The Running Thread - 2019

[run.minnie.miles]

QOTD: How did you figure out you needed some nutrition on longer runs? Advice from others, self-learning from bonking, etc? Did you do much testing of different types of nutrition? Gu/other Gels/sports bean/liquid?

I am one of those people that likes too much information- so I'm not sure where I first learned about the need to fuel, but I accepted it as common way before I started running longer distances.

As far as actually putting it into practice, I used regular food for the longest time and didn't realize that it wasn't working that well. When I started marathon training last fall, I transitioned to typical running fuels and used (and liked) a variety of sport beans (my fav), gus and blocks. Using this made a big difference! I will also say that after several hours of fruity/sweet things, salty things post-marathon tasted SO good.

 

[BuckeyeBama]

ATTQOTD - I guess that I have always run, so I have always known. As I have gotten older and slower I have required more fuel. But I still do not need to fuel for runs shorter than 16 miles.

Related - I carry water for runs longer than 7 miles in the summer heat, and longer than 10 miles in the winter. The hydration has been harder for me to get exactly right than the fueling. I run out and backs, so if I don't carry enough water for a particular run from the start, I suffer from slowed paces late in a run (no place to buy water and no water fountains along my routes).

 

[ChattaDIS]

Another source for possible discount shoes: LeftLane Sports

Just ordered two pairs and found a promo code on top of their prices. Less than $100 shipped for both. Definitely a fan so far. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[avondale]

So for today's QOTD: How did you figure out you needed some nutrition on longer runs? Advice from others, self-learning from bonking, etc? Did you do much testing of different types of nutrition? Gu/other Gels/sports bean/liquid?

ATTQOTD: A combination of reading about it and (maybe) bonking once or twice. I partly run to help control weight, so it sort of annoys me to take in calories while I'm running. But I can see that it's needed.

I try to get most of my calories and electrolytes through sports drinks, because I have very slow digestion. I'm not sure how much of anything solid actually gets into my system. When I do something solid, I use sport beans - mostly because I don't like the stickiness of GUs. I eat the whole bag of sport beans continuously at once - chew one until it's gone, have the next, repeat. Then drink after the bag.

Follow-up question: on a hot/humid day, how do you tell the difference between bonking and heat exhaustion? This has been a question for me and why I'm not sure if I've bonked or just gotten into heat exhaustion.

 

[ChattaDIS]

July Running totals

Distance: 130.24 miles
Avg. Pace: 9:40
Elevation: 2,877 ft

Total miles for 2019: 712

July was a good month for me considering I juggled the heat, humidity and thunderstorms in Virginia AND the 110+ heat in Phoenix during vacation and still took a week off for hiking and relaxing. During Vacation in Utah & Arizona, I managed to squeeze in a "Forest Gump"
inspired run at Monument Valley, and another at Lake Powell the next morning. Beautiful places to run and visit. Also did family hikes at Rainbow Bridge, Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon, and Pinnacle Peak (in PHX). View attachment 421905View attachment 421906View attachment 421910

Monument Valley (AZ/UT border)
Antelope Canyon (on the left)

Loved antelope Canyon. so Awesome.

 

[sky13]

Today's run was amazing!

For the last few weeks I've been thinking that I need to step up my distances a little (in preparation for Wine and Dine challenge). For the last few months my usual run distance has been 5k, which is a distance I've become fairly comfortable with. Have occasionally done 10k distances including one last month where I finally broke the 1 hour 10 minute barrier (doing a 10k in 1:07:22).

Today I went out for a run and thought maybe I should extend my run to 10k if I still felt OK after the 5k mark. Felt great at the 5k mark so kept running... and ended up with a 10k time of 1:04:49! Which is my fastest 10k ever and the first time I've ever broken the 1 hour 5 minute barrier. Feeling awesome right now!

 

[Neon Cactus]

ATTQOTD: When I started training for my first marathon, the thought of nutrition never crossed my mind. When I went to get running shoes, I went to a running store and the person helping me had done marathons and while I was trying on different shoes, he started talking about the gels and bloks. I tried the Clif energy gels and they worked well for me. This last year I also tried the energy beans they were fine. I've been lucky in not having to really experiment too much.

