Episode 30: Sports Dietitian Tips on How To Build Your Performance Plate with Jessica Isaacs, RD, CSSD
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Episode Transcription
Participant #1:
In this episode, we are joined by Jessica Isaacs, an elite athlete sports dietitian at UCLA who helps athletes fuel to win. She uses evidence based customized nutrition recommendations to optimize performance and recovery, reduce injury risk, and achieve body composition and health goals. Additionally, Jessica tackles diet culture and nutrition misinformation on Instagram and TikTok will run her own sports nutrition private practice. Jessica talks in this episode all about the performance plate method and how she uses it with her athletes. We hope you guys enjoyed this episode. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the upbeat Dietitians podcast. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Pod. Today we are joined by a very special guest, Jessica Isaacs. Jessica, welcome to the podcast. Thanks so much for having me, ladies. So to start us off, tell us a little bit about your day in the life, what you do for work, how you got to be a dietitian, and also some of your hobbies things you like to do when you're not working. Okay, so I am a second career dietitian. Right out of high school, I joined the Air Force. I was an aircraft mechanic, so absolutely nothing to do with nutrition. But I came into nutrition through kind of a life journey of my own, just struggling with an eating disorder and just really falling heavily into diet culture. And just through that journey of just my daughter, I had a daughter at a young age and she was making comments about her own body, and I was really seeing that some of the stuff that I was dealing with in my own life. So I thought it was private and something that I had kept to myself. Well, that was clearly kind of spilling over into her life as well. And I knew that I needed to make a change. So I started on my road to recovery from my eating disorder, and then through it just kind of awakened this passion for nutrition that I didn't know that I had. So I saw both the healing power of nutrition and then started to get into fitness and saw really what it could do for athletic performance as well. And I became fascinated with the idea of taking nutrition in these anti diet culture messages and coupling that with athletes that are performing at the highest level and just wanting to help fuel them and help them understand the nutrition. And so I didn't know at the time what a dietitian was. But I did some Googling and I found out that's what I needed to do if I wanted to work with athletes and work with nutrition was to become a dietitian, specifically a sports dietitian. So I went to school at Purdue Purdue University. And while I was there, I spent a couple of years interning in sports and just getting to understand the role, making sure that it was the right fit for me. But it just made me want to do this work even more. Coming out of school and my dietic internship, there really wasn't a role that was available for me in some entry level. So I took a job in clinical nutrition, working in a hospital setting. But I really found that was great foundational to learn a lot about medical nutrition therapy. I see athletes all the time with type one diabetes, with GI, issues with celiac disease, with other allergies. So having that good foundational medical nutrition therapy background was really helpful, even doing more performance based work. And so my first job in sports nutrition, I just kind of some connections worked out. And a lot of the work that I was doing to kind of keep on foot in the door and sports nutrition worked out for me. And I got a call for a job at Mamba Sports Academy, which was the late Kobe Bryant's training facility in California. And so I went to work there as their sports dietitian. It was really fantastic to get to see all sorts of different athletes at different levels, from youth to professional level. I got to do some really cool things with helping out athletes that were trying to get into the NBA and athletes were trying to get into the NFL. I work with some Olympic athletes, and I also work with some young athletes just really getting started in their sport. And that became really fun, just especially seeing those athletes that were just entering sport or were still at the high school or collegiate level, which really is kind of like my bread and butter today because they still need to learn so much about nutrition. There's so much they don't know. And so Kovid hit, Kobe had passed away. The Academy kind of took a hit, and I was let go. And during probate early, Kobe was kind of scrambling of like, what do I do now? And so I started a private practice where I kind of had a private practice all along. But I pumped more time into that and really started spending a lot more time on social media, really expanding, kind of trying to expand my reach and trying to reach that athlete audience. I found out that a lot of them are on TikTok. And so I thought at the time, my daughter is now 14, I thought TikTok was just like a booty shaking app. And it still very much is a booty shaking apprehension to reach younger people and share some nutrition messages in educational and engaging way. They're already on there being nutrition messages, but a lot of them are not good nutrition messages. So I wanted to kind of break up the noise and be a voice of, like, anti diet culture and more performance based nutrition. And so through all this things kind of grew for me. And then I got a call at UCLA where I am now as their basketball dietitian. So I work with the men's and the women's basketball team. I'm here all day, every day, like literally all day every day sometimes, but supporting the teams. And it's a really cool role where I only work with, like, 30 athletes who just have small rosters. But I can really individualize everything that I do with them. I spend a lot of FaceTime with them, educating them on nutrition, helping fuel them before and after practices and games. I do team talks all the time with the teams and