Those of us who are veteran runners know that we all have some sort of ritual we go through pre-race. Something that makes us feel prepared and ready for the challenge that lays ahead of us. But for those of us who are just entering the field of racing (or any sort of competition, really), the days leading up to your “maiden voyage” can be quite stressful. How do I prepare? What if I’m not ready? What if something goes wrong? Even if you’ve competed before, pre-event jitters are an uncomfortable reality almost all of us face. The routines we go through before such events help us feel calm, prepared, and in-control (even if we’re not!).
If you’re a regular follower of my blog, you might know that I am a retired competitive runner turned fitness professional/weekend warrior. If you don’t know the full story, you can get caught up with this article I wrote on my unlikely running career. Due to my long history with running events, I’ve come up with a routine that I rely on so I know I’ll be doing my best. This weekend I’ll be facing another self-inflicted challenge: The Washington DC Spartan Sprint! I’ve been training consistently (it is my job, after all), I’ve registered, I’ve got the address in my GPS, I’ve got my Altra Lone Peak running shoes (final review on those to follow this weekend). Now there’s nothing left to do but contain my excitement and prepare myself for Saturday morning!
I’ll be writing a series to share some of my pre-race rituals, as well as the science behind them. Hopefully I’ll be able to ease some of your pre-competition jitters, and maybe help you fine-tune a ritual of your own! Today we’ll be going over a much-misused practice: Carb Loading
Carb Loading
Many of you may know the term carb loading or carbohydrate loading, a tradition of consuming a large amount of carbs pre-race to fuel your muscles through their upcoming challenge. However, most of us misuse carbs in this context.
In high school, we would have Spaghetti Dinners and Pizza Nights before big races, where we all stuffed ourselves silly in hopes that it would improve our performance the next day. There are a few things wrong with this approach, one of the main issues being timing.
Carbohydrates are a necessary fuel source, and can be found in many foods. We mainly think of breads or pastas, but carbs are also found in fruits and veggies. However, our muscles can only make use of the carbohydrate energy when it’s been broken down and stored as muscle glycogen. The process of turning your apple or your pasta from recognizable food into usable muscle glycogen takes an average of 48-72 hours. Thus, if you’re going to be carb loading, you should plan to eat your fuel foods two to three days out from your event.
The source of your carb is also of importance. Before a big event, the last thing you should be doing is changing up your diet. Our bodies are highly reactive to changes in environment, and our gut environment is no exception! With thousands and millions of bacteria living (helpfully) in our gut, a drastic change in diet results in a drastic change of inhabitants (dormant vs active bacteria). Any sudden change could leave you running for the bathroom instead of the finish line, if you catch my drift. So if you are accustomed to fruits and veggies, don’t suddenly throw in whole wheat pasta by the plate-fulls. Trust me, you’ll regret it. And you’ll be wasting energy trying to deal with the aftermath of your meal instead of spending your energy reaching your goal.
Oranges are, actually, a wonderful source of lean energy. Image property of Wikipedia.
Your event also determines whether or not carb loading is appropriate. Short duration-high intensity events deplete muscle glycogen stores before your metabolic pathway has a chance to switch over to lactic acid and lipid fuel sources. Through training and maintaining healthy levels of readily available fuel sources, short bursts of power like this can be fueled. If repetition is required, or long term endurance, replenishing of fuel stores may be needed.
If you’re a flow chart sort of person, you’ll love the Krebs Cycle (which is the official name for what is going on here).
Krebs Cycle, aka How We Keep Getting ATP. Image property of Wikipedia.
If you prefer words, keep reading!
To break down this concept into more digestible bits, think of the last time you went for a challenging run.
During the first couple minutes maybe you felt awesome, but then minutes 5-10 we pretty rough.
After those 10 minutes, though, maybe you regained some energy or found a “second wind.”
After prolonged exercise, maybe you felt like you lost all of your energy, or you “hit the wall.”
All of these subjective markers can be attributed to objective stages in the metabolism of your fuel sources.
During the first few minutes of activity, your muscles deplete their glycogen stores (a fraction of your stored glycogen. Don’t panic, there’s more in your liver!). Once the fuel is gone, you feel winded and tired and downright crummy. This sends a signal to your body along the lines of “Well, I guess we’re not stopping. Time to use that other stuff we’ve got in storage!”. But it takes a bit of time to move the fuel from your liver and change it into something that can be shared via the bloodstream and used by your muscles.
As soon as the fuel is available, though, BAM you feel good again! There’s that second wind! Fortunately for us, we also have lipid stores (aka, fat stores) that can be broken down and used as well. It takes a longer length of time to get the lipids ready for use, though, so our bodies wait until it looks like we’re going to be active longer than 10-15 minutes. Also fortunately for us, our bodies are good at multi-tasking! While our energy stores are being transferred from the liver into usable components for our muscles, our bodies are also starting the process of metabolizing lipids for even more energy. Cool!
However, we can only store so much energy at one time! Once we’ve used up our glycogen, it becomes very apparent that we are running on vapors. We hit the wall, hard, and it’s difficult to continue. Most people that I know won’t be active for this length of time. But think of your marathoners, ultra-marathoners, triathletes, iron-people…you get the idea. These competitors need to be able to keep moving. Thus, in the spirit of multi-tasking, they map out when the best time is to consume high-glycemic foods to keep them kicking!
That’s right: while they are transferring energy from their liver to their blood stream for their muscles, and starting to metabolize lipids, they are also consuming, breaking down, and storing new glycogen to be used. Go ahead, thank your body for being awesome.
Race gels, gatorade, and bananas fall into this category. Easy on the gut to digest while active, and chock-full of energy. This is also why, if you have high glucose problems or are NOT an ultra-marathon-level athlete, these refuel sources may not be your best choice (but I’ll always love bananas). This is also why bananas, oranges, and the like are available immediately following sports events; the athletes need to refuel before they get hangry (hungry+anger=hangry)!
But I digress. Eat well 2-3 days out from your event, not the night before. And stick to foods that you know work well with your gut.
Stay tuned for other pre-race preparation as I get ready for the Washington DC Spartan!
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