FROM SPRINT TO IRONMAN

There is so much hype surrounding sports nutrition these days; the science is evolving, with an increasing number of studies proving that nutrition plays an important part in performance gains. This chapter will help you to understand why correct fuelling around your triathlon training is important to achieve your goals and optimize your performance.

You will probably have some idea of the basics of good nutrition – for example, that you should eat carbohydrate for energy, protein for repair, fat to absorb important nutrients, and vitamins and minerals for a healthy immune system. In this chapter we will look at these factors in more detail and I will explain how the quality of these nutrients, and when you consume them, plays a fundamental role in sports nutrition.

So, whether your weekly training is less than 10 hours or over 20 hours, the basic principles of good nutrition are applicable to all; whether you’re a novice or an Olympian, a Sprint triathlete or Ironman, you need to begin with a strong nutritional foundation. Once this has been established, you can move on to a more detailed nutritional plan, helping to make you stronger, fitter and more able to meet your performance goals.

BEFORE YOU READ ON...

When working with sports nutrition, it is normal to calculate the nutritional requirements for each macro-nutrient to ensure that training fuel demands are being met. These are converted based on your weight in kilograms, so throughout the book I will be referring to grams of nutrients per kilogram of your body weight, or as you will see it displayed: ‘g/kg BW’. Therefore, a great starting point would be to calculate your weight in kilograms. Most home scales will have conversions. Using metric values ensures greater accuracy.

THE SPECIFICS OF SPORTS NUTRITION

The main difference between healthy eating and sports nutrition is the attention to detail and the fine-tuning of nutrient delivery. In healthy eating, the ultimate goal is to promote long-term good health and fend off increased risks of disease, while maintaining a balance so that food is still enjoyable. In comparison, sports nutrition, although still based on healthy eating guidelines to an extent, is performance driven. It is about getting the best out of your training over the three disciplines, whether that’s an early-morning swim session followed by a lunch-time run, or a three-hour bike ride at the weekend. Tailoring your nutrition choices to your training, including the intensity, frequency and volume, will ensure that you have:

1 >   Put the right amount and type of fuel into your body to meet the demands of your training session, allowing you to perform to your best ability (we will go into this in more detail when we discuss different intensity levels of training in Chapter 2)

2 >   Made the correct choices after your training session, helping your body to recover, repair and adapt

The key to good sports nutrition is both preparation and organization; fundamentally, to achieve your goal you need to tailor your nutrition to the exact training session. It’s not just about energy in and energy out. By just meeting energy demands, you may be able to carry out all your training but you may not see any actual improvements in your day-to-day training and overall performance.

Making good nutritional choices will ensure that the following adaptations occur from training:

>>> Increases in strength and lean muscle mass

>>> Good consistency at each training session, ensuring you can conduct each one to the best of your ability and progress your performance

>>> Good sleep patterns, a good mood and high energy levels

TRAINING NUTRITION

So what types of food should you eat before a training session? Training is the stimulus that sends messages to your muscles to work at a specific level. In order for this stimulus to work effectively, you will need to feed it appropriately. What you feed your body before training will very much depend on what the session is and its intensity.

Like most people you probably eat carbohydrate before you exercise, to give you energy. However, when you go for a 45-minute swim, do you ever stop to think about how much carbohydrate you really need? Would the choice be different if you were going out to swim 45 minutes hard or if you were just going for a social recovery swim with some friends? The reality is that you would need a lot less carbohydrate, in fact probably none, if you were just going for a recovery swim, but your body would struggle to maintain a high intensity swim for 45 minutes, without carbohydrate.

Carbohydrate is stored within our muscles and liver as glycogen (see page 14). When your body signals that it needs energy, for example during exercise, it converts this glycogen into glucose and transports it to the working muscle to ensure that the level of activity can be maintained. Although your body could get energy from fat stores, the subsequent processes to convert fat to glucose take too long and so cannot support high-intensity exercise. This is why it is so important to fuel your body with carbohydrate prior to hard training such as a threshold swim, turbo bike intervals or track session.

So what happens if, for example, you have a bowl of porridge/oatmeal and then head out for a slow recovery swim with friends? Your body still uses the carbohydrate provided by the porridge/oatmeal as it is still the most available source of fuel. What is so bad about that, you might ask? Well nothing really, unless you want to lose some body fat or you want to become fat adapted (see page 73).

To use fat as fuel, you need to train at a moderate to low intensity (see Chapter 2) because this level of activity is slow enough to allow your body time to provide the energy it needs from fat stores. So if you have a few pounds to shift or are trying to become a bit leaner, you can achieve your goal with this type of training session as long as you do it in a fasted state or ensure that your last meal did not contain carbohydrate.

