The Certificate of
Integrative Sports Nutrition

Watch Introduction Video

Now accepting applications for our 30th of May 2024 start date!

The modules within the Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition are approved by the British Association for Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine (BANT®) to provide Continuing Professional Development (CPD) credits for Nutritional Therapists for a maximum of 100 credit hours

The Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition is approved by the Board for Certification of Nutrition Specialists℠ (BCNS℠) to provide Continuing Education (CE) credits for Certified Nutrition Specialists® (CNS®) for a maximum of 30 CE Credits

About this course

The Centre for Integrative Sports Nutrition is proud to deliver this innovative certificate course, led by Ian Craig, leading expert in the emerging practice of integrative sports nutrition. This course supports professionals like you, our peers, with a programme that:

  • Provides sports nutrition training that is respected by university academics and industry professionals
  • Provides credentials that are recognised by principle professional nutrition and exercise associations
  • Puts you on the leading edge of the expansive developments occurring right now in sports nutrition
  • Demonstrates how you can apply innovative principles to better help your clients achieve their unique goals
+ Read More
Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition

What you'll learn

This course is a progressive learning experience, starting with an integrative (or functional) nutrition study of our physiological body systems within a sporting context. We then move through performance nutrition with a strong focus on the contextualisation of relevant research information to an athlete’s life. The course is then completed by the study of two specialist modules of your choosing.

Course content

The Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition consists of two 8-week ‘base’ modules (Integrative Body Systems in Sport and Applied Performance Nutrition) and two 4-week specialist modules, to be selected by yourself based on your personal interests.

Integrative body systems in sport

Module 1 represents a step-wise progression through the physiological body systems of an athlete, or active individual, starting with an introduction to integrative and personalised thinking in a sporting context. By focussing on the underpinning health of an athlete, this module creates the base layer of our performance pyramid.

Lecture content

  1. Integrative thinking and the functional model in sports nutrition
  2. Individuality and genetics of health, nutrition and performance
  3. Gastrointestinal health specifically in athletes
  4. Detoxification and biotransformation in a sports context
  5. Musculoskeletal health, inflammation, and recovery
  6. Exercise immunology and nutritional support
  7. Endocrine and nervous system disruption, imbalance and fatigue
  8. Energy, mitochondria, cardiovascular health, and the antioxidant debate

Workshop content

Each workshop focusses discussion around a case study from that week’s lecture, plus provides time for tutorial-style Q & As. Below is a list of case studies that are covered:

  1. An aspiring English Channel swimmer with fatigue
  2. An elite triathlete viewed from a genetics perspective
  3. A trail runner with gastrointestinal issues
  4. A ‘toxic’ recreational weight lifter
  5. Musculoskeletal rehabilitation after a skiing accident
  6. A recreational triathlete experiencing recurrent infections
  7. A young marathon runner with adrenal fatigue
  8. A Masters endurance athlete with cardiovascular health concerns

Module assignment

You are asked to write a 1000-word case study essay of a sporting individual who displays the signs and symptoms of some body system imbalance. After describing the person, and cross-linking his or her body systems in an integrative way, within the challenges of their exercise pursuits, you’ll outline your proposed nutrition and lifestyle intervention strategies.

Read More about this module

Applied performance nutrition

Module 2 represents a more quantitative, performance-focussed approach to sports nutrition, delving into popular topics such as calorie needs, macronutrients, micronutrients, hydration and electrolytes, pre, during and post-exercise nutrition, and overtraining. As for all of our teaching, we view these topics in a very personalised way, contextualised to the needs of the athletic individual under our care.

Lecture content

  1. Calories for a sports person: measurements and limitations
  2. Body composition: measurement modalities and nutritional strategies
  3. Macronutrients: carb vs fat discussions, train-low-compete-high, and nutrient timing
  4. Micronutrients: considering nutrient-dense nutrition, assessments and interventions
  5. Pre, during and post-exercise nutrition, including sports and recovery drinks plus gels 
  6. Hydration and electrolytes: assessments and strategies
  7. Overtraining: the neuroendocrine picture, monitoring and recovery
  8. Dynamic action learning of performance nutrition

Workshop content

Each workshop focusses discussion around a case study from that week’s lecture, plus provides time for tutorial-style Q & As. Below is a list of case studies that are covered:

  1. Caloric estimations of an active lady struggling with body composition
  2. Nutrition and lifestyle interventions with our week 1 client
  3. Macronutrient needs of a Masters track cyclist
  4. Micronutrient needs of a recreational cyclist
  5. Nutrition preparation for an ultramarathon race
  6. A basketball player with cramp problems
  7. An overtrained English Channel swimmer
  8. Dynamic action learning of performance nutrition

Assignment

You are asked to revisit your case study client from module 1. After recapping on your health intervention strategies, you’ll write up a 1000-word essay on quantitative nutrition strategies, considering their caloric needs, macronutrient balance, micronutrient intake, hydration requirements, and how to assess their overtraining risk.

Read More about this module

Individual speciality units

Once you have completed module 1 (integrative body systems) and module 2 (performance nutrition), you now choose two of the following specialty units to complete your certificate course.

Each module is a collection of three lectures, presented by professionals who have specialist interests in these areas. In addition, you have the opportunity to interact with these specialists during our weekly workshop meetings. Week 4 is an action learning workshop, which draws from the knowledge and experience of all course participants within a dynamic workshop discussion of applied performance nutrition.

