Latest / The Uplift- with Luke Pollock / #17 - Conor O'Neill - Physique vs Performance
Transcript
- Luke Pollock: Connor O'Neill, great to have you on uplifts, the pod. Thanks very much for coming on, mate. To get started, could you just tell the listeners sort of a bit of your history, your background? Conor O'Neill: Yeah, suppose it started the present day and then go back to where it started I suppose. Now work is generally working with athletes around performance nutrition with the subset goals of body composition, improving overall health, but with the driver being the performance outcomes that can come along with those things. Predominantly working with GAA athletes but also recreational runners, other sporting athletes, rugby, soccer, even there was one guy who was working with a couple of years ago who was a professional go-kart racer. there's, you know, there's a variety of different athletes that I work with, but GAA being the predominant one at the minute, mostly because of my own background in sport. I grew up playing basically every sport that you could think of as most young lads here do. When the golf was on on the TV, we would have been building mini golf courses out in the green in the estate. When Wimbledon was on, we would have lined out the tarmac in a tennis set up and we'd be playing it. When the rugby was on, the Six Nations was on, that's what we would have been trying to set up our local soccer pitches and stuff like that. that was always the way, but it... Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: I suppose, especially where I grew up in Cross and Glen, the predominant sport and really the only sport that was played as an thing was Gaelic football. And where ended up spending most of my sport, sporting career, if can call it that, from a young age right up until sort of senior level, or at 17, I was coming into the team and... ⁓ year that I came into the team, we actually won an All-Ireland Club title. Not I can say I had any impact on that because it was a 17-year-old coming onto the sub bench, but I think part of that setup was really ⁓ formative for in terms of being in a high-performance environment ⁓ and seeing went into that. And it also drove towards looking for more external ⁓ from... It's just the team sessions, external strategies and things I could be looking at, led towards things like strength and conditioning and nutrition, even the mental side of things and going down that sort of road. And who was ⁓ always of academic, ⁓ ended looking towards things like things like other other sporting professionals where there wasn't much. specifically when in the GAA at the time in terms of what you should be doing from a nutrition perspective. So we had to look at other sports like endurance sports, even like some rugby, NFL, those things that were a little bit further along, or not necessarily further along in terms of what they were doing, but further along in terms of where the research was being invested into. And tried to take as much of that as possible into my own performance and apply it. get the benefits of it and seeing benefits of doing so try and ⁓ you where I was weak coming into that senior team to try and gain some advantages through other areas that I was able to implement that maybe other lads weren't. And ⁓ that probably like a passion for specifically the nutrition of things. And decided to start out. some of that stuff online at a time again where there wasn't much of that going on, know, especially within GAA there was maybe, you know, two to three people that I would have known of who are putting out anything online in terms of information for GAA players around strength, conditioning, nutrition, et cetera. So in the starting days it was a little bit cagey where I wasn't putting my face up. It was written articles that were going out without a name attached to them and everything else, but managed to build up a bit of a following through that. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: started off selling like recipe ebooks and nutrition sort information ebooks. And then developed into me getting the necessary qualifications, actually be able to coach people one on one with it. ⁓ Started working a couple of inter-county teams as and taking on individual through the online remote sort of coaching aspect. from ⁓ then ⁓ maybe eight to ten years ago till now have been doing pretty much that with hopefully a lot of development in terms of what I've been doing along the way but that's where leads to ⁓ today where I'm doing, the work that I'm doing now reflects basically that same path that I was on. Luke Pollock: So it's been like quite a natural progression from just curiosity to here, let me actually try and share some of what I've learned. Did you start off like back eight to 10 years ago when you picked up the phone, made a post, was the intention for this to be your job? Conor O'Neill: It was, I would say, yes, to a certain extent. Tentatively at the start, I would say. was when I started putting stuff online, I was actually still within a degree in mechanical engineering. And yeah, was final year. Me and, you know, Gail was living with Thomas McAleendon, who also went into sort of the fitness industry side of things, had both been doing engineering. Luke Pollock: Nice. Conor O'Neill: and we were living together and we sort of were able to spur each other on to start moving things in the direction of what we maybe wanted to do a little bit more than the engineering path that we had gone on, you know, it decided to go on from seventh year of uni or of secondary school and found ourselves a little bit, yeah, not wanting to go down that route. So that was, that was a really good inflection point and, you know, coming out of of uni, I sort of had that decision to make of do I go and accept the job offer from the place that I was in placement or do I forge a different path in some direction. I decided to go that route. Now, at the time, I wasn't making, I don't know if I was making any money from the nutrition side of things. I may have been making a little bit, but certainly not enough for it to be an instant career path. went in to work in a coffee shop. Belfast for a few years whilst I was building up the business and yeah maybe I would say three years of that is what it took to get to the point where it could be a financially viable business but that's your question I think in the initial stage of putting it out I wouldn't be someone who would be inclined to put stuff on social media or put myself out there for the sake of anything other than trying to make a career path I suppose. would be that I would have seen as a necessary evil at the time as opposed to something that I would be doing in and of itself in terms putting stuff out for free and information online. And I was maybe somewhat changed over time in the sense that I think there's value in sharing your thoughts with wider Luke Pollock: Yeah, fun. Conor O'Neill: base of people who are also interested in the things you're interested in, regardless of business. But I think probably if I felt at the time that I could have built up the business without social media, I probably would have went that route. But that's where it started. ⁓ I wonder about that. Some people, guess on just you saying that, is probably saying that in that similar position of seeing it a necessary evil. