Alameda Runners – Get After It!

I love to review products aimed more towards sports nutrition, because it opens up the door for us to try so many unique products. Today we’re going to keep it rather simple, and chat about an emerging flavor of GU Chomps: watermelon.

I’m a big fan of electrolyte blocks that I can chew on, and it’s always a great time to test these products out. I’ve reviewed the GU Blueberry Pomegranate Chomps in the past, so I’m relatively familiar.

My 2011 Oakland Running Festival (ORF) goodie bag included a sample size of the GU Watermelon Chomps energy chews for athletes. I saved the sample blocks to try during a light bike ride around Alameda on an unusually warm day (above 70F in late March/early April).

As expected from sports nutrition, GU Chomps have a nice combination of both simple and complex carbs to fuel us. The Watermelon flavor (four pieces) has 90 calories, 50mg sodium, 40mg potassium, 23g total carbs, and 11g of sugar.

The taste of the GU Watermelon electrolyte blocks have a juicy watermelon flavor that should help athletes with a sweet tooth. The taste is good and it’s less sweet than some type of watermelon flavor candy, and should be easy to get down with a bit of water.

I normally just drink water on shorter bike rides, but the Chomps about 45 minutes into the ride properly fueled me for the rest of the 90 minutes spent out and about. They taste good and are effective — give them a try if you see them at your local running or cycling store.

Just like many of you, I have a choice between wearing my regular prescription eyeglasses or wearing normal sunglasses. I usually run wearing my sunglasses and will go for long bike rides with my prescription glasses (higher speeds, longer distances) to ensure I don’t end up in too much trouble.

Lately, I have become interested in picking up a pair of prescription sunglasses that will be able to protect my eyes and allow me to see normally. I remember it wasn’t too long ago when prescription sunglasses either were much too for average customers.

More manufacturers now offer “RX” sunglasses that are custom designed for athletes.  Cyclist-friendly Rudy Project has its “Rx-able sunglasses”, while Oakley has a strong catalog of Authentic Prescription Lenses. Ray-Ban also has some models that are Rx-compatible, with the trend only to continue this year.

Alameda Runners recently caught up with sunglasses maker Revo (full interview to be posted soon), but the company had this to say about its prescription sunglasses effort:

“Revo Rx is an important part of the Revo line. Revo has a state-of-the-art, in-house optical lab to be able to provide and fill prescriptions of unsurpassed quality and exceptional clarity. Since every athlete’s eyes are different, the need for custom eye-wear is crucial and without that customization, it can lead to eye fatigue and headaches. Almost every model in Revo’s collection can be customized for each person’s prescription, whether that is single-vision or progressive lenses.”

If you’re an athlete looking for prescription sunglasses, there are a growing number of choices for you to check out. Your local sunglasses store will probably have prescription sunglasses models you can try on. Options are available, so you just have to browse around and see what’s best for you.