Fueling/Hydrating For Races Longer Than 90 Minutes
The Night Before
Eat a well-balanced meal the night before, emphasizing (but not overdoing) carbs. Carbohydrates contribute to glycogen stores.
General Rule of Thumb: Fueling and Hydrating During The Race
For races longer than 90 minutes consume enough carbohydrates to maintain normal blood sugar level and to spare your muscle glycogen. A general rule of thumb is to consume about 100 calories or carbohydrates after an hour of exercising and another 100 calories every 40 to 45 minutes after that, ideally as a carbohydrate drink or gel (better than bars which can be hard to digest). Many gels, gummies, or sports beans come in 100-calorie packets. Drink a half cup of liquid every 15 to 20 minutes.
Race Day Timing
2 to 3 hours before the race:
Eat a light, low-fiber carbohydrate meal such as a bagel or cereal and a banana two to four hours before your race – low-fiber food that is easily digested such as cereals, toast, and a banana. No carbohydrates, especially simple sugars, should be ingested within two hours of the start; this can lead to a blood insulin reaction causing weakness and fatigue.
Drink 16 – 20 ounces of water, giving your body time to process extra fluid. It takes one to one and a half hours to eliminate excess fluids through urination, so you don’t want to have to urinate at the starting line or soon after you start.
Within 45 minutes before the start:
Drink only water. Cold water will empty from your stomach faster than a sports drink. If you want, drink another a cup of water 10 to 15 minutes before the gun goes off. Since your kidneys shut down when you start running, last-minute fluid intake doesn’t reach the kidneys and will remain in your body available for sweat. How much caffeine you should consume depends on the desired effect. If it’s muscular, you’d need a significant 3-4mg caffeine per kg of bodyweight. That’s up to 320mg (three cups of coffee) for an 80kg athlete. One strategy is to have a strong coffee before the start and top up with caffeinated gels or cola.
Within 20 minutes of the start:
Chew two sticks of run gum or a caffeinated gel. As Joe Maloy writes on the MOVE! website, (https://www.movegoals.com/caffeine.html), caffeine intake “caffeine intake can be strategically timed to deliver performance benefits—both making a hard effort feel easier and helping to keep you focused during a race.”
For An Olympic Triathlon....
About 10 to 20 minutes after getting on the bike, have a gel with about 100 calories and a half a cup of water or a half of a cup of a sports drink with 100 calories.
Then every 20 minutes for the rest of the bike and run think about hydrating with a half a cup of water and fueling with 50 to 100 calories.
Within 30 minutes of finishing a race, replace lost nutrients by consuming carbs and proteins. Chocolate milk is an optimal recovery drink because it provides the ideal carbohydrate:protein ratio of 4:1. Carbohydrates replenish glycogen stores, and protein halts muscle breakdown (helps build and repair muscle) during your race. Eating antioxidants like cherries help clear the oxidative stress.
The Night Before
Eat a well-balanced meal the night before, emphasizing (but not overdoing) carbs. Carbohydrates contribute to glycogen stores.
General Rule of Thumb: Fueling and Hydrating During The Race
For races longer than 90 minutes consume enough carbohydrates to maintain normal blood sugar level and to spare your muscle glycogen. A general rule of thumb is to consume about 100 calories or carbohydrates after an hour of exercising and another 100 calories every 40 to 45 minutes after that, ideally as a carbohydrate drink or gel (better than bars which can be hard to digest). Many gels, gummies, or sports beans come in 100-calorie packets. Drink a half cup of liquid every 15 to 20 minutes.
Race Day Timing
2 to 3 hours before the race:
Eat a light, low-fiber carbohydrate meal such as a bagel or cereal and a banana two to four hours before your race – low-fiber food that is easily digested such as cereals, toast, and a banana. No carbohydrates, especially simple sugars, should be ingested within two hours of the start; this can lead to a blood insulin reaction causing weakness and fatigue.
Drink 16 – 20 ounces of water, giving your body time to process extra fluid. It takes one to one and a half hours to eliminate excess fluids through urination, so you don’t want to have to urinate at the starting line or soon after you start.
Within 45 minutes before the start:
Drink only water. Cold water will empty from your stomach faster than a sports drink. If you want, drink another a cup of water 10 to 15 minutes before the gun goes off. Since your kidneys shut down when you start running, last-minute fluid intake doesn’t reach the kidneys and will remain in your body available for sweat. How much caffeine you should consume depends on the desired effect. If it’s muscular, you’d need a significant 3-4mg caffeine per kg of bodyweight. That’s up to 320mg (three cups of coffee) for an 80kg athlete. One strategy is to have a strong coffee before the start and top up with caffeinated gels or cola.
Within 20 minutes of the start:
Chew two sticks of run gum or a caffeinated gel. As Joe Maloy writes on the MOVE! website, (https://www.movegoals.com/caffeine.html), caffeine intake “caffeine intake can be strategically timed to deliver performance benefits—both making a hard effort feel easier and helping to keep you focused during a race.”
For An Olympic Triathlon....
About 10 to 20 minutes after getting on the bike, have a gel with about 100 calories and a half a cup of water or a half of a cup of a sports drink with 100 calories.
Then every 20 minutes for the rest of the bike and run think about hydrating with a half a cup of water and fueling with 50 to 100 calories.
Within 30 minutes of finishing a race, replace lost nutrients by consuming carbs and proteins. Chocolate milk is an optimal recovery drink because it provides the ideal carbohydrate:protein ratio of 4:1. Carbohydrates replenish glycogen stores, and protein halts muscle breakdown (helps build and repair muscle) during your race. Eating antioxidants like cherries help clear the oxidative stress.