Beef liver in their meals is helping Japan’s World Cup squad prepare for matches at high altitude in South Africa.
Beef liver, popular as a stamina builder and fatigue beater in everyday Japanese cuisine, contains a lot of iron which produces the oxygen-transporting hae-moglobin in the red blood cells. “We serve liver by stir-frying it or cooking it Chinese style,” Japanese team spokesman Ichirota Fukushi said. “It’s aimed at supplying iron.”
He added that beef liver was also served while the team trained at an altitude of 1,800 metres in the Swiss Alps resort for about 10 days before they arrived at their base camp.