Some of my athletes, particularly ultra-endurance athletes, such as Ironman triathletes, like to become ‘fat adapted’ – this means that their body becomes more efficient at using fat as fuel and so can help ‘spare’ glycogen stores in longer endurance events. When you think about training nutrition, ask yourself:

1 >   What type of session is this going to be? High, medium or low intensity?

2 >   How long is this training session going to be?

3 >   What are my body composition goals?

Answering these questions will help you to choose the correct fuel and the correct portion size.

CARBOHYDRATE

Most triathletes are aware of the need to consume carbohydrate as fuel for training sessions. There does, however, seem to be a lot of mixed messages about carbohydrate fuelling when it comes to timing, type and portion size. It is important to be aware that some carbohydrates are more desirable than others!

In general terms, your carbohydrate requirement depends upon your activity level; it is the key fuel source for exercise as it is broken down into glucose and utilized by the body to provide energy to the working muscles. Carbohydrate is stored as glycogen within the liver and muscles. It is the source within the muscle that is the most readily available during exercise, releasing energy more quickly than other fuel sources. Storage within the muscle is limited, which can be an issue in longer moderate- to high-pace endurance training sessions. Inadequately fuelled muscles will lead to fatigue and poor performance, and will potentially depress your immunity, increasing your risk of illness and injury.

Regardless of what distance you are training for, it is really important to plan your carbohydrate intake around training sessions; the amount you require depends upon the frequency, duration and intensity of your training. You will need to consume more carbohydrate around high-intensity sessions and less on lower-intensity or rest days. This is summarized in the table opposite and we’ll look at it in more detail in Chapter 2.

To help you meet your needs, it is important to understand the difference in the types of carbohydrate that are available. Over the years, carbohydrates have been classified in many different ways; the most common types are simple and complex, but you may also be familiar with high GI (glycaemic index) and low GI. The glycaemic index (GI) is a ranking of carbohydratecontaining foods based on the overall effect of each food on blood-glucose levels. Foods that the body absorbs slowly have a low GI rating, while foods that are more quickly absorbed have a higher rating.

Most recently, sports nutritionists have started to use the terms ‘nutrient dense’, ‘nutrient poor’ or ‘high fat’ types of carbohydrate. Nutrient-dense carbohydrates are those that provide carbohydrate as well as other nutrients; examples include bread, fruit and dairy and these should be included regularly in the diet. Nutrient-poor carbohydrates provide carbohydrate but no other useful nutrients; some examples include energy drinks and sugar. High-fat options provide carbohydrate but also a high percentage of fat. Try to keep these foods to a minimum; examples include chocolate and pastries.

These different types of carbohydrate are summarized in the table below:

Category	Description	Examples	Use for athletes
Nutrient-dense carbohydrate	Foods and fluids that are rich sources of carbohydrate and other nutrients, including protein, vitamins, minerals, fibre and antioxidants,	Breads, cereals and wholegrains (eg oats, pasta, rice), fruit, starchy vegetables (eg potato, butternut squash), legumes (eg lentils, beans, peas and peanuts), low-fat dairy products (eg milk, yogurt).	Everyday food that should form the basis of an athlete’ s diet. Helps to meet other nutrient targets, such as good fats, protein, vitamins and minerals.
Nutrient-poor carbohydrate	Foods and fluids that contain carbohydrate but minimal or no other nutrients.	All sugars (eg dextrose, sucrose, agave nectar, honey, molasses etc), sof drinks, energy drinks, lollies, carbohydrate gels, sports drinks and cordials, any type of white bread.	Shouldn’t be a major part of the everyday diet but may provide a compact carbohydrate source around training.
High-fat carbohydrate	Foods that contain carbohydrate but are high in fat.	Pastries, cakes, chips, crisps and chocolate.	Occasional foods that are best not consumed around training sessions.

TABLE 1.1 Types of carbohydrate

It is difficult to quantify the percentage of overall diet that should be formed of carbohydrate, which is why no matter whom I work with I use the guidelines in Table 1.2 (see overleaf). However, these are ball-park figures and will vary from individual to individual. Additionally, there is a gender difference: women, in general, utilize a much lower amount of carbohydrate than men for the same level of intensity. In addition, a woman’s carbohydrate use will vary according to where she is in her menstrual cycle.

