Skip to content
White TrueSport logo.
Search
Close this search box.
  • About
    • Ambassadors
    • Award Program
    • Media
    • Partnerships
    • True Experts
    • TrueSport Team
  • Learn and Teach
    • For Coaches
    • For Educators
    • For Parents
    • Train the Trainer
    • Mindset of a TrueSport Champion
    • Publications
    • Videos
    • TrueSport Topics
      • Sportsmanship
        • A Good Sport
        • Bullying Prevention
        • Conflict Resolution
        • Leadership
        • Respect & Accountability
        • Teamwork
      • Character Building & Life Skills
        • Decision Making
        • Goal-Setting
        • Mental Wellness
        • Performance Anxiety
        • Perseverance
        • Shortcuts
      • Clean & Healthy Performance
        • Body Image
        • Clean Sport
        • Dietary Supplements
        • Energy Drinks
        • Hydration
        • Nutrition
        • PEDs
        • Preparation & Recovery
  • Join Us
    • #ShowYourValues
    • Cohort for Change
    • TrueSport Talks
      • TrueSport Talks – RESOURCES
    • Newsletter Sign-Up
    • Events
  • Shop TrueSport
Menu
  • About
    • Ambassadors
    • Award Program
    • Media
    • Partnerships
    • True Experts
    • TrueSport Team
  • Learn and Teach
    • For Coaches
    • For Educators
    • For Parents
    • Train the Trainer
    • Mindset of a TrueSport Champion
    • Publications
    • Videos
    • TrueSport Topics
      • Sportsmanship
        • A Good Sport
        • Bullying Prevention
        • Conflict Resolution
        • Leadership
        • Respect & Accountability
        • Teamwork
      • Character Building & Life Skills
        • Decision Making
        • Goal-Setting
        • Mental Wellness
        • Performance Anxiety
        • Perseverance
        • Shortcuts
      • Clean & Healthy Performance
        • Body Image
        • Clean Sport
        • Dietary Supplements
        • Energy Drinks
        • Hydration
        • Nutrition
        • PEDs
        • Preparation & Recovery
  • Join Us
    • #ShowYourValues
    • Cohort for Change
    • TrueSport Talks
      • TrueSport Talks – RESOURCES
    • Newsletter Sign-Up
    • Events
  • Shop TrueSport
Search
Close this search box.
Facebook X.com Logo (formerly Twitter.) Youtube Instagram Linkedin Pinterest
Facebook Twitter Youtube Instagram Linkedin Pinterest

How to Help Your Athlete Gain Weight the Healthy Way

  • August 1, 2024
  • Body Image, Nutrition
EducatorsParents

Kristen Ziesmer headshot.The topic of weight gain for athletic performance is an incredibly complex, tricky topic, especially for caregivers of young athletes. It can be difficult helping an athlete gain weight in a way that’s healthy from a nutritional standpoint and maintains a healthy relationship with food from a mental standpoint. Doing all of this while still making mealtime enjoyable for the whole family, and fueling your athlete appropriately for sport, can feel overwhelming.

But here, TrueSport Expert Kristen Ziesmer, a registered dietitian and board-certified specialist in sports dietetics, offers simple explanations for why and when an athlete should focus on weight gain and easy ways that you can help them achieve those outcomes.

 

Evaluate the ‘Why’ for Weight Gain

If an athlete feels like they need to gain weight in order to excel in their sport, it’s important to talk about the athlete’s mental health and relationship with the scale before moving forward.

“I have parents who contact me and say that their son plays baseball or football and needs to gain weight to be competitive,” Ziesmer says. “I can understand that, but at the same time, it can easily get out of control.”

“Athletes who think they ‘need’ to gain weight can develop bigorexia—the need to be bigger,” says Ziesmer. “And for some athletes, there’s simply nothing that they can do to grow their muscles any faster as their body goes through puberty.” Simply put, there is no powder, potion, or quick fix that will help your athlete safely bulk up.

Ziesmer believes that the only time weight gain is appropriate for young athletes is when the athlete is underweight for their height and age, or is actually losing weight throughout a season. “I look at growth charts and compare that to the athlete, rather than looking at the sport they’re playing,” she says. “To gain weight just to be competitive in sport is very tricky and potentially unhealthy.”

On the flip side, not every sport celebrates weight gain, and your young athlete may be trying to stay smaller and delay puberty. In sports like running and gymnastics, athletes may be intentionally avoiding weight gain in order to fit a certain body type/size that they perceive to be best for their sport, even while hearing from a doctor that they need to be gaining weight to be in a healthy range.

