Marathon Taper Nutrition

You’ve been working hard for months, getting up early to train in the dark, in the cold and wind and snow.  The big day is almost here! Make sure that you keep your focus as you finish up your season of training with the week leading up to it: the taper.

FOUNDATION:

The foundation of any runner’s diet, at any time of training, should be healthy and balanced: lean proteins, whole grains, unsaturated fats, and plenty of fruits and vegetables. A base of carbohydrates (from grains, vegetables, fruit, and dairy) should be complemented with protein and fat.

WEEK PRIOR:

Decrease intensity and duration of activity. Increase proportion of carbohydrates 3 days prior; increase even more for the last 4 days. Keep mealtimes consistent and don’t try new foods. Hydrate!

DAY BEFORE:

Don’t overeat samples at the Expo; ask to take one to try later. Stick with familiar foods that you have been successful at eating the day before a long run. These should be foods that are easy on your stomach. Attempt regular meal and snack times, and remember to hydrate. Try to get some sleep.

MORNING OF:

Keep in mind timing of waiting for the start. You may have several hours of waiting and may or may not be provided with snacks and drinks while you wait. Does that work with your race-day nutrition plan? If not, bring your own.

94 Years Old and Still Running... on Carbohydrates

If you're a runner or endurance athlete or have ever read up on sports nutrition, you are likely aware of how important carbohydrates are. They give you energy to "go the distance" and are the main source of fuel for an active lifestyle. People have even made a science of carbohydrate "loading," finding ways to pack as much carbohydrate into their body's stores before a big endurance event. I've been reading a lot about sports nutrition lately, in part because I've started a small private practice counseling athletes and also because it's a fascinating topic.

In reading the newly published 5th edition of Nancy Clark's Sports Nutrition Guidebook, she really drives home the focus on carbohydrates for athletes and how your body (and possibly performance) will suffer if you focus too much on protein or go gluten-free for no medical reason without replacing it with enough non-gluten carbohydrates.

It's no secret that carbohydrates get a bad rap in general, but if you're an athlete the cold hard truth is that you need them and they will help you if you use them right. As Nancy emphasizes, carbs don't cause you to gain weight; extra calories, especially from fat, and not enough physical activity cause you to gain weight.

I was reading an inspirational story in Parade magazine recently about Olga Kotelko, a 94 year-old track star. She's broken all sorts of records and is still going strong. Obviously they asked her about her diet, and this is part of how they reported on it:

"She is no stranger to carbs, often having toast in the morning (perhaps topped with cheese and honey) and bread again in her lunchtime sandwich."

I could be adding emphasize in the wrong places here, but when I read that I could just picture some readers across the country thinking to themselves "BREAD?! TWICE a day?!" The way that it is phrased, that she is not a stranger to carbs, seems to imply that eating bread twice a day is excessive. In reality, active people need a whole bunch of carbohydrates in order to fuel themselves properly (the amount depends on the athlete's weight and the intensity of the activity) and no one should ever be a stranger to carbs. Has your relationship with carbohydrates taken a turn for the worse? Consider making 2014 the year you mend that bond - you'll be amazed by what carbohydrates can do for you!

Get Active! Get Dirty...

So you've been a runner, you've tried the whole cycling thing, maybe even started swimming so that you could do all three and call yourself a triathlete. But where's the fun in pounding clean pavement, coasting down pristine roads, swimming in (hopefully) crystal clear waters? If you're ready to take your workouts to the next level and get good and dirty, then it might be time to try something new.

Soiled Runners

Tough Mudder Vermont 2012

When you're ready to combine running with getting good and dirty, plenty of options await you. Perhaps you want to get dirty but not covered in dirt - then you could find a local Color Run where you where white and get pelted with colored corn starch during the race so that you end up looking like a rainbow. Or if you need obstacles mixed with dirt, try a Warrior Dash, a 5K that has boot-camp style elements. Want to mix in some blood with that dirt? Take it one step further and do Tough Mudder race, where not only do you have obstacles which will likely involve you falling into cold water, running through fire, and on your hands and knees in the mud, but you get shocked by electrical wires at the very end, after jumping (and smacking yourself up against) a half pipe which is, of course, covered in water and mud.

Riding Rugged
I always assumed that if you were a cyclist and you wanted to get dirty, you picked up mountain biking. Mountain bikers, in my experience, enjoyed the dirt, liked the fly recklessly down bumpy mountainsides with their fat knobby tires, and did very little uphill riding. Well, turns out that if you want to get your skinny tires dirty, there is a sport for you too! I recently attended the Gran Prix of Gloucester, a championship cyclocross race. In cyclocross, participants ride several laps of a course featuring any number of obstacles such as sand, stairs, wooden risers, hairpin turns, muddy pits, etc - all on a road bike (or a special cyclocross bike which looks a whole lot like a road bike). Sometimes they have to dismount and un-clip their pedals, or if they're really skilled they can bunny hop up and over (jumping while still on your bike). The riding goes on for approximately 45 minutes and whoever finishes the course first wins! For local races in your area, check out the race calendar.

Gran Prix of Gloucester 2012

Gran Prix of Gloucester 2012

Love that Dirty Water
I like to at least pretend that all of the water that I swim in is clean - or at least a very safe level of unclean - so I won't focus on races you can do if you're a swimmer who wants to get dirty. However, because of the nickname, here is information on the Charles River Swim, a 1-mile race that takes place each June, assuming that the water has been deemed safe and free of toxic algae by the government...

A Sneak Peek at the Copenhagen Marathon Expo

Today I had the opportunity to explore the Copenhagen Marathon Expo! The race is tomorrow and while I won't be here to watch the 12,000 or so runners, I didn't want to miss my chance to see the expo since I've spent quite a bit of time at marathon expos in the states. I was mostly curious about the sports nutrition products that are being marketed in Europe and got some great photos and information from vendors, as well as several samples to bring back home to try. However, that information requires some additional research. Time (as well as internet access) is precious at the moment so I'll just post one photo and the promise of a post regarding European sports nutrition, to come. If you're curious about my trip to Denmark, with most of my time spent eating and drinking rather than being active, check out Mother and Daughter Spiser.

In Danish, "Pace Setter" translates to "Fart Holder"

"Wear as few clothes as decently possible..."

Marathon runners coming through!

So said an e-mail sent to runners who qualified for the Boston Marathon this year. The weather in Boston has been fairly cool recently. However, today on Patriot's Day (aka BOSTON MARATHON DAY), it reached almost 90 degrees. I've spectated at races that have been unexpectedly extremely hot  and it's been a mess: officials telling runners part way through that the race was shutting down and they should stop running, runners not listening to them and continuing to run despite the removal of services like water and medical support. Not a good idea. I was impressed by the way that the Boston Athletic Association handled this year's heat wave. A few days before the race they decided to give runners the option to defer until next year if they didn't feel safe running in the heat. They advised people who had never run a marathon before not to run (aka the charity runners because all other runners had run at least one marathon before to qualify for Boston). If you did decide to run, they advised that you wear as little clothing as possible. They added mist tents, more water, and cooling stations inside buildings like churches and schools.

My favorite long-run fuel; strawberry Clif Shot Bloks

The Boston Marathon weekend is always a fun one for me and this year was no different. I spent Friday and Saturday working in the Clif Bar booth at the marathon expo. I love chatting with runners about how to incorporate Clif products into their training and racing plans and hearing people's stories about their favorite flavors or when a Clif Bar saved their life (you'd be surprised how many people have a story like this, often about a hiking trip). Then on Sunday I volunteer at the expo for registration and get to give runners their number and answer any questions they might have about the course, the buses in the morning, etc.

Then comes the day itself... Marathon Monday. There are always masses of bikers that wake up early and cycle the 26.2 miles to Hopkinton and back. I've never felt quite ready enough to do that in mid-April but I did bike 7.5 miles of the course out and back this morning, covering Heartbreak Hill and getting to Wellesley and back. It was fun seeing all of the spectators getting their chairs set up, seeing the volunteers prepping the water station, the kids writing on the streets with sidewalk chalk. After the bike ride I got to relax and cheer on the 27,000 runners from mile 23. I gave out sunscreen, my friends gave away free popsicles, and we helped a runner or two who needed some extra support.

Always trust a pale girl to bring the SPF 70 to the party

All-in-all it was an exhausting weekend - and I didn't even run the marathon! But it was well worth it. If you're curious about how many calories working at an expo, biking part of the marathon course, or cheering for hours can burn, stay tuned for an upcoming post because I had my metabolic armband on through it all... And if you're interested in trying to qualify for Boston, the guy behind No Meat Athlete has a new business called Run Your BQ (Boston Qualifier). Good luck!