Preparing for the Leaky Freaky Duathlon

Duathlon Preparation & Strategies

So with two weeks to go until the Leaky Freaky Duathlon, I wanted to put together some useful tips for you for the time leading up to race day and the day itself. Clearly the bulk of your training will have been done now and you will be looking to taper towards the end of this coming week to leave you feeling fresh for the day.

You may well have your own plan and your coach will likely have tailored your plan, but my advice would be some nice short sharp 30-75 minute sessions, with some run-bike or run-bike-run combinations. These will keep your glycogen levels up but also give you a chance to practice your transitions and make sure your race day kit works and fits well.

I have had a few questions come in which I thought I would use as the basis for my article to help you, as always if one person is thinking it, there are probably many more. I tried to keep it short but as Einstein said “Make things as simple as possible, but not simpler”.

So here we are …your questions answered.

Matt, how do YOU work out your carb intake for this distance event?

The short answer for this is always going to be trial and error. Hopefully less error in this case, because you will have tried out the foods/fuels you will use already during the longer session.

You may like myself have been training long enough to have had a few rides where you’ve miss-fuelled and “bonked” , for those of you less familiar with this term in relation to cycling, it’s a lack of energy and it feels horrible. Over the last few years of racing I’ve actually reduced my intake in olympic distance races to one bottle of isotonic energy drink on the bike and a single gel just before the run.

My suggestion for this race if you are new to this would be to carry one gel with you on each of the runs just incase. Although ideally I suggest you do most of your feeding on the bike because your heart rate will be lower and there will less demand on the peripheral vascular system for blood, therefore you will get a better digestion and uptake of the carbohydrates.

In terms of total amounts, your body can’t absorb more than 60g of carbohydrates alone per hour, if you use caffeine to your advantage, you may well be able to uptake nearly 90g and if you use a glucose/fructose combination nearly 110g, however, too much and it will just make you feel bloated and you will get unwanted GI distress, which can lead to unpleasant side effects.

You can even use your training data from your Garmin etc to see how much you burn in your training sessions per 1 min average to see what you think you’ll need for a race. From here you then choose when to take on fuel as it’s easier on the bike than the run. Solids can work on the bike, but liquids work better when running for many people. For me I will be basing my nutrition on what I KNOW WORKS for me which will be a feed on the bike after 15 mins, because that is when I anticipate having a heart rate low enough after finishing the initial climb out of transition, just after the school on the corner. There after I will look to take on up to 20g of mainly solid/isotonic fuel every 20 mins. I will use a caffeine gel as my second feed on the first leg of the bike.

Q: Sodium intake Matt, what do you use to help people avoid cramping?

Cramping is from more than just sodium intake. This is not to discredit the impact that low sodium due to sweating has upon nerve impulses, absorption of nutrients in the gut, brain function and muscle contraction. It’s also a mixture of fatigue level and temperature too.

I actually have a client who I have helped with her nutrition who suffered with cramps generally and we found that her daily coffee was causing this, most likely due to its acidity, which will cause a leaching of the alkaline minerals within the cell, inducing cramp.

In triathlon people often get cramps in their calf coming out of the water in a race, luckily unless some one falls in a lake there is no chance of this being a cause in this race. Pacing and knowing what your body can do before it starts to cramp is important. The reason we cramp more in races than training is because we’re pushing harder. If we know our abilities and race pace, then plan and stick to a strategy.

That’s why I encourage most of my athletes to know what heart rate they can operate comfortably in to use this info. Flexibility can also play a part, poor biomechanics can mean that training/racing can put your body in positions that it’s not great at working in.

If you feel a little tight in the hips, don’t be afraid over this duration to take a little hip flexor stretch in transition. It must be said at this point, if this a recurring issue you should get a bike fit done and then include some mobility training in your programme.

I would look wider than just sodium intake, but some people use zero electrolyte tabs, I actually personally like the H2Pro Hydrate Tabs.

Q: For an event that will take 4-6 hours, how would you fuel yourself both prior (evening before) and that morning?

The key is DO NOTHING YOU HAVENT DONE IN TRAINING. Hopefully I am getting this message across, you must practice your nutrition in just the same way you will have been practicing your cycling and running over the last few months. Depending on your regular eating habits; carb/fat ration or carb back loading etc (For the purposes of this article I wont explain it here, because if you don’t know what it is now and haven’t tried it then I wouldn’t start two weeks out). I would choose something easy for breakfast, small portion. If your evening meal contained a good high carbohydrate portion (easy to digest protein and carb sources) and you’ve not had a couple days of high volume training, your muscles should be fairly well fuelled. So normally I will have a meal 90 min before I go cycling (a banana omelet with oats) which will be enough to top up my energy stores and get my blood sugar up before the race. You could look at porridge, what ever sits well with you. Accept that no matter what you eat, you’re going to need to refuel in an event of that length.