 

[FFigawi]

On the topic of nutrition, the team from Tailwind have a booth at the Ride London expo. They told me the company is coming out with a new flavor this week: cola. This sounds so good and so terribly bad all at once. Can’t wait to try it.

 

[Dopey 2020]

July 62 miles at 10'12"/ mile
I m happy with that since I took a week vacation and I'm still noticing slight improvements in both pace and endurance

ATTQOTD I looked on here and elsewhere on line, then tried a few suggestions until I found something that seemed to work for me (noticeable energy and decent taste and digestion)
Under an hour and I'm fine, longer runs I like to start fueling around 45 minutes in and keep grabbing a few gels every mile or two. My favorite right now are Honey Stinger cherry chews. Seems to work great for me up to about 17 miles, I'd still like to come up with a better plan for the marathon. I went through four packs of chews, a cliff bar, and banana and still ran out of steam. Hopefully I'll figure it out when the longer training runs start.

 

[PrincessV]

But mixing while running ended up not being that easy and super messy.

Right?! I'm a pro at dropping a Nuun tab in my bottle on the run, but trying to pour a little bag of Tailwind into a bottle on a breezy day was rough, lol!

Follow-up question: on a hot/humid day, how do you tell the difference between bonking and heat exhaustion? This has been a question for me and why I'm not sure if I've bonked or just gotten into heat exhaustion.

For me, this is the beauty of knowing that I sip an ounce or two every 1/2 mile and fuel every 45 minutes: if I've done that, I already know I'm good on fuel and hydration, so any ill feelings are more than likely thanks to heat.

 

[camaker]

On the topic of nutrition, the team from Tailwind have a booth at the Ride London expo. They told me the company is coming out with a new flavor this week: cola. This sounds so good and so terribly bad all at once. Can’t wait to try it.

Tailwind is great stuff. I just wish I could figure out how to work it into a faster running event like a marathon on the fly. It was a lifesaver in my last 50 miler, though. My stomach decided it didn't want to deal with solid foods after mile 12 or so, so I switched from water in my hydration pack to Tailwind (it was the on course drink). At each aid station, I would have a partial banana and orange slice while refilling my pack with Tailwind. That combination carried me comfortably through the remainder of the race.

 

[MissLiss279]

I know someone who uses empty Nuun containers to put powdered drink mix into so it’s easier to dump into a bottle and refill as you are moving.

 

[tigger536]

July: 209 miles
Average pace: 10:42
Personal run streak: 793 days (as of July 31)

 

[DopeyBadger]

Tailwind is great stuff. I just wish I could figure out how to work it into a faster running event like a marathon on the fly. It was a lifesaver in my last 50 miler, though. My stomach decided it didn't want to deal with solid foods after mile 12 or so, so I switched from water in my hydration pack to Tailwind (it was the on course drink). At each aid station, I would have a partial banana and orange slice while refilling my pack with Tailwind. That combination carried me comfortably through the remainder of the race.

Have you considered playing with the solubility a bit? Instead of 1 scoop per 8oz or 12oz as directed, trying something more concentrated (thus an ability to carry more carb content without the extra water weight)? I did 1oz : 1 scoop, but it's not completely in solution at that point. I didn't play with anything in between (like 4oz per scoop), but it should be somewhat easy to find that solubility point. The key would be making sure that you then still drink at aid stations since the necessary liquid volume for bodily absorption would be unchanged (still roughly 2g carb: 1 oz water). But then you wouldn't have to re-mix any of the solution in your large drinking vessel. Not sure how well it would work though since I haven't personally tried it.

 

[apdebord]

ATTQOTD: While training for my first half, I knew that I was going to need something once the miles started getting higher, but I learned I needed to fuel for 5 milers. Nothing bad happened, I just got light-headed. I started out with GUs and Clif Bloks and I learned that I can't do caffeine during runs. I've now switched to SIS gels. I probably over-do it, but during the marathon I took a SIS every 6 miles and 1 Blok each mile (also was an incentive to finish each mile). I also had a baggie of pretzels to combat the sweetness and I ate 4 bananas (1 before, 2 during, 1 after)...

