand how what we eat and drink supports their day to day wellbeing, training and performance. This could include advice on how to fuel differently for a range of training volumes and intensities, injury prevention or recovery from an injury, optimising immunity and recovering from illness, optimising body composition through lean or fat mass increases or decreases.

How we work

Knowing the “what”, “why”, “when” and “how much” of nutrition is vital and we work hard to educate athletes to develop their understanding and change habits. This knowledge and habit development is delivered in the form of formal workshops/lectures, 1-to-1’s as well as a range of other methods. Knowledge is only the start of the journey, we work with athletes to develop practical strategies, cooking skills, planning and organisation looking to change behaviour and make delivering results in life, training and performance a habit.

Our work extends beyond the athletes and incorporates work with coaches, practitioners, chefs, back room staff and management to ensure the environment supports athletes to use nutrition to their advantage. This can come through working to optimise what is in and the layout of catering, changing or introducing signage/reminders, support planning and logistics for travel or games to name a few.

Experience of our team

Our team has a wealth of experience across Performance Nutrition working across development environments and Elite Sport from Olympic, World, European, Commonwealth and Professional sport. Alongside this work in the sporting environment with athletes, coaches and support staff, we have consulted on app development, menu/recipes creation and elite environments.

Alongside this each year our Performance Nutrition team offer mentoring and coaching to the next generation of practitioners and have seen our alumni go on to roles with various home country Institutes of Sport and professional sport including rugby, football, irish rules football, diving, and combat sports.

Each member of our team holds a minimum standard of qualification including:

SENr Practitioner or Graduate status.
MSc in Sport and Exercise Nutrition or equivalent.
ISAK level 1.
UKAD Introduction to Clean Sport.
Level 2 Food Safety.

Meet The Team

Andrew leads the Performance Nutrition team at Loughborough Sport, supporting the development and delivery across internal and external services. He leads on relationships with key partners both on and off campus. Leading the delivery for swimming and the Centre of Excellence for Boxing. Having previously held roles at Swim England, British Diving, England Athletics, Sheffield Hallam University, and worked extensively in boxing, triathlon, and athletics.

Harriet is a highly experienced performance nutritionist, who alongside her work at Loughborough Sport, has worked for the English Institute of Sport and provided nutrition support to British Rowing, British Wheelchair Basketball and an EFL Academy. Since joining Loughborough Sport in 2016, Harriet has shaped her role as a performance nutritionist to also include spearheading Loughborough Sport’s female athlete health strategy, as she is passionate about creating an environment that better supports female athletes. Other interests of Harriet’s include: nutritional strategies to aid recovery, and supporting athlete robustness.

Max is a former student of both Swansea and Loughborough University completing a masters at the later in 2020-21. During this period he undertook an internship with Loughborough Sport gaining first-hand experience alongside his degree. Since then, Max has gone on to gain part-time roles with both Loughborough Sport and the UK Sports Institute where he supports England Netball. His current area of focus is understanding maturation and its potential effects in sport to better support youth athlete development.

Fran is alumni of Loughborough University, having completed an MSc Sport and Exercise Nutrition at Loughborough University alongside a placement with the Loughborough Sport Performance Nutrition team. Upon graduating from her MSc, she joined the English Institute of Sport, providing full time nutrition support to British Gymnastics World Class Programme before returning to Loughborough Sport in early 2023. She has also previously worked with Derbyshire Institute of Sport, England Athletics and Breaking GB. Her passion for supporting athletes to optimise and enjoy their nutrition is driven by her own experiences as a competitive swimmer and a love of (eating and cooking!) delicious food.

Bethan is currently completing a stipend placement within the Performance Nutrition Team alongside a part-time MSc in Nutrition and Physiology for Sport and Exercise. Before joining the team at Loughborough, Bethan completed a BSc in Nutrition from Cardiff Metropolitan, obtaining Registered Associate Nutritionist status. Some of her areas of interest include energy expenditure variability within team sport athletes and the effects of the menstrual cycle on exercise performance and subsequent nutrition considerations.

Anna is currently completing a stipend placement within the Performance Nutrition Team alongside a part-time MSc in Nutrition and Physiology for Sport and Exercise.

Grace is currently completing a stipend placement within the Performance Nutrition Team alongside a part-time MSc in Nutrition and Physiology for Sport and Exercise.

Loughborough Sport's Casual Nutrition Team

Contact Us

Opportunities at Loughborough

Summer Work Experience

Support the performance nutrition team in providing support to University athletes and teams throughout the pre-season.

What's involved:

Assist in the development, implementation and monitoring of practical nutrition strategies.
Assist with tasks such as dietary analysis, workshops, hydration and recovery stations, season planning and athlete education.

Who is this aimed at:

BSc / MSc on any course
Loughborough University students
Looking to start their journey in performance sport

Advert: Feb – March

Interview: March / April

Start date: summer