What Olympic weightlifter Emily Campbell eats to perform at her best
Three fried egg sandwiches, three chocolate-chip pancakes, a five-egg omelette, three sugar-coated slices of French toast, a bowl of grits, and two cups of coffee. That’s what the US swimmer Michael Phelps ate – no, not in a day – but just for breakfast, while training for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Since then, our fascination with how the most physically impressive humans on the planet fuel their training – and performances – has continued to grow. Blame social media and the fact that those small little squares give us a glimpse into Olympians' everyday lives – offering nuggets of information on which supplements they chug and their favourite Friday night takeaway – but since we’re just as nosy as you are, and the 2024 Paris Olympics is around the corner, we’ve tapped up a couple of the Team GB Olympic athletes (and their nutritionists, of course) to find out exactly what the world’s best athletes fuel themselves on...
Meet Emily Campbell: Britain's best female weightlifter
Emily Campbell won silver at the Tokyo Olympics in the +87kg category – securing Team GB’s first medal in the sport since 1984. Since then, she’s cemented her place among the world’s very best lifters, winning world bronze and silver in 2021 and 2022 respectively and four straight European titles in 2024. WH spoke to Campbell ahead of Paris 2024 to find out how she eats to optimise performance.
WH: Hi, Emily. Why don't you start by telling us a little bit about how important your diet has been to your training ahead of the Olympics?
EC: Diet – and fuelling properly – is really important as an athlete, but in the beginning, it wasn’t something I massively focused on.
When I first started weightlifting, I weighed around 95 to 98 kilos. At the time, the weight classes were 70 and 75 plus – which meant I automatically fell into the super heavyweight category – and there was just no way on this planet (unless I lost a leg) that I was going to get into the category below.
But when you’re in an open category, the girls tend to be really heavy – they tend to weigh around 100 kilos plus. I remember my coach at the time saying to me, no pressure but you’re going to have to put a little bit of weight on if you want to compete with these girls at a higher level.
The weight categories then changed to 90 and 90 plus – and at this point I probably weighed about 102.5 kilos, I’d put on a good six kilos pretty easily just from weightlifting, getting in the gym every single day, building that muscle and not doing anything crazy eating wise.
To be a super heavyweight girl, you have to lift ridiculous weights, so nobody really wants to play up there if they don’t have to. I worked with a nutritionist to try and get down to 90 kilos and compete in that class. I dieted for three months and got to 100.7 and my body was just like, no. So that’s when I made the definitive decision to be a super heavyweight.
I started to feel the effects of putting on a lot of weight when I got to 115kg and I did start to freak out a little bit. Obviously, because your body does change. You look at yourself differently. You’re sort of not fitting in your clothes anymore. But then you’ve also got this thing in the back of your mind going, ‘I’m really healthy and performing really well. This is really good for me’. So you always have that battle of the two. And you have to remember what your goals are and what is important to you.
I got to around 115 to 118kg and then the goal was 120kg. And it was really tough to get up to that body weight. It took a toll on me mentally as well because I felt like it went on in fat before it went on in muscle. At that point, it was just like calories, calories, calories. Around those times, I was probably close to about 4,500 to 5,000 calories a day.
WH: Have you ever struggled with the calorie demands?
EC: Sometimes, when I come back from training and I’m so exhausted, the last thing I want to do is stand in the kitchen and cook for 30-40 minutes, I’d rather just sit on the sofa and eat half a pack of biscuits.
Being an athlete is less about seeing food as good or bad, and instead seeing it as fuel. Some days, I’ll be training for four hours. A single weightlifting session can take two – two and a half hours, and I do a reformer Pilates every week as well. So it’s just about being kind to your body, and fuelling it well because you put it through so much stress every single time you go to the gym. Otherwise, you’ll just get injured.
It’s tough in our sport because you have weight classes. So there a lot of eating disorders are developed because you have to weigh in – so you have to starve yourself and then you start asking yourself to be fuelled again and your body changes so much from when you’re training to when you compete in and I think a lot of girls in particular struggle.
We’re still, as a nation, obsessed with how females look. I just don’t think men get held to the same sort of standard. Whereas if a woman’s body dramatically changes or she looks different or she doesn’t look a certain way that people want them to, it’s created into such a big issue.
Especially for us [weightlifters], we wear one of the most revealing outfits. Tightfitting, skin-tight, one piece – it’s not very flattering at all. We resonate with the athletics team a lot – they wear little pants a little crop top and they’re completely exposed.
WH: Although further research in this area is needed, there's finally some research being published about how menstrual cycles affect female athletes – do you change the way you fuel yourself on your period?
EC: We always have to make sure that throughout training we're taking on enough carbs – even if it’s a Lucozade or a Rice Krispies squares bar, which we wouldn’t normally have while we’re training, but on our periods things like that are really important.