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Wouldn't we have all, wouldn't we have all? Yeah. Conor O'Neill: But I think there are actually people and the more I've spoken to people in the fitness industry and you know, would hear people, certain people saying that they enjoy that aspect of it and putting stuff out on social media and they enjoy the aspect of building a following and seeing that number go up and different things like that. And I always thought to myself, kind of, know, one of the bluffing. they really, like, is that really something that you enjoy? But think I've come to accept that some people do enjoy that aspect and maybe that is more. of an extrovert versus an introvert type thing. for yeah, I've had to position and ⁓ push in a direction that allows me ⁓ to it and allows me to be more than enjoy it allows me to be feel proud of what I'm putting out there and not it into what is apparently working on social media at that time and pandering to the algorithm and things like that. can be important for depending on what type of business you're running. ultimately, I think I've seen over time that it's not necessary ⁓ build in a business if you have other things that align more with what you feel good about and that you're able to therefore be more consistent with and and to put in more effort for it to be high quality. Luke Pollock: Yeah, I think a lot to touch on there, but initially I'm just thinking at the start, I thought it was a necessary, but I was the same, right? I'll start this page and I'll be able to quit my job within probably a year as like an impersonator at Chess Physio. But wasn't the case. took me ⁓ nearly years. So that's number one, I relate to that very closely. It normally takes a lot longer than we think it does, because stuff happens quickly on social media, right? And it's in your face, you think, ⁓ this could happen to me if I just start posting. Number two, just on the enjoyment piece. would say I enjoy certain aspects of it, but there's other aspects I don't enjoy when, and there's also been periods where I've enjoyed it a lot less and more. Like I'm actually quite enjoying it at the minute. And the podcast has been a big part of that, you know, getting to talk to people and it feels like you have real connections on the other side of it. But when you're just posting for the second post and that's when it becomes a bit of a task. It's just like another job. So yeah, I would. Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Luke Pollock: I don't know if you've got anything to add to that. Conor O'Neill: I think it depends, like with the social media say things, it really depends on what you're wanting to get out of it. If you're wanting that social, if you like the idea of having that social validation and seeing, you know, having a big following as something that is actually going to benefit you either from just a fulfillment standpoint or from a business standpoint. then yeah, it can be something that is worth pursuing. I know even friends and people who I would know that within the industry do like that idea and do have that feeling of being proud of that side of things. I personally can't relate to that as much. But it's important to identify what you want. If you're the person who wants to build a good business, God forbid, like build an impersion business, for example, like we're in a world where is like ⁓ seen as ⁓ only thing to be doing. It necessarily you don't necessarily need to be making these Instagram algorithm feeding, you know, snappy reels all the time or, you know, doing things that you don't necessarily feel aligned with in order to make it Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: Because as I say, like the thing that you're gonna generally get the most benefit from is the thing that you are willing be consistent with, willing to put effort in towards making it high quality. And generally, to do that over time requires, I found that it has to be something that you are, that you feel good about and that you feel proud of the work that you're doing. And that's what I see as something that's pursuing. Luke Pollock: Yeah, yeah, I would, would echo that. And it's so easy to get stuck into like as well. I find, know, I get lost in these big followings, which might not actually correlate to a more successful business as you've alluded to. Should you do in person work as well? Or is it mostly online? Conor O'Neill: Yeah, it is mostly online. Any in-person work that I'm doing is generally like workshops or within or if someone is local to where I'm based, instead of say a call that I might usually have with an online we might come in and have a meeting to just discuss it in person, go for a coffee or whatever. So that's ⁓ program, the main flagship program that I run stays the same and it's predominantly online, obviously to facilitate location, waiting in different locations and being able to work with people from all over the world. but also with being more of a streamlined process for the client and for myself that we're not having to do consultations and they're not having to work their schedule around coming and seeing me each week or whatever. So most of it is an online based element, but there is some impersonal work where it makes sense to do so. And yeah, generally that'll be with the likes of teams, for example, if I'm working with teams or doing one-off talks and stuff like that. Luke Pollock: What, who is your most, what is your most common presentation that you get? So, who do you most commonly work with, and for what problem are you trying to solve? Conor O'Neill: Yeah, that can vary. Generally, as I said, mostly like, say, teams or other teams, like, for example, last month or a months back, I went to with a of youth swimming athletes. So these were 11 to 18 olds who and it was great to get in. went and did it during Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: did a split session. So half the group was doing a session at, I think it was six in the morning. The other half was then switching over at 6.45 to do their session. And in between, you know, the other group was then in with me for a talk each time. But to be in that facility and to see these guys who are, you know, I'd say 11 to 18 year olds in the pool who are there four mornings a week at, you know, six, six 30 before school. And then maybe have like two training conditions sessions out of that. And maybe they're playing other sports as well. And seeing these, you know, youth athletes that level, was brilliant to see firstly, like inspirational even for myself to be able to see what that was like. Because swimming as sport something that I'd been exposed to at all, you know, growing up or even in my work. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: working with people, but it was great to be invited down there to be able to give that talk share the overall performance nutrition principles and preparing for it, obviously try to see where that fit into the sport of swimming itself ⁓ and it applicable to, ⁓ you especially younger athletes and their parents as well who come in for the talks. So that was an example of something that would be outside of the norm of what I would usually do. So usually it would be mainly within, say, GA teams. Where the of what I would be speaking about is performance ⁓ nutrition. how to use nutrition to improve your fueling, improve recovery and those type of things. And ⁓ generally, number one, will require some aspect of body composition change for a lot of athletes or they may have like ⁓ separate goal of wanting to body composition. So generally that. balance between performance changing body composition while still having the overall health in a good place is where athletes work with individually and even within team talks is what we've been discussing. That's more the with individuals, the team talks because managers are getting in for team talks. It's they want the performance end of things to be the main focus and don't want to hear any of someone wanting to get it. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: get a six pack or vanity that the management might see with that. Whereas you work with an individual player, they have that motivation and want to do that, but they also can have, we can also have that conversation around benefits of body composition and also the potential downsides that we want to avoid with that as well. that's generally what discussing and working through. