Let Me Pick Your Brain
I’m not a runner, but Sunday at 6:30 in the morning, I’m going to attempt to stumble through 13.1 miles of torture, being passed by those who are both much older and much younger than I, and Gatorade.
But I need help. Not being a runner (and not a morning person, thus resulting in my training happening mainly after 10 a.m.), I don’t know what to eat the day of the race. My last long run was the best time I’ve had, and right before that, I ate two chocolate chip cake cookies. Do you think that would work? Any tips or advice?
8 Comments to “Let Me Pick Your Brain”
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Carbs are good … that may be why you had good results with the cookies. I like a couple of pieces of toast and honey with gatorade before halfs.
Don’t forget the night before either. Make sure you have a good (healthy) dinner. Conventional wisdom is to carbo load with pasta, but for 13 miles it’s more psychological than anything.
BTW I’ve found that enjoying a couple of strong screwdrivers with real orange juice works well for easing tired muscles afterwards. YMMV.
Have a great run!
Don’t eat anything more than maybe a banana before you run at 6:30am. Basically just get up and go to the race. Eating a bunch will just make you queasy, especially if you are not used to it. I would eat some pasta for dinner the night before.
Don’t try anything new! If the cookies worked, repeat. One of the biggest mistakes people make before a long race is tricking up their routine. It would be like running a half in brand new shoes.
I agree with Duncan - pay special attention to the night before. If you’ve never carbo loaded, this probably isn’t the time to try. Go with what you know.
Have fun and good luck!
Dittos with what BF and Duncan have said. Because it is an early morning race it is probably more important that you have a good carb meal the night before. You might want to consider higher carbs in your diet 3-4 meals prior to the race. Those carbs should be whole grain pastas, breads, cereals and/or potatoes. If you feel like you need something in the morning dry toast or even whole grain waffles (w/o syrup) can add to your run and not contribute to any gastric heaviness.
Sport drinks can be beneficial but some authorities recommend that you cut it with water to prevent the sugars from slowing your digestion and creating stomach trouble. Look for the drinks that use complex sugars and minerals.
Alkaline ash minerals such as calcium, magnesium and potassium are important to help balance your pH out from the lactic acid that your muscles produce with work. Taking a mineral supplement for the next few days would be helpful. After the run you might take a 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda as a buffer for all these muscles acids which will spare the minerals for repair and regeneration.
I like to run with water that has a pinch of sea salt in it to keep my sodium levels up.
If I can think of anything else I will leave another post. Good luck!
I hate to play mother, but Krista forgot one VERY important detail. She’s diabetic. Really, we’re worried about her, so if anyone has special instructions for a Type I diabetic running for so long it would really help.
I think that my tips are still pretty valid. I wouldn’t add any new sport drinks if I wasn’t sure what it would do to my blood sugar. For a 13 I would definitely bring some test strips and check your glucose levels a couple of times, and especially at the end. Carry what you would normally carry in case your BG gets low. MAKE SURE YOU WEAR A DIABETIC BRACELET OR TAG so that emergency personnel have all the info they need to assess you if something happens. Otherwise you shouldn’t have any problems. Good luck again!
Hey all,
Thanks for the advice! I think I’m going to carb up Friday night, and then go with a banana, and a little bit of water the day of the race. I’ll also carry some sugar substance for the race.
I’ve read in several places that you should not carb up the night before, because those carbs won’t really get to you until the day after the race. Is this true? The pasta party for the OKC Marathon is the night before, and it was the same way with the White Rock Marathon. So who’s right? Or does it just depend on the type and amount of pasta you eat?
There are several schools of thought about carb loading and running. But basic physiology tells us that the carbs are digested pretty quick and taken up into our bodies within hours after they are eaten. As a diabetic you probably see that in your post-meal blood testing. Carbs are just as quickly utilized as fuel or energy in our body, turned into carb reserves or into fat. When you run your muscles use fat and carbs for energy. The muscles preference for energy is fat-burning, but at certain paces and distances it can’t help but use sugars from the blood stream or from reserves in the muscles. The muscles in your body will try to maintain a certain amount of carb reserve in the form of glycogen. It is carb storage. You will use these reserves when you run and then your body will want to replenish those reserves as soon possible(hence the post-run carb cravings that some people have when they run). Carb loading itself will not increase the total amount of glycogen the muscles will store, but will ensure that you will have your normal reserves. If you eat additional carbs several meals prior your race, and lay off running during that time you will probably top off your reserves and not need to carb load the night before.