Foot care is super important (see our plog on that in the training tips section of the MARCH blog) but food probably comes first. Screw up either and the race is dead – but screw up ya food and you are too!
Here is a summary of my approach – using examples from a 5 day desert ultramarathon in Namibia.
Two general rules I stick to:
1. If it tastes like crap on a 1 hour training run it’s gonna kill you on an ultra. Forget it. Go for something you can stomach. Ignore the scientific, calorific justification – you’ve gotta eat it. A multi day desert ultra is an exercise in suffering. Your brain is screaming out reasons to stop. Throw some rubbish food in to the mix and you’ll stop in your tracks. Carbo gels make you want to heave? Me to! Black listed.
2. More is more. I’ve done less is more – in ultras it aint. During the Marathon des Sables across the Sahara I went super light and super stupid. I lost over 5 kilos in 7 days. It certainly didn’t help my running! I was broken and breaking further. I now eat a lot, even when I dont want to. Every hour something goes in my mouth – whether I feel like it or not.
So, what about the specifics??
Well, as always, it’s pretty personal. But having done a bunch of these things across a bunch of different deserts I’ve got it wrong enough times to know the following works for me:
1. Breakie
Tried cereals. They work well but you gotta mix them with something really. To start with I carried powdered milk. Then I got sick of the weight so started mixing it just with water. See rule 1 above. I now cant eat cereal – ever! So I go for these cereal bars. 2 for breakie plus a sugared coffee (that’s just me – I gotta start with caffeine).
2. Powders
Right, there’s plenty out there. I’ve tried a few and settled on Hammer from the USA. Natural, organic everything – and most importantly, a very high calorific value per weight.
I mix the Perpetueum with my water throughout the day. Lots of it. I’ll get through 800 calories per day just from Perp.
Crawl across the line at the end of each die feeling like death? Yep, we cant change that but as you’ve gotta do it all again the next day you gotta get some complex carbs, protein and aminos in to you quick. Recoverite will do that.
The flavours in both are mellow so they’ll stay down and do the job.
3. Electrolytes
DO NOT forget about our little friend sodium (salt) and his pals. Miss them out running across the desert and you could wake up dead – or worse. In Jordan last year it was hitting mid 50′s celcius in the sun (which is where you run incidentally – forget the weather report temperature in the shade – there isn’t any).
Drinking water without replacing your sodium is deadly. They call it hyponatremia and it’s no fun. We know someone who suffered from this in one of our races. After 9 months in hospital he was still battling through rehab. Really really horrible and so so tragic. You must replace your salts! Hammer Endurolytes do the trick well.
4. Day food
Like I say above, I eat every hour, and I dont stop to eat. I have to be able to reach it in my belt pocket and stuff it down my throat on the hoof. I mix technical and simple. I use a technical energy bar from Hammer. They are tasty (see rule 1) and very soft. Forget hard bars like powerbars. You dont have the energy to chew hard and by the time you have found it, you will have choked. I can’t stand carbo gels but you do need a quick release carb for those really low patches. I find the pure simple sugar kicks of sweets and jelly beans too manic. Boom and bust. I think you need something a little more linear. I find Bloks work well. Like a scientific wine gum. Tasty but a little more sophisticated in their energy kick.
I then throw in some salted cashews and macadamias. I like the taste. The salt is good and there’s protein there too. And for a ‘sweet’? Yoghurt coated cranberries. Hmmm tastes like heaven when you’re sick of everything else.
I keep all this stuff on easy access in belt pockets and over the course of a 6-15 hour day this is what I eat, along with my Perp, which is also delivering me a lot of calories.
5. Evening food
The Namib race is different to the rest I’ve done as they are supplying the evening meal. Normally I go with a high calorie dehydrated number – aiming for 800 cal in a pack. Not sure what they’ll give us this time. But I have decided to throw in a couple of soups, just in case….More because I find deserts get cold at night and a hot soup really picks me up. Not really looking for much food value particularly – just heat and flavour. The miso is a new addition post Jordan. One of our mates had some and the flavour was so different to everything else I just craved it. You soon start obsessing about any flavour enhancer after days of the same so miso is my little evening treat!
6. Packing
Endless running, across endless sand, for endless days does funny things to your mind. Simple things become quite difficult. You start counting things wrong and worrying about whether you’ve got enough. I bag all my food in to individual day packs. That way I know that’s all I’ve got and it gives me comfort to have the direction of what to eat on what day. Obviously losing all the packaging, as you need to cut down the weight. Some races have long days, which are a double marathons so its good to fix each pack for each day depending on the distance. You can also count up your calories for each day and make sure you’ve got enough per day. Maybe it’s just me but I feel more comfortable knowing its all sorted. Measuring out your daily portions of Perpetuem powder in the desert aint gonna work. If you look closely you will see each bag has a number of different bags inside. All my powders are measured out and labelled. I even split my Perp in half. In Jordan my crazed mind thought it was a good idea to pour all the Perp bag in to my bladder each day and just let it dilute over the course of the day as I refilled….Clearly what actually happened was I drunk all my Perp in the first 2 hours. It took me 3 days to work out why I was crashing and burning 3/4 hours in to the day – doah! With it split between 2 bags that wont happen again!
Righto, so that’s the fuel plog.
MARCH on – but with full stomachs!!
