Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Experimenting with my Ironman nutrition strategy

There is no denying that an Ironman is a long race. 140.6 miles long to be exact. How you fuel your body during those miles is a crucial part of getting to the finish line. This post takes a look at my personal nutrition needs (which I have not yet totally figured out) based on my height, weight, heart rate and other factors.

I had a serious nutrition fail that forced me to walk the whole half marathon of Eagleman 70.3 and I have had a few fails during training which has made me cut rides and runs short. It is time to get serious about what my body needs to keep it going for almost 17 hours. Let's take a closer look, shall we?

I am just over 5 feet tall, I weigh 116-118 lbs on a daily basis, I have a very high heart rate and a very sensitive stomach. All factors that I need to take into consideration for my nutrition plan.

My weight plays an important part in figuring out how much liquid I need to take in during a training session or race. You should be able to weigh yourself before your workout and after your workout and if you hydrated well enough you should be within a pound or two of your starting weight. Ready for some kindof scary facts? I did such a poor job of hydrating at Eagleman that when I weighed myself several hours after the race (after eating a huge meal, ice cream, and almost a gallon of water) I weighed 106 pounds. That is a loss of over 10 pounds. Holy moly. No wonder why a few co-workers told me on Monday that I looked "frail".

My high heart rate is due to my heart having a small left ventricle. Phil likes to joke that I have a bird heart and I am not capable of loving. I promise I am capable of loving. The left ventricle pumps oxygenated blood into the aorta and through the body. My little birdie heart has to pump harder to get the blood flowing. This means my Zone 2 is in the 160s and my VO2 max is over 200. Due to my heart rate being very hummingbird-esque, I have to keep a careful eye on it. It flutters from Z1 to Z3 very easily. (Don't worry, I have had it checked- I am healthy!) If you are in a high HR zone for an extended period of time, your muscles use all of the blood that your heart is sending through your body and not enough blood is flowing to your stomach which can lead to a total GI system shut down. I would like to try to avoid that.

my bird heart flutters
My stomach is super sensitive when it comes to the typical "race nutrition". I can only stomach certain flavors of Gu, certain textures of gummy electrolytes, and I have to wait atleast an hour after waking up to eat or else I feel sick. And if I am nervous at all I can barely choke down food. The morning of Eagleman, I threw up half a bagel due to nerves while the National Anthem was playing. I love America.

So what now? I need to be able to eat before Ironman even with a nervous stomach, I need to keep my HR down to keep my stomach working, I need to eat things that wont upset my stomach, and I need to hydrate enough that I dont lose 20 pounds in a day. All of these items are crucial to getting Bib 137 to the finish line on my own two feet and not in an ambulance.

Let's add another wrench to the already complicated nutrition plan- Ironman Cozumel is going to be offering water and Gatorade as the hydration on course. I usually use EFS as my sports drink because it sits well in my stomach and has a high salt content. As of this weekend, I am kissing EFS goodbye and practicing with water, Gatorade and salt supplements. Good thing I stocked up on these babies on Amazon!

So now- from this day forward- I will strategically plan my long bike and run nutrition.  I am going to keep a diary of my before weight, my after weight, how much liquid I took in, how many calories I consumed, how much salt I took in, and how my stomach and my body feels after the workout and adjust accordingly.

After working with Melissa Dalio of Endura Coaching on my nutrition issues she helped me identify a good starting point for calories per hour (I burn 400 calories an hour in Zone 2!), salt per hour, sugar per hour, carbs per hours, ect. I am going to document my nutrition experimentation on the blog starting with my 12 mile run and 80 mile ride this weekend. I think there is going to have to be some tweaks depending on how I feel this weekend but I am confident that if I write out a plan and follow it and document the results, I will be able to find my optimal nutrition strategy come Ironman in November.

Excuse me, my type A personality is showing. :)

For all those experienced Ironmen out there...advice is welcome!

16 comments:

  1. 1) Can you teach me all about HR and that kind of stuff? I don't know much about my "zones" and whatnot...I guess I should start by getting a HR monitor?
    2) I didn't realize EFS has a high salt content. I definitely should check that out because I get headaches after tris and long workouts, which I think is due to dehydration/salt loss. After my last Oly, I had a massive headache and asked the medic for some advil (which he didn't have) but he gave me salt tabs instead, which helped a ton! So, I think I may experiment with EFS as a preventative measure, and maybe buy some salt tabs too. Good to know you can get them online (what can't you get online these days?)
    3) I'm glad you're experimenting with nutrition now! It's going to make race day that much better for you!!

