Are you always tired after your long runs? Feeling drained every day during your Marathon training? The biggest change for me came when I improved my fueling during my runs as well as throughout the day. It led to me feeling stronger in my runs and coming home with more energy throughout my day.
Runners often talk about taking gels during a Marathon, but how much? Do we need gels during training? Why do I feel sluggish after a run?
Lets dive in.
- Why Do You Need To Fuel
- Daily Carb Intake for Marathon Runners
- Best High-Carb Foods for Runners
- How Many Carbs Do Runners Need During Training Runs?
- Carb Loading Before a Marathon: How and When to Do It
- How To Fuel During a Marathon
- Conclusion
- FAQ
Why Do You Need To Fuel
During exercise your body uses glycogen stored in your muscles. There is a finite amount of glycogen that your muscles can store and once you use it up you need to replenish. We do that by eating carbohydrates which breakdown and are converted into glucose. Glucose is then absorbed into the bloodstream and stored in muscles.
The reason our muscles and body start to feel sluggish is because the muscle stores don’t have the energy that they need. If they don’t have the energy to perform in our runs, then this also slows the recovery time for our muscles and body to get back to 100%.
Recovery is one of the most crucial factors in a successful Marathon training block. Training takes its toll on your body, whether you’re running 60 miles per week or this is your first Marathon and new to running 35 miles. The training load is a lot for most people. Being able to recover quickly before our next scheduled run so that we are fresh and can hit our workouts properly is extremely important.
By fueling properly, throughout the day as well as actively during any runs longer than 60 minutes, it jump starts the recovery process that your muscles need.
Lets say we go on a 2 hour run with no fuel, by the end we are tired and our muscles are fatigued. If we only then eat some carbs, say a banana. By the time it digests and the glycogen enters the muscle stores, there has been quite a bit of time passed with depleted muscles where they don’t have the resources to start recovery.
Alternatively, if we are fueling during the run, by the time we finish we still have some glycogen stored in the muscles which means that they can immediately start the recovery process.
Glycogen Window For Recovery
There is an ideal 60-90 minutes window post run for glycogen absorption. This window is limited but it is when our muscles are the most receptive to replenishing glycogen. Fueling during the run helps kickstart the full advantage of that window.
Signs You Are Under-fueled
- Frequently tired
- Hungry immediately after a run
- Hungry the day after a long or hard run
- Not recovering quickly between training
- Fading over the duration of a long run
Daily Carb Intake for Marathon Runners
Depending on how much you are training and how you are feeling, a good bench mark is to aim to consume 5-6g/kg of carb throughout the day if you are averaging 1 hour of training 5-6 days per week.
Example ~6g/kg of carb:
80kg (176 lbs) – 480 g of carb
77 kg (170 lbs) – 465 g of carb
75 kg (165 lbs) – 450 g of carb
72 kg (159 lbs) – 435 g of carb
70 kg (154 lbs) – 420 g of carb
When people ask me if I’m on a diet, I say yes, I’m on a high carb diet! Eating 400-500g of carb every day takes specific dedication and purpose in what you are eating.
If you are training more than 1 hour per day, lets say closer 10-11 hours per week, then bump that intake up to 8g/kg of carb per day.
If you are training closer to 30-45 minutes per day, say 3-4 hours per week, then maintaining your normal diet is probably sufficient. So long as you aren’t on a slow carb or low carb diet.
Calorie to Carb Ratio
In general, the calorie to carb ratio is 4:1. Meaning that for every 1g of carb, that food has 4 calories to it.
If you are aiming to eat 400g of carb each day, that alone is 1600 calories.
For the average non runner, men need about 2,200 calories per day and women need about 1,800 calories per day. As a highly active person, men need closer to 3,000 and women closer to 2,400 calories.
Best High-Carb Foods for Runners
How do I eat 400g of carb? What does that look like? How do I still eat healthy without just consuming simple sugars? Lets dig into some example foods that are easy to prepare and high in carb.
