ND could probably save millions simply by placing chocolate milk dispensers throughout the Gug.
in place as part of a collective bargaining settlement, so quality of facilities will likely go back to playing an important role in recruiting.
if some sort of draft/distribution is put into place, then maybe not.
Although I think one could argue it might create adverse selection, at least for ND in the new world order.
Golden came to ND after a 6-year stint in the NFL.
He also shares his viewpoint on players eating/co-mingling with other non-football-playing students at ND
doubt the nutritional program is an issue. The one consistent complaint I hear from my daughter and her friends is the offerings in the dining halls are abysmal. Simple fresh fruit is rarely available outside of apples. It just doesn't seem to be a priority for the University because they sure have the resources. Hoping these improvements for the team somehow spill over for the students.....won't hold my breath though.
have berries at meetings to entice people to show up, because the dining hall never had them.
...See here: South Dining Hall menus.
The choices are not exactly reflective of a whole-food plant-based diet, but there are resources to get fruit and vegetables. For dinner tonight,. for example, they list (as for every meal, it seems) apples, oranges, and bananas as fruit choices. A salad bar includes iceberg lettuce (thumbs down for that), spinach, and "locally grown salad greens." Under "Vegan," they list carrots, celery, flax seed, and almonds along with hummus and a few other items. The pasta stir fry allows you to choose tomatoes, broccoli, and mushrooms.
Our younger daughter ('20) lived in Farley and went to the NDH, and I ate there maybe a half-dozen time during her tenure, and got into the SDH, my old haunt, a few times as well. Is it foodie-quality stuff? Not really. Is it minimally adequate? I'd say so. Abysmal seems a bit more than how I'd describe it. There are also a lot of choices outside of the dining halls that include outlets that match the trend towards healthier quick-service food. For example, there was a Mediterranean spot in the Hesburgh Center where you could get a salad or a rice bowl with Naf Naf Grill-style toppings--garbanzos, baba ganouj, etc. Flip Kitchen in the Huddle area of LaFortune has rice bowls, salads, smoothies, and flatbreads. In the last several months I was there and had a Thai style chicken bowl with carrots, lettuce, Chinese cabbage, and other stuff.
I can’t speak to all the offerings, but I know there was ample fresh fruit options when we took the kids to the dining hall last fall. And I would highly doubt there are fewer fruit options than there were when I was a student.
Certainly making food for such large numbers has its challenges, and there are likely still more options that are carb-heavy or fried. And an athletics program policing choices is another challenge when there are options with varying nutritional value. But it’s not hard to get salad with grilled chicken and hard-boiled eggs if we’re just talking about access to nutritional food.
for an Epicurean delight!
I must admit that when I was a kid I LOVED this stuff. I would bet my Mom to buy it. Although she was no health nut, she rarely would. I remember the big cans of it, and you'd punch out a triangle-shaped hole on each side and it would come glug-glug-gluging out. So delicious. And, as the commercial makes clear, loaded with good for you fruit, too.
the kids but we've heard plenty of jokes about how the menus are far more favorable when there are lots of parents anticipated to be in town (Admitted students weekends, etc). My kid isn't super picky so honestly I've been surprised about the complaints regarding food. I didn't have any complaints back in the 90s!
The university could certainly have the nutritionists and chefs and cooks do their stuff at the dining halls.
Perhaps they can grant regular students access to the training tables at Swarbrick Memorial Food Hall.
Dan Devine had what he called training table, which was really that the team ate together in the North Dining Hall.
lived in Grace and Flanner back then.
Training table had steak regularly. It was the same bad steak that other students only got at Sunday brunch after a home football win.
but didn't make them come back for seconds. Could ask for a little more. And Wednesdays were special as that was Steak and Shrimp night, which was never on the regular menu.
As you said , it was the same food. SDH stayed open until 7pm during the week for athletes. Sometimes it was a brisk walk in crappy weather to make it by 7. Then another walk back to North Quad.
Infamous winter workouts/pukefests.
to solve for the state-of-the-art equipment problem?
which would be convenient for degree-seeking players that have class at DeBartolo, etc.
Plenty of chairs, no eating in hallway.
from comments on MF's podcasts and others, it was a kitchen issue, space issue as players were eating in hallways and , with the increase in analysts and recruiting staff, there was a space issue for football staff. The medical recovery area also was mentioned as deficient in size and equipment. There may have been more, but those issues were the ones I remember.
solve for that problem?
