You’ve put the training hours in. The early mornings and the late nights. The infinite number of Monday mornings where your only response to “how was your weekend?” has consistently been “oh you know, mainly just training really.” That race or event you’ve been working hard towards is just around the corner, and it’s time to make sure you’ve got everything covered so you can do your training justice and, most importantly, enjoy your time out on the race course.
We all focus on training our bodies to prepare for an event. But it can be all too easy to neglect the nutrition side of things – which can lead to disastrous consequences come race day. It doesn’t matter how fit you are, get your nutrition wrong and the only line you’ll be sprinting for is the line for the loo! But get it right, and you’ll be racing strong and feeling epic.
Check out our race day fuelling tips to help you nail your nutrition strategy and optimise your performance…
Before your event
When we talk about race nutrition, you might just think about the gels or bars you’ll take during the event. In actual fact, your race day nutrition needs to start a few days before your event to help maximise stored carbohydrates, hydration levels and to reduce the risk of stomach issues. Food can take up to 72 hours to move through your digestive tract, so what you eat in the days leading up to the race can have an impact come race morning.
How to carb load effectively
Carb loading refers to increasing your intake of carbohydrates – such as pasta, rice and potatoes – in the days leading up to an event to increase the amount of stored glycogen in your muscles and liver. Glycogen is your body’s fuel, so when you’re taking part in an endurance event lasting over 90 minutes you’ll definitely want to start with a full tank! By maximising the levels of glycogen your body has available before you start your race, the idea is that you’ll have more energy available to you once you get going – helping you to perform at your best and stave off fatigue.
The mistake we can often make with carb loading is to increase our intake too much, which can lead to bloating and stomach upsets. Not ideal! Instead of increasing the overall volume of what you’re eating, think about the balance of what’s on your plate: increase the amount of carbohydrate while slightly reducing the fat, protein and fibre content so that you’re not left feeling overly full. Performance nutritionist Barbara Cox-Lovesy also suggests spreading the intake of carbohydrate foods and drinks over smaller and more frequent meals or snacks, and ensuring you’re increasing your fluid intake as carbohydrates need water to be stored.
Reduce fibre intake
Day to day, we know that having a diet rich in fibre is essential for good health and wellbeing. But a large consumption of high fibre foods can also lead to gastrointestinal discomfort such as bloating, cramping or unwanted porta-potty dashes during exercise. If you tend to have a sensitive stomach or have suffered from GI issues during events in the past, it can be worth reducing your fibre intake a day or so before your race to reduce the risk of stomach issues. Choose simply carbohydrates such as white bread, rice, pasta and peeled white potatoes and reduce your portions of fruit and vegetables the day before your event.
Top up your hydration levels
Hydration is key for performing at your best. Just as you’ll want to make sure you’ve got a full tank of fuel before you start your event, you’ll also want to be adequately hydrated so you’ve got a reservoir of electrolytes – essential for muscle function – to draw upon once your event is underway. Check out our Hydration blog for some top tips on staying hydrated during training and racing.
Practice your event nutrition strategy in training
The best way to find out what nutrition works best for you, is practicing it! We’ll often train using the gels, sports drinks or bars we intend to use on race day to make sure our stomach (and our tastebuds) can tolerate them. Do the same with your pre-event meals. Choose a weekend where you’ve got a couple of big training sessions to tick off and practice gradually increasing your carbohydrate intake 1-3 days beforehand, test out the main meal you intend to eat the day before your race and that all-important race morning breakfast. This will help you to identify any potential issues and fine tune your nutrition strategy so that you don’t have to stress about it in the busy few days before your race.
Bonus tip for early race starts
This is probably most relevant for my fellow triathletes out there, who will be all too familiar with the 3am alarm call to get down to transition ready to hit the start line before the sun has even had a chance to fully rise! Early starts can wreak havoc on your stomach and make it difficult to force your pre-race breakfast down. My top tip is to have your main meal at lunch time the day before, followed by a lighter snack in the evening. That way you’re less likely to wake up feeling bloated and full up on race morning, making it easier to get that last bit of fuel on board. Barbara Cox-Lovesy also suggests avoiding a heavy carb late at night, as this can send your blood sugar levels into a roller coaster that will affect your sleep – which is the last thing you want when you’ve already got pre-race nerves keeping you up at night!
Again, practice what works best for you in terms of what you eat but as an example, I’ll have: plain white rice and tuna for lunch the day before my race, followed by a peanut butter and jam sandwich for dinner and then a pre-race breakfast of rice pudding with maple syrup. Wherever possible, I’ll try and have that pre-race breakfast 2-3 hours before I’m due to start the race so it’s had time to go down. For middle and long distance races, I’ll generally top up my energy levels shortly before the race start with a gel or a few jelly babies to make sure I’m fired up and ready to go for the swim.
On race day
Pre-race meal
While nerves and excitement might mean you don’t particularly feel like eating before your race, it’s important to try and top up your energy levels. Barbara Cox-Lovesy gives the following guidance for planning your pre-race meal:
- Eat 1-4 hours before the event, depending on personal preferences, event intensity, length and starting time. The closer the meal to the event start, the smaller the meal should be.
- Choose foods which are familiar, easily digested and low in fat and fibre to help stomach and intestine emptying prior to the event and minimise gut upsets.
- Opt for high carbohydrate food such as cereal with low-fat milk or pancakes with honey, jam or maple syrup.
Remember the golden rule: nothing new on race day. This applies to your nutrition as well as your kit. The race hotel breakfast buffet might be full of tempting things, but maybe save trying that unidentified bowl of something interesting-looking until after your race, just in case.
Beat the bonk: Top up your energy levels throughout the event
Once your race has started it’s vital to keep topping up your energy levels, to avoid “bonking” – a horrible sensation where you feel like you’re running on fumes, energy levels drop and it becomes impossible to maintain your pace/effort or even to finish the race. What you take on – for example energy gels, jellied sweets etc., and how often is largely down to your individual preferences and the length of your event. Our bodies all react differently, so while sports nutrition companies will have a one size fits all recommendation, it really is best to practice taking on different amounts of fuel at different intervals during training to work out what’s best for you.
For guidance, Barbara Cox-Lovesy suggests aiming for 30-60g of carbohydrate per hour. Once you’ve practiced your race nutrition in training, you can work out exactly how much you need to carry with you and have a clear plan about when you’ll take it.
Bonus tip: Always carry a “just in case” emergency gel/bar/whatever it is you plan to use. If you end up taking longer to complete the event than planned, or have an energy gel falling down the loo half way through an Ironman marathon incident… you’ll be grateful you’ve got some extra fuel on you!
When the race is on and the adrenaline is pumping, it can be all too easy to forget to keep fuelling up. If you’re using a bike computer or a sports watch, many of them now have functionality where you can set up an alert at set time intervals to remind you to eat or drink. This is also where choosing nutrition which not only sits well in your stomach, but which you actually like the taste of really helps. You’re far more likely to keep fuelling well if you enjoy eating the snacks you’ve got in your back pocket!
Remember, once you start to feel hungry or thirsty – you’re already fire-fighting. So eat up, drink up and don’t wait until you think you need it. It’ll already be too late!
Want more training and racing tips? Check out some of our recent blog posts:
How to Train and Race in the Heat
10 Ways to Improve Your Performance
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