How to Fuel Guide: 50k Trail Run

BY STEVE BORN

Once I retired from my chosen sport of ultramarathon cycling, I decided to do a bit more running. And while I had done a few 10k’s and half marathons on the road, once I started running trails I was hooked! So! Much! Fun! My current furthest distance is 30k and I am working towards increasing that to the 50k distance.

One of the things that has always helped me—whether I’m cycling, Nordic skiing, or running—is fueling properly and a bit of prudent supplementation. Doing that ALWAYS made my day much more enjoyable… and I know it will for you as well.

In talking with a veteran ultrarunner, it was suggested to me that while there are many variables that will determine course difficulty, and thus finishing time, in general, a 50k course with moderate technicality and about 3000ft of vertical should take 4.5 – 5.0 hours for faster runners and up to 8 hours for slower runners.

Before you get to the product suggestions. Here is some essential information...

5 Simple Ways to Improve Athletic Performance Now

While there are numerous steps that you can (and should) take to optimize athletic performance, here are a couple of super easy ones. Start with this right away, and you’ll experience noticeably rapid improvement in your endurance and overall exercise performance.

1) Stay properly hydrated all day long. With approximately 60% of your body being comprised of water, it’s vital to maintain optimal hydration all day. Unfortunately, a lot of people—perhaps you? —live in a state of perpetual dehydration that negatively affects athletic performance and overall health. Starting now, gradually increase your fluid intake—primarily from pure, clean water—so that the total number of ounces you’re drinking daily is equal to 0.5 to 0.6 of your body weight in pounds (e.g., a 180-lb athlete should consume 90 – 108 ounces of fluids daily, in addition to what is being consumed during exercise). During exercise, drink 16-26 ounces per hour.

2) Fuel lean. It’s interesting to know how many calories you’re burning every hour during exercise; however, that amount isn’t a factor in terms of how many calories your body can accept in return for your fuel donation. The goal of caloric intake is to consume the least amount necessary to maintain energy levels where you want and need them to be hour after hour. For most athletes, this represents an intake of 120-180 calories per hour. Larger athletes (200+ lbs.) can consume 200 or slightly more calories. And if you find that’s not quite enough calories, that’s an easy fix—you consume a few more. Remember, it is ALWAYS easier to fix a “not enough” problem than an “uh oh, I overdid it, and now my stomach is rebelling” problem.

3) Ditch the sugar. Most fuels are comprised of short-chain carbohydrates, also known as simple sugars (glucose, sucrose, fructose, etc.) Hammer Nutrition fuels do not contain any simple sugars; instead, we use maltodextrin, a complex carbohydrate. Both maltodextrin and some simple sugars will boost energy levels quickly, which is a desirable benefit. However, simple sugars—because they are comprised of only one or two saccharide molecules—will drop your energy levels just about as quickly. Constantly feeling great for a few minutes, then fighting your way out of an energy rut for several minutes—commonly referred to as ”flash and crash”—is no way to enjoy your winter sport/activity.

Conversely, because maltodextrin is MANY saccharide molecules weakly linked together, you enjoy quick-acting and much longer-lasting energy without any wild fluctuations in energy levels. Another great thing with maltodextrin is that your body can digest greater amounts of calories—with no delay from entry to exit of the digestive tract—and make them available for energy production. You can efficiently digest up to 3x more calories with maltodextrin than any simple sugar, which basically eliminates stomach distress issues.

4) Don’t eat for 3 hours before your workouts, races, and competitions. By refraining from consuming any calories in the 3-hour period before your workouts, races, and competitions, you put your body in the ideal physiological state to use its finite stores of muscle glycogen most efficiently while utilizing the vast amounts of calories from body fat stores more effectively. Adopt this practice in all your workouts—even the early morning ones—and you’ll start seeing massive improvements in your endurance in a relatively short time. Note: If you must have some calories before the start of exercise, consuming something easy to digest (e.g., a serving of Hammer Gel) 5-10 minutes before the beginning—but no further out—is acceptable.

