{"id":739222,"date":"2026-07-02T16:15:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T16:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/739222\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T16:15:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T16:15:09","slug":"trout-sushi-for-breakfast-the-surprising-diets-of-wimbledon-stars-wimbledon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/739222\/","title":{"rendered":"Trout sushi for breakfast? The surprising diets of Wimbledon stars | Wimbledon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Trout sushi washed down with coffee kombucha<\/a> may not be the stereotypical breakfast of champions, but it\u2019s become the go-to for Wimbledon\u2019s tennis stars.<\/p>\n

Athletes are increasingly demanding sustainable options, as well as seeking out gut-friendly foods aligned with a microbiome diet, according to the tournament\u2019s chefs. Recent research has shown a link between gut health, which can be improved through dietary changes, and sporting performance.<\/p>\n

\u201cGut health and probiotic products are very popular. We\u2019re aware of that so we\u2019re absolutely thinking about that,\u201d said Joe Furber, the senior food and drink manager at Wimbledon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s something we\u2019ve improved on for this year,\u201d added head chef Sam Kent. \u201cIf a player walks into our restaurants and wants to focus on their gut health, we have provided them the options there, but also the information telling them that this is what\u2019s got good gut health in it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tournament\u2019s gut-friendly offering includes plant-based, fibre-rich foods such as beans and fermented products such as kombucha. Wimbledon has also joined a growing number of sporting events switching from beef to venison, which is lower in saturated fat and has a smaller carbon footprint. Its meat comes from wild deer culled from London\u2019s royal parks.<\/p>\n

\u201cSupporting gut health is important for athletes, especially when training or competing in hot weather,\u201d said Dr Luciana Torquati, who researches sports nutrition at the University of Exeter. \u201cFoods containing live cultures like yoghurt and kefir, probiotic supplements, alongside prebiotic foods and supplements may promote a diverse microbiome and help support digestive and immune health, improve nutrient absorption, reduce gastrointestinal symptoms.<\/p>\n

\u201cTogether, these factors may help athletes better tolerate demanding conditions and reduce the risk of gastrointestinal symptoms and illness that can negatively affect performance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year, more than 20 stadiums, including Brentford and Twickenham, started to serve wild venison, while the golfer Rory McIlroy put elk \u2013 which is similar to venison \u2013 on his Masters champions dinner menu<\/a> earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Rory McIlroy in the Wimbledon royal box with partner Erica Stoll, right, on Tuesday. Photograph: Clive Brunskill\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Head chef Bryn Williams said: \u201cWe swapped our beef for venison in a lot of spaces a few years ago. Venison is fundamentally a more sustainable meat, with a lower carbon weighting \u2026 There is an abundance of venison in this country.\u201d He said venison was now available across the whole Wimbledon site.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt eats a wild diet, so it\u2019s naturally eating what\u2019s good for itself, it lives a good life, and so it is nutritionally dense, it has a really high level of protein as well \u2013 people are looking for high levels of protein in their red meat, and it\u2019s naturally lean, it\u2019s got a much lower saturated fat content. So you\u2019re talking about something that\u2019s really good for you as a person, and really good for the planet,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The growing emphasis on sustainability and local sourcing extends to other ingredients, including British chia seeds and quinoa, lemongrass grown in north Wales, and chalk-stream trout from Hampshire \u2013 which is \u201cfar more sustainable\u201d than salmon, which has now been phased out, said Kent.<\/p>\n

The trout is used to make California rolls and nigiri. \u201cSushi is always popular with the players, it\u2019s number one \u2026 across the board,\u201d said Kent. \u201cWe can\u2019t make enough of it, they absolutely love it. We have a full-time team of on-site sushi chefs and they are producing from the very early hours of the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if players eat sushi for breakfast, he added: \u201cAbsolutely, sushi is available at all times of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The kombucha, which is new this year, is brewed from old coffee grounds gathered from the site. \u201cWe take the coffee grinds from that each day and we brew that into a fresh kombucha. The coffee grinds are obviously something that are naturally wasted, they have many great uses, such as being used for compost, but also really interestingly, you can brew it into kombucha,\u201d said Kent.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you\u2019re giving a second life to that product, but also then producing something that is both pre- and probiotic and much lower in caffeine \u2026 It\u2019s a really great breakfast start that also has loads of good gut benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Strawberries remain a Wimbledon stalwart, with about 2.8 million sold each year. Any excess is used to make jam for the following year, as well as a strawberry sauce for the chicken karahi served in the restaurant.<\/p>\n

But for Wimbledon\u2019s tennis stars, the priority remains eating enough to fuel their hours-long matches. \u201cYou will see slightly weird things, like someone will have pasta with cake on top,\u201d said Kent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trout sushi washed down with coffee kombucha may not be the stereotypical breakfast of champions, but it\u2019s become…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":739223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-739222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=739222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/739223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}