Hey Amanda,

Full respect to you – with kids and studying plus Thai! I’m a keen recreational Thai enthusiast myself – very good fun.

Right first, you’ve not wasted your time. You have gain knowledge – but you are lacking the official stamp you need to practice.

What you need is insurance. This is the bottom line, so when you advise people take certain foods and supplements that you have the qualifications to give the client reassurance that you are for real and not a weekend course nutritionist.

Recently you have to become a registered nutritionist with the NCT to practice nutritional therapy – this door is now closed, but it would be worth dropping them a line to discuss the possibilities available to you.

There are some courses which will automatically qualify you as registered – but these take time, ION the one I did takes 3 years part time. You can do 1 year full time.

these courses are for becoming a full blown nutritionist available and capable to handle many health complaints. As you want to specialise in sport you can try this other route.

Train as a personal trainer / fitness instructor – and get a qualification which enables you to advise poeple on healthy eating and sports nutrition. that way you can start sooner and it’ll take least time, money and distruption to your family.

There’s also a great qualification by ISSN – you’ll need to get the book, and study sefl directed, and you can do the exam in UK – if you pay a university to oversee you in exam conditions. Or you can travel to US for conference and do it as part of the conference.

Books wise – there’s alot to choose from, Micheal Colgan is a good one Optimum Sports Nutrition Bible, John Berardi does some excellent information, T nation is also a great site for nutrition, Also look at the paleo diet site by Cordain, that’ll get you started.

Aslo for making weight any body building type diets are worth looking at as well as all the stuff on my site – the carbohydrate cycling diet is very useful for fighters making weight and still having to spar with some energy.

By the way if you look up pay4TV fights on google, and the last may thai addicts night at porchester hall – i’m commentating with my mate Sak!

Good luck! and good luck with the fighting.

you sound like you are slightly over weight – if that’s fat then it depends on your immediate requirements / sport

you will lose fat on the regenerate system and gain muscle –

I think you get the 4WFL as part of this system – if you are leaner to start with it’s easier to build muscle as you’ll be more insulin sensitive, I would do the fat loss phase first – then start regenerate.

Matt

it was fun actually – i'm no expert either – but in at the deep end. It was s good fight.
hope you are good. I saw your question – it's in my 'to do' box I will get to it asap!
kind regards
Matt

Hi Matt, I'm currently studying Biomedical Sciences in Uni. of Southampton. Having only recently discovered my career ambitions, I'm now looking into the possibility of taking a postgraduate course in Nutrition/ Dietetics in the hope to one day become a Sports Nutritionist.
I was hoping you could recommend courses, or give me some guidance on which associations these courses should be approved by, for me to progress further on my career path. I’ve been looking at some masters courses in Dietetics, Public Nutrition, Human Nutrition and specific sports nutrition courses in Loughborough and UWIC, but have also found some diplomas online. My fear of choosing a specific sports nutrition course is that it presumably closes many doors (in the public health sector) if I then find there are limited jobs in the sports field…
Any advice would be a great help.
Regards
Oliver West