What do the Springboks eat to prepare for tournaments?

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Some people are wondering what the Springboks eat to perform in highly competitive global tournaments. The reigning world champions will take on the All Blacks in the final of the 2023 Rugby World Cup in France tomorrow evening.

Social media was abuzz when Retshegofaditswe Ox Nche posted a picture of himself with a sizable slice of chocolate cake.

Fitness expert from North West University, Bert Moolman, says it’s all about balancing skill, physical fitness and endurance.

“From a strength and conditioning perspective, I think there’s a lot of hard work that goes into that. The guys are physically really strong and that helps. Obviously, it’s a contact, high-intensity sport. So, the bigger the collision and the bigger collisions you can create and handle, I think that’s a very big component of succeeding in the match. So, I think we’ve got a pretty strong gene pull in the Southern African part of the world. And that helps a lot getting guys even a little bit bigger or stronger to perform better in the match.”

Professor Lize Havemann-Nel from the same university says each player has unique nutritional requirements.

“Let’s say for instance, we look at a 120kg rugby player and they are training between 3 and 5 hours a day, their energy requirements from a carbohydrates point of view can be between 5 to 7 grams per kilogram and even higher. And that equates to between about 600 and 800 or 900 grams of carbohydrates which is 45 to 60 slices of bread. So thankfully we don’t only feed our players bread.”

Meanwhile, a community rugby club in Inanda, Durban, is turning to sport to deter young people from getting involved in crime. What started as a group of children teaching each other rugby, is now the uMzinyati Ministeries Rugby Club.

It has about 40 players aged from seven to 19. But they need items such as kits and boots.

Seventeen-year-old Asanda Mnyandu says, “I like rugby because it teaches us how to be disciplined and how to respect each other inside and outside the game and it teaches us how to communicate with other kids and not be bullies to others. Well, I go with Springboks because they are trying their best to win this cup and what I like about Springboks is that they don’t give up, they push hard and hard until they win the game.”

Umzinyathhi resident, Bonakele Ngcobo has been encouraging the players since 2016.

“Some kids they facing gender-based violence, some kids do not talk to their parents in a way that they can talk to us. So when there’s a coach and manager, as I’m a manager, we’re able to identity those social ills, even in the school when they are not doing right, we just come in and identify those things.”

Countdown to the 2023 Rugby World Cup Final | Paris through the eyes of SABC’s Simon Burke: