Abstract:

This study aimed to determine cyclists’ nutritional knowledge and habits, and nutritional ergogenic aid usage and shed light on the relation between cyclists’ nutritional knowledge and ergogenic aid usage. It was conducted in Cyprus. There were three groups (study groups: competitive cyclists-CC, recreational cyclists-RC; control group-CG: sedentary adults). Data were collected with a questionnaire that had three sections (the first two sections were related to general nutritional habits, ergogenic aids, anthropometric measurements, and the last section included The Nutrition for Sport Knowledge Questionnaire-NSKQ). All data were evaluated by Statistical Package for the Social Science-SPSS version 24.0. Totally 174 adults participated voluntarily in this study (n: 58 for each group). CC and RC skipped their main meals and smoked less than CG (p<0.05). Although most of the participants had poor sports nutrition knowledge (60.0%), CC had the highest NSKQ score and this result showed us CC had more information about sports nutrition than CG (p: 0.001). According to ergogenic aids usage, CC (56.9%) used more than RC (39.7%) (p: 0.000). This study showed that cyclists (CC and RC both) -who used ergogenic nutritional aids- had lower NSKQ scores (p: 0.027). In conclusion, the nutritional knowledge levels of the cyclists were found to be insufficient. It was observed that cyclists had significant differences in nutritional knowledge and low level of knowledge about ergogenic supports. Thus, continuous sports nutritional education is necessary to increase their knowledge.

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