Snacks and practice

[MamaofEnS]

My DD practices for a maximum of 4 3/4 hours, a min of 3 1/2 hours. There is never a snack break. When they rotate from one event to the next, they are allowed to go grab a snack, either from something they brought, or they can just grab it from our pro-shop. They pro-shop then bills the parent. If it is not something that can be consumed instantly, then they don't eat it. My DD always has a fruit bar, applesauce, Gatorade and water. Usually, the fruit bar isn't touched. She does eat the applesauce prior to practice, and has a regular meal at home for dinner (between 8-9). Then she gets to start homework.

MamaofEnS

 

[fishchimes]

I think a 5 minute snack break is a good idea for any gym. We used to have a 10 minute break, and people were usually done before the 10 minutes were up anyway. We don't have break anymore, but I wish we still had a least a couple minutes. I used to eat an energy bar in the changing room but certain people were making a huge mess, spilling drinks etc. so we're not allowed to eat in there anymore.

I don't really understand what the problem with having a snack break is. Obviously you don't want a 20 minute snack break, but gymnastics takes a lot of energy. Make some rules about eating over the table or the types of snacks you're allowed to bring if you're concerned about crumbs.

 

[10.0]

I can see it both ways. When I did gym we sometimes had time to grab a snack not a specific snack time but maybe a 5-10 min. break where you could do whatever eat, drink, use the restroom. But I remember having a specific room/lounge area and that was the only place food could be eaten it works out good as that way the mess was at least contained, you were also expected to only bring in healthy snacks. The gym I work at now sells all kinds of candy and chips and soda and junk, it makes me mad that in this "healthy" environment you are encouraging kids to eat bad, it also angers me as they sell candy out of quarter machines and it gets ALL over the gym and I help clean the gym and I get tired of scraping jolly ranchers off the floor each week. I wish this gym was like the one I attended before and did not sell candy or even allow kids to bring it in for the kids health and my sanity.

 

[Bella's Mom]

it gets ALL over the gym and I help clean the gym and I get tired of scraping jolly ranchers off the floor each week. I wish this gym was like the one I attended before and did not sell candy or even allow kids to bring it in for the kids health and my sanity.

Oh wow....that would make me kinda mad too. Our girls eat in the "party room" since it has a refrigerator and is attached to the gym. No one eats IN the gym. That would be a cleaning nightmare.

We have a snack shop that has different varieties of snack bars and those 100 calorie packs. Most girls bring from home though.

 

[bookworm]

If a 12 yo cannot handle a 4 hour practice with out breaking for a meal (and there isn't some medical issue that necessitates it) then she should do something else that could accomodate it...practice time is for practice...short (< 5 min) water breaks are ok but to expect time to dine in the middle of a practice (and as one poster said , time that I'm paying for) is unrealistic..

I am not talking a general nutrition but rather what your gymnast eats prior to practice and/or during. We have a mom (dd is 12) who is having major issues with our gyms 'snack policy'. The policy is that there is no set snack time provided for any level and that no food may be brought out onto the floor. Food is not ever restricted and no child is ever not allowed to eat. The mom feels the girls are being set up for an eating disorder and that a meal break should be provided. I respect everyone's individual choices in regards to what they feel is best for their child but I also understand and agree with the gyms position. Practice is 4hrs, I load my dd up on a healthy, whole grain carb and provide her a healthy snack to eat if she needs to. I have tried to instill personal responsibility in her eating habits and choices ie my body tells me I am hungry so I will eat. The coaches say that no meal time at practice is pretty standard across the board. The mom has asked that the coaches make sure her child take a 12-20m snack break 2hrs into practice which I assume will met her needs.

I am just curious how other gyms or moms handle long practice hours that fall over traditional meal times.

I did not say that they could not eat anything during the practice but in reference to the OP's original statement that this mom wants a "meal break" 2 1/2 hours into a practice, and sorry, that's unrealistic to expect...the child should eat before the practice ( my daughter will do pasta or a salad on the way to gym) and have something available to munch on the fly , but a meal break is unrealistic to expect. And to answer your question, I have another child in a different sport and he doesn't break for meals either...yes, they need fuel for a long practice but they can be fed their meals before and after practice.

