Normally I always take a concentrate of mushrooms...
Nice!
For my immune system.
A little bit of Gatorade to help.
Lovely! OK, nice. Yes.
Nutrition and hydration are fundamental when it comes to any form of exercise
and Gatorade plays a massive role in that.
I'm here at Manchester City to learn from some
of the world's best players and coaches.
To begin with,
I'm going to meet Tom Parry,
who's a first team nutritionist
and he's going to tell me everything I need to know.
Hi Cel, nice to meet you.
Pleasure.
Well let me just take you through what we do with the players.
I'll take you around the buffet.
I've chosen a high protein one for you today.
So we've got your smoked fish, your cottage cheeses and things like that.
Yeah.
Now, if this was the day before a game
we'd flip it.
We'd have overnight oats, homemade granola, a big cereal station
and that would just set the tone for them to know
‘ah, today I'm carb loading’ or ‘today I'm going easy’.
You’ve thought it through!
We’ve thought it through.
I see, OK.
Pep helps as well.
Pep’s helped us with that.
And then this is the main kitchen then? Wow.
These are the chefs.
Hi chefs!
The guys at GSSI, the Gatorade Sports Science Institute,
have put together an education workshop for me
so the full nutrition team have the level of knowledge
to start making the recommendations.
‘What's your training session going to be like today?’
‘Can I recommend this for you?’
We'd always encourage a little bit of vegetable
or a little bit of fruit to allow some fibre.
Yeah.
Because fibre slows the release of sugars into the blood.
So if you are having a very carby meal
it just helps you process it a bit more healthily.
Ah.
And they say that variety is the key to gut health.
OK, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
So as many different things as you can eat across the week.
It is so important isn’t it?
Because for us really, well, for even just individuals,
me as an athlete,
if you want to make sure you're in the best possible
physical way and mental way,
what your fuelling your body with
is obviously key, isn’t it?
It's so important. It needs to taste good.
It needs to feel good.
Not everyone is as disciplined as Rúben Dias
to just do it off his own back.
Yeah, yeah.
You have to lure some of them into it.
Rúben, always a pleasure to see you.
To perform at the highest level,
you have to make sure you’re fuelling your body in the right way
and also looking after it in the right way
and I know for yourself, you're meticulous in that.
When did you realise that hydration and nutrition were key to your routines?
Well, since a young age, it's part of the routine.
I've always been very connected.
It’s one of those I think you need to follow
and you really need to understand because every detail makes a big difference.
How much does your nutritional and hydration routine change
pre-game to post-game, or are they quite similar?
Obviously it has differences.
Yes.
But essentially, I think the key word is being hydrated before
and after, especially that first day or the second day after a game.
Those are normally the most important to actually recover well.
I see.
Drink the water, drink the electrolytes or whatever your nutritionist thinks.
Hydration is key, guys. It’s so important.
Where does Gatorade come into that?
At what point of the day will you have your Gatorade fix?
So if I'm training, instead of drinking just water I'll drink Gatorade.
Well, it's a little bit of an extra.
Normally, I always take a concentrate of mushrooms.
Oh, nice!
For my immune system
and because it’s horrendous, I add a little bit of Gatorade to help.
Lovely! OK. Nice, yeah.
So just to give it a little bit of sweetness?
Do you have a favourite meal?
Do you have a go-to meal that you’ll kind of like to have before a game
to kind of fuel you? Or training say?
Well, one meal I normally always have before a match,
the famous Riyad’s Pasta!
Of course!
Why is it so good? What is it about it?
Well, in fact, it's very good and it's just easy.
So after the guys have got their food...
Yeah.
They'll all come round and take a seat
and then I'll give out
the hydration stuff, the micronutrients, so the pills and things like that.
We've got some for you actually.
Ah, what a treat!
I’ll talk you through it.
Omega 3.
Yeah.
Probiotics for gut health and vitamin D because we need it.
We’ve got no sunshine over winter.
It’s rainy Manchester!
That’s it.
Are these accessible for everyone to get then?
Absolutely.
If you go into any supplement store or health store,
or even high-end supermarket.
Available online as well, you can get it anywhere.
Probiotics is a big area these days,
gut health seems to control a lot in the body,
so probiotics are very important.
So, talking about rehydration.
When I'm taking my day-to-day training,
when should I be consuming my liquids?
Do I do it before, do I do it during, do I do it afterwards?
All of the above, got to keep going.
Just from a simple point of view,
if you weigh yourself before
and then afterwards and you've lost one kilo,
you need 1.5 litres of fluids to rehydrate.
It’s a very simple one.
OK.
Can I ask you, Tom? Because I've always wondered this.
You know when you get given
your Gatorade and everyone's like, ‘you need your electrolyte drinks’.
Can you actually explain what that means
and what it is doing for me?
Basically, imagine if you drink a litre of water.
Yeah.
You're going to pee out
about 800ml of that
OK.
one litre.
So what the salt does is it tries to match the electrolyte level of your blood.
So then the kidneys don't detect any change
and then you don’t go to the toilet.
Ah!
It's restricting that urine output, for a technical term.
It’s keeping it all in the body.
So yeah, keeping it in the body.
Keeping your blood volume so you can deliver oxygen as much as possible.
Are there any players that have specific requests?
Are there any dishes
and if so, what are they?
Rúben Dias is really into his food,
Yes.
so anything Portuguese.
So there's a dish called Bacalhau,
Bacalhau à Brás.
It’s the nicest thing ever.
Is it as popular as Riyad’s Pasta?
Yeah, ah!
Nothing is as popular as Riyad’s Pasta!
What would be your one top tip for myself and for those at home
when looking at nutrition and making sure we're fuelling ourselves in the right way?
I think people get in a routine
of training day, after day, after day,
running themselves into the ground.
You've got to put the nutrients back in.
Yeah.
You don't have to be a Michelin-starred chef.
Variety is the key
and if you have vegetables and protein on every plate,
the way you metabolise, the way you process it all,
it’s just so much healthier.
We're talking about drinks, but my number one tip is to sleep well.
Sometimes we can't because we've got tight schedules
and sometimes you arrive late
and you just have to train in the morning.
Of course.
You'll have your time to recover the sleep.
But if I have to choose one, and the most important one.
Sleep!
For me is the number one.
Well Rúben, an absolute pleasure
and as always it's great to get tips from you
and thank you for your time and for your words, man.
Thanks.
I need to give me what my body needs.
No, I think that comes also with age.
Should I be nervous?
Because I’m wondering what you’re going to put me through.
No, no, no.
We’re just going to do some nice easy exercises.