Exercise intensity	Situation	Carbohydrate targets for women	Carbohydrate targets for men
Light	Low-intensity or skillbased activities, such as plyometrics or movement patterns; core work or exercising less than three times per week	3–5g/kg BW	2–4g/kg BW
Moderate	Running for about an hour a day at a steady pace that enables you to have a conversation	5–7g/kg BW	3–5g/kg BW
High	Running at moderate–high intensity for 1–3 hours a day, including double days	6–10g/kg BW	5–7g/kg BW
Very high	Extreme running – moderate –high-intensity, or long runs (20 miles plus) back to back for several days	8–12g/kg BW	8g/kg BW

TABLE 1.2 Carbohydrate intake requirements for different training intensities

So, for a moderately active 60kg/132lb adult, who trains for 30–45-minutes across all three disciplines, three times per week, this works out to be 3 x 60g = 180g of carbohydrate a day. I recommend that you derive this carbohydrate solely from nutrient-dense foods (see Table 1.1). Even within this group, certain foods will make the carbohydrate go further: 100g/3½oz rolled oats provides 60g of carbohydrate but 100g/3½oz of butternut squash only provides 20g. You would need to eat 300g/10½oz of squash to provide 60g. Here are some other examples:

>>> 100g/3½oz wholemeal bread will provide 60g of carbohydrate

>>> 1 banana will provide 25g of carbohydrate

>>> 400g/14oz drained can of chickpeas will provide 39g of carbohydrate

So by using more of the vegetables, fruit and legumes as your carbohydrate source, your allowance will go a lot further.

In one of my favourite examples of different types of carbohydrates, I compare jelly babies to potatoes. Ten jelly babies provide 60g of carbohydrate. But a 300g/10oz (medium) potato or six large carrots provide the same. It is obvious which option will be the more filling. This example also demonstrates how easy it is to over-consume simple carbohydrates – most people could polish off a big 190g/7oz bag of jelly babies, which would provide in the region of 152g of carbohydrate, but could they consume the equivalent in potatoes or carrots in one sitting?

Having said that, in certain training situations, jelly babies may be the preferred fuel. For example, you might be training for an Ironman event and doing a long bike ride with some longer interval work, lasting over 90 minutes. By fuelling up with nutrient-dense carbohydrates, such as pasta, bagels or oats, you will have built up good glycogen stores. However, these stores tend to only last between 60 and 90 minutes, depending on the intensity at which you train. So you will find it useful to ‘top up’ your stores by choosing foods, such as jelly babies, from the nutrient-poor group, to provide you with instant energy. We will look at this in more detail in Chapter 2.

So remember, as athletes, it is important to consume carbohydrate to help fuel your training sessions. However, it is essential to choose the right type, at the right time in the right portion. We will look at this in more detail later on in this chapter.

PROTEIN

Proteins are often called the building blocks of the body. Protein consists of combinations of structures called amino acids. There are 20 amino acids and these combine in various sequences to make muscles, bones, tendons, skin, hair and other tissues. They serve other functions as well, including transporting nutrients and producing enzymes.

Eight of these amino acids are essential and must come from your diet. They are found as a complete source in animal-protein food such as dairy, meat, fish and eggs. They are found in an incomplete source in plant-based proteins; that is, they will be lacking in one or more of the essential amino acids. Examples include vegetables, grains, nuts and legumes. You can derive a whole source of protein from plant sources by combining plant foods in the right way. Some good combinations include baked beans on toast; rice and dhal; and wholegrain bagel with peanut butter. (See also pages 36–40 for information on vegetarian and vegan diets.)

In general terms, most moderately active adults, so those of you who walk the dog daily or take an exercise class once or twice a week, will meet your protein requirements without any problems. The suggested amount is around 0.8–1g/kg BW per day, with women needing the lower end and men the upper end of this range.

Let’s take a 57kg/125lb woman: based on the calculation 0.8g/kg BW per day, her daily protein requirement will be 46g/1½oz.

EXAMPLES OF FOOD PORTIONS THAT PROVIDE 15G OF PROTEIN

>>> 2 large eggs

>>> 75g/2½ oz chicken fillet

>>> 150g/5oz Greek yogurt

Those of you who train more than four times a week and include a mix of training sessions and distances over the three disciplines will need protein primarily as a response to exercise, for repair, recovery and adaptation.

Protein has been a huge area of research for many years, with the most recent findings demonstrating how important protein is in the recovery phase in all sports and not just weight training, as previously thought. When you train, especially for endurance events such as Olympic distance, Half or Full Ironman, or during very high intensity training such as track, turbo or threshold swims, there is an increase in the breakdown of protein in the muscle. By ensuring good protein choices throughout the day, you will help to counteract this and remain in a positive protein balance (so there is more protein available than will be broken down during training).