 

[MaryA]

The policy is that there is no set snack time provided for any level and that no food may be brought out onto the floor. Food is not ever restricted and no child is ever not allowed to eat. The mom feels the girls are being set up for an eating disorder and that a meal break should be provided. [/FONT]

Our gym is a rec gym... no practice is really long enough to warrant a snack break. But this sounds like a fairly healthy policy to me. If a child is not restricted from eating when he/she is hungry, and encouraged to listen to her body and give it fuel when it is asking for it, that sounds like the opposite of an eating disorder to me. That sounds like the way all of us should (but few of us do... myself included) eat. Now I suppose that this could be the "official" policy but in reality the girls are actually discouraged (either by coaches or peers) from leaving the floor to eat, but if that's not the case, I think it sounds good! If the mother wants her daughter to take a snack break half-way through practice, then it sounds like that would be perfectly allowable.

 

[gymluvr33]

Once we hit team and practices are 2 hours long (for levels 4 & 5), we get a snack break of 10 minutes. Level 6 is either 10 or 15 minutes (I can't remember) for a 3 hours practices, and levels 7 & up are 15 minutes for a 3 1/2 hour practice. When I was younger I would always bring something to eat, and now I sometimes will, but most of us older girls use the time to work on homework as most of us are in high school and have a TON of homework to do. We always eat in the viewing area and none of the food is allowed in the gym (I agree with the other posters, that would be a nightmare to clean). I like this policy because it allows to eat if we need it, or gives us time to get a little homework done and ask for help from our teammates who have taken those classes before if we don't understand our homework. If the break were being abused then I would probably feel differently, but I (usually) like our break time.

 

[gymdog]

Our gym is a rec gym... no practice is really long enough to warrant a snack break. But this sounds like a fairly healthy policy to me. If a child is not restricted from eating when he/she is hungry, and encouraged to listen to her body and give it fuel when it is asking for it, that sounds like the opposite of an eating disorder to me. That sounds like the way all of us should (but few of us do... myself included) eat. Now I suppose that this could be the "official" policy but in reality the girls are actually discouraged (either by coaches or peers) from leaving the floor to eat, but if that's not the case, I think it sounds good! If the mother wants her daughter to take a snack break half-way through practice, then it sounds like that would be perfectly allowable.

Ironically by placing so much pressure on the issue and insisting her daughter eat at a set time, I can guarantee you she's pretty much asking for problems. My dad and I have had very similar friction over that kind of pressure to eat, although he's learning to back off and I'm learning to relax too. He means well, and he doesn't really understand what he's doing. I have a visceral reaction to people even suggesting I eat. As soon as someone asks me if I'm hungry my first instinct is to not eat.

By 12 the child is probably old enough to go grab a few bites of her snack when and IF she wants it. Placing so much importance on the issue is really going to backfire, in my opinion.

I really don't see the need for a formal snack break. I don't prohibit or discourage eating (except when I'm giving a quick water break in between drill sets and they need to come back quickly), but you have to stop workout, warm up again, etc. I prefer not to eat when I work out and never took a snack to practice (my mom brought it in the car when she picked me up). When I work out I generally lose my appetite for the most part until about an hour after which isn't really uncommon.

 

[pixie flips]

Ironically by placing so much pressure on the issue and insisting her daughter eat at a set time, I can guarantee you she's pretty much asking for problems. My dad and I have had very similar friction over that kind of pressure to eat, although he's learning to back off and I'm learning to relax too. He means well, and he doesn't really understand what he's doing. I have a visceral reaction to people even suggesting I eat. As soon as someone asks me if I'm hungry my first instinct is to not eat.

I agree. I made reference to this (just to be clear) in my deleted post.
But, you put it more tactfully than I did.

The littlest things can have the biggest impacts on impressionable children. As a child my father would not allow us to leave the table until everything on our plates was eaten. To this day, I still feel like I have to finish my meals no matter how full I am. I struggle to tell myself "it's okay to put left overs in the fridge". It's just been ingrained in me.

