A call for help with ironman nutrition

Triathlon Forum
1

Okay folks, I need some help. IMC a couple of days ago was another great race until the 10 mile mark of the run, when it became another vomit filled walk of pain. This seems to keep happening to me and I have no idea why. I finish the bike feeling great, run a few miles well, and then start to feel this sense of impending door that finally unleashes a flood of pain and suffering a few miles later. It is not a conditioning problem, I am fairly sure of that.

I use my exact same nutrition during 1/2IMs, long rides, long runs, and bricks, and I NEVER have any problems. I did not over exert myself on the swim or the bike, in fact both felt very easy. I’m looking for any and all advice, anecdotes, ideas, shots in the dark, etc, etc. Eating more, eating less, gaining weight, losing weight, never drinking water again, etc, etc. I’ll listen.

My race day nutrition:
Standard low fiber breakfast around 4am: rice, egg whites, banana, OJ, glass of milk

100 cals of clif bloks + two Motivator caffeine pills + water 30mins before race start

400 cals per hour of 75% carbopro / 25% gatorade endurance plus a splash of OJ on the bike

One salt stick pill per hour on the bike (total of ~600 mg sodium per hour on the bike)

Alternate clif blok, gatorade, and carbopro/OJ mix each mile on the run, salt pill as needed (I think I only managed to get one salt pill down on the run before I started hating the idea of putting anything in my stomach)

Again, I do this plan ALL THE TIME in training and shorter races, with no problems whatsoever. At mile 15 I started throwing up so violently that I was completely emptying my stomach and my abs cramped up so running was terrible. I walked most of the final 11 miles of the race and finished in a big time personal worst of 12:47 after spending 5:47 on the marathon course. I guess the bright side is that makes for quicker recovery. :frowning:

After the finish line I headed straight to medical. My blood pressure was slightly low (112/74), which the doc attributed to lack of electrolytes. But the amount of Na I was taking had always been sufficient in the past, even during races hotter than this one.

I just don’t get it. Any ideas will be listened to. I’m 32, in good shape, 5’10", ~157 pounds. Thanks,
-Colin

2

Hope you find something. I’ve no ideas. Sorry you had a rough race.

xoxo
tc

3

Total shot in the dark: the mix of caffeine pills and the electrolytes? Is that something that causes issues only when you really put your system under long-duration stress and therefore wouldn’t surface in a half or below and wouldn’t surface in training because you don’t get to that stress-level? For whatever reason, the caffeine pills are sticking out to me as trouble makers in your write-up. Do you have a comparison how much coffee-equivalent or espresso-equivalent that would be?

4

caffine pills…that’s bs…what do you need that crap for?

5

in my opinion you should reduce calories per hour to 300, stop taking salt pills, reduce to 300 mg of sodium an hour, use heed instead of gatoraid, which has enough sugar to be basically a child’s sugar fruit drink, thats just my opinion though, your stomach is going to feel a lot different 10 hours into racing than it does 4 hours in a half im regardless of if you are eating the same thing
.

6

I’d go with too many calories and look at your electrolyte balance and hydration. It’s far easier to keep things separate: hydration use plain water, calories use a liquid food or some hard stuff if you like a change on the bike, electrolytes as capsules. Stay away from 'ose sugars as much as possible, especially fructose.

Some great stuff at www.hammernutrition.com

You can only get a rough idea in training about nutrition. You can’t fully simulate race conditions, which is why any nutrition plan must be flexible and adapted to suit the conditions of the day

7

My only thought is, maybe you shouldn’t have taken in calories at every aid station? Maybe your gut needed some time in between feedings to digest.

My n=1 IM run thing was to do one gel every 3rd aid station for the first half, then every other coming back home. Little water at every aid station.
YMMV.

Hope you get it sorted out. That’s a bummer.

8

Your body can only process roughly 60 grams of carbs an hours, anything else is likely to cause stomach problems. Thats about 24 oz of sports drink. Ask Matt Fitzgerald about this, he says this is the way to do it any race, and he’s planning on doing it for IMAZ. You might be hungry by the end, but it might be worth it.

9

thats just a hole bunch of weird crap to be eating all day. maybe try some normal solid food instead of cliff blocks and caffeine pre-race

and maybe some normal solid food at the start of the bike to replace some of the sugar drinks

10

Total shot in the dark: the mix of caffeine pills and the electrolytes? Is that something that causes issues only when you really put your system under long-duration stress and therefore wouldn’t surface in a half or below and wouldn’t surface in training because you don’t get to that stress-level? For whatever reason, the caffeine pills are sticking out to me as trouble makers in your write-up. Do you have a comparison how much coffee-equivalent or espresso-equivalent that would be?

Yeah, that’s a fairly good point, although I did take them before my long rides/bricks to get used to them. Honestly, I never have caffeine in “normal” life. I hate coffee. I was just trying to get a race day boost.

Thanks for the thoughts, any more are welcome.

11

I’d go with too many calories and look at your electrolyte balance and hydration. It’s far easier to keep things separate: hydration use plain water, calories use a liquid food or some hard stuff if you like a change on the bike, electrolytes as capsules. Stay away from 'ose sugars as much as possible, especially fructose.