try to educate them not just on their needs now, but on their needs for the rest of their lives. So whether they're moving on to the professional level or whether they're moving on to just be regular humans, I really want them to walk away understanding nutrition and the whys behind everything. So it's been a pretty cool role here. Really food service, heavy role. I've also got a team of interns that help me with things. I do some education work with interns as well. Just kind of preparing the next group of sports dietitians as much as I can still do a lot of, like, content work and that sort of thing on social media. It's been a lot of fun to meet other sports dietitians and other dietitians, but then also athletes and feel like I'm making an impact there. And then I have my private practice on the side. So busy day every day is kind of a busy day. Every day looks a little bit different. Hobbies wise outside of work, I don't have a ton of time most days, I'll be honest. It's a lot of time. A lot of sacrifice working, doing this kind of work. But hiking. I love hiking, spending time outdoors, camping when I can thrifting I love to go thrift shopping. You can catch me there anytime. I have the day off shopping. I've got my daughter back at home. She doesn't like to spend much time with me, but every now and then she'll let me go get our nails done together or something. We did that the other day, and then I've got a couple of dogs too that I don't get to see enough of. But I love getting to come home to my little family at home. That's my life so awesome. Thank you for sharing all that. We have quite a few dietitians on, and I always feel like everyone's journey to get in. Their role they are in is so different. So it's always just so crazy to me. It's always here. Everyone gets where they are. Well, as a sports dietitian, we really want to Hone in on that today. We kind of want to hear your thoughts on what's called the performance plate method and how you sort of use that with your athletes. Yeah. So a lot of times when people kind of start working with me, they're talking about, like, how many calories should I be eating or what should my macronutrients look like? Or can I get a meal plan sort of thing? And I really want to navigate us away from all of that. I think with Inhuman, that could be kind of setting you up for some disorder eating or not really understanding why you're doing these things. So I want my athletes to understand based on their day, based on their training, based on their goals, how they should switch up their meals and then also be able to make free choices, make choices of things to go on their plate that aren't necessarily following a plan, and it doesn't really necessarily exclude any foods or save one food is better than the other, but all foods can fit onto their plate. We're just going to divide the portions up based on what their day looks like. There's three basically core plates think of like an eight inch nine inch dinner plate, and we're kind of sectioning this off into different categories based on what our day looks like. So the first starts off with kind of a low intensity. This might be an off day plate. This might be a day where maybe you're just going for a short walk or a short jog, not really a super active day, maybe some yoga, light body weight training, or maybe this is just simply like, no practice, just a recovery day. Our plate looks like this. So half of the plate is going to be color, which is fruits and vegetables. This is where we're getting a lot of our vitamins and minerals and so on these days off. It's a really great day to focus on repairing our body with these nutrients that we might not get a lot of during the week, especially when we're focusing on other categories and then the other half of the plate divided up. So we have got a quarter of the plate of a carbohydrate and a quarter of the plate protein. Since we're not using as much energy on this day, this is a day where we're going to have the least amount of carbohydrates for energy just because we don't need as much fuel. But I will say with any of these days, I really stress to my athletes to listen to their bodies if they're hungry or if they want more food, if they want other things on their plate, like they can totally do that too. This is just kind of a baseline, a guideline template of where we're going to build off of and then the next day is going to be a more active day. So maybe a day when we're having practices, maybe practices of like an hour to 2 hours a workout, like strength training, maybe an hour strength training or something like that, maybe going for a three to five mile jog. This might be a plate that we would use. So instead of dividing it into half and quarters, we're just basically breaking everything down into thirds. So a third of the plate carbs, a third of the plate color fruits and veggies, and then a third of the plate protein. And then the one other category that I haven't really mentioned is healthy fats. And these things might already be on the plate. So we might be cooking with some olive oil. We've already got a healthy fat on the plate, so we don't really need to put extra on there, or we might be having something like salmon that already has some healthy fats in it. So we don't need to worry about it too much. But it is an important thing to have on our plates and different degrees and different amounts based on goals and needs. Healthy fats are really important for all athletes. But I say it's really important for my female athletes to really make sure that we're getting healthy fats on our plate because of its role in hormone health. And then finally, our last plate is going to be like our big carb heavy plate. And this is a day when we're doing some heavy hard training. So maybe this is game day. Maybe we're doing two days. Maybe our practices are 3 hours or 4 hours with Lyft. So these are going to be our big days. Maybe it's a tournament day. Or maybe you're trying to put on some muscle mass. This would be the plate that we're looking for. So half of the plate now is going to be carbohydrates carbs being our energy source. The