This article is part of our Italian Week on Tennis Buzz.

When you think italian cuisine, you probably think pizza and pasta. The perfect food for a tennis player.

As a tennis player, your diet must help you:
– achieve high performance
– recover more efficiently
– have better health

The most important component of a tennis player’s diet are the Carbohydrates.
Carbohydrates (sugar, bread, potatoes, rice, pasta) fuel the muscles and avoid early fatigue.
You need to eat at least 6 grams of carbohydrate per kg of body weight per day (6 g/kg/day). When you are on the court several hours a day, you need to eat more carbohydrate: 7 to 10 grams per kg per day.
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Interesting article by the Wall Street Journal about world number Rafael Nadal‘s training regimen and diet.

Rafa’s fitness team consists of 3 people: his doctor Angel Ruiz Cotorro, Manacor based gym teacher Joan Forcades, and his physio Rafael Maymo.

Dr. Cotorro describes Nadal as a “very special athlete”, who “mixes the explosive pace of a 200-meter runner with the resistance of a marathon runner”.
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