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October 29, 2024
The complete, field-tested playbook for training, tournament week, and round day—using the world's first 3-stage Hydration Nootropic (caffeine-free, third-party tested, anti-doping) tailored for energy, focus, and performance.
This guide is split into three parts:
Part 1: How to fuel day-to-day golf training so you recover, adapt, and show up sharp.
Part 2: Tournament-week setup—carbs, hydration, and travel tactics that protect performance.
Part 3: Round-day plan—exactly what to eat and drink the morning of, on the range, and tee-to-green.
At the end, you'll find example meal plans for a typical training day, the 24–48 h before a tournament, and a full round-day checklist.
Your practice plan is periodized; your nutrition should be too. Golf is a 4–5 hour cognitive-motor sport: decision-making, visual processing, and fine motor control run in parallel with walking and repeated sub-maximal efforts. Even mild dehydration raises perceived effort and can impair execution and cognition—exactly where reads and tempo live. Early golf data (female elite golfers) show better execution and lower perceived effort when euhydrated vs. dehydrated in simulated play.
If practice volume climbs (more balls, more walking, strength sessions), increase total energy so you're not raiding muscle or rolling into sessions underfueled. Under-eating for long stretches also elevates illness risk—lost practice days you can't get back.
Carbohydrate is used as a fuel for intense actions such as golf swings and walking. Carbohydrate is stored in small quantities as glycogen in both the muscle and liver.
For most golfers in a training block, consuming around 5-7 grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight should be sufficient to maintain the fuel tanks and support your performance and recovery.
Build this mostly from "slow fuels" (oats, whole-grain breads/pasta, rice, potatoes, fruit) and layer "fast fuels" (white bread, rice cakes, ripe bananas, sports carbs) before/after key sessions when rapid delivery matters.
If we assume that you currently consume 2000 - 3000 calories each day, you will likely need to add an additional 500 to 800 calories or 125 to 200 grams of carbohydrate to your daily diet to meet the demands of daily training.
In a practical sense that's the equivalent of an additional banana and tablespoon of honey in a slightly larger bowl of porridge at breakfast, with a bottle of apple juice, an extra slice of bread at lunch with some fruit, a slightly larger serving of rice with your evening meal and three caramel rice cakes before your training session.
Protein rich foods are digested, absorbed and broken down into individual amino acids which are primarily used to support growth and repair processes in the body, particularly in muscles. Imagine amino acids are like small bricks, these bricks are used to rebuild tissues. Golf practice is taxing on muscles and joints, so consuming protein in sufficient amounts and at regular periods across the day is important to aid growth and repair processes.
Target around 1.6-1.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight should be sufficient to optimise the repair processes, evenly split across 4-5 feedings.
Think eggs/Greek yogurt at breakfast, lean proteins at lunch/dinner, and a pre-sleep protein dose to support tissue repair from hitting + gym work.
Suitable protein sources to aid repair processes include lean meats such as chicken, turkey and lean beef, eggs, fish, shrimp, dairy products such as milk and Greek yogurt, soy, beans and pulses, and even whey or vegan protein powder if you struggle to meet the daily requirements from wholefoods alone.
Fruit, vegetables and healthy sources of fat can be referred to as boost foods as they have the ability to boost numerous aspects of our health and functioning as humans, thanks to their vast quantities of vitamins, minerals, fibre, fatty acids, water and other phytonutrients.
Nitrate-rich veg (beetroot, spinach, rocket) support nitric-oxide pathways that can aid blood flow and efficiency; polyphenol-rich fruits (berries, cherries) help manage exercise-induced oxidative stress. Contemporary reviews continue to support performance benefits from adequate dietary nitrate intake.
Hydration is the most "coachable" gain in golf because it touches both brain and body. Practical baseline: arrive euhydrated, replace sweat during, and restore after. Classic guidance: sip regularly, and include sodium with longer or hotter sessions to promote fluid retention and help maintain plasma volume.
For drinks during prolonged activity, solutions with around 0.5-0.7 g sodium per liter are commonly recommended.
APN FUEL is a 3-stage, caffeine-free Hydration Nootropic designed for the rhythm of golf. Each stick mixes with around 500 ml water.
The formulation prioritizes electrolytes + nootropic support without caffeine (so you can train late, sleep on time, and still feel locked-in the next morning).
You don't need extreme depletion/loading cycles. Simply bias meals toward familiar, lower-fiber carbs for 24–48 h to keep liver/muscle glycogen high for long walking days and high-rep ball striking.
24 - 48 hours of 10 grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight is sufficient to fill the fuel tanks in the muscle and liver.
This 24 - 48 hour carbohydrate load should be coupled with a reduction in training volume and intensity to encourage storage.
In a practical sense, for a 70 kg golfer that is around 700 grams of carbohydrate, which could look something like this:
Note: This example only includes carbohydrate items.
Scale back roughage the day or two before the first round to reduce GI noise on course: swap brown for white rice/pasta, trade bran for Rice Krispies, keep veg portions modest but keep nitrate-rich options (beet, spinach, rocket) in rotation.
Arrive topped up—not bloated. Include sodium with fluids to support retention and maintain plasma volume as you acclimate to course heat/humidity. IOC guidance for competing in the heat underscores preparing for the environment and planning hydration deliberately (alongside acclimation and cooling).
Safety & trust: APN products are third-party tested and listed on Cologne List®, which minimizes the risk of contamination with banned substances (no list can ever be a 100% guarantee, but it's the recognized European standard).
Aim to re-top liver glycogen and steady blood sugar with a familiar, lower-fiber carb-forward breakfast plus protein (e.g., bagel + yogurt/fruit + juice). This timing supports absorption and helps you avoid heavy gut feel when you start warming up.
Add a "fast fuel" snack (rice cakes + honey, ripe banana). Begin sipping fluid.
This 3-stage flow matches how focus and fatigue evolve across a 4–5 h round—without caffeine spikes or sleep disruption later.
Weigh pre/post (if practical). Replace around 125–150% of fluid lost over the next few hours (e.g., 1.25–1.5 L per kg lost) and include sodium to speed retention.
(templates, not prescriptions)
Do electrolytes really matter in golf?
Yes, especially across multi-hour rounds and in heat/humidity. Sodium in drinks helps retain fluid and maintain plasma volume; classic exercise guidance recommends around 0.5–0.7 g sodium per liter during prolonged activity.
Isn't this just for endurance sports?
Golf's unique demand is sustained cognition + fine motor control. Hydration status affects attention, mood, and reaction time, which show up in club selection, green reading, and tempo.
What about anti-doping?
APN products are third-party tested and listed on Cologne List®, a program using independent controls to minimize the risk of banned-substance contamination.
