Recovery: Junk Food or No Food? | GTN Coach's Corner 

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Interesting esp with all the great research on UPF recently!

Three time world champion Peter 'Robbo' Robertson use to carry a small wooden stick in each hand when he ran to remind him to relax his hands and arms and stop them from crossing the centre line. Dual world champion and Olympic Gold medal winner Emma Snowsill and Commonwealth Games champion Brad Kalefeldt also ran with hand sticks. In the end it is all psychological. I pretend I am playing piano, like I would if riding a bike, just to relax my fingers, and then arms. Great show as usual. Thanks.

Thanks for replying to yet another one of my questions. This series is great! I will keep usually doing 18k+ long runs once a week (going to get longer as I get closer to my races next summer). But every once in a while my wife is working a nightshift and my kids wake up earlier then planned so then I dont really have a choice. So good to know that the occasional 9+9 has pretty much the same aerobic effect.👍

I've been eating fish and chips (or occasionally sausage and chips) half way through my long run of 5km, is this ok?

Yes I bet the person is in America doing a bike ride and forgot nutrition and the only options are lays , oreos, or Coca Cola at the local convenience store or vending machine. Been there!!

Doing 2 runs instead of 1 long run, is fine if you can’t do a long run for whatever reason. Better 2 runs, than no run.

Big picture first: overall calorie needs are met. Secondary to that would be nutrient timing. So getting something is better than nothing, especially if you're feeling hungry and have another session coming up within the next 6 hours or so. But if you train 'just' once a day or even less frequent (e.g. 4-5 days of 1x per day), then it's no big deal. Simply eat enough during the rest of the day - which should be the end goal in any case.

I've used the double run/brick day with very good results (PBs) for both marathon & ironman races recently. Idea being that your long run gets up to ~28k in one go, then can train longer distances closer to race day but without risking injury & needing too much recovery, e.g. 2 x 15, 17, 18k with varying recovery in between. Same for ironman peak training, had 2 weeks out a double brick of 2 x 90/15k and i felt super prepared after that without taking too much strain. Thoughts @gtn?

#gtncoachescorner I’ll give my question one more shot. The long distance triathlon diet. I’m concerned about how much sugar one eats in a full IM with all the gels. Eating 60g of carbs per hour mainly in the form of sugar gels means that you can easily reach 400g of sugar intake. Is this a problem for one’s health and pancreas? We hear so much about the dangers with sugar: insuline resistance/diabetes, etc. Or are the health harms mitigated by the fact that you are burning it as you consume it? Even if you don’t race often, one has to have that diet in training to practice. Hope you can answer it this time. Thanks!

I got a proper pump in my forearms when running my 5km PB and my hands were very relaxed. Super strange

Thank you for answering my question! That is very helpful :)

#GTNCoachesCorner Hi all, and thanks for the excellent advice as always! Following on the theme of nutrition, I’ve recently started experimenting with higher-carb fueling, especially during my long rides (3-5 hours, depending on the week). I know I definitely need more carbs than I’m used to-I’ve usually just had a gel or half a bar per hour, probably close to 20g/hr, which is way too low-but I’m worried about what else I’m taking in as I aim for that 60-80g carb target. Specifically, how concerned should I be about sugar? It feels almost impossible to hit 320 grams of carbs without also taking in 80 or more grams of sugar-close to twice a normal person’s total daily intake. How bad is that, or is it something that I as an endurance athlete should disregard completely?

Love these - question for another #coachescorner - I’m about 50, did 1st Ironman (California) just under 12h. Everyone was run walking. But strategies differed. I walked all uphills and aid stations. Others alternated run walk by time. Is one strategy for run walk better than another?

#gtncoachescorner Hi GTN. I have a question regarding hydration and fueling for longer events. I still I can't figure out the whole picture when you add salts to the mix to prevent cramping. I know with electrolytes and gels I will still get cramps on longer events. My sweat is very salty, so how do I get the extra salts? I bought some tablets that have salts, but they also have carbs, so maybe I have to replace 1 gel every hour?

Before my first marathon I made the mistake of in my long runs having a short (5-10 min) break halfway through - so whilst I thought I'd done long enough runs beforehand, I'd not actually run *continuously* for long enough so I definitely hit the wall earlier than I was expecting in the race...

Having a readymade protein shake with a truck load of artificial ingredients and chemicals is not any better than junk foods, in my opinion. I prefer to eat those real veggies and proteins instead.

I just need my nuggies with sweet-sour sauce from time to time :x That being said most "junk" food is not in itself unhealthy it just has a lot of pointless calories due to sugary sauces and breading and the like.

Can confirm in America there’s sometimes nowhere to get some healthy quick. Just recently salad to go drive thrus have come up in my area

Surely if you have just done a hard session, you will be sodium depleted and so some salt (alongside plenty of water) is a good idea?

Sure took a long time to answer the first question...

This must be a carbs channel. Sorry You need protein and electrolytes.

When choosing food, there is a distinct difference between weightloss/cutting and recovery for performance/strength. If your exercise is aimed at cutting you're probably better off not eating if there's only junk. If you want to get more powerful, the junk will get absorbed and you can just compensate in other ways.