Professionals in the field of sports nutrition understand the critical role that nutrition plays in achieving sporting, health or fitness goals. Yet today, only elite athletes are likely to have any access to support from sports or performance nutritionists. That is why my colleagues and I at Danone have worked with leading experts in the field of sports nutrition to launch the GetPRO Professional Hub, a new resource hub aiming to make sports nutrition more accessible to all athletes, regardless of their level. 

The hub’s free-to-use, evidence-based learning and delivery resources have been developed in consultation with a panel of sports nutrition experts. At this hub, sports nutritionists can find a range of resources we hope will help them develop their skills and their ability to work with athletes and sports teams; resources include evidence-based presentations that can be used with teams, infographics to share, and expert blogs.

We are also proud to sponsor a grant funding programme and a supervision and mentorship scheme, more details on the latter coming soon.

The funding element of the programme, the GetPRO Professional Grassroots Sports Nutrition Grant , is hosted in proud partnership with The Nutrition Society. The Nutrition Society has a mission to "advance the scientific study of nutrition and its application to the maintenance of health”, which aligns perfectly with our values. This one-of-a-kind grant programme, which offers awards of up to £2000, hopes to expand opportunities for early career sports nutritionists to engage in their communities and for athletes, regardless of their level, to benefit from professional nutrition support.

The resources and grant programme were launched at the European College of Sports Science’s (ECSS) congress in Glasgow in the first week of July 2024, where we also hosted a well-received talk from one of our hub’s expert blog authors Nicky Gilbert on the topic of how to encourage behaviour change in athletes.

We hope the impact of the GetPRO Professional programme will extend beyond individual sports nutritionists and athletes. By integrating professional nutrition support into grassroots sports, GetPRO Professional is looking to foster career development opportunities for sports nutritionists while also promoting more informed community sports nutrition programmes. With increased awareness of the importance of nutrition in sports and more widespread adoption of healthy eating habits, we hope to inspire a greater appreciation of nutrition with athletes of all levels.

This is just the start for us, and we welcome your feedback and ideas.  We have plans to develop additional modules and develop further offerings to support sports nutritionists. Let us know if there is a specific resource, blog or module topic you would be interested in seeing.