I ran a stand alone marathon in 3:02 this year. I hit the wall at mile 23. I think it was because I didnt fuel properly. I only consumed a few calories from the aid station drinks. I didnt take any gels or other solid foods.
In 2012 I’m going to again attempt a sub 3. I am putting together a fueling plan for this attempt.
My question is … if I plan on being out there for 3 hours and I want to consume 180 calories a hour, all I have to worry about carrying is something that holds a total of 360 calories because I will only be consuming fuel for two hours… right?
What I mean is, from the start gun to hour one I’ll be using whats in my stomach… from hour one to hour two I’ll consume 180 calories from my source and from hour two to three I’ll consume another 180 calories from my source…
Is this the right way of thinking or do I have it wrong?
180 calories/hour seems like a lot to me IMO. Why not just have a GU every 45 minutes, keep it simple. If you ran a 3:02 with nothing, this should be a huge improvement. Train this way and see if it works.
I generally shoot one GU before the race and cary 4 with me in my pocket, unless the race has some on course.
I think you are over thinking this a bit. how long till your next race? just start practicing on your long runs (start with 1-2 gels/hr?), and experiment with prerun fuel . and more race pace runs
Hello,
I ran a stand alone marathon in 3:02 this year. I hit the wall at mile 23. I think it was because I didnt fuel properly. I only consumed a few calories from the aid station drinks. I didnt take any gels or other solid foods.
In 2012 I’m going to again attempt a sub 3. I am putting together a fueling plan for this attempt.
My question is … if I plan on being out there for 3 hours and I want to consume 180 calories a hour, all I have to worry about carrying is something that holds a total of 360 calories because I will only be consuming fuel for two hours… right?
What I mean is, from the start gun to hour one I’ll be using whats in my stomach… from hour one to hour two I’ll consume 180 calories from my source and from hour two to three I’ll consume another 180 calories from my source…
Is this the right way of thinking or do I have it wrong?
I think you are over thinking this a bit. how long till your next race? **just start practicing on your long runs (start with 1-2 gels/hr?), and experiment with prerun fuel **. and more race pace runs
I
Bingo. Its all about training with what you want to race. So, that means using the same nutrition strategy while you train. Everyone is different … so try the 180cal / hour method if you like. however, I have seen more so that staggering your intake every 20-30 minutes helps the body digest better. But who knows … give it a shot!
Are you sure it’s fueling? Also, don’t go too far to the other extreme. I think it’s a mistake a lot of triathletes make in marathons because they’re used to races being moving buffets.
All my marathons (2:49-2:58) have been on gatorade served at the aid stations and one or two gels. Take the first gel at roughly hour one and then the second gel around 2 hours to get me across the line.
You probably hit the wall because you didn’t have the training for how fast you went out not because of nutrition
x2 on the point above.
That said, I would think 300 calories or so for the whole event would be about right, as others have said, gel circa every 45 minutes, i.e. 30-45, 1:15-1:30, around 2:00 and then maybe another
I just did New York in <3hours. I made it real simple:
I took a gatorade at the first aid station (mile 3) and a sip of water at almost every mile based aid station after that. At each 40 minute mark, I took a Lemon Sublime GU.
The temps were in the low 50’s, so the plan worked out well for me.
I just did New York in <3hours. I made it real simple:
I took a gatorade at the first aid station (mile 3) and a sip of water at almost every mile based aid station after that. At each 40 minute mark, I took a Lemon Sublime GU.
The temps were in the low 50’s, so the plan worked out well for me.
Pretty similar plan for me, I always do Gatorade at aid stations and in my last marathon (2:56 PR) did a GU every 5 mi. (Some people seem to have trouble with Gatorate + GU, but not me.) Didn’t feel like choking them all down, but kept it up & had plenty left at the finish. This was the first race where I felt on top of nutrition, but of course it’s hard to isolate if that was really it. Personally, I wouldn’t wait an hour before fueling.
For an open Marathon I start using coke at mile 16-18, pending how I am feeling and every mile after that if possible. The last IM I did I started at the first aid station that had it, and I also used EFS Liquid Shot. Start training with coke and get use to it, and you will learn to love it. I was using it during my big 800 sets this past season so I was use to running hard with it as well, worked great. But like others have said what works for them may not work for you so TRAIN with different things and find out what works for YOU! And 180 an hour doesn’t sound high to me, if that is what YOU need. Your pre race meal is also just as important, consider a Gel 20-45mins prior to race start as well.
For people running in this time area there are two walls to contend with in my opinion:
The caloric wall
The muscular endurance wall
The first one is fairly obvious - you need to take in a few calories to get you through the last 60 - 90 minutes of the race. However, it’s not going to be a large amount and it will vary from person to person. My guess is that it’s in the neighborhood of 1 -2 standard gels worth of calories.
