Green tea is a leaf and therefore a vegetable.

If you buy loose green tea rather than tea bags, then the brewed / cooked leaves are large and resemble chopped cooked cabbage leaves. It’s unusual that so many of these leaves are thrown away. Tea can be bought in whole leaf, normal ground tealeaves or as a powder. Like any green leaf they are packed with nutrients and the tea from green tea leaves is a powerful drink subjected to many studies over the years in the east and the west. The tea contains many nutrients but the leaves left behind contain many more including Theanine and important amino acid not easily obtained in the diet except from tea and mushrooms. Theanine is closely linked with calm and relaxation as it crosses the brain barrier easily and is a precursor to many brain chemicals and neurotransmitters such as seratonin and may be of great benefit to athletes under stress of competition. Theanine itself boosts the productivity of T cells (Kamath A et al) as already mentioned is vital to physically stressed athletes who often have a taxed immune system.

The leaves are rich in many nutrients and it’s a shame to waste them. Green tea is so high in polyphenols (anti oxidants) and vitamins and minerals that it’s too good to waste. Green tea leaves can be put in stuffings, soups, chewed, mixed with other greens, or used as a ground health drink see just below in addition to any other way they can be prepared or added to foods and breakfast cereals.

The Rude Health show this year at the RDS had a stand promoting Matcha green tea, where they were handing out free tea all weekend. Matcha is an expensive powdered green tea (the whole leaf). http://www.twohillstea.com/index.php/green-tea/about-tea

Green tea is freely available in supermarkets and health food shops and is nearly as cheap in organic form as it is for Tetley’s in Tesco! I recommend only the high quality organic ones as there is much controversy over pesticides used in rural community farms so far from civilisation in china that the authorities may not travel to inspect them!

Beneficial traits associated with green tea include:

Cancer reduction. (Cancer and free radicals are linked so its relevant to athletes and non athletes)
Cholesterol reduction (no direct links but stress and cholesterol are linked weakly to heart disease and free radicals are more closely linked so combined, cholesterol lowering effects are important.)
Weight loss aid (crucial to many athletes and beneficial to anyone wanting to reduce fat)
Blood clot prevention (athletes dehydrate and blood thickens resulting in risk of clots)
Blood sugar control (absolutely vital for athletes for performance and for stable energy in non athletes)
Anti viral, and anti bacterial (These powers are well discussed in the literature)

All these can benefit the health and performance of an athlete or non athlete.
This is quite amazing for a simple cheap cup of tea.

Green tea has one of the longest lists of nutrients compared to hundreds of herbs in my books. I’m not going to type them all but there are loads of vitamins, minerals, aminos, calcium, zinc and many more minerals and a huge list of phytonutrients. (Healthy plant chemicals.)
Surprisingly it does contain caffeine but in much smaller amounts to normal tea and coffee. Caffeine can benefit athletes in many ways especially in sports where concentration speed and agility is needed (most sport). For non-athletes a small trickle of caffeine along with the theanine found in green tea can help keep you nicely alert while staying calm, good for stressful situations.

In addition there are many more in the region of 30-40 phytochemicals many of which have therapeutic properties.

• Green tea contains polyphenols, which are powerful antioxidants.
• EGCG (a polyphenol) has been shown to protect DNA in the cells from hydrogen peroxide, which is a potent free radical (damaging molecules).
• Elizabeth Lipski says that the polyphenols in green tea are responsible for lowering cholesterol, tumours and ulcers. She also states that polyphenols also increase the beneficial bacteria in the intestinal tract while clostridium was reduced.
• Cathechins (phytochemicals in green tea) are associated with liver repair along with Silymarin (Milk Thistle).
• Patrick Holford says that green tea is drunk at an average of 3 cups a day in Japan and their cancer rate is lower. He states that many studies have showed the phytonutrients in green tea to have better cancer preventing properties that vitamin A & C.  That’s a bold statement! And he does reference the studies.

I have outlined the therapeutic benefits of the chemicals in green tea. Green tea provides various anti oxidants such as, phenols, vitamins with the help of aminos and minerals. It has very small caffeine content compared to many beverages on the market so that’s a good trait. Its cheap and freely available and hardly a calorie in it.
As a social beverage which it is, I would recommend it to my clients and show a positive comparison with cocoa, coffee, “black” tea or “normal” tea (Tetley’s, Typhoo, Lyons). Although other teas have no calories and some phytonutrients, I believe that the quality and content is not as good as high quality green tea.

I have excluded the physiological pathways and digestion and metabolism of the nutrients in this question. Similar to the wonderful garlic, the anti, fungal, antioxidant, and anti bacterial properties in green tea have been shown to assist our bodies and certainly athletes, in a similar fashion to the nutrients found in garlic and other quality herbs and foods.  
But don’t forget to eat some leaves! Don’t throw away the best bit!

Brendan Murphy
Phone: 087-7874050
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WEB: www.personaltraining.ie

^ Kamath A, Wang L, Das H, Li L, Reinhold V, Bukowski J (2003). "Antigens in tea-beverage prime human Vgamma 2Vdelta 2 T cells in vitro and in vivo for memory and nonmemory antibacterial cytokine responses". Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 100 (10): 6009-14. PMID 12719524.