On the topic of nutrition, the team from Tailwind have a booth at the Ride London expo. They told me the company is coming out with a new flavor this week: cola. This sounds so good and so terribly bad all at once. Can’t wait to try it.

I got to try it a few months ago; I'm not the biggest cola flavor fan in general, but it wasn't terrible. I think it's a pretty mild flavor. My husband says it's similar to a flat coke, or one of those cola bottlecap candies.

 

[Sleepless Knight]

Thank you for the affirmation.
I keep reminding myself that I have years of running if I want to. I do not have years of making captain marvel suits from paper bags. I also keep reminding myself that while it looks like there are people who can do it all, that is false.

Good for you. Like you said running will always be there, but this time will not be. I've heard it said that love is actually spelled T I M E. Sometimes that's a limited quantity, but you can really make it count if it is by making sure that they know they're most important.

How did you figure out you needed some nutrition on longer runs? Advice from others, self-learning from bonking, etc? Did you do much testing of different types of nutrition? Gu/other Gels/sports bean/liquid?

In training for my first marathon, I trained with no fuel whatsoever. I bought some energy chews before the race and would take them sometimes if I remembered to along the course. It took a while before I began to realize that I would feel better if I took in fuel more often. But even then I was not taking in enough fuel. This never cost me during half marathons, but I was really struggling in marathon training.

Seems like 6.4 miles is awfully short to be requiring nutrition.

While I agree that the distance may be short enough to get by without nutrition, it may prove extremely valuable to practice fueling during training for longer races.

During marathon training, I had a series of near terrible long runs. I was miserable, struggling, and beginning to doubt myself even though I had 9 successful half marathons and 5 multirace weekend challenges under my belt before this point. It wasn't until @DopeyBadger asked me about my nutrition and how much I was taking in that I discovered the problem. I had been taking in nutrition, but nowhere near enough. I should have been eating a small packet of sport beans, but instead was eating 1 or 2 beans total at the proper interval.

Once I learned how much nutrition I should be taking in, I started to experiment with what worked best for me before settling on a solution. I don't want to know what would have happened during the marathon had I continued with that fueling strategy that failed miserably in training. Even 6 mile runs helped me learn how to fuel properly for when it really mattered.

 

[camaker]

My husband says it's similar to a flat coke, or one of those cola bottlecap candies.

I LOVE cola flavored BottleCap candies!! Definitely going to have to give this a try now! Thanks for the taste review.

 

[roxymama]

I used to mix Crystal Light with water when I did Jane Fonda exercise videos back in junior high because I thought it'd give me some good energy. I guess I didn't understand what low calorie meant. I'm glad my brain has slightly developed since then.

I didn't use any fuel until I started training for my first 15k because I got into the 90+ min territory. I was really bad about hydration during training back then and really only started carrying a water bottle on training runs when I started half marathon training. I started with blocks and couldn't chew and run, so I switched to gels (clif) and they never have failed me so I haven't branched out. I tried beans for a bit but couldn't quit figure out the quantity and again...that whole chewing thing.

At the WDW HM that I was running purely for fun, my friend and I were punchy and we took the free bag of beans at mile 8 like a shot (all of them at once.) It was horrible if not hilarious. But that's what a lot of people do with them, so....

 

[Miranda]

I don't think you can really definitively say "6.4 is awfully short"... it all depends on your running speed, not the distance. For me, the shape I am in right now? That is for sure near the 90 min mark. I am normally an every 45 min fueler, but don't do it unless the run is going to be ~90 or longer.

 

[LdyStormy76]

July total: 0 miles
Positives: Managed to get my gym shoes on July 15th for the first time in almost a month and took the dog for a slow and painful 4 block walk July 16th. Walking gait has improved since then, but still at 4-6 blocks at a time, but my stride is still much shorter. MRI July 3rd pinpointed the problem, some nice medication has allowed me to start moving, and the specialist visit today gives me an 8 week course of action that includes PT. While the half marathon I wanted to do in October is off the schedule I should be able to complete my next 5k at the beginning of September.