5) “Refill the tank” ASAP after all your workouts. Your body wants to reward you for your efforts in training, strengthening the immune system, rebuilding muscle tissue, and storing more minutes of readily available fuel (glycogen) in the muscles. All you have to do to enjoy all of these endurance-enhancing benefits is supply your body with the materials it needs right away—ideally within the first 30 minutes after exercise (the sooner, the better)—meaning complex carbohydrates and high-quality protein such as found in Recoverite and Organic Vegan Recoverite.

Supplement Suggestions

Fully Charged – Hammer Nutrition’s pre-exercise supplement provides numerous athletic performance-enhancing benefits without resorting to stimulants or excessive amounts of caffeine. Taking one dose 15-30 minutes before the start of your ride will allow you to enjoy all of this amazing product’s benefits for a good 3 hours and oftentimes longer. If you’ll be exercising longer than that, additional doses may be taken.

Anti-Fatigue Caps – This unique supplement significantly increases endurance by neutralizing the fatigue-causing ammonia that builds up in the blood and muscles during both high-intensity and endurance exercise, both of which are very much a part of many winter sports and activities. Take one dose of 2-4 capsules 15-30 minutes before the start, with additional doses of 1-2 capsules hourly.

Endurance BCAA+ – The perfect complement to Anti-Fatigue Caps, Endurance BCAA+ supplies the key amino acids—the BCAA (leucine, isoleucine, valine)—that the body needs to satisfy a small percentage of its energy requirements during prolonged bouts of exercise, helping to protect against lean muscle tissue breakdown. BCAA supplementation has also been shown to decrease the perception of fatigue on both a mental and physiological basis.

Fueling Suggestions

Success "during" starts "after"! It’s absolutely vital that you "refill the tank" after all your workouts... this is a major key for noticeably enhancing athletic performance. When you begin a workout or event/race, the primary fuel your body uses for the first 60-90 minutes or so is known as muscle glycogen. The more consistent you are with ASAP post-exercise fueling—Recoverite or Organic Vegan Recoverite is ideal for that—among the many benefits you'll receive is more minutes of glycogen stored in the muscles—maxing out at somewhere between 60-90 minutes—ready to serve you in future workouts and races.

Finish all calorie consumption 3 hours prior to start. See #4 in the earlier article as to why this is so important.

“Pre-emptive strike” dose of Endurolytes or Endurolytes Extreme. Taking a dose of Endurolytes or Endurolytes Extreme 15-30 minutes prior to the start will cover your electrolytic mineral needs during the first hour of the race, allowing you to focus on getting into a nice, smooth rhythm instead of having to consume pills at that time. The dose of Endurolytes can be anywhere from 1-6 capsules, with most athletes using 2-4 capsules an hour, the amount dependent on body weight and temperature conditions. If you’re competing in hot-weather conditions—especially if you’re not acclimated to those conditions—I suggest taking a pre-race dose of 1-2 Endurolytes Extreme capsules.

Take your first dose of Anti-Fatigue Caps and Endurance BCAA+. 1-2 capsules of each product, 15-30 minutes prior to the start, will get these nutrients in your body and ready to serve you during the first hour.

Consume 1-2 servings of Hammer Gel 5-10 minutes prior to the race. Consuming 1-2 servings of Hammer Gel at this time will supply some calories to augment muscle glycogen stores but without interfering with the efficiency of how your body will use its finite stores of muscle glycogen as a fuel source.

Fuel selection during the race. The key here is to make sure you’re supplying your body with sufficient amounts of calories, fluids, and electrolytes while being super-efficient at the same time. Keeping things as simple as possible minimizing the time spent treading water while staying properly fueled, is of paramount importance.