more energy we're using, the more energy we need to be consuming on our plates. And then the other half of the plate is protein and color. So kind of almost an inverse of our first off day plate, where we're going from color being the biggest category to now carbs being the biggest category. And then the other thing that we haven't talked about either is like fun foods. I'm big on, like, all foods can fit into an athlete's day into an athlete's plate. No food should be excluded. I think for any human, if you want chocolate, eat chocolate. If you want cookie, eat a cookie. You shouldn't be restricting things. And you should be able to have these foods in your life. But I think it's helpful for my athletes to contextually see it on a plate. And so that way we're knowing we're checking all the other boxes and we're getting all the good stuff into and we're going to add that fun food to our plate as well, just in the appropriate category. So maybe it's more carb heavy. It goes into the carb category, but those foods can actually go on our plate as well. And then the other thing is that these places would be for three meals a day. So if it's trading day, then you're following that training day plate for all three meals of the day. If you have early morning practice and you're not going to do, maybe you're not going to get up a few hours in advance to eat something. Then I would say maybe follow that harder intensity plate the night before so that we'll make sure we're nice and fueled up after that overnight fast to have fuel in the morning for that practice or game or whatever that day may be. Absolutely. That was actually going to be one of my questions was do you have to include, like, I'm going to do, like, plate two and plate three on the stair? Like, how does that kind of look? But you answered that. So glad you brought that up. The play performance method is something so interesting because I've gotten more at least we've got messages where people are like, bring on a sports dietitian and have them talk about calories and macros. So I know what I need to eat, but it's really cool to see that it's not just so cut and dry like, this is what you should be eating every day for whatever you're doing. It really depends on what you have going on that day. What performance? Like, how close performances to that. I also really like how you included that it's okay to have those fun foods, because there's a lot of food demonization on the Internet, and I'm sure especially people who are trying to get better at their sport are like, oh, I can't afford to eat chocolate because it'll ruin my games or say those things. But I'm really glad you addressed that as well, because you know how sports dietitian approved, you can eat on food.
Participant #1:
Yeah. And I think that's an important message is that athletes they get exposed to all the same nutrition messages and nutrition misinformation that the general public does. But there's not a lot of sports specific nutrition messaging out there. Like, if you follow sports dietitian accounts, you may be, but a lot of what the bulk of what athletes are seeing is the same thing that everybody else is seeing, which is very, like, weight loss, heavy messages and diet culture messages and bad diet messages. And so it's very confusing for them. A lot of times, athletes aren't getting any kind of nutrition education until maybe this level at collegiate level. Even then, it's a growing field. But not everybody has the same kind of access to sports dietitians. Or maybe you have a dietitian at your school, but they're spread over hundreds of athletes. So maybe you don't have the same kind of interaction. And I think it's really important that we get more of these foundational nutrition messages. But then also the athletes understand that when you're on the Internet and when you're going through feeds and you're seeing what I eat in the day, unless it's like a high performing athlete. That's not a message for you. If you're seeing a 1600 calorie meal plan, that is absolutely not for you. I don't care who you are, what kind of athlete you are. 1600 calories is not enough. Keep it moving. Like, keep it moving. Have a two in front of it at least. But know that, right. And sometimes a lot of my athletes, I would say most of my athletes when we start working together are under fueling. And a lot of times it's not intentional. There's certainly are some that have, like, some carb restriction, carb beer sort of thing. But a lot of times it's not that they're intentionally under fueling. It's just that they don't understand how much their body needs in order to perform at their best. And nutrition has to be a really conscious effort for them because they have such busy schedules, especially for student athletes. You've got school schedules, you've got training schedules, you've got other commitments, you've got a social life you want to put in there somewhere. And so you've got to find out where you're going to eat during the day. And when you've got these big chunks of your day already taken away with activity, it's hard to fill in enough and get it enough. And unless you're like staying on top of that and aware of, first of all, what your body needs, it's easy to get behind. And that not only just sets you up for not performing at your best, but that's also going to give you an increased risk of injury, which is certainly something people want to avoid. Right? Absolutely. Yeah. I feel like that's so huge because diet culture infiltrates like everybody's lives, and it's obviously negative for everybody. But as an athlete trying to be the smallest version of yourself, eat as little as possible that's going to negatively impact your performance in huge ways, obviously. So I think that's a very important message you just said is we got to stick clear of those types of things. 100%. Yeah. And look for sports division social media accounts because they should be your go to people, especially with all the nutrition accounts on the Internet. There are sports dietitian accounts. You just might not have been aware of them until now. So now you don't have an excuse.