So how much protein does a triathlete actually need? The latest guidelines recommend something I call protein pulsing, where protein is consumed more frequently throughout the day rather than as a large amount straight after exercise. This has been based on scientific findings demonstrating that our bodies can only absorb and utilize a certain amount of protein at any given time. It works on the principle that you need to consume up to 0.4g/kg BW from your three daily meals. For most triathletes this will equate to around 20-30g of protein. Those of you who also include weight training would also benefit from an additional 0.4g/kg BW portion before you go to bed to enhance your recovery.

EXAMPLES OF FOOD PORTIONS THAT PROVIDE 20G PROTEIN

>>> 3 large eggs

>>> 100g/3½oz salmon fillet

>>> 200g/7oz tofu

>>> 80g/2¾oz pork loin

>>> 1 x 400g/14oz can baked beans in tomato sauce

>>> 100g/3½oz chicken fillet

This can then be additionally supplemented with 10g protein portions as snacks through the day. Good examples include:

>>> 50g/1¾oz almonds

>>> 15g/½oz beef jerky

>>> 300ml/10½fl oz glass of milk

>>> 100g/3½oz Greek yogurt

Choosing a protein snack over a carb one is particularly useful if you are trying to watch your weight as protein helps to keep you full for longer and prevents blood sugar fluctuations. Furthermore, studies have demonstrated that a higher protein intake can be useful when you are trying to reduce your overall energy intake, as it helps to prevent the loss of lean muscle mass. The aim is to maintain as much lean muscle mass as possible as this is metabolically active and helps to continue to drive the weight loss.

FAT

Contrary to popular belief, not all fat is bad for you! In fact, it is vital that everyone eats some fat to help absorb the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K and to provide essential fatty acids that the body cannot make. These nutrients have important roles to play within the body.

As with carbohydrate, there are different types of fat in the diet and some are more desirable than others!

Saturated fat is the kind of fat found in animal products; examples include butter and lard that is found in foods such as pies, cakes and biscuits/cookies, fatty cuts of meat, sausages and bacon, and cream. It also encompasses trans fat, which is often found in processed foods. These saturated fats should be kept to a minimum in our diets. The one exception to this is dairy; studies report that a component of milk fat in dairy products such as cheese and yogurt reduces the absorption of saturated fat.

Although some fat is essential in our diet, it is also important to remember that eating too much fat can lead to weight gain; 1g of fat provides 9 calories whereas 1g carbohydrate provides just 3.87 calories and 1g protein, provides 4 calories. If you over-consume calories, it can lead you to become overweight, which will also increase your risk of getting certain clinical conditions such as type 2 diabetes.

Most of us eat too much saturated fat – about 20 percent more than the recommended maximum amount.

>>> The average man should eat no more than 30g of saturated fat a day

>>> The average woman should eat no more than 20g of saturated fat a day

To put this into context, eating two pieces of buttered toast, a bacon sandwich and a bar of chocolate, can clock up around 35g of saturated fat. Ideally, you should replace these saturated fats with ‘good’ fats or unsaturated fats. These include:

>>> Oily fish, such as salmon, sardines and mackerel, which are an exceptionally good source of omega-3 fatty acids

>>> Nuts and seeds, including their oils and butters

>>> Sunflower, rapeseed/canola and olive oils

>>> Avocados

However, it is important to point out that these good fats are high in calories and should be eaten with that in mind.

I generally recommend you take on around 1g/kg BW fat in total a day and that the majority of this comes from good fats. So for a 60kg/132lb athlete this will be 60g. I give all my athletes a list similar to the one below and encourage them to choose servings off the list to make up their daily requirements:

>>> 25g/1oz nut butter (14g of fat)

>>> 100g/3½oz avocado (15g of fat)

>>> 20ml/⅔fl oz rapeseed/canola oil (18g of fat)

>>> 25g/1oz sunflower seeds (13g of fat)

>>> 1 mackerel fillet (16g of fat)

So for a 60kg/132lb athlete this would be two slices of toast with 25g/1oz peanut butter; avocado and sunflower seeds in a salad; and a portion of mackerel with their evening meal.

In certain situations this recommendation of 1g/kg BW may need to be increased. Usually, this will be linked to a training demand/adaptation or increased energy requirements. There is a big move towards fat adaptation for ultra-running events and we will discuss this in Chapter 2.

HYDRATION – LIQUID FUEL?

Staying hydrated is essential for optimal health. Add training to this equation and hydration is even more important as you will have more fluid losses to contend with in the form of sweat.

