This season, I saw way too many athletes using G2 as their sports drink while training for a half-ironman or Ironman race. Let me be as clear as I can upfront- G2 is NOT a sports drink and will NOT provide you with enough calories to sustain any workload much longer than 1 hour.

I have come across too many athletes who want their cake and to eat it too. They want to train really hard so they can go really fast, but they also want to restrict the number of calories they take in while training. The cold, harsh reality is- you can do one really well, or you can try to accomplish both with mediocre results. Bottom line- if you want to go fast, you have to eat to train and recover, which means taking in a sufficient amount of calories. If you want to lose weight, it’s relatively easy- create a 500 calorie deficit a day, 7 days a week, which will end up being 3500 calories per week, which is one (1) pound per week. If you want to lose two (2) pounds per week, double the calorie deficit.

Depending on your nutritional plan (sports drinks, water, gels, bars, etc…), an athletes that is training for an event that will last longer than an hour (1/2 marathon or longer, Olympic distance triathlon or longer, etc…)- your sports drink should contain at least 200 calories per 20 oz serving unless you are planning on taking in a lot of gels and/or bars.

Here are the Nutritional Facts for some common sports drinks, per 16 ounces (the standard large water bottle is 24 ounces):

The numbers above are pretty clear, Gatorade (G2 for sure and possibly Gatorade Endurance) might not have enough calories to sustain your workouts and/or races depending on the intensity and duration. In general, athletes should be taking in 200-400 calories per hour depending on the athletes size and the intensity of the race. That would be close to two (2) bottles of Gatorade Endurance, three (3) bottle of G2 or perhaps one (1) bottle of Infinit. If you are drinking 2+ bottles per hour, you might find yourself in the restroom a little more than you want.