Alameda Runners – Get After It!

Nutrition is dear to my heart since the day I bonked hard and Emily from Clif thought it was worth a call to tell me what a terrible thing I did to myself.  She also told me to make sure I never do it again.

If I ever wind up on the back of an ambulance because I bonk, I only have myself to blame.  She is such a wonderful person.  Can you readers guess who our number one expert is going to be for this series of articles?

Everyone is different.  We all have different nutrition and physiological needs.  I posted a question about nutrition to a small sample of athletes on www.dailymile.com.  Their comments are posted below.  To make it easy on our vendors who are answering the questions, I will post the questions first then the comments.

How do we find out what to eat before a morning workout?
What do I eat before a race?
I can swim for 30 minutes at about 80% effort 60 minutes after oatmeal.  I have trouble transitioning to the bike or run after the swim.  Nothing seems to want to go down.  I can drink some (4oz) coffee between the swim and next effort and be fine (note: the water is about 50F) Do you have any ideas on what I should try next?
How do we prevent the dreaded post workout crash?
How do we consume enough calories to complete a 4-10 hour training session?
How do we train our bodies to burn fat during these long workouts?
Do you have any general dietary tips for us amateur athletes?  Something like, eat more spinach and limit Big Macs to one per week.

Athlete’s comments on asking questions to the professionals:

Great idea! I seem to be really bad at avoiding a post-workout crash. I’ll get through the workout and feel awesome afterwards… for about 15 minutes. Then I often go downhill- lightheaded, overly tired, very rarely I’ll be a tiny bit nauseous.

It’s always worse if I didn’t eat enough earlier in the day, but I’d like to know more what I should be eating before and also after workouts to help with recovery. Especially because often when this happens I haven’t even done anything too crazy!

I would love to know what to eat before a run. I usually eat something kind of high in protein afterward. It’s so hard to know what to believe when it comes to nutrition! Thanks!

I’d love to hear the information you get from the nutritionists – I struggle with knowing how much to eat before an early morning run, as well as what I should be adding to my diet to specifically help as I train (anything in particular that the average person might not eat much of, but that really helps runners?)

Good to see I’m not the only person that struggles with what to eat before a run.