A visit to your athlete’s doctor should tell you where they are on the growth chart in terms of their weight compared to their height and age. “If your athlete is below the 25th percentile and if that number is dropping, that’s a red flag,” says Ziesmer. She does note that some kids are just naturally going to be smaller, and that’s perfectly fine. The key is looking for that downward trend in the growth chart or in their BMI—if it continues to track lower and lower, intervention may be required.

 

How to Support Healthy Weight Gain

 

1. Look at the overall diet—not one specific meal

At TrueSport, we talk a lot about what to eat around practice and competition, but we also focus on what an athlete is eating throughout the day. Ziesmer notes that especially where weight gain is a goal, caretakers need to be even more focused on the athlete’s total intake, not just how they fuel for training.

 

2. Hone the athlete’s plate

Helping your athlete gain weight does not mean taking them out for fast food and milkshakes for every meal. “First, I would recommend looking at their overall diet and asking yourself if most of their meals follow the guidelines laid out for an athlete’s plate, where every meal has an appropriate amount of carbohydrates, protein, fat, and vegetables,” Ziesmer says.

“A plate for a heavier training day should be half covered in carbohydrates, a quarter protein, a quarter vegetables, and a couple of thumbs of fat. This should be your athlete’s normal meal ratio if they’re trying to gain weight.”

 

2. Add liquid calories

Your athlete may simply not be eating enough during these mealtimes. “Some kids who are on the smaller side or who tend to lose weight easily have a hard time eating enough food at one time,” Ziesmer says. “In these cases, I would suggest adding more calories in the form of easy-to-eat liquids. For example, they could incorporate a healthy smoothie as a snack after a meal.”

 

4. Use healthy, dense fats

“Adding high calorie and nutrient dense foods to meals and snacks is a great strategy,” says Ziesmer. “Peanut butter or any type of nut butter is great. Adding avocado and cheese to dishes can be helpful. Cooking food in olive oil or avocado oil rather than a no-calorie spray is good. And you can always throw some chia seeds and flax seeds into smoothies.”

 

5. Have snacks on hand

“Snacking often is really important for weight gain as well, and it usually works better than trying to have three giant meals a day,” says Ziesmer. “Aim for your athlete to eat six times a day, including smoothies and easy snacks. And as always, make sure they’re fueling appropriately around their sport.”

 

6. Be aware of family dynamics

Be aware of how one athlete’s need to gain weight can impact their siblings. It can be difficult helping an athlete gain weight if you have more than one child in the family and not all of them are sharing in the struggle to put on pounds. Avoid singling out your athlete who needs to gain weight (or pointing out to your other children that they don’t need to gain weight).

Instead, Ziesmer suggests simply focusing on balancing your athlete’s plate slightly differently. “They can still eat the same foods, but how you’re balancing the plate is going to be different,” she says. They can eat the same chicken burrito bowl as their siblings, but perhaps with an extra scoop of rice and an extra handful of shredded cheese or scoop of guacamole. Similarly, the athlete who is underweight may have full-fat Greek yogurt while their siblings are eating the lower-fat version, so the meals look identical but are slightly different from a nutritional standpoint.

 

7. Don’t continually emphasize their size

Man with leg amputations skiing on modified ski.The topic of weight gain or body size shouldn’t be a constant source of conversation in your household. Even well-meaning comments about an athlete’s body can be misconstrued or internalized and can lead an athlete to develop an unhealthy relationship with food, says Ziesmer. Constantly pointing out an athlete’s size—whether it’s that they’re currently small or that they’re beginning to gain weight—can create more struggles with body image.

“For example, when I was younger and was in cheerleading, I was smaller and everyone would always point out that me being small made me easier to lift,” she says. “Those comments made me think that I needed to stay small for my age and height. And today, I hear from so many girls and boys who are in that situation: They’re told that they need to gain weight to be healthy, but they’ve been praised for their small size.”

 

8. Work with an expert

It’s important to get expert help if you believe that your athlete needs to gain a significant amount of weight, needs to gain weight in a limited time frame, or you’re concerned that your athlete’s mental health is at risk due to an issue with their body image.

“Often, athletes who are in these situations will be best served by consulting with an expert, whether that’s a sports dietitian or a therapist,” Ziesmer explains. A dietitian can help you and your athlete put together a smart fueling strategy for optimum weight gain, while a therapist who specializes in body image issues and athletes may be best served to help an athlete unpack a complicated relationship with weight gain.

______________________________

Takeaway

When focusing on weight gain, look at the full day of eating, and subtly increase the caloric and nutritional density of meals by adding extra servings of carbohydrates and healthy fats. Your athlete may need extra meals and snacks to meet their higher caloric needs, so don’t expect them to simply increase the volume of food they can comfortably eat during meals. Finally, don’t be afraid to seek expert help from sports dietitians and therapists who can help your athlete better understand themselves and their bodies’ needs.