Participant #1:
Yes. Well, Jessica, speaking of, where can our listeners find you on social media? Yeah. So I'm pretty active on Instagram and TikTok. I'm at Jessica, the sportsrd Rd for registered dietitian. I've got a website as well. Jessicathesportsrd. Com. But I'd say Instagram and TikToks where you're going to find all the fun stuff. And I would say Instagram, if you're on Instagram, go there. If there's a lot more fun stuff that I can post on there that I can't post on TikTok as well as like, I'll post a video on TikTok. But on Instagram, I can expand on that message a lot more in my caption. And so a lot of times, if you do see something that I posted on TikTok, if you go over to Instagram, you're going to get a lot more bigger picture of what some overall message and takeaway as well as some applications, some things that you could actually do and implement in your own life. Absolutely. And just make it easier for yourself and follow her on both. You don't have to worry about that. Perfect. So kind of getting now to the fun section. Although this episode has been full of lots of fun, but our controversial section, we like to have bonus questions where either we debate or just kind of talk about our food opinions, like people like sharing their opinions about things. So today's question is our kick hats. Technically, Lasagna and Jessica, we always let the guests go first. I love this question. It's so fun. I just got a few different food debates on my Instagram as well, and it was very hotly contested. I think there's two camps of people people that are like black and white. Yes or no, like this is something. And you're a crazy person for even asking this question or the other ones that are a little bit more open minded to explore some different ideas. So I love this question. I would say it really depends on what the definition of lasagna is, but I see it as like a lasagna layered dish and a kit cap layered as well. So I could go with a KitKat being chocolate lasagna. Yeah. I think the definition is the big part, and I'm the one in that camp where I like to explore think about all the parts, the exact wording like what is the actual question asking? And so upon my Google search, I stumbled upon the definition of lasagna, which is based on the noodle itself. Like lasagna is the noodle, not really the dish. And it made me wonder, is the dish actually a casserole? I don't know. And so my answer is that I don't know if the kit Kat is lasagna, because I don't think a Kit Kat is a noodle. I don't know. I was going to say I agree because I also view lasagna more as the layered component. And in my head I was like, lasagna is a social construct. It's what you make it. But Kikat is layered wafers and chocolate. So I like the chocolate lasagna or like chocolate casserole interpretation. But if we're going to follow the standpoint of lasagna is a type of noodle. Caquettes don't have noodles in it to my knowledge. Right. But like our wafers noodles. I don't know. I would think not because isn't the definition of a noodle like it has to have, like, eggs and flour and certain ingredients? I don't know. Lafers have that vegan noodles. True. Oh, my gosh. Kit Kat is a vegan casserole.
Participant #1:
Chocolate casserole. I think that's good. Yeah. Okay. Well, we broke the Internet today. Well, Jessica, thank you so much for joining us today. It was an absolute pleasure, and we'll definitely have to have you back on for all things sports nutrition related. Because I know everyone has so many questions about sports nutrition and there's so much we can go into. But thank you, everyone for joining us for today. Thanks for tuning in, and we hope you listen again next week for a fun and thrilling episode. All right. Thanks, guys. See you next week. Bye.
