Eat well and learn

Sport Nutrition for Health and Performance: Melinda Manore & Janice Thompson. Human Kinetics 2000. 536 pages hardback, 9" x 11½", £39.50. ISBN 0-87322-939-8

Even when I began racing in 1955 the importance of nutrition in sport and exercise was already well understood, even if the details about what we should be doing were still hazy. Things have advanced since then. Now you can make a career as a sports nutritionist, a professional; would-be professionals in any field need an advanced level textbook, and this is it. Like Wilmore and Costill on physiology, its comprehensiveness almost makes commentary superfluous. Every aspect of nutrition is exhaustively discussed. Nutrients are grouped by chapters according to their function – energy releasers, blood-forming, bone-forming, antioxidant, and so on, an organisation which I have not seen before. The result is an emphasis, not on memorising for exams, but on understanding, which is the only way in which real learning is ever going to take place.

There's a good section on so-called ergogenic aids, drawing attention to the deceptive practices used to market them. Testimonials are based on the placebo effect. Tell someone they're getting a boost and 40% will improve. Two as examples, carnitine and creatine, are evaluated as examples, the first failing to do what is claimed for it, the second offering some help in limited circumstances.

It's only fairly recently that we've learned that sport is particularly bad for women, because of its links with appearance, weight, and the perception of food (for some) as the arch-villain in their lives. Hence the need for a special section on nutrition and the active female. It's curious that a recent correspondent to Cycle Coaching magazine described 'balanced diet' as 'a meaningless expression'. I can't think why anyone should think so. Here, and throughout the book, the concept of the balanced diet is stressed: only by eating the whole range of food will you get all the nutrients you need.

Boxed highlights frequently draw attention to a range of topics, concepts case studies and illustrations throughout the book . Each chapter ends with key concepts and terms and extensive references.

What they call in the film world the 'production values' are of the highest: large, clear typefaces on good paper, double columns, in a strong, sewn, durable binding.

It's also an invaluable reference work. You want the glycaemic index of sponge cake? The metabolic pathways requiring B-complex vitamins? Twenty research studies of zinc and magnesium deficiency? Ubiquinone as an ergogenic aid? The relative contributions of glycogen and fat to exercise at different levels? The Food Guide Pyramid? How to work out your BMI? A behaviour modification programme for weight loss or maintenance? It would be a challenge to come up with anything significant in the field of sport and health nutrition that isn't covered here.

This textbook goes far beyond the needs and requirements of the average athlete, and probably the average coach; but for the sports scientist, the advanced coach, the nutritionist or sports medicine specialist, it represents an investment.

Ramin Minovi