Related Content

Loading...
A variety of process granola bars out of their packaging against a pink background.

Do You Really Need to Avoid Processed Foods?

  • May 1, 2025
EducatorsParents
Stephanie Miezin, MS, RD, CSSD, breaks down the differences between unprocessed, processed, and ultra-processed foods, and how they fit into...
Read More
Mother and teen daughter talking on a couch while daughter looks at phone.

How to Help Your Athlete Avoid the Pitfalls of Perfectionism

  • May 1, 2025
EducatorsParents
TrueSport Expert, Dr. Kevin Chapman, offers a few tips to help parents navigate tricky topics like body image, social media,...
Read More
A tag that says "organically grown" attached to a vegetable.

Is That Expensive Food Really Better?

  • April 1, 2025
Parents
There are both times when you should—and times when you shouldn't—worry about buying the more expensive food option.
Read More
Hangers on a rack all holding sports bras.

4 Things to Know About Female Athletes and Breast Support

  • March 1, 2025
Parents
Dr. Michele LaBotz, shares what caregivers need to know to help their female athletes understand their development and find the...
Read More
1 2 … 36 Next »

Join Us

Subscribe
Shop TrueSport
Host TrueSport

TrueSport logo without icon in white.

© 2025 TrueSport | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Sitemap

Goal-Setting Lesson Video Transcript

Hi. I’m Trevon, Trey, Jennifer. Team USA wheelchair basketball player, paralympian, and true sport athlete. Today, I want to talk to you about goal setting. And there are three things that I would like you to know. First, successful athletes set goals and a planned roadmap. Second, goals should be written down, assessed over time, and changed if necessary. And third, goals need to be challenging in order to be worthwhile. As a freshmen at Edinboro University, I was a part of a team that made the national championship game. And at that time I recognized I was the low man on the totem pole, but I felt in my heart that I knew my dreams were so much bigger than winning a national title. I wanted to make Team USA. I knew what achieving my lofty goal was not going to be easy and that I would need to work hard every day.

So, as a reminder, I created a pyramid of goals that I kept right above my bed. This pyramid reminded me of the accomplishments that I was working towards and visually represented my need to create a solid foundation underneath me before reaching the top. In the bottom roll of my pyramid of goals I listed goals such as obtaining my bachelor’s degree, becoming a scholar athlete award recipient, and becoming an All-American. The middle row listed winning a national title and playing for a professional team. And at the top row, the most challenging of them all, I listed becoming a gold medalist for Team USA.

By understanding that there are smaller stepping stones to achieving my ultimate goal of being on Team USA, I was able to stay motivated and to stay focused on completing the smaller stepping stones fully before moving onto the next one. Now I’ll be the first to admit that not every goal that I listed on my pyramid was accomplished, but seeing my goals every day when I went to bed, I was able to push through the days that I felt like doing nothing in hopes of achieving the bigger picture. Remember, create a clear goal roadmap, assess your goals often, and continue to challenge yourself. I hope that you never stopped dreaming big or reaching for the stars. And I look forward to seeing where your roadmap takes you.

Body Image Lesson Video Transcript

Hi, I’m Kara Winger, Olympic javelin thrower, and true sport athlete. Today I want to talk to you about body image and I have three things I’d like you to know. First, healthy thoughts often lead to healthier bodies. Second, there are varying body types and no one’s body is exactly like another. And third, true beauty goes deeper than the skin. As a multi-time Olympian, I’ve experienced a lot of variation and progression in my training. My coaches and I adapt to my training frequently, all with the goal of supporting my long-term success and health in the sport of javelin. I’m talking to you about body image today because sometimes even with the best of intentions and a common goal in mind, the changes you make to your training habits can prove to be detrimental if made for the wrong reasons. In the lead up to the 2012 Olympic trials, I was told in order to improve my performance on the field, I should try to become a leaner, skinnier version of myself.

So I changed my diet. I went along with what I was being told to do, even though I’d had great success at a slightly heavier weight and higher body fat percentage, and became much leaner than ever before. It seemed like a successful change at first, but I didn’t have nearly the results I’d had before. And I believe becoming leaner than my body naturally wanted to be was what caused my ACL to tear. In the end, it cost me heavily going into the 2012 London games. The takeaway for me, and hopefully for you, is that it’s important to know what works for you and your body and to not compare yourself to others. You should do your research and experiment with your diet to find what makes you feel the best, rather than focusing on what you look like. Today, if I feel like having a chocolate chip cookie, I have one, just not every day.

I’ve learned what a properly balanced meal for my body looks like and I recognize food as the fuel that keeps me throwing. I hydrate and allow myself time to recover. And I listen to and communicate with my body so that I can be the best version of myself. In the end, you are in control of how you see, treat, and respond to your body. We only get one and it’s amazing to discover how many things our bodies can do. Be a true sport athlete. Love who you are in this moment and get excited for all the places your body will take you.