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Yeah, the vanity stuff is, I'm sure, so real for like every athlete. No who's got social media now can almost ignore it. And if they can, ⁓ to them. I ⁓ to some advice for me now. So I'll tell you little bit about my... me this time last year and I won't tell you what did on the other side of the story. I want to see what you think. So, all right, last year I came off a full season of rugby where I had repeated injuries and came out this season probably a little bit heavier than I would used to be. So I normally sit between 90 and 93 kilos and I was probably about 94 and I think just because of frustration of not playing as well and playing often I thought, right, something needs to change. And I would go obviously spending more time on social media. know, you just see like these ripped rugby players and ripped up GA athletes or whatever. And you're like, right, I need to lose leading down a bit. Cause I was always, I was always super lean in uni and up, like I would never have to worry about what goes into my body. I was just one of those people who were just, I could eat anything ⁓ and be super lean the whole time. Um, so then obviously I get a little bit older and I'm like, I can't just eat whatever I want anymore. So I don't really, because I've never actually had to face the challenge of. Calorie counting or watching why you eat too much. Cause I just eat and train whatever I want. And I still come out with a six pack until the edge of 24. And then I started realizing I'm actually not really as happy with the way I look. So I decided to start like a cut before pre-season. and was terrible and it lasted about two days. would you have said to me if I came to you then? What would your advice have been? Conor O'Neill: So to get a little bit more info, suppose you were coming into the off season. Did you say you were injured at the time or you just had a scurry of injuries? Luke Pollock: just coming off the back of injury. So I was technically fit, but I didn't feel great. So I was like, I want to lean down, look better, get a bit faster and be ready for pre-season essentially. Conor O'Neill: Right, so, and yeah, if you wanted to lean down, take the off season to do it and probably do it in a way that was going to be... sustainable enough to you through that preseason and still be able to transition on the other end and not feel like you're going to blow up afterwards as result of feeling restricted whole time. well, let's look the we break down nutrition and performance nutrition in general. I tend to work on a framework of like what I call the performance nutrition pyramid. So we have these ⁓ foundational elements that build each other. And you may have seen similar pyramids before of like the one back in the day was the Muscle and Strength pyramids from Helms, for example. And the same way that you wouldn't ⁓ put on a building site before you'd actually built the house, and the same way you wouldn't build the house until you had the foundations in place, it's the same way that we want to be thinking about our nutrition. ⁓ We to thinking about what are the foundational elements that we want to have in place before we then start building in the fancier stuff on top. So what I'd say is that as the foundational first tier of that nutrition is food quantity, being the amount of energy, the number of calories, that breaks down to then in terms of the macronutrients, protein, fats and carbs. At the top of that food quantity element, we're looking at food quality, which food quality and lifestyle is usually what I'd say. So ⁓ we're at things like your fiber intake, your fruits and veg. where the sources of the macronutrients are coming from a little bit as well. Things like hydration, you can even put the likes of sleep and stress management into that category as well. Then we're looking at on top of the food quantity, food quality, and we're looking at food timing. And this is where a lot of the performance aspects of nutrition will come into play. So here we're talking about things like training versus rest day nutrition, things like the pre-performance meal, things like your intra-performance nutrition, post- performance, recovery, nutrition, things like meal frequency, protein distribution, those type of things that are more time-enraided. And then that last sort of tier, the cherry on the top would be supplements, where there are plenty of supplements out there that are a waste of money or to a certain extent have a lot of downsides, but there are also plenty that are evidence-backed and beneficial, minimal downsides, and those are the things you want to be focusing on. sort of break that into like two categories of number one, food supplements, two, performance supplements, ⁓ supplements, being things that you could from food, but supplements make them that little bit easier to do so or more convenient. So things like your protein powders, carbohydrate powders, vitamins, minerals, those type things. Then we have the performance supplements that are more things that you're not likely to get in sufficient quantities from food. that you can take in supplemental forms. So things like creatine or beta-alanine or citrulline, malate, these types of things. we have that general framework, food quantity, quality, timing and supplements. So we can take that and can use that for anything. can use that for, like I would use that when I'm working with athletes, we'd use that when I'm doing team talks. So you can use that as well when you're reading information online and you want to see, is it something worth you putting into place? So you might see the latest. supplement advertised and you say, right, where is that in the pyramid? Okay, it's at the top. If I don't have those more foundational aspects in place, is it even worth me looking at that? Maybe not. if you're thinking about, you you've read something about a pre-match meal and you say, right, that falls into the timing section, that might be worth looking at, but it might be better focused. I might be better focusing on the more foundational aspects if I don't have those already in place. So that's framework. So if take that and we look at it ⁓ for your situation. We'll start with those foundational elements and the first thing we want to look at is the calorie count. So what we generally do there is either use a formula to give us a starting point we'll track your intake for a week or two and see where it's currently at and ⁓ decrease ⁓ by certain amount in order to get us to the point where we're losing enough body weight. The we do that, the way I generally recommend doing that is tracking your body weight along with the calorie intake, seeing where that leaves you after a couple of weeks. If you were maintaining your body weight at the current intake that you had been tracking, then that's a sign that we need to reduce it. If you were losing weight at that current intake, then we have it in the place that we want it. Now, we don't want that intake to be so low that number one, it's caused a lot of hunger. Number two, it's affecting your recovery or your training quality to an extent that you're not comfortable with. You can get away with a little bit more in the off season when you're not trying to perform well in matches or team training sessions. you still don't want it to be to the point where it's unsustainable and it's really taken away from your ability to train at the level that you want to and to be able to enjoy your life. So. Right. Luke Pollock: Yeah, just to stop you there. That's exactly where I was. So I didn't because I didn't know what I was doing. Right. So I just like, we just caught a lot carbohydrates. I think the problem was my reasoning behind it. So really interested in what you're about to say. But my reasoning behind it was I wanted to look better. But actually, like to your average person, I probably look pretty good. But I wanted to feel like look better rather than Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Luke Pollock: necessarily like I didn't really have performance in my head. So I'll let you carry on from there. Conor O'Neill: Mm hmm. Yeah. And yeah, so there's two aspects that one is even if even if you didn't care at all about your performance, there's