The Ultimate Guide to Game Day Routines For Athletes

Creating a good game day routine around your schedule and your diet is critical to sustainable success as an athlete. In today’s blog post, I’ll go over the importance of these two aspects to help you optimize your game day routine. Before we dive into the details though, let's talk about the routines of some of the greatest athletes in the world.

Part 1 - Game Day Routines of Elite Athletes

One of the key things that I learned over my career was the power of developing a rock solid routine. The way I approached game day evolved over time as I learned more about how to optimize how I spent the day and how I fueled my body. I preach routine with all the athletes I work with, as well as with the Fully Equipped Athlete: Get Better Everyday Newsletter. 

While I spent a ton of time experimenting and developing routines, I was curious to see what other athletes were doing with their routines. I decided to do some research on some of the elite athletes in the world to learn more about how they approach their “gameday”. I chose the following examples:

• Lebron James

• Patrick Mahomes

• Sidney Crosby

• Cristiano Ronaldo

• Bryce Harper

While they all have their own likes, dislikes, rituals, etc, it was crazy to see how many of the themes were similar between them, even though they play different sports. Here are the key themes:

• Routine schedule

  • He’s up at 7 a.m., often with no alarm. Bedtime is 9:30, 10 at the latest. - Patrick Mahomes 

• Sleep

  • “Everyone talks about eight, but I prefer 10 during the season. It’s the best for your body.” - Bryce Harper

• Pregame physical activity

  • "It sets a standard for our team when your captain and your top player brings a work ethic to the rink every day like he does. He certainly makes my job...as far as demanding the type of standard that we need to be successful." - Coach Sullivan on Crosby’s game day skate 

• Optimized diet

  • “I had an egg white omelet with smoked salmon and gluten-free pancakes with berries. That was my breakfast. For lunch, I had whole wheat pasta, salmon, and vegetables. And right before the game, I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. And at halftime, I had sliced apples with almond butter on top. Right after the game, [I had] a protein shake to put in my system right after.” - Lebron James

• Recovery

  • “Recovery is more important to me than actual training sessions due to the large number of games I have to play. Winding down and resting is a key part of my day-to-day routine and enables me to perform to the highest level in my profession and prolong my career.” - Cristiano Ronaldo

For me, one of the most interesting aspects here is how much emphasis is put on sleep and recovery. Even for a young player like Patrick Mahomes, he is very disciplined with his sleep schedule. Lebron James is known to sleep 10-12 hours a night, and Bryce Harper mentioned getting more than the recommended amount of sleep. 

For players late in their career like Lebron James and Ronaldo, they’re both showing that they can maintain their peak performance beyond what is considered the “prime” of their careers based on their age. Sidney Crosby shows the hunger he has every single day, even during the pre game warm ups. 

Even though these players are in different stages of their careers and play different sports, it’s really telling how similar their routines are and the things that they consider to be important for optimum performance.

If you’re truly interested in getting the most out of your athletic performance, pay attention to what the top athletes are doing. They didn’t grind to get to the top then stop grinding, they found what works for them, and stayed consistent with it to sustain that high level of performance. This is just an overview though. Next, we’ll get into the specifics. 

Part 2 - Game Day Routine

While it’s very important to develop a routine that you can follow every day, most athletes have a specific game day routine that they follow. Some people might call it “superstitious”, but when I talk about building a routine I mean the specifics of your day and not whether or not you tie your left or right shoelace first. 

Building a game day routine is about squeezing the maximum amount of value out of the time that you have to ensure that you’re going to be able to perform at your highest level, day in and day out. This isn’t something that you’re going to be able to come up with overnight, and finding the right routine for you isn’t as simple as copying a template. It will require some experimentation to understand what is working and what is not and constantly testing and adjusting.  

Whether you’re a high school athlete or a seasoned pro, building these routines are critical to getting the most out of yourself and getting that consistency you need to perform at your peak. If you take care of all the little things before and after the game, you’ll give yourself a much better chance of succeeding in the games themselves.

That being said, here is a quick sample of what my game day routine (and morning routine) looked like and a short snippet from the Fully Equipped Playbook:

Wake Up

• Brush teeth

• Simple movements like neck circles and bent over hamstring stretch

• Ice cold shower for a couple minutes to wake my body up

• Drink 16oz. of room temperature water with couple pinches of Himalayan Salt

• Breathwork (with SilentMode/Breathonics) and meditation

• Gratitude journal

• Feed and get the kids ready with my wife

• Eat breakfast, have a coffee and look over my Most Important Tasks for the day

Pre-Game

• Arrive at field, get dressed, get treatment (if needed)

• Activate (warm-up) body, get in a workout, cage work, quick snack, head out for early work and BP

• Eat pre-game meal, breathwork/visualization for 10-20 min 

• Cup of coffee, get dressed again, watch film on starting pitcher, quick activation, hit in cage

• Now ready for GAME TIME

In-Game

• Get out there and ball out! (but seriously the in game routine section deserves it’s own post entirely)

Post-Game

• Write down 3 things I did well and 1 thing I could improve on

• Electrolyte recovery drink, cool down, stretch/foam roll, hot/cold tub or other treatment if needed

• Eat a well balanced meal to get vital nutrients for good recovery

• Go home with the family and be present

Bedtime

• Put down the phone at least 30 minutes prior to going to sleep

• Listen to a podcast or book on Optimize app

• Melatonin spray 30 min before bed

• Gratitude journal

• Brush teeth

• Get 8 to 10 hours of sleep. (Check out the blog post I did on the power of sleep for athletes. Don’t overlook this, as sleep is the #1 performance enhancer for anyone!)

Next time you’re watching a game of your favorite sport, find the player that is consistently performing at a high level. Then think about the example routine that I just laid out, and all the work that goes in before and after the game to make sure that athlete is continuing to perform their best. Hopefully, this will be motivation for you to build towards a successful routine as well!

Part 3 - Gameday Nutrition

I developed my own game day nutrition routine the same way I developed my overall game day routine: with practice and experimentation. While I’ll share some of the tips that I have and some of my favorite methods, don’t take it as gospel. There are many different options out there that you can use to build out your game day nutrition routine, and I hope that this quick rundown is just a way to get you thinking about building your own. 

Pre-Game - When it came to pregame, I wanted to make sure that I was eating something to fuel me up, but not slow me down or leave me feeling too full.

• 1-2 hours before game time - protein (chicken breast, beef jerky, etc), carb (rice, sweet potato, apple, banana, etc), healthy fat (avocado, almond butter, etc), couple glasses of water

• Just prior to game time - “shot” of raw honey 

In-Game -  It was all about trying to keep the energy levels up and stay hydrated throughout the game.

• Drink with electrolytes for hydration

• Fruit (any fruit works here)

• Sunflower seeds

• Protein bar

Post-Game - As soon as the game was over, I immediately transitioned into recovery mode with a meal designed to get my body back on the path to recovery. 

• Post-game meal: high in protein, good amount of carbs, healthy fat

• Post-workout: recovery shake (protein, greens powder, glutamine, creatine, banana, blueberries, almond butter

Being great is about being consistent. Building a routine around your schedule and your eating habits will make a massive difference in your performance. I challenge you to think about what you’re putting into your body on gameday and make a plan to introduce some changes to help you achieve optimum performance.