England Rugby has signed a new four-year partnership with Optimum Nutrition, part of the Glanbia Performance Nutrition group.
Optimum will serve as the Official Performance Nutrition and Official Nutrition Education Partner to England Rugby.
As an Official Partner, Optimum will provide products from its Informed-Sport tested range to the England senior men’s and women’s teams and sevens squads. Optimum Nutrition will also receive match day branding rights at Twickenham Stadium, starting with Saturday’s Six Nations game against Italy.
Working together, England Rugby and Optimum Nutrition will co-create a ‘good nutrition for performance’ education programme aimed at community adult and age-group rugby players, coaches and parents in England.
The programme will be supported by a content series that will be published on a digital hub on EnglandRugby.com ahead of next season. Optimum Nutrition will also produce products specifically for community rugby players, the first of which will be a rugby focused variant of ‘Gold Standard 100% Whey Protein’ which will aid muscle recovery.
Dr Simon Kemp, RFU medical services director, said: “This advice will be consistent with England Rugby’s ‘food first’ policy, but recognises that there are circumstances where the use of selected supplements is appropriate and will aid recovery, reduce injury risk and optimise the effects of training.”