still a limit what how low you can go with your calories because you are going to hit that point eventually where hunger becomes too much of an issue, where overly restriction causes you to just not be enjoying your days because you can't, you know, Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: food obsessed, you're thinking, you know, I can't eat this because it's going to put me a hundred calories over what I want it to be. You're not able, you're starting to not go to social occasions and different things like that. regardless of whether performance is an issue, there's still a limit to how much you want to be dropping those calories. But performance is something that you want to continue it, even if it's only performance in the off season, ⁓ which probably going to be your performance in that case, it's just going to be being able to lift at a certain rate in the gym. or being able to get out and at least do some form of jogging or something like that. still, that's there's still going to be a limit with that. That's still going to increase, that's still going to increase the number at which ⁓ limit comes into play because we know the impact that training quality, especially in the can have on muscle retention during a fat loss phase, which is obviously something you still want to have during an off season ⁓ when going to coming back and need that muscle in the end season. ⁓ So we want to have that limit and there's different ways you can set that limit. Some people will use like a calorie deficit limit. So let's say like 500 calories, for example, of your maintenance. I tend to not really use as that because we don't actually know what your maintenance calories that number can change over time. It can be inaccurate based on, know, it's going to be inaccurate based on any that use because those formulas are based on averages. And even if tracking your intake and you know what it is and you're still seeing the same weight, your maintenance is still going to have a range anyway. You know, you might have a of calories that you would have stayed the same way at anyway. You know, if you're staying the same way at 2400 calories. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: If you had to be 2600 calories during that time, you don't know, you might have still stayed the same way at anywhere. So what I tend to say is actually with based the limit based on weight loss rate per week. So usually if it's especially if it's in season, you're probably looking at towards like the no point five percent of body weight per week, maybe up towards one percent in the off season. Again, you get away with a little bit more. So say for a 70 kg athlete, that might be. you know, point three, five to not point seven, maybe up towards one point, maybe to one point four kilos per week. That's that would be at the extreme end. But based a percentage of weight loss per week would be a good place to to start in terms of determining where your calories should be and to see rate of weight loss ⁓ that you want see without it ⁓ being unsustainable for reasons talked about before. So. That would be where I would set, how I would go with setting the calorie limit, the calorie target. And that might take a couple of weeks to establish and it also might change over time. Some people can be hitting the same calorie target for 12 weeks plus and be seeing the same rate of progress that whole way through it, throughout it. Others might see that rate of weight loss for four weeks and we might need to take it down further, you know, every two to four weeks thereafter just to keep that rate of weight loss going. So. That's calories. That's first foundational element that we would think about when it comes to going on a fat loss phase. ⁓ Luke Pollock: it's interesting that you that because in my mind I've thought I was wrong to think I was sort of wrong to have that hat on that I want to look better at because I'm an athlete and to be honest, should be eating ⁓ quite a and my body weight was probably just up because I wasn't playing as much. But you're sort of saying you actually can still lean out a little bit and perform well. Is that fair to say? Conor O'Neill: Hmm. Yeah, yeah. this gets us into article that literally just went out today. But few to say on that. Firstly is that if your body composition isn't where you want it to be, you could have benefit, you could have a benefit even to performance of just improving your body composition. So, for example, if you are, you know, if you were 95 kg and you went down to 90 kg and that was all from body fat, that would be an equivalent of you taking off a 5kg weight vest that you were running around with the whole time. And as you can imagine, you'd be, you know, percentage faster, able turn better, more energy efficient, able to go longer into the game if you had taken off a 5kg weight vest that you were wearing the whole time. So that's one thing to say, is the body improvements can have that improvement on performance if not in the place you want it to be. The other aspect is... ⁓ Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: that this element, what I call like the performance and physique balance. The way that I think about it now is something recently was able to sort of make visual and make practical to think of it like a seesaw or a balanced scale with different things on each side. And if on one side we have that energy deficit that we know has potential to bring down your performance levels and that's all you change, you just the same way as you were eating before. the only thing you change is you drop the calories. Then the likelihood is you probably are going to see a performance detriment, recovery detriment well. So ⁓ might have been the position you felt you in when you just dropped your calories, dropped your carbs and that was it. But if we start to layer up things on this other end of the scale that are performance enhancers from a nutrition point of view. So say you start, you know, during this fat loss phase, you also start improving your around training sessions. You also start improving ⁓ Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: your protein intake up to an adequate level. You also start making your ratio of carbs to fats into a more suitable place. You also start implementing some supplement, supplementation. You also start eating more healthy foods. You you start doing all these things. You start to see as that seesaw can start to balance out to the point where you're offsetting a lot of that calorie deficit potential downside with these more performance enhancing things to the point where you can actually those scales in the other direction. ⁓ and see performance improvements during that fat loss phase in some cases. Again, there's a limit to that because you go to the more extreme you go with that calorie deficit, the more you're have to start layering on more of these performance enhancers. And also if you have the bandwidth, the energy, the schedule and lifestyle to be able to start implementing these other things, ⁓ then that's going be difficult to do enough of that to offset. these potential downsides, but it's definitely something that can be done can be allow you to see benefits in both at the same time. Luke Pollock: Yeah, I think that's really helpful picture because when I think of when you mention the word fat loss, it's not a nice word in my head for some reason. Obviously people have different feelings of thought, like it's quite a sensitive topic for a people, but in my head it's not a nice word because it almost takes me back to when I was trying to lose fat and I felt my performance get a lot worse. Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Luke Pollock: And when you mention like even physique changes, I always just think about what I'm going to have to take out rather than you've just said. Actually, you can add a lot in which will also which also benefit performance. I'm not necessarily change your mind, not not contribute to worse fatigue physique. Sorry. Conor O'Neill: Hmm. That's interesting from a language perspective. If I said words ⁓ composition improvement, would you have those same associations? ⁓ Luke Pollock: No, yeah, I would feel way better, way more comfortable if you said that, yeah. Conor O'Neill: That's interesting, like it's interesting because that's, you know, obviously when you're doing things like writing your website and different things like that, I obviously thought a lot about those type of things. And generally use the words body composition, know, rather than physique or fat loss. Now, with that said, if I'm trying to make something snappy and marketable, Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: generally the physique tends to tends to hit better other people. ⁓ Fat is probably then third down the list of actually that's something that you associate with maybe your general, you know, middle aged gym go where he wants to really go from maybe overweight to just a regular weight they'd be happy with. ⁓ So it is to that association. Luke Pollock: And then also. Yeah, I think it's also like not as many people are going to know what body composition is. It sounds fancier, but to me it makes a lot more sense and it feels more like it's going to not only will I feel better by the way I look, but I will also perform better as well. Conor O'Neill: Yeah. Yeah, it also as well takes into account if you break down body composition, what your body is composed of. also takes into account muscle mass, probably like mass and stuff as well. But at least with composition, can tell the body you're not just saying fat loss at all costs. Physique can have that same combination, but body composition in plays we're talking not only. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: dropping body fat, also increasing muscle mass and just what your body is composed of. Luke Pollock: Yeah. So to round off my, my sort of story on that, I lasted about three days in a, in a, what I thought was a calorie deficit and that nearly killed me. so what I did instead was actually just increase my cardio sessions during the off season. I ate quite similar, like similar to what I had been eating during the season. And tried to increase my protein intake as well. I'd like to touch on protein intake, because you mentioned that as one of the pillars that helps push that performance side of the seesaw up. this protein Firstly, talk to me about your parameters of it, and then we can get into a little bit more of maybe the nitty-gritty and how you and get your clients to increase and manage their protein intake. Conor O'Neill: Yeah, is of these things that's gotten very popular, very much in the popular, ⁓ I suppose, of even people who aren't athletes to the point I would say I nearly say protein is critical, but also potentially overrated ⁓ in the common the in the common society, I suppose, in the in in Luke Pollock: ⁓ really? Conor O'Neill: What is the what is the word in the common consciousness? Like, yeah, yeah, exactly. And reason I say that is because there is a certain amount of protein that if you don't get your are compromising your muscle mass, your recovery, even performance. But the amount of marketing and products and on protein would lead you to believe and often does lead a lot of athletes to believe that they need more. Luke Pollock: the health and fitness space. Yeah, yeah. Conor O'Neill: then they actually do. when setting a protein target for ⁓ athlete, I'd use the rule of thumb of around two grams per kilogram of body weight. And that'll change based on body composition. So for example, if someone is, you know, 30 % fat ⁓ and is kg, not have them eating 200 grams of protein. Number one, it's not gonna be practical for someone in that position likely, but also it's not necessary. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Yeah. Conor O'Neill: The actual protein requirements your body are based on your lean mass, muscle, ⁓ muscle tissue you have, know, your fat mass doesn't need protein to sustain it. don't want to sustain it, but if you wanted to sustain it, protein wouldn't do that for you. So, you know, make based ⁓ on someone's body percentage of the body composition. But generally two grams per kilogram body weight for a normal sort of fat individual, it's to be a good place to start. So what that could look like for someone who's 80 kg be about 160 grams of protein. That for a lot of people, once I advise that and once they tracking their intake and they start seeing where the current protein intake is at, quite often they'll nearly come back to me and and I feel like I should be more protein, you know, I need to, are you sure I shouldn't be bumping this off slightly? And that's a common thing that I would find. Now that'd be different with people who maybe... aren't athletes where a lot of time they are on the consumer protein relative to that target. But for a lot of athletes, you know, because of potentially marketing, potentially. potentially a lot of maybe bodybuilding information online, know, body, the body can use more protein. If someone is enhanced with from science and drugs, for example. So, you know, there is that aspect of it that could actually bump up what someone expects. They might need to be taken in terms of protein. But yeah, generally, that's that's that's where I'm at in terms of the recommendations. Luke Pollock: What are some of the easiest levers to pull to try and increase your protein intake? Because for me, it's not the case where I'm thinking I hit my protein goal. Like I probably rarely do. I struggle with. What are some easy levers that you would suggest pulling? Conor O'Neill: Yeah. ⁓ And if you're saying you're sort of like 90 kg plus, you know, you're starting to get up towards that sort of 180 grams of protein per day. you know, for someone in that position, you could be, ⁓ know, struggling to hit those targets. And generally, the way I start to look at it is, right, are any meals that are firstly, that don't have a protein in it, you know, don't have a protein, a decent protein source in it. So if someone's porridge for and they're not having anything that's like eggs on the side or Greek yogurt, or a protein shake or some other form of protein along with that. We say, let's look at those meals where you're not currently getting any sufficient amount of protein and just get some into those. So that can easily go from you having 10 grams of protein in a meal to bumping that up to 30 or 40 grams per day. And then it would start to look at the meals where you do have protein sources in and just adding a little bit in extra to that. So say you're having chicken as part of your lunch, can we just either like one and a half times the portion that you usually have, which is going to probably bump up your protein by another 15 to 20 grams. Can we then for dinner do the same thing? And if, if, if we do those three things there or play that to those three meals just mentioned, you could easily bump your protein up by 50 plus grams of protein for the day. Then what you can start to look at is right. If you're not, if that's not getting you to a sufficient level, can we just add in a protein shake somewhere? an easy way to do it. Or can we look to add in some protein within your snacks within the day. So whether that's replacing your snack that usually is a bowl of cereal with a Greek yogurt with fruit or something like that. So that would be the sort of order of priorities I would say it is. Luke Pollock: feel like you've been watching me. had porridge this morning with flaxseed and honey and that's it. And then, yeah, my snack is always a bowl of cereal. that's two easy things I can change. And I did get into a period of having like a smoothie with bit protein in that with berries and stuff, but. Conor O'Neill: You Luke Pollock: I just go back to what is what I find easiest in the morning, which is just chucking some oats in a bowl with some milk. Yeah, and it's just Conor O'Neill: Yeah, really easy way with that what exactly I do. I have porridge every morning