Also, the article listed "other amenities" but strangely didn't list them out specifically. Do we have any information on what those amenities might be?
We don’t have dedicated art rooms for all our elementary school. Quick! Tear down the buildings and build three brand-new ones for $100 million before the levy from the high school renovations expires in January to disguise how much the project really costs the taxpayers even though though the district has achieved excellent educational outcomes with these facilities that are deemed deficient based on a standard that isn’t tied to their ability to achieve educational outcomes.
I get the need to have nice work space to attract and retain the best (and to deliver), but the investment seems out of whack with what the true driving forces are of both schools and college football.
I also understand some rich donor may want his name on a tangible building instead of a few years' worth of player payroll.
solve for that problem?
Therefore I cannot provide you an intelligent or an informed answer you your question.
What I did was point out something that is happening despite the repeated denials of several board members who do not have any information on the subject.
"in the hallway." Although, my follow-up questions would be:
1) how many players, how many times?
2) are players required now to all eat at the same time creating a numbers game bottleneck?
3) what is the existing capacity/square footage and what additional space is required.
I also don't think anyone is denying football players are eating fast food on occasion. I had lunch at Duncan last summer on a drive to Ohio. A table of 5-6 freshmen players were next to me and eating Chik Fil A.
My follow-up questions to that would be:
1) does ND have an issue that other schools do not? Do players at Michigan and Georgia, et al. never eat fast food, in other words?
2) does ND have an accountability or commitment issue with its players (I doubt it, but is that what ND is saying when they push the story that fast food eating is a reason for building a $100M edifice)?
not find satisfactory.
Sports science is a field which has seen rapid growth over the 5-10 years. Nutrition, sleep, recovery, etc are all exploding in a rather rapid manner. The technology available has fundamentally changed the game so to speak. Programs from high school to the the pros are utilizing wearables to track almost everything now.
To my mind, this new facility will place Notre Dame in a position to leverage this new data and optimize both player performance and player health.
Now, is this a stated reason for the new facility? Most probably not. Most people don’t deep dive on this subject like I have (don’t ask why). It’s far easier to make generic statements that will be more easily digested by the general public. Is this also a deviation from the Notre Dame of old? Most definitely. But this is where sports are in 2024. We can either evolve or die.
prepared and served and eaten at the North and South Dining Halls.
I suggest you might educate yourself on what alumni are trying to explain to you.
It is a bad, bad, bad thing to segregate and sequester the players from the student body for mealtime and for study time. Those are two things that should not be done with the team. If you can't understand it, then bow the fuck out and go listen to your weirdo teetotaling Andrew Huberman podcast.
It's going to be a 30 minute or more round trip from the sports complex to the dining hall, right? With the packed schedule of a Division 1 athlete, one might argue that those 30-90 minutes a day (depending on how many meals need to be taken from the sports complex) could be better spent. Particularly during the season.
Another argument might be that the athletes are already eating later than the student body (thus the dining halls having special later hours for athletes) so they are already segregated by timing, even if they're sharing a space.
I tend to agree that having the football team sequestered completely in their own palace is counter to what has made Notre Dame unique. Of course, that has been slowly eroding for a long time.
Then to the dorm then to the library then party schooling and Im not fooling. Kegs ducks and grain. That's the ruling.
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Its a nice idea to have all ND students co-mingle, but schedules need to be taken into consideration as well.
Football athletes are generally hitting the weight room first thing in the morning, before they head to breakfast. Practice is in the afternoon, before heading to dinner. So, there's going to be natural segregation just from that perspective.
Maybe the right solution would be to open up the Gug dining facilities to others so that our athletes can invite their non-athlete friends to join them for meals. Lunches can only be had at NDH/SDH since there aren't schedule conflicts.
As a point of fact, I do happen to know quite a bit about dining is done for athletes and students at Notre Dame. If you would like to have that discussion, I am more than open to having it with you.
If you want to continue to insult me at every turn, you can sit on it and rotate. I’m frankly done with your childish taunts and sophomoric behavior.
Nonsense.
We just spent $450 million on a football stadium. Methinks we can find the analysts a few cubicles over there.
It is just a giant load of crap.