Palmeiras star Gabriel Menino said that he felt he was “about to die” after trying to emulate former Manchester United striker Cristiano Ronaldo’s diet.
The Portuguese’s demanding physical regimen has consistently drawn notice, and it is a part of his career that he has maintained as he approaches his 40th birthday. A lot of players have attempted to imitate Ronaldo’s diet and training after the forward had remarkable performances in his late years.
Gabriel Menino, who plays as a midfielder for Brazilian club Palmeiras, also thought by trying Ronaldo’s diet he will improve, but it was not at all what he expected. The 22 year old recently spoke in an interview with Palmeiras Cast, “I wanted to lose weight a bit and gain more muscle,”
“I called Mirtes, Palmeiras’ nutritionist, and asked her to make me a Cristiano Ronaldo diet. I wanted to look like Cristiano Ronaldo.”
He then described the diet, “The diet was like this: breakfast was an egg and supplement. Pre-workout was a supplement, lunch could be grilled and salad,”
“For breakfast, it was more supplement, for dinner, again, grilled meat and salad, and before going to bed another supplement. That was it”.
He then described how the diet didn’t help him as he expected and how he thought he would die, “I was warming up and couldn’t take any more running. I just thought, ‘I’m going to die.’ Five minutes into the game, I couldn’t run anymore, I would need to be substituted”.
“She [Mirtes] saw from above that I was not well. She asked the masseur to bring me gel and isotonic. I took advantage of the fact that Weverton was in attendance and consumed it.”
Gabriel Menino (Palmeiras player)
— CristianoXtra (@CristianoXtra_) March 1, 2023
"I wanted to lose weight a bit and gain more muscle. I spoke to the nutritionist & said I wanted to go on Cristiano's diet. On the second day of following the diet, I ran for five minutes after which I fell and was going to die from this diet." pic.twitter.com/XiV48K8llr
While Menino could not work with this diet, Ronaldo became one of the world’s best players even in his post-30 years. Ronaldo had to leave Europe due to disagreements with his former club Manchester United and joined the Saudi Pro League club Al Nassr where he is still performing, scoring eight goals in five games for the club.
While at United, Ronaldo was said to make personal requests to the staff to give him some of his favorite foods. Many of his teammates there gave up dessert after seeing Ronaldo and regularly asked the staff what Ronaldo was eating to emulate his success.
Jose Blesal, Al Nassr’s nutritionist, has also spoken highly of Ronaldo, “Every conversation with him [Ronaldo] is a learning curve.”
“We met and talked about his diet, about how he understands the importance of this and rest for performance. He wears two rest meters: the ring and the bracelet. He is the first to arrive at training and the last to leave. Dealing with him is wonderful.
“Cristiano helps me a lot because we can no longer teach him anything, but he creates a school around him. The rest of the players do what he does because everything he does is wonderful to improve his performance. Since he has been here, all the players have trained more intensely and followed a stricter diet.”
Jose Bellisa (Nutritionist at Al Nassr):
— The CR7 Timeline. (@TimelineCR7) February 20, 2023
"Since Cristiano Ronaldo started training with Al Nassr, every player at the club has been training more intensively and following a strict diet." pic.twitter.com/vvwcammol6
Clearly, Cristiano continues to inspire all types of people around him. While we can only imagine how he manages to keep up his monstrous diet, we can clearly see the benefits of it on the pitch.