and all I do is add on top of the porridge a couple of scoops of couple of good decent scoops of Greek yogurt on top of it. That's adding 20 grams of protein. Luke Pollock: noted. I will implement I will ⁓ it's something I know I know I need to get like more almost more serious about as well because every every other aspect of my training Conor O'Neill: Give it a try. Luke Pollock: I said the nutrition is the side that keeps me down. know, I'm fairly consistent with the gym and pitch sessions. And obviously I'm a physio, so I keep up the mobility rehab side of stuff. But actually this is one lever I feel like I can pull a little bit, pull a little bit more. And that's why I was excited to talk to you. ⁓ Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Yeah, with the the protein, like to give a concrete example, like with most things with nutrition, it's a case of, well, if not currently implementing it and you look at, well. what is my reason that I would be implementing it? And if I don't have a good reason, then that's probably what's leading to the lack of to actually do it. And may know the reasons or you may know may not, but just reiterating those be very important. So you're looking at the protein and saying, well, why, what is protein gonna for me? What is increase in my protein intake gonna do for me? And for a lot of that might just think, well, you know. I'm in a muscle gain phase, it's going to help me gain muscle or ⁓ like that. Or if I'm in season, ⁓ going to maybe help with my recovery. But starting to say, well, if I'm not in those positions where I'm trying to gain muscle or I'm not in season where I'm trying to recover, what other asks, what other reasons should I be doing it? ⁓ And one reason might be that that's like one signal that we can be given. on a consistent basis to maintain muscle and to facilitate that recovery as well. Like you start and think of right every time I can get a protein source in, I'm hitting that button that says I signal to the body to retain muscle mass, signal to the body to improve, to recover better, signal to the body just to build the tissues again that are being consistently broken down and just sort of now thinking that that every time you're thinking of a protein to say, right, you know, that's the that's a way of me pushing that button to say, you know, three to five times a day, I'm going to go bump. right, let's do that. Get that in, hit that button and see that then as something that's building up over time where I can improve that one thing and months down the line, it goes me hitting that button twice per day to hitting it three or four times per day. know, the amount of extra times you've hit that button throughout that three months could be the difference between, you know, seeing that extra bit of muscle gain or staying injury free or having better training because you're showing up fresh for sessions and and so on. Luke Pollock: Yeah, massive point, massive point because I probably, um, I'm using myself as a guinea pig here, but I, I think I will have a lot of common beliefs that other athletes, other rugby players hold as well. Um, I, I see protein as like the muscle, the muscle builder. Yeah, it's good for recovery, but really I see it as like, want to want to build muscle rather than the recovery side of things. So it's really nice to hear you say that. Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Luke Pollock: From like an injury point of view then, obviously a lot of my clients will be rehabbing from a surgery or just a soft tissue injury. What would you recommend one of your clients if they came to you with an injury, how would you change their nutritional intake? Conor O'Neill: there. Great question. again, it's something that is very easy to go straight to the fancy stuff, the fine tune ⁓ at the top, the supplements, the, you know, those type of things that are at the top of the pyramid. But this, the same structure will apply. It'll apply differently and for different reasons, but it will still apply. I know we didn't go through that full structure, but the, the for recovery that might change would be looking at right now with the calorie intake, we have to take Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: into account balance where depending on what the injury is, the body might actually increase its energy requirements for the healing of that muscle or or whatever the injury is and simultaneously your training load is probably going to decrease when you're injured. and maybe in crutches ⁓ and therefore about is actually increasing you know the energy requirements. there's all this balance going on of reduced training load, increased healing requirements and these different things that come into play. But generally what would recommend is that for most injuries, especially bigger injuries and more serious injuries, we want to be in calorie balance. We want to be at a level where we're body weight for the most part. There's certain injuries you can get away with taking that opportunity to go ⁓ body composition change phase. like, say you break your finger or something like that, it's not gonna probably require a huge amount of extra energy you to, you ⁓ facilitate healing of a small bone like that, ⁓ especially over ⁓ But it might be putting out of training for in certain of training, you know, things like ⁓ it's like that, you be able to make the body composition changes that you might need to make at that point. ⁓ for the most part with injuries that are a bit more serious, yeah, on the state of body weight is probably going to be where you want to be. And we just go through that, we go through that same process of calorie tracking, body weight tracking, to find where the maintenance level of that is. And as with any time you're going to a goal of calorie maintenance, you can get away with trying. and trial and pushing that up a little bit because of daddy they spoke with forward is for most people a calorie maintenance range as opposed to this one figure. So you want to be as far in the high end of that as possible if you can get away with it. So that's something to take into account with that. So that's firstly the calories side of things. Then still want to be looking at that macronutrient breakdown and having protein in a place where we're consistently hitting. set target per day, but also consistently, as I say, like nearly hitting that muscle protein synthesis button consistently throughout the day, of at least sort of three times within the day, one has a decent protein bolus in to of that, to initiate increase in muscle protein synthesis. fats and carbs breakdown, you have to be as specific with that in terms of in times of injury because you're not tailoring it as much to training session or training day or the demands of your training. But the layer up food quality side of things is certainly something that you want to be focusing on when it comes to injury. ⁓ And what I'm talking about is things like your fiber intake and your overall sort of high quality ⁓ intake, fruits vegetables, et cetera. It's something people often miss, not only in injury ⁓ nutrition, but also performance nutrition in general. Is that aspect of it? There's a lot more research coming out on the impact that gut health can have on things inflammation, where athletes have generally in inflammation as a result of heavy hard training and being able to modulate that inflammation, something that the gut health has a big impact on, as well as ⁓ and vegetables and particularly having an on that anti-inflammation. process. So like that are something definitely worth taking into account for injury healing and ⁓ get that quality ⁓ to a point. eating just having a set of either the amount of fibre you're going to taking in or the number of servings of fruits and vegetables and ⁓ things like legumes, grains stuff like that can be really important to focus during that time to again modulate that inflammation. that you will be likely experiencing during injury or especially in the initial stages of an