Simple High Carb Foods
Fruit:
Banana – 28g
Apple – 25g
Dried Dates – 36g per 2
Raisins – 33g per ¼ cup
Vegetables:
Sweet Potato – 27g per 1 medium
Potato (white) – 37g per 1 medium
Grains & Bread:
White Rice – 45g per 1 cup cooked
Pasta – 43g per 1 cup cooked
Quinoa – 39g per 1 cup cooked
Sprouted Oats – 27g per 1 cup cooked
Sourdough Bagel – 45g each
Sweeteners:
Raw Honey – 17g per 1 tbsp
Organic Maple Syrup – 13g per 1 tbsp
Drinks:
Orange Juice – 26g per 1 cup
Latte – 15g per 1 medium
Chocolate Milk – 30g per 1 cup
Energy Gels:
Maurten 100 – 25g
Maurten 160 – 40g
Honey Stinger Gel – 24g
Gu Energy Gel – 23g
400g of carbohydrates is like eating 14 bananas! Or eating 5 bagels with honey and banana slices!
Now of course nobody is going to eat just one thing! But knowing how many carbs are in what you are eating and counting them throughout the day helps you to learn what to consume.
A simple trick is getting in the habit of adding raw honey or organic maple syrup throughout the day. Choosing to eat oatmeal with blueberries instead of eggs in the morning for breakfast. Taking a couple bananas with you to snack on throughout the day too!
How Many Carbs Do Runners Need During Training Runs?
Once you get into your training runs, as discussed earlier, bringing carbs with you during any run over 60 minutes helps speed up recovery post run.
Aim for 60-90g/hour of training.
This has been a big breakthrough topic in the last 5 years in the running world where more and more people are catching on to the idea that consuming 60-90g of carb per hour during a race is the best spot for performance. Even consuming as much as 120g of carb for ultramarathon races!
It’s important to start this practice in training and not to do something new for your race.
For example, if you have a 2.5 hour long run, bring along 150g-200g of carb with you in the form of gels which are the easiest to consume.
A good rule of thumb is that you should be able to wait about an hour after your run before eating a meal. If you finish your long run and are famished and need to eat right away, you need to consume more carbs on your run.
By consuming 60-90g of carb per hour this helps train your gut to able to handle and withstand that amount of food without causing GI issues.
If you do get GI issues, start slow and build your tolerance.
Carb Loading Before a Marathon: How and When to Do It
During marathon training, we are running nearly every day. Which means that our glycogen stores in our muscles are constantly being filled and emptied every day.
Once we get close to a race, it’s a good idea to top up and make sure that our glycogen stores are completely full prior to a Marathon.
Carb loading for a Marathon is a 3 day step. Slowly building an increasing the amount of carb each day.
3 Days Before
6-8g of carb per kg of body weight.
2 Days Before
10-12g of carb per kg of body weight.
1 Day Before
10-12g of carb per kg of body weight. Limiting the amount of fibre you eat.
How To Fuel During a Marathon
We talked before about 60-90g/hour of the race, but timing is also important.
Frequency matters, you want consistent energy throughout the duration of the race. So you want to evenly spread out your gels during a race. Go by time rather than by distance since every one races at different speeds and you may also have different paces throughout. Although by fueling properly this should help avoid bonking and hitting the wall.
Race Protocol
Morning of, eat a breakfast aiming for 70-90g of carb about 2-3 hours beforehand. Something that you have eaten regularly as to not introduce something new the day of your race.
10-15 minutes before the start, 1 gel (23g)
Once the race begins, aim for 20g every 15-20 minutes. 60g/hr is every 20 minutes, 80g/hr is every 15 minutes.
Garmin and Coros watches have the ability to set an alert at a set interval. So you can have your watch alert you every 15 or 20 minutes to eat an energy gel.
Post race, a recovery drink that has a 4:1 carb to protein ratio will help your muscles recover faster.
Conclusion
Fueling properly starts in training, it helps you maintain energy throughout the day and recover better after your runs. If you find yourself really fatigued after a run then you should try eating more carbs throughout the day.
FAQ
Can I use real food instead of gels during training runs?
You can! However sports gels are usually faster to digest than real food. If you are training for an Ironman or Ultramarathon where the duration of the event can be 10 to 24 hours. Typically in a Marathon, it doesn’t last long enough where the digestion period for real food is advantageous.
How do I avoid stomach issues when eating so many carbs during a run?
Slowly build into it and train with it consistently. Every run bring a little bit of carb with you and start training your gut. On the long runs, start with 40g/hour and slowly build up over time. If you find that you have no GI issues at 80g/hr but at 90g you do, then staying at 80g is good! As long as you are in the realm of 60-90g/hour
Breaking 3 
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