Nutrition Guidance for Dancers and Cheerleaders - With Pro Sports Nutritionist, Monica
Monica Salafia (MS RD CPT), a former sports RD and nutritionist for the NBA’s Denver Nuggets, shares her basics on nutrition when it comes to being a professional dancer. Working for the NBA, Monica has loved watching the NBA dancers and wants to share her knowledge to help dancers take care of their nutrition throughout auditions, practices, games, and the dance season.
Former Denver Nuggets Nutritionist
Founder of Mind on Nutrition Coaching
As Seen On ABC Sacramento, CBS Sacramento, Fox31 Denver, NBC & More!
Monica Salafia - MS RD CPT
Monica is a well-known and respected sports nutritionist in Denver, CO that most recently worked as the nutritionist for the NBA’s Denver Nuggets. She continues to work with athletes in the Colorado area and run her own nutrition and coaching business.
She is walking us through her tips/advice/knowledge when it comes to nutrition for dancers and cheerleaders. Not every dancer or dance team has nutritional guidance, even though it is such a vital part in being the best athletes we can be whether that be at practices, games, and even dance auditions. She is giving us a one-on-one when it comes to dancer and cheerleader nutrition guidance!
One-on-one with Denver Fitness Dietitian and Nutritionist on professional dancers and cheerleaders nutrition. Also - her story on how she got into nutrition for professional sports teams. WATCH HERE!
I’ve written about coaching clients to high body confidence before, and when it comes to dancers, confidence is a must when bringing it on stage or the arena! Food is fuel and in order to reach our highest body confidence, it’s important to know what foods make us feel best while also meeting our needs.
Dancing is often a high-energy demanding sport. With auditions, practices or game nights lasting three hours (or sometimes more!), its so important to eat enough food to sustain that amount of energy.
Typically, a female dancer can look at a dance practice like a high-intensity interval workout. That means, there are short bursts of intense activity followed by some rest. To fuel this type of exercise, carbohydrates are the preferred source of fuel. So dancers, please eat your carbohydrates!
Here are some carbohydrate foods that you can include at your meals throughout the day:
This is not an exhaustive list!
Fruits: strawberries, kiwis, mangoes, cherries, watermelon, apples.
Vegetables: cucumber, tomatoes, green beans, asparagus, summer squashes
Whole grains: oatmeal, flour or corn tortillas, quinoa, farroh, pasta
Starchy Vegetables: potatoes, including white and sweet, beans, legumes, peas, corn.
Sometimes, you’ll need a quick bump of carbs before your dance session! Instead of relying on a sugar-y carbonated energy drink, a food source will give you the energy you need.
Here are some easy to digest carbohydrate sources for right before:
2 Rice cakes
1 medium sized Banana
3 dried Dates
A 8 fluid ounce green juice or tart cherry juice (I love this for athletes!)
2 Clementines
Vegtables:
A little extra tip, while vegetables are extremely healthy for you and I encourage you to get your daily servings, it might be best to hold off on the vegetable-heavy meals right before a dance routine. Vegetables are very fibrous and can take longer to digest.
If you find yourself feeling bloated, distended, and you’re not loving that feeling in your dance outfit, consider scaling the vegetables back within the 3 hours of your dance routine!
What about protein?
Dancers, like every other athlete, rely on protein to build additional muscle to support their flips and high kicks. It’s most ideal to get an even amount of protein throughout the day, as this is how the body best assimilates protein.
We want to strive for leucine-rich sources of protein. Animal proteins are easiest for our bodies to get the amino acids it needs, but you can absolutely meet your protein needs through plant foods too. In my expert opinion, a healthy mix of both is best.
This is not an exhaustive list:
Animal Proteins:
Eggs, Egg whites
Deli turkey or canadian bacon * aim for something with fewer than 360mg of sodium per serving.
Chicken breast, or thighs
93% to 99% lean ground turkey
93% or higher lean ground beef
Sirloin or flank steak
Any whitefish
Shellfish like shrimp or scallops
Whey protein powder
Greek Yogurt
Plant Proteins:
Quinoa
Pea Protein powder
Beans
Legumes
Lentils
Chickpea pastas
Nuts and seeds
As a Registered Dietitian working with athletes, I spend more time counseling on getting the right amount of carbohydrates and protein, as these are the most relevant macronutrients to consider. Fats are absolutely important! And we must include fats in our diet to have a healthy metabolism.
The fats we should focus on are those that come from plants like olive oils, avocado oils, and it’s preferable to get omega-3 fatty acids from food items like salmon, chia and flax seeds, although sometimes supplements may be necessary.
There are resources you can download for free to get more food ideas that fit the needs of an athlete here:
- Strong Snacks
-Getting Stronger Fuel Guide
The most important thing to consider is the individual's needs. Programming how much and what to eat looks different for every body, but I encourage people to work with a Registered Dietitian to find exactly what that looks like.
Looking for nutrition guidance?
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Want to hear more on Monica’s journey, experience, advice, and tips to dancers and cheerleaders?
Checkout her one-on-one video HERE
A special shoutout to Monica for allowing us to feature her and share her nutrition knowledge with the dance and cheerleading community. We are grateful to be able to highlight you and learn more on how to fuel our bodies in our community!
XO,
The Sideline Secrets
“Making the dream into a reality”