Energy And Macronutrients Intakes Of Some Professional Soccer (Football) Players In Cameroon

Research Article
Fabrice W. Fokou., Benoît B. Koubala., Christelle O. T. Fomou., Elvis A. Mbolifor., Rachel Fadi and Elie Fokou
DOI: 
xxx-xxxxx-xxxx
Subject: 
science
KeyWords: 
Soccer (Football), Nutritional status, Championship, Energy intake.
Abstract: 

Whatever the practiced sport, a balanced diet is required to provide the necessary nutrients in adequate proportions in order to ensure an excellent physical performance, recovery and maintenance of the health of the athlete. This study aimed at diagnosing the feeding and the nutritional status of the male ''soccer (football)'' teams in Maroua town, Cameroon. Data from food diary and body measurement were used to measure food consumption and to determine the nutritional status of the players. It comes out that players have unbalanced diet (85.19%), lower energy (62.96%) and water (75.93%) intakes. According to the Quetelet’s index, although the average BMI falls within the normal range, 31.2% of the respondents present a bad nutritional status in favor of moderate malnutrition (24.04%) and overweight (11.1%). However, 45.45% of players who exhibiting a moderate malnutrition, had a sufficient energy intake indicating a physical effort above their capacities. In the same way, 33.33% who presenting overweight had a sufficient energy intake indicating a physical effort below their capacity. These results underline the need for a dietician in the teams and good balancing of the physical effort during training sessions which opens prospects with the improvement of the measurement of food consumption.