This meal tops up your liver glycogen stores, which deplete overnight, and helps to control blood sugar levels. Ideally, use this plan in training to get your gut used to the amount and the types of carbohydrates you will consume during the race. This will help you know what you’ll need to carry during the race. On the days before the race, check what stops there are, and what each station will have. On race day, make sure to arrive with a nutrition and hydration plan in place. If it’s hot leading up to the race, you may need to drink more than you normally would to be hydrated. An easy way to judge if you’re hydrated is to check the colour of your urine – it should be a pale straw colour. Staying hydrated in the days before the race is also important. If you’re susceptible to an upset stomach, lower-fibre options, (such as white bread or pasta) may be helpful. For snacks, try pancakes, bananas, rice cakes with jam or toast with honey. Pasta, rice, bagels, bread, potatoes and cereal are all great carbs to include in your meals. So each meal, try to eat slightly more carbohydrates than usual and include between two and three high-carb snacks between meals. Rather, it means increasing the amount of carbs you eat about two days before the race.Ī carbohydrate intake of 7-12g per kg of body weight in each 24-hour period is recommended. This doesn’t mean eating as many carbs as you can the night before a race. One way to top up glycogen stores before the race is through “ carb loading”. Since no one wants to feel this way during a race they’ve spent months training for, it’s important to make sure you’re fuelling yourself properly – not just on race day, but in the days leading up to it, too.īefore the race, you need to have enough glycogen stored in your body. Dehydration puts additional strain on your body, which makes racing feel harder, affects temperature regulation and contributes to fatigue. Hydration levels also will affect how you feel during the race and how well your body can cope with the race demands. It can also lead to low blood sugar, leaving you feeling light-headed and weak. During a marathon, this fatigue might take the form of heavy legs, or “ hitting the wall”. So when we don’t have enough carbohydrate available to use as fuel during exercise, energy levels drop and we start to fatigue. While the body stores some carbohydrate (in the form of glycogen) in the muscles and liver, unfortunately, it can’t store large amounts. Your body uses carbohydrates to fuel high-intensity exercise, including marathons. After all the hours that have gone into training for a marathon, it would be a shame to fall at the last hurdle because you haven’t given your body the nutrients it needs.
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