The intensity of the race will be a factor in what you choose, after all this is a race so you will push harder than you do in ‘MOST’ of your training sessions.

Hard/hilly rides in summer or race training is hardly practical for lots of really solid food, so I tend to use liquid carbs and water, with some fruit like bananas as they are non fibrous and don’t require much digestion. Do make sure they are ripe though as if they aren’t they will be starchy as will cause GI discomfort….been there done that and it is not pleasant.

(I tend to save gels these days for race day only; messy, not great for your teeth, expensive and just not needed for training once you know your body)

Steady state winter rides or group rides with friends, with some hard hills maybe but generally base training, I prefer to have food and experiment, but I’ve taken oatcakes with dried fruit (didn’t work that well for me), bananas, flapjacks, soreen, jersey pocket nutrition bars and Nakd bars.

Q: What are your thoughts on Dr Tim Noakes take on fuelling for endurance athletes, super low carb/ high fats?

I like Tim Noakes’ work on “challenging beliefs”, there’s a lot of very sensible information about endurance training etc. There’s a Ted Talk on it on Youtube, have a look. As for “super low carb” dieting; I would always ask in the case of my massive switch like that “Why are you doing it?”. I can understand extreme Ketogenic/low carb diets in the cases of two medical disorders; Diabetes and epilepsy, control of bloody sugar for fat loss, because without insulin there will be no fat gain. I even advocate moderately higher fat diets in lower intensity training phases. But sure you can perform well on lower carb diets, but there’s no actually performance edge over a normal endurance athlete’s diet of high carb. In fact in race day efforts of multiple high intensity bursts lower carb diets are shown to be less effective, because low carb states induce more acidity in the muscles, which reduces performance.

If you are keen to learn more have a look here for studies on the matter:

‪http://jap.physiology.org/content/100/1/7

‪Tim Noakes- how much exercise is too much >>

Q: Hey Matt, after a long event like this, what’s the best way to refuel after it? Also does it have to be right after you finish or can it be a bit after e.g. Having to drive back home from the event. Cheers

After this race, if you’re hungry, eat. I know I will be.

However, it will be something liquid to start with, within 10-45 mins of finishing. My choice is a shake made up of vegan protein powder, lean greens, berries and a banana.

If you want to focus on rehydrating coconut water drinks can be a good idea.

Then after an hour I would be looking to get some solid food in. So if your house is further away I would be thinking about bringing some food cooked with you in a cool bag or booking a meal at a local pub/restaurant.

The combination of the meal should really be a balanced meal, like any other.

I think a small meal combination of sweet potato/baked potato with chicken or salmon with some raw/steamed leafy greens with a handful of mixed seeds or a bit of avocado would be a good idea. After a big event like this you need to replenish your intramuscular fat stores, which many people fail to pay attention to, most just think about carbs and protein….which by the way is the key with your post event shake.

Recovery nutrition is also about “what’s next”.

If you’re pretty hard core and you’re going to get right back into training the next day or two, then yeah, just like any training session you’ll need to get a protein source and a small meal in soon. If you’ve a fairly long drive home then yeah, I’d want to have a little something. If i get home hungry and tired, I might make bad food choices. So maybe a protein drink, some lightly flavored water, fruit etc. Nibble on after the race.

Ok, so this will hopefully help many of you for whom this is the ‘longest’ event in terms of duration that you have ever done.

Matt’s On The Day Advice:

Register in plenty of time, don’t worry about what anyone else is doing, not to say that you have to be antisocial, you really don’t, but don’t get involved in other people’s chaos. Get your kit laid out in transition exactly how you want it in transition one. Have a drawstring bag or rucksack for your trainers, you will need this for the carrying of them to the 2^nd run.

Make sure you have all the necessary tools (Alan keys, tyre levers, inner tube etc) incase of a puncture or mechanical issue.

Warm up really well. Include some mobility and dynamic flexibility. You should keep this warm up as close to the start of the race as you can and keep warm; studies have proven that this increases your potential to produce power. The race starts relatively early and getting cold waiting is a really bad idea.

Don’t rush the first run; I would aim to run it at a comfortable pace, one, which you could sustain for 9 miles. You will know this from your training, so make sure you have your watch on and set up for a multisport event. I will be using a bike computer to keep an eye on my bike performance and a wristwatch for the runs.

If it is cold it might be worth wearing an under layer for the first run, then you can always take it off for the bike, or after the first bike.

I suggest a couple of 750mm water bottles on the bike, with your choice drinks in them.

Break the event down into its individual parts e.g. 3 mile run then the 28 mile bike…… just one part at a time, this will help you over come any overwhelm you may create in your mind about the task ahead.