Much has been written of the diet best adapted to an athlete when training for a contest. The object of training is to prepare a man to do a very large amount of work, and sometimes skilled work, in a very short time. This is a different problem from that which confronts a laborer or an artisan. The latter requires that regimen which will enable him to do a large amount of work daily over long periods of time. During the period of preparation for an athletic contest, muscles must be made to grow, and the waste caused by tests or trials of strength be repaired. Proteins are therefore needed for cell growth and repair. They are also required, as has already been explained, to furnish nervous energy.

The work that muscles do can be accomplished upon carbohydrate food, as it will economically furnish a large number of calories or units of force. But to set the muscular work free quickly, and to perform it accurately by a correct correlation of movements, much nervous energy is needed, and for its production proteins are required. When large amounts of food must be eaten, proteins should form a conspicuous part ot the diet, because they are digested with comparative ease. Such carbohydrate food as is eaten should be as digestible as possible.

In preparing for many kinds of athletic contests it is also an object to lessen the weight of the contestant as well as to increase his strength. This is best accomplished by exercise. A relatively large amount of protein will also help to accomplish it. However, athletes, when in training, always eat enough to grow fat, if it were not for the severe exercise that they take.

Increased endurance is acquired by such exercises as gradually strengthen the heart and increase the depth and power of respiration. Diet influences these changes only as it does general strength, by furnishing to the muscles and the nerves to be used, such food as they need to produce energy.

Experience has taught athletes and their trainers that a generous mixed diet is the best one for them. At the training tables of the Harvard and Yale crews such foods as the following are eaten: Breakfast cereals, dry toast, vegetables in reasonable variety, and fruits; beef, lamb, mutton, chicken, fish, bacon, and eggs. Desserts of simple puddings or ice-cream are furnished, but no highly seasoned food.

The utility of sugar or of carbohydrates as producers of strength has already been dwelt upon. In this connection it is interesting to note the experience of the Holland oarsmen who, while in training, began to show signs of overwork, loss of flesh, a lack of ambition and energy, and disinclination for study and work. By eating sugar as freely as they wished, sometimes as much as one-third of a pound a day, they were refreshed and enabled to win a race against antagonists who did not believe in its use. Sugar is generally permitted to those in training, but pie, cake, and other sweet and more or less indigestible dishes are forbidden.

Although food must be eaten by those in training in larger amounts than by the same persons at other times, care must be taken not to overeat, and thereby derange digestion; nor must meals be eaten at too long intervals.

The table on pages 156 and 157, compiled by At water and Bryant, gives a summary of results of dietary studies of university boat crews, foot-ball teams, and professional athletes, and compares them with the ordinary diets of men of various occupations and with the generally accepted standard dietaries. It is noticeable that the diets of the university crews compare closely with the American standard for one doing hard work and are somewhat more generous than that of German and English standards. The largest amount of food is eaten by the foot-ball teams. It is also noticeable that the proportion of proteins is greatly increased relatively to other kinds of food. This is also true of Sandow's diet. The excess of proteins in the food of college students training for a contest is particularly striking when their diet is compared with that of their fellows at an ordinary college club. The latter furnishes 3690 calories and contains 107 grams of protein; the average diet of a college crew in training furnishes 4085 calories and contains 155 grams of protein. The difference in fuel value of the two diets is approximately 400 calories. The oarsmen's diet furnished one-ninth more energy than that of their fellows who were not doing athletic work. There was a difference of 48 grams, or an increase of nearly one-half, of protein. The relative proportion of protein was therefore unusually large.

Tea, coffee, and cocoa are usually permitted to men in training. Occasionally the first two cause so much nervousness as to prevent skilful coordination of muscles and they must be forbidden. Spirits and other strong alcoholic beverages are forbidden. Beer and light wines are sometimes allowed.

Violent exercise should not be taken soon after meals. It will hinder and sometimes stop digestion. Light exercise with dumb-bells or pulley weights is not only permissible, but desirable before breakfast, but prolonged or violent exercise should not be taken after so long a fast as a night's sleep entails.

If violent exercise is attempted after a hearty meal, it will be observed that weariness is felt more quickly, and that it requires more mental force to compel one's self to do the work, and even under such compulsion it is not done with the quickness, cleverness, and accuracy that may be shown at other times.

Although exercise creates a need of food to restore the strength and energy that has been expended, it is best not to eat immediately after exercise. A short rest of a half-hour or an hour should intervene. The habit of athletes of reclining and being rubbed for some minutes after exercise is useful both as a rest, and as an equalizer of the circulation.