Faster Runners – Finish time is 4.5 to 5.0 hours

OPTION #1 – “Carbs only” + Anti-Fatigue Caps + Endurance BCAA+
To cover your calorie needs, one of our “carbohydrate only” fuels— Hammer Gel or HEED—will be completely sufficient. Given a choice, I would personally opt for Hammer Gel, as it is a more concentrated fuel than HEED; I can get the calories I need more quickly—consuming 1 serving every 30-45 minutes—I can drink plain water to take care of hydration needs, and I’ll take Endurolytes or Endurolytes Extreme (in capsules) to cover my electrolytic mineral requirements.

Should you decide to use HEED instead of Hammer Gel (perfectly acceptable!), you’ll want to make sure you’re consuming the appropriate amounts. Each scoop of HEED contains 110 calories. I (Steve Born) personally use 1.75 scoops of HEED 2.0 an hour, which supplies 192.5 calories, an amount that works well for larger athletes like me (I’m 200 pounds). A 1.0 scoop (110 calories) per hour works well for lighter-weight athletes. Medium-weight athletes will find that 1.25 scoops (137.5 calories) to 1.50 scoops (165 calories) per hour is an excellent amount.

Continue to take Endurolytes or Endurolytes Extreme hourly to satisfy your electrolytic mineral requirements.

NOTE: With this fueling option it is essential to take 1-2 capsules of Anti-Fatigue Caps and Endurance BCAA+ every hour.

OPTION #2 – “Carbs + protein fuels” Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0 + Anti-Fatigue Caps + Endurance BCAA+
Regarding calories, you can do your entire race on Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0, or you can do all but 1 hour on either of these two fuels, with 1 hour’s calorie needs covered via Hammer Gel (for a little variety in the menu).

Each scoop of Perpetuem 2.0 contains 90 calories. I (Steve Born) personally use 2.25 scoops an hour, which supplies 202.5 calories, which works well for larger athletes like me (I’m 200 pounds). For lighter-weight athletes, 1.0 scoop (90 calories) to 1.25 scoops (112.5 calories) per hour works well. Medium-weight athletes will find that 1.50 scoops (135 calories) to 2.0 scoops (180 calories) per hour is an excellent amount.

Each scoop of Sustained Energy 2.0 contains 100 calories. I (Steve Born) personally use 2.0 scoops an hour, which supplies me with 200 calories. For lighter-weight athletes, 1.0 scoop (100 calories) to 1.25 scoops (125 calories) per hour works well. Medium-weight athletes will find that 1.50 scoops (150 calories) to 1.75 scoops (175 calories) per hour is an excellent amount.

THE ADVANTAGES OF THE MULTI-HOUR FUEL BOTTLE

Instead of making a 1-hour bottle of either Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0, which would mean I’d have to drink a full bottle of flavored/semi-flavored liquid hour after hour (which I wouldn’t like), while also having to stop and make more (which burns up precious time), I would make a bottle of either fuel that contains a few hours’ worth of fuel.

To make (for example) a 4-hour bottle, I’d start by using the smallest water bottle I have (less flavored drink mix I have to consume). Then, I fill that water bottle 1/3 full of water, add a couple of scoops of Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0), put the lid on, and shake well. I’ll repeat the process until I’ve mixed the appropriate number of scoops in my one bottle (for me, that’s 9 scoops for Perpetuem 2.0 and 8 scoops of Sustained Energy 2.0). Now, because I have 4 hours of fuel in one bottle, I only have to drink ¼ of that bottle every hour, augmenting that with water from a hydration pack or from the aid stations to take care of my hydration needs.

Again, the benefits of using a multi-hour bottle of fuel:

You get to drink and enjoy plain water from another bottle to care for hydration needs and cleanse the palate. Yes, some liquid is left in the multi-hour fuel bottle. However, over 3-4 hours, it's pretty minimal, so that you can consider that fuel bottle a "calories only" bottle.
By keeping your calories separate from your fluids, you can keep track of you taking care of those two areas of your fueling from sources that are independent of each other. Additionally, in hot weather races, your ability to process calories may diminish while your fluid and electrolyte requirements may increase. Keeping the three entities of fueling—calories, fluids, and electrolytes—independent of each other will allow you greater flexibility with your dosing, making it easy to alter your intake of any or all of those fueling components whenever necessary

NOTE: With this fueling option, continue to take hourly doses of 1-2 capsules of Anti-Fatigue Caps. Note that while it is not an absolute necessity to take Endurance BCAA+ every hour (because your fuel has amino acids in it), there are still tremendous benefits to be enjoyed by taking 1-2 capsules hourly during the event.

IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT AID STATIONS: Most organized trail running events will have an awesome spread at their aid stations, offering a wide range of foods and snacks. And while it certainly looks inviting, you’ll want to avoid the temptation to eat much of what’s being offered. Cookies, cupcakes, doughnuts, and other similar foods may taste good going down, but it’s guaranteed to result in stomach issues not too far down the road… and that’s no fun at all. If you want to enjoy a little solid food while you’re stopped briefly at an aid station, opt for fruits such as bananas, cantaloupe, pears, watermelon, papaya, and mangos. These are all alkaline fruits, and since you’re an “acid-producing machine” while riding your century, these fruits will help balance blood and muscle pH, and that will negate stomach issues from occurring. Also, make sure that you don’t overconsume solid food, even these healthy fruits, as that will cause your body to use its finite energy to digest food instead of helping you get down the road faster.

6) ASAP after the race. “Refill the tank” ASAP with Recoverite or Organic Vegan Recoverite. Refueling your body with two scoops of Recoverite within the first 30 minutes after your race takes advantage of the glycogen synthase enzyme when it’s most active. This allows the body to replenish and increase its glycogen stores while also providing the raw materials (the amino acids from protein) to help rebuild the muscle tissue and support the immune system.

Slower Runners – Finish time is up to 8 hours

Primary-to-sole fuel is Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0. These are our long-duration fuels, containing complex carbs, protein, and key auxiliary nutrients (Perpetuem also contains a small amount of healthy fat). These are both such complete fuels that you could use them as your sole source of calories from beginning to end. That said, I do like some variety in the menu, so I alternate with other Hammer Nutrition fuels.

I would carry a full Hammer Flask of Hammer Gel. This holds 5 servings, which easily covers 2 hours’ worth of calorie requirements, and for some 2.5 hours. Plus, it is a LOT LESS MESSY than the single-serving packets.

Solid Food. A great option for some solid food during my up-to-8-hour fueling plan, I’d consume 1/2 to 2/3 of a Hammer Bar. Super easy to chew, really tasty, and quite satisfying.

Continue to take Endurolytes or Endurolytes Extreme hourly to satisfy your electrolytic mineral requirements.

So, in 1 bottle, 1 flask, and 1-2 bars I have all the fuel I need to take care of my calorie needs for 8 hours. A flip-top capsule dispenser will carry enough Endurolytes for at least 8 hours, oftentimes more, and it’ll easily carry all of the Endurolytes Extreme you’ll need.

Here’s a possible fueling plan that will cover up to 8 hours on the trail, using the above-listed fuels:

Hour #1 – ¼ bottle of Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0 + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #2 – ¼ bottle of Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0 + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #3 – ½ to ¾ Hammer Bar+ water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #4 – Up to ½ flask of Hammer Gel + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #5 – ¼ bottle of Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0 + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #6 – ¼ bottle of Perpetuem 2.0 or Sustained Energy 2.0 + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #7 – ½ to ¾ Hammer Bar+ water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)
Hour #8 – Up to ½ flask of Hammer Gel + water + Endurolytes (or Endurolytes Extreme)

SPECIAL NOTE: On a hot-weather day consume Perpetuem in the first four hours...

ASAP after the race. “Refill the tank” ASAP with Recoverite or Organic Vegan Recoverite. Refueling your body with two scoops of Recoverite within the first 30 minutes after your race takes advantage of the glycogen synthase enzyme when it’s most active. This allows the body to replenish and increase its glycogen stores while also providing the raw materials (the amino acids from protein) to help rebuild the muscle tissue and support the immune system.

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