A Good Sport Lesson Video Transcript

Hi, I’m Izy Isaksen, Team USA, Modern Pentathlon, Olympian, US Army Sergeant, and True Sport Ambassador. Today, I want to talk to you about being a good sport. There are three things I’d like you to know. First, real winners act the same toward their opponent, whether they win or lose. Second, follow the rules and be a gracious winner and respectful loser. And third, sportsmanship reveals your true character.

I started competing in Modern Pentathlon eight years after my older sister and three-time Olympian, Margaux Isaksen, began competing. I soon realized that people often compared the two of us. I would overhear spectators and teammates asking, “Who’s the better athlete,” and “Who’s going to beat the other.” Instead of letting outside pressures create a negative experience for us, I chose to practice winning and losing with grace and respect. I know that it would have been easy to let our hyper competitive mindset affect our relationship, but instead we decided to support and cheer for each other, regardless of our own performance. My experience of competing against and being compared to my older sister, taught me to focus on how to perform at my best, rather than putting wasted energy into wishing for others to fail.

I believe that sportsmanship reveals true character. So, no matter what situation I encounter during competition, I know it’s important to always treat people with respect and be a good sport. Remember, be a fierce competitor, find grace in all your victories and losses. And I hope to see you out there.

What Kind of Coach Do You Want to Be? Video Transcript

Edwin Moses: You’re a coach. Maybe what you want is very simple, for everyone to just run in the right direction, score for their own team, to try and try again and again. Maybe you want your athletes to become all stars. You want them to earn trophies, medals, win titles. You want them to reach the highest height their sport allows. And wanting all of that, of course, that’s good. But as every great coach discovers, developing a great athlete means nurturing, nurturing the even greater person within. Truth is, you have even more influence than you know.

You have the ability to affect even deeper change, to take what’s in your hands and do something even more extraordinary. You can be both the coach who provides the skills needed to win the game and the coach who helps them learn and succeed beyond the sport, to become all stars wherever they land in the future, and to enjoy their lives more now, because the confidence and courage they find working with you will stay with them when they need it the most. There are games to be won, lives to change. Coaches have the power to do both.

I’m Edwin Moses, and the lessons I’ve learned through sport have challenged me, guided me, and shaped my life forever. What kind of coach do you want to be?

THE SIMPLE TRUTH: DECODING THE SUPPLEMENT INDUSTRY VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

At first glance, dietary supplements look the same. They seem safe and healthy, but just because the label says a product is a dietary supplement, that doesn’t mean it’s safe. Unfortunately, you can’t tell whether a product is safe or not just by looking at the label. Most vitamins, minerals, fish oil, and other supplements containing nutrients are probably just fine, but supplements are not evaluated or approved by FDA before they are sold. Although it is rare for vitamins or minerals to be contaminated with drugs, there has been at least one case of a vitamin containing an anabolic steroid.

At the other extreme are products that contain drugs, stimulants, anabolic steroids, or other hormones. Even though these are not technically dietary supplements, many of them are labeled as supplements. For example, body-building products sometimes contain anabolic steroids or Selective Androgen Receptor Modulators, known as SARMs, or other hormones. Some pre-workout or energy products contain illegal stimulants like DMAA, ephedra, or other amphetamine-like stimulants. Weight loss products might contain prescription drugs like sibutramine, or hormones, like human chorionic gonadotropin, also known as hCG. All natural or herbal sexual enhancement products might contain hormones or Viagra-like drugs. Products like these can harm your health and career, but they’re for sale online, in some nutrition stores, and they’re labeled as dietary supplements.

When you pick up a supplement, especially one that promises performance enhancement, you don’t know if it belongs in the “Mostly O.K.” pile or in the “Dangerous” pile. After all, two products might look the same, but one might contain just amino acids and other legitimate ingredients, while the other also contains anabolic steroids. Because of this, FDA has issued a warning about certain categories of supplements: body building products, weight loss products, and sexual enhancement products. Be extremely careful when considering a supplement in one of these categories. We strongly recommend that you avoid products in these categories.

Even when FDA tests supplements and finds dangerous ingredients, companies sometimes refuse to recall them. Sometimes, they simply repackage their product and continue selling it under a new name. Just because a product is on a store shelf doesn’t mean it is safe. You need to do your research and be an informed consumer. The dietary supplement industry is enormous. Supplements that appear to be safe could actually be dangerous products in disguise. If you use dietary supplements without doing your research, you may be taking serious risks with your health and your career. Please visit USADA’s Supplement 411 for more information about dietary supplements.