injury. The timing, say the things then, ⁓ be different from, say less of a focus ⁓ in an phase, but still can come into play where you want to be ensuring the rehab sessions you're doing are as high as possible. I'm sure you've seen that the difference in how intent, intent, how much intent someone applies to their rehab sessions, affects their outcomes in terms of how quickly they're able to get back full health or whatever, because I know myself from just being in different teams and stuff like that, like I've lads who have gotten injured and they're doing their rehab session on the side of the pitch, but they're talking while they're at it, they're going, they're doing it at minimal effort ⁓ You know, that's a different story altogether. But what I'm saying there is that if you're someone who will be playing a lot of intent to those rehab sessions, you want them to be adequately fueled you want to be sort of doing your best to optimize how much intensity you're able to give to that. And go ahead. Luke Pollock: And for just just to interrupt you on the on the timing aspect so for because this will apply to training as well for like an hour long lower limb rehab session. How much time would you want someone to give to load up and load up fuel wise before that session? Conor O'Neill: Yeah, it's going to be like of ⁓ issue in something like that. If you're not actually running, example, where, you know, your digestion is obviously going to be a lot more affected if doing like an intense running session where literally the food is potentially bouncing about there. If it's still in your stomach ⁓ versus a where doing, you know, whatever rehab you're doing maybe is a little bit more stationary or at least you're not repetitively moving as much. So ⁓ Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: With that, you know, the digestion is going to be the biggest component of when you're eating. But still, if you want to fuel a session, you probably want to be your main meal somewhere in range of say one to three hours, you know, prior to that session. And if want to be getting an extra sort of snack within that, you know, 60 minutes beforehand, that would be good option to have there as well. And to the extent to which you need that will depend on, you know, the amount of ⁓ volume you're doing and the amount of intensity you're doing, but not going to be something that you need to be thinking about as much as I say, compared to like if you were doing a know, 90 minute training session with the team or something like that. ⁓ And again, with the, with your pre-training or pre-match meal or whatever, that's going to, a lot of it's going to come down to trial and error of when you to eat, based on your schedule, ⁓ based on you feel digestively, like eating. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: 90 minutes before a session versus eating three hours and having smaller meal at that 90 minute time point versus having a bigger meal at four hours out and a couple of snacks. ⁓ There's lot of trial and error when it comes to that. But still, it ⁓ still is an factor to start working through, ⁓ especially if performance an outcome for But again, in the space of injury, it's less important. in that case, but we still don't want to be going into sessions feeling empty or feeling like we don't have the energy that we need to actually give what's needed to that session. So you have those sort of food timing aspects and we might probably with an injury, we're probably not looking at like training versus rest day and changing things based on that. We're probably not implementing any, almost definitely not implementing any carb loading or things like that. We're not going to carb load for a Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: for a rehab session on the Saturday morning or something. But things like that, know, and then the supplements can be useful depending on what the type of injury is when it comes to injury. there's more more research coming out on the likes of collagen, which is mixed, to be honest. It had like the research done on a lot of it has shown benefits when taken, say 10 to 15 grams prior to rehab sessions. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: But as far as I've seen the is yet to be done on comparing someone who has adequate protein intake throughout the day versus someone who doesn't and is supplementing the theory, there will be a theory to say that if you have sufficient protein, then that protein is going to give you the amino acids that would be required to build up that joint which is what we're trying to do with collagen. ⁓ Collagen is a group of amino acids, same way protein or else would be a group of amino acids. The amino acids are different within each, but there's still a theory to potentially say if protein is adequate, there might not be any additional benefit of supplement with collagen. But generally, I'd still recommend someone with a joint injury, for example, to be taken usually, to any benefits we can. ⁓ Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: of having the specific amino acids, especially in and around the reset abscessions when blood flow is going to be there for to the joints and it's going to be able to deliver those amino acids. again, the research potentially is still developing with that. With like bone injuries, we can be looking at things like vitamin D, calcium, vitamin K, all of these things that can be used in the synthesis of bone tissue. And Yeah, potentially just other supplements that are going to plug in any deficiency within the diet. Things like Omega 3, like fish oils can be really useful again for those anti-inflammation effects or rather inflammation effects. Because ⁓ you know, a physio, like inflammation isn't necessarily always a bad thing, but want to be able to, we want to be able to give the body what needs to, to modulate as it, as it needs to. And Omega 3s are one of the things that I think that can help with that. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: as well as helping with a range of other things. So pretty much the pyramid as go through it and what you might about when it comes to injury nutrition. Luke Pollock: Nice. Yeah. Super helpful. Going on to, well, just when you mentioned the Omega-3 part and the inflammation, it's something I get asked about all the time. Like, should my knee still be swollen? Is it normal to still have inflammation? And think the answer I always give is like, there's a time and a place for inflammation. If it's still swollen weeks after, then that's not the time or the place, you know? Your trying to tell you something, whether that's your ⁓ brain. or your body's response is a bit different and not really right, or it's not managing the load you're putting on that joint, for example. So yeah, that's ⁓ just to add on the inflammation side of things. I find that interesting you mentioned. In terms of like a non-injured athlete, myself at the minute, supplement wise, I think people I know will be supplementing creatine and protein if they're playing to, a high level or they're just serious about their health and fitness and their sport. Any other supplements you would recommend? And I know this can go down different paths, but any other supplements you recommend typically off the top of your head? Conor O'Neill: Yeah, I mean, as I said, with supplements, I kind of think of it in two brackets. There's like the sort of food supplements or even you call those health supplements, are things that you could get ⁓ food, things like your omega threes in this case, things like vitamin D, especially in the wintertime, if you're not getting a lot of sunlight and other vitamin mineral supplements, like it's no harm probably throwing in a good quality multivitamin just ⁓ to sure, you know, you're trying to give some of the vitamins. that you might be missing out from your diet. other mineral supplements, like can help in cases, especially with like improving sleep if you're deficient in it. The likes zinc and vitamin C can help