Water polo is a game requiring high levels of swimming fitness, as well as strength, power and speed. Elite players train often twice a day for 3-4 hours in total and have high energy requirements.

At the Queensland Academy of Sport the women’s squad regularly take part in cooking sessions in the nutrition training centre to hone their food preparation skills, nutrition knowledge and to try tasty new dishes.

On the menu at our last session was a selection of brunch, lunch and snack recipes – some of which can be found on the Eat Smart blog and website. These included: Vegetable frittata, berry yoghurt granola parfaits, quick quesadillas, chicken dukkah and quinoa salad, turkey ricotta and beetroot wraps,date almond and coconut balls, crunchy cookies, cranberry and oat muffins, cauliflower hummus dip, kiwi and banana breakfast smoothie, protein smoothie and a green smoothie.

Look out for some more of these great recipes in the future!

As we pass the half way mark of the London Games we want to congratulate the athletes who have consulted the services of the Eat Smart team on their performances so far. A number of the Queensland swimmers seen by Holly, Jess and Kerry completed their campaign with medals of varying colours. Kerry’s long jump athlete has a silver. Holly’s six Queenslanders in the womens water polo team are doing a fantastic job and have moved into the semi-finals – so a great medal chance. Also Joseph’s two Queensland boys are performing well in the men’s water polo team and scoring plenty of goals. Good luck to those still competing and we hope your nutrition plans serve you well!

Holly, Kerry, Jess and Joseph have all had a hand in helping a number of our Olympic athletes towards their dreams of success in London next month. Holly has been working with the Queensland based members of the womens water polo team – The Stingers. Queensland is supplying 6 members and a reserve to the team – with a mix of experienced campaigners and some new faces. They are a great medal chance, so keep your eye on them! Joseph has been similarly looking after the Queensland based Aussie mens players from The Sharks. Kerry, Holly and Jess have given nutrition support to a number of our top swimmers and long jumpers through the Queensland Academy of Sport programs. Plus Holly has helped one very excited judo athlete from Brisbane qualify for his first Olympics. More later!

You may have caught some of the exciting swimming finals featuring Australian athletes over the last 2 nights – more on this from Kerry later in the week! For the last week our womens and mens water polo teams have also been battling it out in Shanghai with the the world’s best. Many of these athletes are looked after by Holly and Peta at the Queensland Academy of Sport. The girls lost narrowly in a penalty shoot-out end to their quarter final with Italy and now play off for 5th to 8th place. The boys needed to beat powerhouse Spain to reach the quarters but their narrow loss means they play off for 9th to 12th position. Good luck to both teams in the rest of the tournament.

 Last week in Sydney saw the nations best water polo players battle it out for the National League Titles. The finals series involved two mens and two womens teams from Brisbane – many of whom make up the QAS water polo squads whose nutrition is looked after by Holly (women) and Peta (men). 

Congratulations to the Barracudas women’s water polo team (pictured below)  who won narrowly in a penalty shootout and to the Barra’s men who won bronze. Both of the Breakers teams narrowly missed the semi-finals. 

Barracudas Womens Water Polo Champions 2011

A number of these players are now preparing for the World Championships in Shanghai in July 2011 as part of Australian teams and are involved in camps and competition leading up to this important event. 

As a prelude to the finals the girls played a staff vs players game in the QAS recovery pool – won narrowly by the staff (with a few ‘ring-ins’). This was followed by the annual ‘bake-off’, where the girls show off their culinary (but not necessarily nutrition-based) skills in the kitchen – judged by their Holly. The winning entry by Australian player Jane Moran was a choc mousse meringue cake which definitely did not tick too many ‘healthy nutrition’ boxes, but was a bit of a taste sensation!