Forums >Running 101>Should energy gels be used while training?
Prophet!
Your toughness is made up of equal parts persistence and experience. You don't so much outrun your opponents as outlast and outsmart them, and the toughest opponent of all is the one inside your head." - Joe Henderson
To paraphrase an old poster: Today is the first day of the rest of your training. It doesn’t matter where you started or how far you’ve come. Today is the day. Your training didn’t start 6 weeks ago. Your training started the last time you hit the road. John “the Penguin” Bingham Life is not tried, it is merely survived if you're standing outside the fire
Good Bad & The Monkey
I'm running somewhere tomorrow. It's going to be beautiful. I can't wait.
Poor baby
rectumdamnnearkilledem
I tried a ClifShot - it didn't taste very good to say the least, but it did seem to help.
Getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to
remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.
~ Sarah Kay
esq.
You should do nothing new on marathon day that you have not done many times in training.
How To Run a Marathon: Step 1 - start running. There is no Step 2.
E-mail: eric.fuller.mail@gmail.com -----------------------------
One more point - if you use the gels/Gu, follow the directions. Don't wait until you actually feel weak or hungry to take one. Every 45 minutes to an hour works best for me - just like the box says.
Why is it sideways?
the difference between the feeling of glycogen depletion and other forms of tiredness.
Yesterday I took an energy gel on my long run (11.5 mi) for the first time. I did this because last week, when I ran 10 mi for the first time, I really felt wiped out at the end. So I thought I'd try an energy gel on my next long run to see if that would help out. I tried a ClifShot - it didn't taste very good to say the least, but it did seem to help. But now I'm wondering if it is a good idea to use them - at least during traning - because I had read in Galloway's book that after one runs for more than 30 min, the body begins to rely more on fat for energy than on carbs, and that you need to train you body to be able to do this. So am I short-circuiting this by taking a carb energy gel midway through my long runs? I can see how you might want to do this during a race to try to get your best time, but I wonder if I should avoid this during training to make sure that my body gets better at using fat as an energy source. Does anyone have thoughts on this?