I find with weight training, all coordination and everything just disappears when my period is about to start. I feel like an octopus – you’re trying to lift heavy weights and be steady and rigid and your body just feels like it’s jelly. And then towards the end of your period, you're the strongest you ever felt because you have that burst of testosterone.
WH: Did you ever feel just bored of eating?
EC: I’m constantly full from the meal before and I’m constantly eating all the time. The only rest I get from eating is when I’m training. Then as soon as I finish training, I’ll eat a protein bar and then go home and eat again and then something else before bed.
I started working with a nutritionist in 2019 and it made such a difference. He taught me simple things like how to weigh food, and what macros I should aim for each day. He would never say ‘this is what you have to eat’, it was much more of a conversation around aiming to hit macros. He just simplified nutrition for me, and made it less scary.
WH: Does your nutrition change going into a big event, like the Olympics?
EC: As we get a bit closer to a competition you can afford to have a little bit less food, because you’re doing way less training.
When you go on these trips – and compete in different cities around the world – you’re not in control of your food, so you have to make really informed decisions.
When we go to the Olympics we’re very lucky – Team GB are fantastic at sitting down and looking at the menus, making sure that things are nutritious and there's plenty of food we need. They’ll have a room full of snacks, gels, caffeine, hydration tabs – whatever you need. But it’s a different story for European Championships or World Championships – it’s very much whatever is whatever the hotel provides. So you need to know what is good for you, how to make the right choices and how to be adaptable.
Sometimes people get so rigid with nutrition, and that's why people struggle. Imagine if you went to a supermarket abroad, and you always have a banana for breakfast and you can't get over not having a banana for breakfast psychologically. That could fry out a whole week of training because you’re so fixated on that banana. Whereas if you’re nice and flexible, you can adapt your diet.
WH: Would you say that you're quite regimented with your food?
EC: I try to be quite organised and plan my meals. I used to get Hello Fresh and Costco boxes, so I’ve saved all the recipes into a folder and split the recipes up by meat. On a Sunday, I sit down and work out what I’m going to cook over the week and make a shopping list. So then I know I’ve got all the ingredients to make whatever recipe I fancy for lunch or dinner that week.
I know what macros I need – whether that’s 250g of chicken at night or 120g of rice – so I’ll stick to the recipe, but adapt it to my individual needs.
WH: What’s your go-to pre-comp meal?
EC: Chicken Caesar pasta salad. Normally, when I make it at home, I put the pasta underneath, then loads of iceberg lettuce, then make my croutons in the airfryer, and add chicken, parmesan cheese and sauce on top.
I just think it’s a 10 out of 10 meal – it makes sure you've got a bit of everything. And it’s not too heavy either – you don’t feel like you want to go to sleep after. That would be my ultimate choice.
WH: What's the food hall like at the Olympic Village? Is it quite overwhelming?
EC: The food hall at the Olympic Village is an extreme sport. You walk in, it’s one of the biggest rooms and everybody’s in the same position as you – everybody’s lost. Nobody knows what they want. Everyone’s got to try and work out what’s going on. It’s overwhelming, so you do have to prepare yourself.
The advice is you go in and do one full circle without picking anything. Just go and see what every section has got. And then think about ‘what would I have at home?’ and what can I eat that is closest to that. Obviously, you do have some days where you just want to eat whatever you fancy.
I lived off gyozas and spring rolls in Tokyo. They were just amazing – and there was always a queue. We had to tag team, ask someone to get the queue and get everybody’s gyozas because the queue was so long.
WH: Are there any big lessons you’ll be taking from Tokyo with you to Paris?
EC: I think I was a little bit naive when I first got to Tokyo – and assumed everything would be available whenever we needed it, and it wasn’t. There were still set times for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and sometimes I ended up missing lunch because I’d get back from training and be so tired, I’d have a nap, and then lunch was closed. So I could have been a bit better with my timings – and in Paris, I’ll definitely be prioritising fuelling first, then sleep.
WH: Are there any big misconceptions about what an Olympic diet looks like?
EC: Yes! That we just eat protein.
Yes, your protein levels do have to be high – I’m currently on 200g of protein per day, and sometimes that’s hard to hit. But my carbs are nearly double that – around 440g a day –because if you don't eat that amount, you just won't have any energy.
I also think that a lot of people think that bodybuilders just eat a white piece of chicken, white rice and broccoli. No sauce, nothing. And that’s not the case at all. We just eat everyday normal meals. They're just a little bit bigger than average.
WH: And, finally, what’s the one thing you’re really looking forward to eating after the Paris Olympics?
EC: Well, I think because we’re in Paris, I’ll definitely have to go and get some amazing French patisserie; croissants and pain au chocolates.
When I come back home, my family are big celebrators, and we always do big parties with lots of Caribbean food. So I’m looking forward to demolishing that with all my family and friends.
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