Tuesday 10 September 2013

What did you eat?

OK I will start this post by saying, that this is a very very personal choice, and is no way intended to be controversial so I have no intention of entering into debate about it.  I am writing it because a few friends are aware of my choice to try to live a low carb lifestyle, and have asked me to write about my fuelling for my race at Glenmore.  If you are reading this, then chances are that you already know that this weekend I ran a 12 hour race, and am absolutely delighted that I managed 50.36 miles!  So, it comes with the caveat that it worked for me, I am not advocating it for anybody else :-)

I have been trying to follow a low carb lifestyle since January 2012 and I think making a pretty good job of it - most of the time... yes there are times when we all have 'wee wobbles' but get back on it again and off we go.  The main reasons for this are to help with weight loss and to teach my body to burn fat for fuel, not to rely on carbs/sugar for fuel.
I ran a 43mile ultra at the beginning of August and fuelled on hard boiled eggs (3) organic baby food (2 pouches) yoghurt pouches (4) a couple of spoonfuls of rice pudding (to keep John happy) and an energy gel.  I drank an electrolyte drink and water from my hydration pack, 2 cans of espresso shot coffee drink and a can of Gin and tonic with cucumber.
John also runs and also eats low carb - he'll eat what's put in front of him :-) wasn't at all convinced beforehand that this type of fuelling would work, but he conceded afterwards that I must have got it pretty well right as I was at no time stressed, was lucid and put in a good performance.
So, to this weekend... Saturday's race wasn't starting til 12 noon which was good in that it gave more time to be up and awake before eating, I was always one of those folk who had to eat within half an hour of getting out of bed, or I was a mega grump, until I did a zero carb week a couple of weeks ago, since then I have hardly ever felt hungry but I wanted to make sure I'd had something substantial before I set off, so at 9.30am I had a large sirloin steak, 2 fried eggs and some strong black coffee - ACE!
(I'm not sure if I would want to eat that at 5.30am for an early morning race but will need to work on that one)
The race was a lap race, this meant that I didn't need to carry anything and could graze from my support table every lap.  It was 4 miles a lap and after settling into a rythm of about 55-65min a lap from lap 5 onwards I ate (in total):  half a hard boiled egg, 1.5 babybel cheese, 1 peperami, 1 pouch of babyfood - (apple, banana and pear I think), a 10cal jelly tub, half a banana (1/3 of which went in the bushes) a handful of blueberries ( a couple at a time), 1 espresso shots coffee can, 1 G&T, 1 can of 'fat' ginger beer and a few sips of water & electrolyte drink.  Yep that really is all in 12 hours...
At NO point in the race did I have an energy slump, neither physical nor mental and can honestly say I enjoyed every single minute of it.  It is probably the best race I have ever run and I felt amazing, mentally I was totally in control the whole time, and physically I felt like I could have just kept on going.
I'm not sure where this sits in terms of advice but can only speak from my own experience and I have never, ever felt this good.

1 comment :

  1. Yes!! It's very hard to control yourself when your favorite dish is front of you and due to weight loss session you cannot eat it.


    Regards,
    Kopi Luwak

    ReplyDelete