engleski

Nutritional knowledge and dietary habits of Croatian tennis coaches

Due to a specific bond between tennis coaches and their athletes, it often happens that coaches act as sport nutritionists as well. The purpose of this study was to determine nutritional knowledge of the Croatian tennis coaches and to investigate was there any relation between the level of nutritional knowledge and their dietary habits. The secondary purpose was to investigate the influence of coaches' supplementation and recommendations they gave to their athletes. The sample consisted of 58 test subjects, Croatian tennis coaches (50 male, 8 female ; age 33.3 +/- 10.8yrs). Data were collected using the method of written questionnaires. Questions were classified regarding the importance of a particular question for the profession of a sports coach in three categories: basic knowledge, advisable knowledge and advanced knowledge. Total percentage of correct answers was 68.9%, with the highest percentage, as expected, in the category basic knowledge (79.4%). However, as the level of question difficulty increased, the number of correct answers decreased by 14% in each category, indicating a linear decline of knowledge (advisable knowledge 65.4%, advanced knowledge 51.4% of correct answers. This research determined that 37.9% of coaches used dietary supplements and they had a better nutritional knowledge than those who did not use supplements (72.9% vs. 66.4%). Chi-square test showed that listed group had significantly better knowledge on the questions relating to special effect of some food on weight loss (p=0.03), unsaturated fatty acids (p=0.02), exercising and fasting (p<0.001), potassium consisting food (p=0.01), recommended daily carbohydrates intake (p=0.04) and synthesizing of D vitamin (p=0.02). In variables which describe whether athletes leaded by examined coaches use particular dietary supplement, chi square test determinates highly significant differences between the groups of coaches who use and who do not use vitamins (p<0.001), minerals (p<0.001) and proteins (p<0.001). The results lead to the conclusion that the questioned coaches do well with regard to the basic nutritional knowledge ; however, if they are to be more efficient, they should expand their knowledge. The results also corroborate the assumption that, due to tennis coaches' close relationship with their athletes, they relate their own and players' needs for dietary supplementation.

diet ; tennis ; nutritional knowledge

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