When I was younger, I was a notorious sleeper. A true night owl, I would stay up late and get up late. When I first took up marathon running in my mid-20s, the thought of waking up early enough to run before work was about as alien to me as the thought of enjoying running 26.2 miles! As a child on family holidays (normally to Spain or some Mediterranean island), I would often sleep until gone midday, my parents leaving me in the hotel room snoring whilst they went off to enjoy the sunshine beside the swimming pool. This made for an interesting dynamic – me waking up just as the Spanish were thinking of heading off for a nap. Perhaps that’s why my Spanish is so poor – a lack of exposure due to conflicting sleep schedules. C’est rien. ; )
Why am I telling you this? Because even though I have managed to shift my circadian rhythm enough to drag myself off to the pool before sunrise, or onto the turbo before the rest of my family wakes up, my years as a late sleeper prepared me for life as an endurance athlete in one very important way – I can eat breakfast within minutes of waking up. Like, straight away. When you spend years waking up to find out you’ve got breakfast and lunch to account for, you get pretty good at chowing down whilst still rubbing the sleep from your eyes. In fact, I find it more difficult to limit what I eat when first waking up – so that I don’t have issues digesting it during my first training session of the day - then I do with getting something in. I know not everyone is like this. My wife likes to take a far more casual and reasonable approach to breakfast. Our son will normally happily engage in some other sort of activity for an hour or so before he starts to make eyes at the kitchen. I know a lot of endurance athletes who really struggle with getting calories in immediately on waking, resulting in them either having to go into sessions fasted or having to wake up insanely early to allow them to wake up, finally eat something and then digest it before a race or training session starts. Timing calorie intake before training and racing can be a tricky customer. Whilst certain targeted fasted sessions may be beneficial, consistently putting yourself in a large calorie deficit early in the day can be problematic for both short-term and long-term training goals. So below I’ve outlined a few different training and racing scenarios and how I approach fuelling them. There’s some overlap here with what I addressed in my last blog post, but there’s also some more detail for those who want some more ideas.
*How I breakfast with UCan in different scenarios*
As I mentioned in my previous blog post, for some specific endurance sessions – long aerobic swims, rides or runs, breakfast will either be an omelette or (very occasionally) nothing at all. However, there are several situations where I will want some carbohydrates first thing.
1) Hard training session first thing
When it comes to high intensity training, most athletes are going to benefit from including some carbohydrates in the meal that proceeds the session. This can be problematic when doing so first thing, as the blood sugar rise that follows consuming carbohydrate-rich foods is often followed by a decline as the body releases insulin and begins to store the carbohydrates. A significant issue I have experienced both myself and with athletes I coach, is when this drop in blood sugar coincides with the start of a training session, known as reactive hypoglycaemia. Research into this area is still at an inconclusive stage, but this normally seems to occur when the timeframe between eating and beginning training is around 45-60 minutes. The result is a terrible feeling of dizziness, feeling faint and/or feeling extremely weak. If you’ve experienced it, you’ll know! One of the biggest benefits I’ve found with using UCan in the morning is that it satiates my initial morning hunger, allows me to get in adequate fuelling before big sessions, but also prevents me experiencing this blood sugar rollercoaster. The slower release of the carbohydrates also takes away the fear of experiencing this sugar drop during my warm-up. As I outlined in my previous post, this will be prepared the night before and be waiting for me in the fridge in the morning:
1 scoop Cocoa Delite UCan
30g Oats
15g chia seeds
15g coconut flakes
100ml coconut milk
Enough water to get just the right consistency
Top tip – mix the UCan, water and coconut milk before adding the other ingredients to ensure the powder is well mixed in. I’ll normally do this is my Nutri-bullet and then just mix everything else in. I’ll normally eat it straight from the NutriBullet cup (don’t judge me!).
If the session is a run, I will normally take out the coconut milk as the fat can lead to a bit of acid reflux.
2) Race simulation sessions
Closer to race day I will include several sessions which mix in race intensity. For ironman or half ironman this mid-level intensity can be a tricky one to fuel for. Ensuring the body is still utilising fat as its primary fuel source early in the session is a priority, but recognising the duration of the session as taxing to carbohydrate stores must also be addressed. Here I will typically go for a very simple 2 scoops of UCan about 30 minutes before the session starts. This will normally be lemon or cranberry-raspberry flavour as I find them just that little bit more palatable when I’m going to begin the session so soon after drinking it. Recently, I’ve been using the Edge gel as a pre-training fuel source. This is particularly useful as it can fit in a kit bag without needing mixing. It’s also mimics what I do on race day (more on that next blog).
3) The race breakfast
I typically like to finish my pre-race breakfast no closer to the race than 2 ½ hours before. Luckily my iron stomach first thing means I only have to wake up about 2 hours and 35 minutes before the race starts to achieve this! My pre-race breakfast before a long-course triathlon is focused on getting a balance between getting in calories, increasing carbohydrate stores, and trying to avoid too large an insulin spike, which would have a damaging effect on my substrate utilisation (I want to maintain my body’s ability to utilise its fat stores, preserving the vastly more limited carbohydrates stores for what will be a long day). My tried and tested pre-race breakfast looks like this:
3 hard-boiled eggs (cooked the night before)
2 Scoops UCan Cocoa Delite
20g Barley Flakes (The biggest ones you can find to slow digestion)
15g Coconut flakes
Just in case it’s not obvious – the UCan is mixed and then the Barley flakes and coconut flakes are sprinkled on top. The eggs are consumed first, separately and with a very generous coating of salt.
Perhaps the most important thing to note in the above scenarios is that they are tried and tested. I’ll repeat that for those who are skim-reading (how dare you!) TRIED AND TESTED. Science underpins the rationale behind the different elements of the various breakfasts I consume, but practicality and experience are the deciding factors. Find what works for you. I’ve gotten my breakfast wrong on dozens of occasions. The mid-ride bonk, the dizziness in a warm-up, the gurgling stomach that tells me I ate too much/ didn't eat early enough, I’ve been victim to them all. The sacrifice for a lack of variety in my pre-training breakfast is reassurance that I’ve gotten what I need to allow me to perform at my best. After all, the pre-training breakfast is only the first breakfast of the day. Breakfast number two can be the chance to unleash the suppressed chef in me.