  • Hypertrophy for Sport and Exercise - Learn about training and nutrition for hypertrophy, and gain a greater understanding and appreciation of the importance of body system approach (including the ‘gut-muscle axis’) for anabolic support, plus consider ergogenic strategies to assist muscular strength and integrity. With specialist practitioners Paul Ehren, Simone do Carmo, and Matt Lovell. Read More
  • Natural Sports Cookery - Learn the importance of food sourcing and energetics, how to supersize the nutrient density of foods, and how to create a balanced meal composition for an athlete using the values of natural cookery. With certified Natural Chef and ex-international triathlete, Rachel Jesson. Read More
  • Gastrointestinal Health in Athletes - Learn about the effects of exercise load on gut functioning, plus nutritional and clinical strategies that you can use in practice to assess and support GI and resilience. With specialist practitioners and academics Katherine Caris-Harris, Dr Justin Roberts, and Rick Miller. Read More
  • Harnessing Mitochondrial Energy - Learn how to develop and harness the mitochondrial potential of your athletic clients to a higher level through interventions that provide wholesome nutrition support, microbiome health, balanced exercise training, and mental wellbeing. With specialist practitioners Ian Craig, Dr Patricia Worby, and Zac van Heerden. Read More
  • Ergogenic Aids for the Athlete - Learn how to support an athlete’s performance by looking at their personal ecosystem of health, and how to identify and use nutritional ergogenic aids in clinical practice to safely improve their athletic outcomes. With specialist practitioners Paul Ehren and Matt Lovell. Read More

Online tutorials to support your learning

We always say to our students that the more you put into this course, the more you will get out of it. With this in mind, at CISN we have a strong ethos of student-tutor interactions: in other words, we are always here to answer your questions, give you support with your course work and assignments, and to help facilitate your development as a great practitioner.

We also actively encourage participants from diverse backgrounds to sign up to this course; this brings varying personal, academic, sporting, and practitioner experiences to the classroom. Learning is not only about systematically working through a set syllabus of lectures and readings; learning and personal expansion also happens during interaction with your peers, tutors and lecturers.

For this reason, we hold a special one hour space for you every week on Zoom while you complete this certificate course. Once course participants have begun to get to know each other, this becomes a vibrant place of discussion, debate, and personal growth.

We draw from the method of ‘action learning’ to inspire these sessions, allowing us to focus more on your learning needs and wants rather than the preconceived notions of the lecturers and tutors. Therefore, each session is completely bespoke to those who are online at the time.

We do, however, set up some structure to our sessions, so they may look something like this:

  • Q & A - Time is given for you to ask questions that have arisen from the week’s lectures: the lecturer and/or tutor will then share their answers within a context of sports nutrition practice
  • Forum discussions - Topics that have been discussed during the week on our online forum may now warrant expansion
  • What have you learned? - Most weeks, the tutor will ask a practice-specific question regarding what you have learned, and will take forward with you, from that week’s lectures and readings
  • Breakout rooms - We’ll then assign breakout rooms so you can discuss that question with peers in groups of 2 or 3: you’ll then come back into the main room and share what you’ve reflected on
  • New work interests - This is also a time when a specialist subject lecturer may share new academic or clinical work they have been engaged in since the time when they recorded the lecture video
  • Case studies - Most lectures are concluded with a case study, so questions may be asked about the client, and what further intervention strategies were, or could have been, employed during their case
  • Any other business - You will always be given an opportunity to raise any topics or questions that have not so far been covered during the session

These weekly Zoom discussions, along with the forum interactions, are intended to expand the way you think about your client cases, and ultimately improve the way that you practice.

Learning Path
Platform Demo
Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition

Who's it for?

The Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition is a postgraduate level course, aimed at degree holders and final year students, ideally within the nutrition and/or exercise fields.

Additionally, knowing that many excellent practitioners are not actually degree qualified, the course is open to individuals who can demonstrate a portfolio of sufficient prior knowledge and experience.

Practitioner experience is a bonus, but not a necessity.

+ Read More

Interaction online

Interaction online

As a participant on the Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition course, you will have private access to our online portal, where you can stream and download videos of the lectures and tutorials, plus access resources and articles provided for each lecture.

Importantly, for discussions, our online portal also provides a forum for you to ask questions, share your viewpoints, and interact with your tutors and fellow students.

Assessments

Assessments

Each module contains assignments designed to expand your learning, and develop your thinking as a practitioner. Modules 1 and 2 each include one formative (non-graded) experiential assignment, plus one summative (graded) assignment, comprising a theoretical case study essay.

Additionally, you will complete one short summative assignment for each of the two specialist modules. These are also very practical case-based essays, which are designed for you to creatively expand your interest and learning within the respective subjects.

Structure of study

Structure of study

The Certificate of Integrative Sports Nutrition is run as an online learning experience.

Every week you will view one 2.5 hour pre-recorded lecture and some readings, complete a quiz, and attend a 60-minute live Zoom workshop with your tutor and peers. At the end of each module you’ll write a short case study style essay as part of your course assessment (described under ‘Assessments’).

Modules 1 and 2 will take around eight weeks to complete, while each speciality unit will take around four weeks to complete. Depending on your study style, you’ll need to allow around five hours per week to complete this course.

CPD/CEU opportunities

CPD/CEU opportunities

You do not need to complete this certificate course in one go, or even at all. Because our courses are split into a number of educational units, these provide you with an excellent opportunity to pick and choose topics that will develop your professional practice and provide you with continuing professional development (CPDs), or continuing educational units (CEUs).

Our courses are accredited by the British Association for Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine (BANT).

Course dates

Now accepting applications for our next course, starting on the 30th of May 2024!

Dates for 2024: 6 February, 30 May and 22 October

10% Discount for:

Next course start dates:

Days
Hours

Grab your seat for our next start date on the 30th of May 2024

Exclusive offer

X 12 monthly plan

OR

Discounted once off cost

Sign up for this exciting course. Seats are limited

Right of Admission Reserved – T’s & C’s Apply

Subscribe to our newsletter