Some great stuff at www.hammernutrition.com

You can only get a rough idea in training about nutrition. You can’t fully simulate race conditions, which is why any nutrition plan must be flexible and adapted to suit the conditions of the day

Are hammer products really any better than gatorade? One real problem with them is that HEED tastes like shit. I mostly drink carbopro, but add a little g-ade for taste. I suppose leaving that out and just using carbopro and OJ isn’t a terrible idea.

12

Carbs: you can digest up to 90gr/h if it’s a mixture of glucose and fructose. Less if you take only glucose. Not recommended to go for fructose only, but the GI problem caused by too much fructose is usually diarrhea, not vomiting. Excess caffeine would have the same kind of effect. Take in too much carbs and your intestine cannot absorb it and your stomach is not emptied. When you vomitted, did you had a lot in your stomach? Did you do that several times? If yes, then it points to stomach not emptied. Could be also due to ischaemia of the small intestine, resulting in the same effect and creating lot of pain (easy to mistake it to stomach pain). If that’s the case, you would not fancy eating a lot for few days after the race, and likely you would experience pain. If you do not pass food from your stomach to your intestine and you carry on forcing food/liquid down, then it will come back up… If this happen, the only solution is swith to very little water and slow down earlier in the race when the symptoms appear. Salt: looks like way too much, except if you are a really very ‘salty’ sweater. You mentioned you tried this nutrition strategy all the time … in training. Have you used it in racing before? Do you really take that much fluid/calories + salt pills every mile on your long run? You must carry a LOT of fluid with you. You are not the only one with this problem in Canada. I have two very experienced team mates who vomited both on the run for the first time. Something in the water?

13

I can drink OJ and milk when not racing but they tear up my insides on race days. Just a thought of something else to possibly remove.

14

The most important thing is to find something that works for you.

I can only tell you my experience:

  • lots of water is not good.
  • on the bike I drink a bit of energy drink if I am thirsty, and I eat solid food (bars) and chocolate with it to get calories down
  • on the run, sports drink, chocolate, gels and if I feel real low on energy, cola.

Timing of food, if I eat a little often I get sick after a few hours. I rather stick to one small “meal” after T1 and after T2, and then I take a bar every hour. In between every half hour or so I drink energy drinks. Not everyone agrees on this, but it works for me. Too many small portions of water and sweets can really upset my stomach.

A nutrition advice I got after having stomach problems with maltodextrin, bars, gels and energy drinks was that stomachs are bad in digesting only sugars and carbs for a long time. You can get by for a few hours on sugar,carbs only but on long duration you might need some fat and protein as well. This brings me to the best sports nutrition on the market: chocolate. There is also a bit of fat and protein in there, and that is a good thing for the stomach if you plan on being out there for 9+hrs. I eat a 100 grams bar after T1, and I eat a bar the first hour after T2. Again, not very common to do, but it works better for me then all the gels and energy drinks. And way cheaper then all the gels… And it tastes so much better. Only in hot weather this can be a disaster due to melting.

Hope it helps.

15

Haven’t done an IM yet, so pls take my ramblings with a pinch of salt. 2 weeks ago I did a long MTB marathon (almost 10hrs). Ate energy bars initially at regular intervals + bananas + some energy drink + water.

Worked out until later in the race when I got to almost throwing up and had bad indigestion (pardon my french: farted like a dog - super unpleasant during a race). Since the race is in the Swiss Alps they had bread and cheese and broth. That helped calm down the stomach.

A thought: maybe your bricks and shorter races aren’t long enough to get your body to the point where it starts revolting against the food you put in, and that’s why it hits you after 10 miles on the run?

Even though my sample is n=1, my impression is that on these very long races it might be worth mixing it up a bit and easting something a bit different. A pro from our club (Mike Aigroz, 2nd IM Canada) apparently ate Babybel cheese (dunno if they exist in the States - small cheeses wrapped in wax) on the bike in Nice (France) on his first IM, to balance out his stomach. Seems to have worked from him at the time.

Cheers
Jever

16

I recognize this, only sugars and carbs doesn’t work for long ultra endurance events. I love cheese, I will try it. I have used small dried sausages as well a few times. They worked perfectly too I can say. Dried salami sausage is like heaven after those gels and sweet energy drinks.

17

Boring as it may be - a dry piece of bread was quite nice during the race, too. Anything non-sweet.

Slightly OT, but also connected: does anybody know of energy food that is not sweet?

18

If that was me I would not drink any milk during race day. And something more solid during the bike, like bars or a piece pf bread.

19

Like other posters have said…caffeine pills are risky. Drink a couple cups of coffee when you wake up. This will help get your brain and digestive tract moving.

I’m only guessing but vomiting might be caused by keeping your HR too high. If your HR is too high, then your body can’t digest the food so it gets discarded. Most people end up in the bathroom but some people vomit. Do you wear a HR monitor while racing? If so, check your data. Just something to consider.

20

Your story is similar to mine for IMC in many ways. As odd as it sounds, in my case I think my stomach issues were smoke related.

The smoke made it difficult for me to breathe (I am hypersensitive to smoke), causing increased heart rate, even at glacially slow running speeds. Blood flow to the gut is interupted as more supply is needed to service heart/muscles. Gut stops working.

And anyone that is telling you that 600mg of salt per hour is too much is full of crap. 1 gram/hour is a good measure, along with enough liquid to digest it.