The muscular endurance wall is an inability to just keep holding the marathon race-pace. Beyond a certain point, assuming caloric demands are being met, the quads just kind of give-out because they can’t take it anymore. Solution - more runs at Marathon race-pace and slightly faster. This will typically put people in one of those suggested no-go “zones”, but it’s all about specificity. A lot of so-called “marathon training programs” make little or no mention of these types of runs, but they are absolutely key!
everyone pretty much got this right on. the calculation is 0.7g of carb per kg of lean body weight per hour. for a 70kg person this means 200.9 calories an hour. to answer your other question about when to start, normally you arent too full when starting a marathon but you want to at least be warmed up and into the race. i wouldnt recommend starting before 20min but you would be safe to go from there. its all about eating in any race past 1:20:00, so if your absorbing rate is what is stated above you want to start soon, no need to wait until you have depleted most or half of what is stored, start as soon as you can. but definitely practice, you need to go out and feel how much you can absorb. the calculation is more of a generalization of what the average person can absorb during exercise, you might have a higher or lower base level absorbing rate.
The muscular endurance wall is an inability to just keep holding the marathon race-pace. Beyond a certain point, assuming calories demands are being met, the quads just kind of give-out because thay can’t take it anymore. Solution - more runs at Marathon race-pace and slightly faster. This will typically put people in one of those suggested no-go “zones”, but it’s all about specificity. A lot of so-called “marathon training programs” make little or no mention of these types of runs!
Everyone likes to crap on his plans but Hal Higdeon’s advanced marathon plans/philosophy hit on this in a major way. He loads your weekends up so you do up to 10 miles a marathon pace on sat and then your long run on Sunday. It doesn’t sound bad but it’s pretty rough in the middle of the training cyle to go and run an hour + at marathon pace once a week. It definitely in those evil no-go zones between tempo pace and base pace but I think it help a lot in my last marathon training.
Are you sure it’s fueling? Also, don’t go too far to the other extreme. I think it’s a mistake a lot of triathletes make in marathons because they’re used to races being moving buffets.
All my marathons (2:49-2:58) have been on gatorade served at the aid stations and one or two gels. Take the first gel at roughly hour one and then the second gel around 2 hours to get me across the line.
2
I have pretty much the same range for time in my past 7 marathon (2h49-2h59)… same strategy one or two gels one every hour. My last race was in November 2h51, no gels, only sport drinks. Kinda hit the wall in the last marathon but I don’t think it was related to nutrition more for a lack of training on pavement, no hill training and a bit too fast first half.
Just remember that you don’t need to jump on your bike after your run, so why making your system work harder in taking calories that you will not use during the race!!!
The first one is fairly obvious - you need to take in a few calories to get you through the last 60 - 90 minutes of the race. However, it’s not going to be a large amount and it will vary from person to person. My guess is that it’s in the neighborhood of 1 -2 standard gels worth of calories.
The muscular endurance wall is an inability to just keep holding the marathon race-pace. Beyond a certain point, assuming caloric demands are being met, the quads just kind of give-out because they can’t take it anymore. Solution - more runs at Marathon race-pace and slightly faster. This will typically put people in one of those suggested no-go “zones”, but it’s all about specificity. A lot of so-called “marathon training programs” make little or no mention of these types of runs, but they are absolutely key!
X2 across the board. A couple gels (about 200 calories total) and some random sips of Gatorade and water, plus lots of MP runs in training have got me through three good marathons in the past year.
Very well said Steve. I would split hairs over this part though:
Solution - more runs at Marathon race-pace and slightly faster. This will typically put people in one of those suggested no-go “zones”, but it’s all about specificity. A lot of so-called “marathon training programs” make little or no mention of these types of runs, but they are absolutely key!
Although I suppose it depends on how you define “slightly faster”.
For example, some of the ‘so-called “marathon training programs”’ that make no mention of MP runs were written by Jack Daniels.
I think there are a few ways of skinning the muscular endurance cat (scaling the muscular endurance wall?). Daniels seemed to believe that inserting T pace bouts in the middle of long runs was sufficient. I’m inclined to believe him because, at least in my experience, there are no athiests at the end of:
2 miles E pace + 2 x (10 to 12 min T pace with 2-min rests) + 10 miles or 80 min (whichever is less) E pace + 15 to 20 min T pace + 2 miles E pace
or
2 miles E pace + 4 x (5 to 6 min T pace with 1-min rests) + 10 miles or 80 min E pace (whichever is less) + 4 x (5 to 6 min T pace with 1-min rests) + 2 miles E pace
I think that was his variation of the “fast finish” long runs that seem to be in vogue now.
But with that being said, a local friend/coach tweaks the Daniels plan by modifying 4 of the standard long runs to include MP work (60min, 90min, 90min and, in the past, 120 min). I find as much as anything that it’s a great way of benchmarking where you’re at. That 90 minute MP better feel not too terribly bad because, in the grander scheme of things, MP isn’t all that fast.
It’d be interesting to see if Daniels’ Running Formula version 3 would include MP runs - I hope we get to find out.