Most fundamentally, being dehydrated impairs the body’s ability to regulate heat. During exercise, this means a rise in body temperature, which leads to an elevated heart rate. This, in turn, makes your exertion at a given training intensity feel much harder and your muscles fatigue more quickly, affecting your performance and putting you at risk of injury.

A symptom not often associated with dehydration is stomach discomfort. Triathletes are already at a higher risk of gastro-intestinal problems, caused by the change in body position – from being seated bent over to suddenly being upright – and the effects of the motion of running, and being dehydrated enhances this. We know that when we are training, blood is directed away from the stomach to the working muscles. If you are dehydrated, any food you have consumed before or during your run will stay in your stomach longer, leading to gastric problems.

So being dehydrated will negatively affect your performance, meaning you won’t get the best out of your training. This will be heightened in warmer conditions and it doesn’t take much; just 2 percent dehydration (ie a loss of 1.2l/40fl oz in a 60kg/132lb athlete), can become an issue. However, the good news is this can all be combated if you learn to hydrate appropriately around your training and also on rest days.

There are no actual guidelines for fluid intake because it depends on the type and level of exercise and also varies within individuals due to:

>>> Genetics – some people sweat more than others

>>> Body size – larger athletes tend to sweat more than smaller athletes

>>> Fitness – fitter people sweat earlier in exercise and in larger volumes

>>> Environment – sweat loss is higher in hot, humid conditions

>>> Exercise intensity – sweat loss increases as intensity increases

So how can you make sure you are getting enough fluid? The simple answer is by checking your urine colour. Ideally your urine shoud be the colour of pale straw at all times. If it seems darker, especially before a training session, then drink! Get into the habit of monitoring your thirst levels and drink throughout the day.

One quick method of assessing your sweat loss and fluid requirements is to weigh yourself before and after training sessions once every few weeks; I use this method regularly when working with elite athletes. So if you weigh 1kg/2lb lighter after a training session and you have consumed 500ml/ 17fl oz of fluid during the training session, your overall fluid loss is 1.5 litres/ 52fl oz. In order to replace this, I recommend that you consume 150 percent of what you have lost. In this case you would need to take on 2.25L. If you were 2 percent dehydrated, it takes up to 6 hours post-training to become fully hydrated again. Adding electrolytes (see opposite), particularly sodium, to your drink post-training, as well as choosing foods/drinks naturally higher in salt, such as milk or cereal, enhances rehydration. Sodium encourages the absorption of fluid into the body and also helps retain it.

How much fluid you should aim to drink during a training session depends on the training intensity and duration, and the climate. For higher intensities even over a short duration, you will need to take on fluid if losses are high; whereas at lower intensities, even up to 90 minutes in cooler conditions, you may not need any hydration. In all cases, it is worth knowing that your body can absorb around 150–300ml/5–10½fl oz every 15–20 minutes.

So now you know how much to drink, what should you drink? To some extent the choice is a personal one, but you should take some things into consideration:

>>> When are you training?

>>> How long is your training session? Will you need fuel too?

>>> How hot is it?

Most of the time water should be all you need to hydrate during training. However, studies show that some people, given the option of drinking only water, are less likely to drink anything at all. So although I’m not a massive fan of artificially sweetened drinks, when it comes to making sure you stay hydrated, I prefer that athletes drink what they know they will! So if this means they want lemon squash, so be it.

If you don’t need to take on energy at the same time, always go for a no-added-sugar variety of drink. If you are trying to take on energy during a high-intensity or long training session, or maybe immediately before, you will benefit from something that gives you energy.

There are numerous sports drinks on the market. My advice is to choose the one you are most likely to consume. If it’s hot, or you are someone who has very salty sweat losses, you will also benefit from electrolytes. If your sweat is salty, it will sting your eyes, you will be able to taste it and it will leave white residue on your clothes and body. Most branded energy drinks have both sodium (Na) and potassium (K) salts added. The normal concentration is around 10–20mmol of Na and 2–5mmol of K. These salts help to draw fluid into your body, reducing your risk of becoming dehydrated. Similarly you could add a quarter teaspoon of salt to your DIY energy drink (see tip, below).

Alternatively, you could use an electrolyte product, which come in an array of flavours and that are usually in the form of a tablet or powder that you add to water. They don’t provide energy, so can be useful in situations when you are training in a hot environment but don’t actually need any additional energy during your training session. I have also been known to use good old rehydration salts that you can buy from the pharmacist when you have gastroenteritis. This is essentially the same product. Always follow the dosage guidelines on the packaging. In the same way if it is a short training session, I recommend drinking water and following up with foods that are higher in salt during recovery, such as soup or casserole, or salted peanuts.