if you are in middle, if caught a cold, for example, or potentially in decreasing your chances getting a cold if you're around people who have a cold. So ⁓ there's things like those that come into play potentially in specific circumstances. On the performance side, you have things like creatine, have caffeine, And things like beta alanine could be worth looking at, especially the likes of rugby players. You may have seen people beta alanine, ⁓ helps the buffering of the lactate buildup. I think beetroot juice has become more lately. There's mixed evidence the of citrulline malate, which increase spasodilation, like the opening blood vessels, potentially allow transport of oxygen and nutrients and from the muscles. Probably like the basic ones that I would probably put into the food supplement section would be like, again, what you mentioned, protein, whey protein ⁓ can a good room for bumping up that protein intake for the day. And then carbohydrate supplements like your maltodextrin or drinks, things that, which fall into the supplement category as well, which can be really ⁓ useful particularly in around training sessions and matches as well. So those would be the basics sort of off the top of my head. Luke Pollock: And then do you have any, maybe you don't, but do you have any opinion or recommendation for like, it's become very popular nowadays to sort of fixate on sleep and sleep supplements and that sort of thing. Stuff like ashwagandha, et cetera. Do you have any opinion on those types of supplements? Conor O'Neill: there's definitely research around the likes of magnesium and other like glycine, for example. Ashwagandha, the last time I looked at it, the research was mixed a lot of that seems to be down to the struggles with dosing it, think, in terms of the actual ⁓ manufacturing process of it. Apparently very difficult to actually see how much of the parts of the Ashwagandha that make the difference to see how much of that is contained within the actual stuff that they're using in it. That's from their point of view, like from the actual manufacturing side of things. So that's like as much as I've gone into with the Ashwagandha. Some people anecdotally say that they found benefit of it from a sort of stress reduction point of view. And there is some research to suggest that. I don't think I've probably ever recommended Ashwagandha just based on the fact that I don't see enough concrete evidence around it for the outcomes that maybe would be important to people. I probably, like, I be tempted to say, like, try it and see how you feel, but also I don't even really feel comfortable saying that because obviously you're going to have to money on that. And like, if I'm saying to go and spend money on something that I actually don't know if works or not, I wouldn't feel comfortable doing that. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: Some people may experience benefits and there is research that suggests that there's potential use it. But for the most part, yeah, those are the things. Now, sleep is another can of worms in itself. And, you know, I tend to stick with the basics of sleep hygiene, just like, you know, cool, dark room, you make sure your bedding is comfortable, different things like that, ⁓ because it can be that, especially if you get very fixated on it, that... the more thinking you're doing about it can actually nearly disrupt sleeping in and of itself. And you're nearly in yourself to point of actually it affecting you more than it probably should. At the time, it's crucially important, but can be disrupted by you just thinking about it too much and over-sharassing yourself with it. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I've actually noticed a massive difference in just having blackout blinds. Yeah, like I get wake, I have to put an alarm on now, otherwise I'll just sleep and sleep and sleep, which is a really nice place to be because I have had trouble with my sleep in the past where you're waking up in the middle of the night, whether that's through stress or like too much caffeine during the day as well. I've had problems with, so I've had to take my coffee back to just one in the morning time. Conor O'Neill: Mm-hmm. Luke Pollock: So I would say if someone listening to this hasn't delved down the path of sleep, for one, be careful because there's so much information out there. Like you say, you can almost overthink it, which you don't want to be, but it's also such a good lever to pull in terms of performance. I'm sure you would agree with that. Conor O'Neill: Definitely, mean, like, there's the basics of it. Like you need to, you need to get enough sleep. You know, if you're not getting enough sleep, it's always going to be a performance limiter. So yeah, like ⁓ the as you say, like caffeine being a big one, just making sure that's not affecting your sleep, making sure you're not having caffeine later in the day. It can a big one if that's something you're currently doing. ⁓ Luke Pollock: And would you have a time for that? Conor O'Neill: But like it'd be different for for each. I won't recommend basically based on the individual, but each individual does have their own ⁓ physiology that will determine quickly they are processing caffeine and getting it out of their system. There seem to be that on average there's like a five half life of caffeine, which Luke Pollock: Yeah. Yeah. Conor O'Neill: basically means that whatever amount of caffeine you're consuming, hours later, half of that caffeine will still be in your system. So that could mean if you're drinking a cup of coffee five hours before bed, you still have half the caffeine probably in your system when you're trying to get to sleep, which isn't good. you ⁓ can of it that way. You can experiment with it if you feel inclined to do so. ⁓ But for personally, like I generally say, like I'll have a midday cut off, like a lot. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Conor O'Neill: usually drink coffee after 12 in the day. And that seems to work pretty well for me. Luke Pollock: Yeah, I've pushed it to 1pm, but I had a coffee at half two on Monday because I was doing a talk in the afternoon and I was like, I want to be alert for this. And it was a busy day and I was physically knackered, but couldn't sleep when I got home. I was like, it's probably that coffee I had. It probably wasn't like, I was probably just overstimulated from the day as well. But I think when you get into a habit, I've restricted my caffeine now past 1pm for the last three years, Conor O'Neill: Hmm. Yeah, true. Luke Pollock: I'm so, I'm quite meticulous with it now. So I feel quite caffeine sensitive as well. So I will really notice it when I have a coffee and I know that's different for different people, you know. Conor O'Neill: you Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And based on their habitual intake, know, so if you're saying like you have taken caffeine, your coffee intake down in total, you probably will find that when you're taking it, it feels more effective as well. yeah, I think like the big thing with the big thing with like sleep, I don't know, not an expert in sleep, but the big thing seems to be consistency in what you're doing with sleep, whether that's your wake up time in the morning, whether that's when you're placing your caffeine, whether that's Luke Pollock: Yeah. Yeah. Conor O'Neill: having a consistent bedtime routine. things ⁓ to be what set you up for your sleep. Luke Pollock: Yeah. Right. Happy days, Connor. I think we will leave it there. Yeah, it's been really helpful for me personally on a personal level, and I hope it's been helpful for some of the people listening. Where can people you if they want to hear more? Conor O'Neill: Probably, well, have podcast, so if you're used to listening to podcasts, you can search performance nutrition. You'll find that there. And if you want to follow on Instagram, it's Conor O'Neill Nutrition. Luke Pollock: happy days. Thank you very much for coming on Colin. Conor O'Neill: Perfect, great stop look.