{"id":910168,"date":"2026-07-03T16:30:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T16:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/910168\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T16:30:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T16:30:23","slug":"its-fourth-of-july-weekend-you-know-youre-going-to-eat-a-hot-dog-or-two-just-eat-them-this-way-a-sports-nutrionist-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/910168\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s Fourth of July weekend. You know you\u2019re going to eat a hot dog or two. Just eat them this way, a sports nutrionist says"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ll concede that you\u2019re not ordering a hot dog on the golf course because of its nutritional value. In fact, in celebration of golf\u2019s long-standing partnership with dogs, Golf Digest even identified the 15 best spots for them on courses around the country.<\/p>\n

That said, a prominent sports nutritionist says the protein and fat in a hot dog can help athletic performance. The bun? Not so much.<\/p>\n

Matt Jones, who has advised athletes around the world including the 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics, the Premier League\u2019s West Hampton team and players on golf\u2019s DP World Tour, explains why simple carbs such as a hot-dog bun can lead to dumped shots, missed putts and a back-nine collapse.<\/p>\n

\"https:\/\/www.golfdigest.com\/content\/dam\/images\/golfdigest\/fullset\/fitness-2025\/Matt <\/p>\n

To simplify the science behind how nutrition impacts athletic performance, focus on two well-known neurotransmitters\u2014serotonin and dopamine, Jones says. When you eat processed foods loaded with simple carbohydrates, the concentration of an amino acid called tryptophan increases in the bloodstream. When tryptophan passes the blood-brain barrier, it\u2019s rapidly converted into serotonin.<\/p>\n

Serotonin has been linked in several studies to something called \u201ccentral fatigue.\u201d In short, central fatigue is a condition where the brain progressively fails to send sufficient neural signals to recruit muscles, leading to decreased force and performance, even when muscles are not directly fatigued. You can imagine what that might mean for a golfer in the home stretch of an important round.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the other hand, dopamine is associated with cognition, mood, memory, attention and learning,\u201d Jones says. \u201cFollowing consumption of a meal low in carbohydrates but high in quality protein and fat, the concentration of dopamine increases.\u201d<\/p>\n

This occurs because protein\/fat whole foods increase levels of the amino acid tyrosine into the blood. And this quickly accelerates the synthesis of dopamine the same way tryptophan impacts serotonin, Jones says.<\/p>\n

Jones did say \u201cquality\u201d in regard to protein, and you could argue that hot dogs aren\u2019t at the top of list when it comes to that. But again, we\u2019ll concede the popularity of them on golf courses means that if you\u2019re hungry and have no desire to grab a bag of nuts, then go with a bun-less dog.<\/p>\n

Jones has a better nutrition plan for golfers and you can read his hole-by-hole advice here.<\/p>\n

This article was originally published on golfdigest.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We\u2019ll concede that you\u2019re not ordering a hot dog on the golf course because of its nutritional value.…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":910169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[37],"tags":[347,74420,210,1182,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-910168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nutrition","tag-article","tag-golf-digest","tag-health","tag-nutrition","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116857002210207627","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=910168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/910169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=910168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=910168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=910168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}