Carly Ponder - Assistant Sports Dietitian - Staff Directory

Staff Directory

Carly Ponder

Title:
Assistant Sports Dietitian

Carly Ponder enters her first season on the Texas Tech sports nutrition staff as she joined the athletics department in July 2025 as an assistant sports dietitian with the Red Raider football program.

Ponder assist in the day-to-day management of Texas Tech’s nutrition program where she helps oversee the nutritional needs for more than 100 football student-athletes. Alongside head football nutritionist Gentry Hicks, Ponder regularly meets with each student-athlete to help guide them to meet target weights during the season and in the offseason.

Prior to joining the Texas Tech staff, Ponder was a performance nutrition fellow at Tennessee, working with the football and women’s golf teams during the 2024-25 athletic year. She moved to Knoxville after previously serving as a sports nutrition assistant at Vanderbilt (2022-23) and as a dietetic intern at Lipscomb (2023-24).

Ponder began her career as a sports nutrition intern at Baylor where she earned her bachelor’s degree in nutrition sciences in 2022. She added a master’s in nutrition sciences from Lipscomb University in May 2024.