Whether you subscribe to Hammer products or not, this will give you the definite base understanding by which to intelligently find what works for you:

https://www.hammernutrition.com/downloads/fuelinghandbook.pdf?utm_source...

I'm oh for two when it comes to nailing IM nutrition, so this isn't the advice of an expert. It's the advice of someone with a lot of mistakes.

Record everything and test as often as possible. Knowing that you use Skatch today is great, but what was the total sodium, calories, carbs, and water you consumed? What was the temp, and how much weight did you lose? Here are the notes I recorded this morning.

7/28 - high of 90 with 90% humidity
Started before 8, finished at 12:30

start weight - 168.2
end weight - 162.6
did not pee until finished - avg color

6 x 21 oz w/ 1 scoop hammer perpeteum cafe
1 x 21 oz water
1 x 8.4 oz red bull + 12 oz ice
2 x cherry roctane
1 x black gu
1 powerbar energy peanut butter
2 x suceed

0:45 - gel
1:30 - 1/2 powerbar
2:15 - 1/2 powerbar
3:00 - gel
3:30 - gel

cals carbs sodium
powerbar 240 44 200
roctane 100 25 125
blackberry gu 100 25 45
succeed 0 0 ?

Fueling is based on body weight, specifically lean muscle mass. If you fuel like a bodybuilder, and you are a marathoner it won't be pretty. You have to find out how to fuel, you. This will get you in the ballpark:

(BWLBS/2.2) x.7

(BWLBS/2.2)x 1

Low range, high range of carb consumption in grams per hour. Salt intake is personal too, since it is based on how much liquid you lose. Start with 500mg's/hour and adjust. You might find yourself getting up to 800-1000 based on your sweat rate and conditions.

If your stomach didn't feel good after a 80 mile ride, with a 30min T run, just imagine how it will feel after 112, and then a marathon. Your gut needs to be as receptive to fuel as possible. Solid foods, will most likely have some fiber and fat in it. These are the two things you do not want in you come race day, they will block absorption. A healthy diet with a variety of nutrients is great day in and day out, but not leading up to race days, or during.

So much of race fueling is effort and pacing too, so it is tough to zero in on the combo of both.

TryScott has got the right idea. Experiment, Experiment, Experiment. The two things I will point out from his example (I know he won't mind!!). There is no info on pacing (maybe it is in his log somewhere else). But noting how effort levels were, changed, etc is important. Also if you look at his weight change, it is a little less than 6 pounds. NOT GOOD. Look at conditions, and you will understand why. So he will have to adjust intake, in the future to try to get this weight change closer to 0. Give yourself a minimal weight loss of 3 pounds/workout. 0 weight loss, A+, 3 pounds and over, F.

Hot, humid, long bike days are hard to nail hydration, since you can only bring do much liquid with you. But at a race, with aid stations around, there is no excuse.

You'll notice he uses caffeine as well. This is a great move. Just know, if you use it whenever you start you have to continue, so you don't crash off of it. So usually 1/2 way through, is a good time to start using caffeine (70-90 mile mark of bike). It is a legal performance enhancing drug, so USE IT. Just be careful during training, you might be wired and not be able to sleep very well which would effect recovery. I never use it in training (except for coffee in the AM), but I live by it on race day.

Shift focus from calories to g's of carbs. If you get your g's right, calories fall into place without paying attention to them.

Only solid food I take in are in the form of 2 powerbars. Banana, maybe. You want blood to be in, and around muscle, not the GI tract. Energy should not be devoted to breaking solid food down during an IM, you racing 10+ hrs, not worth the body worrying about solids. What goes in the gut, needs to get out of the gut as quickly as possible.

[quote=vjohnson] You want blood to be in, and around muscle, not the GI tract. Energy should not be devoted to breaking solid food down during an IM, you racing 10+ hrs, not worth the body worrying about solids. What goes in the gut, needs to get out of the gut as quickly as possible.[/quote]

This is basically the Key rule to follow. Yes everyone is different as to what their GI tract can handle, but in the end the physiology of the body takes over. The single most important thing in nutrition is hydration. Odd, but when you understand how the equilibrium in the body works it makes complete sense. I could write on 100,000 word essay on how the body reacts to food and liquids in endurance events but basically it flows like this. When you take nutrition in (liquid or solid) the body will pull water from your muscles and send it to your gut to break it down if the osmaility of the nutrition is greater than 275 (on average). When the nutrition's osmality is thicker than your blood plasma the body pulls water from your muscles to held break it down so it can pass it along. If its cold out it really doesn't matter, but when its warm to hot that water needs to remain in the muscles to prevents cramps. Most sports drinks around the 225-250 mark in osmality. So when you take in solids your looking around 350-400 easily, which means less water in the muscles. A couple of things that help the digestion process is sodium. Sodium can help transport the nutrition through the gut even if the osmality is slightly higher than required. But using this process alone requires tons and tons of salt, so don't rely on it for nutrition transport, its more of an added substance that aids in cramps prevention (recall pooling of water from muscle).

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