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  2. @Stefanie- I only know my zones because I went and paid a nice chunk of change to have a VO2 max test test- its basically a test where you start slow and then build to an all out effort while breathing in this tight mask and the machine reads when the oxygen level in your breath changes. Its pretty awesome. And yes, get a HR monitor! lol

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  3. Great plan! Now go practice it till its perfect.

    You are hitting on the electrolytes issue well. It screwed me up at mine and I am happy to see you are tackling it head on.

    Practice practice practice!

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  4. eeek, a 10 pound weight loss is really scary!! The nutrition/hydration might be the #1 most important thing to practice for ironman, even above the sports themselves. Good luck with your experiment!

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  5. Lauren, When you figure out you're plan, please let me know! I have to start planning for Ironman MOO next Fall

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  6. I had a miserable fail with nutrition at my 70.3 last month. I ended up walking half of the run. Nutrition is such a tricky thing to nail down. When you figure out the secret, let me know! I'm going to closely follow your training and race b/c I'm considering Cozumel for 2012. Good luck!

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  7. I can't believe you lost 10 pounds after the race! That's scarey. I hope you are able to figure everything out by your IM. I have no clue about what I should be doing for nutrition either?? It's so hard for me to remember to drink/eat while I'm biking.

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  8. yikes, 10 pound loss?! that is HUGE, especially for your pint size self! so i have colitis and played around with nutrition before IMCoz - i find powerbar endurance (1 bottle per hour) works for me, along with strawberry banana powergels (every 45 minutes). i did wind up grabbing the gatorades at IMCoz, but i stuck with my plan and hardly had any issues. you could always carry baggies of EFS on your bike during IM? hope you find what works for you!

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  9. Whoa, thats a LOT of weight loss. Yikes! You're smart for playing around with it in training and documenting everything closely. That will put you in a position to have a kick ass race day! Good luck!

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  10. 10 pounds is a lot, but it's even more when you consider a percentage of your normal weight. I've been doing a lot of research lately about doing liquids only for race day nutrition, because liquids have a better gastric rate than solids, which takes more work from your body and you can't control absorption as well. but I'm in the early stages of figuring it out and this weekend was a giant fail. so, working on it.

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  11. A few thoughts: (1) CarboPro 1200 is the best stuff on earth, liquid gold in a bottle. (2) Even if you burn 400 calories an hour, there's almost zero chance you stomach can process that much -- for someone your size, the general wisdom is that you should be targeting 200-240 calories an hour. (Yes, this means you'll be at a deficit, but that is inevitable, and in any case much of the energy you consume will be from fat.) (3) Don't conclude that you screwed up your nutrition badly just because you walked part of the run. That's very common in long races and can be as much a question of fitness as anything else. Were you having stomach trouble that day?

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  12. I have no experience with long distance tri nutrition, but I do know that when it comes to running my stomach hates the combo of Gatorade/Powerade and chews or gels. I end up on some kind of sugar overload. I've had a success switching to water and salt/electrolyte pills. I imagine that there is no way to abandon liquid calories in an Ironman though. At least you have plenty of time to practice!

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  13. I'm looking forward to reading about your experiments! I love tracking numbers like that..I'm sure you will learn a lot.

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  14. I also use EFS and I've been experimenting with a super concentrated bottle of it on my downtube that I add to my front bottle with with water to dilute it. I've done two Ironman races using Gatorade on the course, but this year for IMFL I'd really like to use the EFS. At this point, I don't know for sure if it will work, but I want to give it a shot. Worst case, I'll have to use Gatorade on the course as well (or whatever they have, to be honest, I haven't looked). Good luck - I truly believe that nutrition is the fourth event of an Ironman!

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  15. I have a high rate rate too when I run (and assuming when I bike). My Z2 for running is anything under 178 (yikes). Keep me updated on your nutrition finds because I am working to figure mine out too. Can't wait to see you at the run and bike!

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  16. You're doing the right thing by practicing....try to get out in all kinds of conditions because youll never know what race day will hand you! Also, remember youve got your special needs bags....those are great for extra nutrition!

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