 

[MdGymMom01]

My dd's gym has a break policy for eating. On their weeknight practice from 4:30-8:30pm, they have about 15 minutes to break and on Saturdays they break for about 20-30 minutes because practice is 8am-2pm. That is just how it has always been--they always allow time for snacking or mealtime.

 

[bogwoppit]

Please do not let this thread go into the area of eating disorders, that is not a CB topic. hHanks!

 

[Mom2Brats]

Our gym has a snack break. It's a 4 hr practice, from 4:00-8:00 and I'm glad that they get to eat as she's always STARVING as it is when they get done. I couldn't do it, lol. It's pretty fast, though... maybe 5 minutes? so I usually send her something she can slurp down quickly like yogurt. And they go sit in the hall... I can't imagine food in the actual gym. We have a girl with juvenile diabetes at the gym, too, so I'm sure she would have to stop and eat regardless of what everyone else was doing.

 

[ZZMom]

This is obviously not an issue for ZZ since her practices are only an hour long but I do usually try to have her eat an apple or granola bar on the way so she doesn't get cranky.

But ... older DD was never in a gym where a snack break took place. As a level ten she generally practiced for at least four hours at a time. She had a snack before and dinner (or other meal) after.

On a non-gymnastics note, my little hockey player (9 years old) has a Sunday morning practice from 7:15 -9:15. We generally are lucky to get fruit or dry cereal in him so early in the morning and he will often stay after for "drop-in" until noon without eating a spec. He is hungry as a wolf after.

I agree with those that say that making too big of an issue about eating might be just a bit confusing for kids. Except of course for those who have blood sugar issues.

Best Wishes,

ZZMom

 

[Saturate15]

Be lucky you are not doing high school gymnastics. We had practice 15 minutes after school got out and would practice 3+ hours.

When I competed club we would do warmup, the linework and one event, then a snack, then two more events and conditioning. About 15 minutes for a snack IIRC.

 

[ZJsMom]

At my kids' gyms there's always been a snack break when practice is over 4 hours. Currently, ds's practice is three hours so no break. Dd goes 4 hours and has a ten minute snack break. The coaches don't want them eating a meal then, just a piece of fruit or something. I think having a four hour practice without a chance for snack isn't smart. These kids don't have as much body fat as we do. They get over hungry if they go that long after a long day of school without eating. I think it behooves the coaches to encourage snacking so they're not dealing with tired, cranky kids.

 

[cher062]

at our gym the L4 & 5 have a set snack time at about 1/2 way through its only like 10 or 15 min. The other levels don't have a set snack time but they can go and eat something off the gym area (in viewing area or locker area) if they feel they need to. Honestly though if your child has had something to eat even if its just something light they usually can go for more than 2 hours without a snack. Heck they are at school 6 hours with another hour for te bus ride to and from and they don't get a "snack time" at my DD's school. She eats breakfast gets on the bus and then they get lunch from 11- 12:30 (in 30 min shifts) goes back to class and comes home. So is school too setting them up for eating disorders? I don't think so. Having a different eating schedule from the average person is very different from having an eating disorder.

At 12 yo she should be able to make it that long without a snack. Heck at 6yo they should be able to do that.

 

[Bella's Mom]

For those opposed to snack times....what is about snacks are you opposed to?

There seems to be this underlying current of "they can make it" or "they don't need it" like gymnastics class is some kind of survival training. Sure, they CAN go the entire 4 hour class without a snack. Technically, children could go several days without eating.

But if a quick snack makes practice more fun and gives more energy, etc,....I am just not seeing the problem.

My daughter is a grazer. She eats a small breakfast before I take her to school. they have a snack around 10AM, lunch at noon. She comes home and has a snack about 3PM, dinner at 5:30 and another small snack about 7:30.

She isn't accustomed to going four hours without energy input and I don't see any reason that it would help her gymnastics to take away a quick input.

 

[Billy]

I think the problem is not about a gymnast having a quick bite of something during practice. I think the problem comes when a 5 minute snack break turns into 15 or 20 minutes of trying to get everybody re-grouped and back into practice mode. One gymnast grabbing a bite with her water will be back quickly. Ten or twelve gymnasts all stopping to eat will then start chatting, etc. and it can take a long time to get everybody back.