Most, if not all women who have run a triathlon know the feeling of butterflies just before the big event.
Sometimes it does not matter how much you test your nutrition during training for a race, when it comes down to it on the day a lot of triathletes cannot seem to hold down solid food.
So is a liquid meal the answer before a race if you are having trouble keeping anything solid down because of nerves? First of all, it is absolutely essential to have a meal before a triathlon, no matter what distance you are competing at.
Your stomach may feel like someone is doing the tango inside of it, but you still need to find the right nutrition for the race that you can take on-board without throwing the lot back up, to provide the fuel and prevent problems like cramps during the race.
The right way to go is purely personal, you know your body and how it feels, but whether you consume liquids or solids, as long as it is quality nutrition, it will feed your muscles properly and they will not know what you ate or drank.
There is a difference however, when it comes to tricking your stomach and your brain into thinking that you have had a good meal when you have only drank liquids.
Liquids will not fill your stomach like solid food does, and you will still feel hunger pangs which may break your concentration, especially in the later parts of a race.
If you really cannot stomach solids, then there really is no choice but to drink liquids, but the good news is that this is not all bad.
There are many athletes who like doing it this way, liquid meals help with hydration and are easy to take with you from home, they digest much quicker than solid food, and this allows you to drink them much closer to the race start.
You do have to be aware of the content of the liquids that you are drinking, they should be made up of a small amount of protein, also be low-fat and have a high carb content.
This fuels your muscles and keeps up your energy levels and helps to keep the hunger at bay longer by filling your stomach, which also stops it emptying too quickly.
You need to keep well away from anything high in fiber, and keep it simple, if you can stomach solids then make sure you take on the right amount of liquids to make up for the much smaller amount that you will be drinking compared to when you are using liquid nutrition.
Here is a ball-park figure to give you some numbers to work from, the right amount of calories or carbs that you need obviously depend on how much you are going to consume during a race.
For every Kilogram of body weight you should be taking in around 1.
5 to 4 grams of carbs, you also need to work out the best time for you to take them on-board.
If you start with a window of 1.
5 to 4 hours before the race, you should be fine, if you really get bad nerves then go for a time closer to the 4 hour mark, before the nerves have had a chance to take over.
If you do opt for an earlier time then you can go for a bigger meal, but if you do not go for an earlier time then your meal should be smaller, and you will probably need to take on extra fuel throughout the race.
If you are up to Ironman distance then you will need a lot of extra fuel, both before and during the race, and you may have to face the fact that only solids will do.
You can do a combination of solids and liquids however, and many women do this for Ironman and Olympic distance races.
Try something like a muffin and a bottle of sports drink that has a 4:1 ratio of carbs to protein, then about 60 minutes before the race take in some sports formulated gels, this should help with your endurance and also help with your recovery on the other end of things.
These methods require testing during training, because you do not want to eat or drink too much before a race, but race nerves on the other hand are hard to re-create if there is no race, so try some of these tips and hopefully you can refine them over time until you get it right for you.
Bad nerves are such a race destroyer for many ladies, so if none of the nutrition tips help then you need to look at the source of those nerves and deal with them directly so you can display your full race-day potential instead of just displaying the contents of your stomach just before you start racing.
First of all make sure you have a good warm-up before the race, go off and do a 10 minute jog, concentrate on your form and breathing, this sometimes helps to take your mind off of the nerves.
You can also try stationary deep breathing exercises and relaxing, get the oxygen pumping to your brain and muscles, breathe in through your nose and out of your mouth and stay focused.
Be a loner, you do not have to be rude but avoid other triathletes and do not talk to them, always get to the race early and make sure your transition area is ready to go, check out the swimming course and avoid stressing yourself by mingling and listening to the other competitors.
You should also scope out the best bathrooms early, and make sure you empty your bowels, but this should be no problem.
Get a small mp3 player and fill it with uplifting music that you like, this will block out all the trash talk going on and leave you to relax, run your race without being upset by the rumors and lies usually discussed by other competitors before a race.
Sometimes it does not matter how much you test your nutrition during training for a race, when it comes down to it on the day a lot of triathletes cannot seem to hold down solid food.
So is a liquid meal the answer before a race if you are having trouble keeping anything solid down because of nerves? First of all, it is absolutely essential to have a meal before a triathlon, no matter what distance you are competing at.
Your stomach may feel like someone is doing the tango inside of it, but you still need to find the right nutrition for the race that you can take on-board without throwing the lot back up, to provide the fuel and prevent problems like cramps during the race.
The right way to go is purely personal, you know your body and how it feels, but whether you consume liquids or solids, as long as it is quality nutrition, it will feed your muscles properly and they will not know what you ate or drank.
There is a difference however, when it comes to tricking your stomach and your brain into thinking that you have had a good meal when you have only drank liquids.
Liquids will not fill your stomach like solid food does, and you will still feel hunger pangs which may break your concentration, especially in the later parts of a race.
If you really cannot stomach solids, then there really is no choice but to drink liquids, but the good news is that this is not all bad.
There are many athletes who like doing it this way, liquid meals help with hydration and are easy to take with you from home, they digest much quicker than solid food, and this allows you to drink them much closer to the race start.
You do have to be aware of the content of the liquids that you are drinking, they should be made up of a small amount of protein, also be low-fat and have a high carb content.
This fuels your muscles and keeps up your energy levels and helps to keep the hunger at bay longer by filling your stomach, which also stops it emptying too quickly.
You need to keep well away from anything high in fiber, and keep it simple, if you can stomach solids then make sure you take on the right amount of liquids to make up for the much smaller amount that you will be drinking compared to when you are using liquid nutrition.
Here is a ball-park figure to give you some numbers to work from, the right amount of calories or carbs that you need obviously depend on how much you are going to consume during a race.
For every Kilogram of body weight you should be taking in around 1.
5 to 4 grams of carbs, you also need to work out the best time for you to take them on-board.
If you start with a window of 1.
5 to 4 hours before the race, you should be fine, if you really get bad nerves then go for a time closer to the 4 hour mark, before the nerves have had a chance to take over.
If you do opt for an earlier time then you can go for a bigger meal, but if you do not go for an earlier time then your meal should be smaller, and you will probably need to take on extra fuel throughout the race.
If you are up to Ironman distance then you will need a lot of extra fuel, both before and during the race, and you may have to face the fact that only solids will do.
You can do a combination of solids and liquids however, and many women do this for Ironman and Olympic distance races.
Try something like a muffin and a bottle of sports drink that has a 4:1 ratio of carbs to protein, then about 60 minutes before the race take in some sports formulated gels, this should help with your endurance and also help with your recovery on the other end of things.
These methods require testing during training, because you do not want to eat or drink too much before a race, but race nerves on the other hand are hard to re-create if there is no race, so try some of these tips and hopefully you can refine them over time until you get it right for you.
Bad nerves are such a race destroyer for many ladies, so if none of the nutrition tips help then you need to look at the source of those nerves and deal with them directly so you can display your full race-day potential instead of just displaying the contents of your stomach just before you start racing.
First of all make sure you have a good warm-up before the race, go off and do a 10 minute jog, concentrate on your form and breathing, this sometimes helps to take your mind off of the nerves.
You can also try stationary deep breathing exercises and relaxing, get the oxygen pumping to your brain and muscles, breathe in through your nose and out of your mouth and stay focused.
Be a loner, you do not have to be rude but avoid other triathletes and do not talk to them, always get to the race early and make sure your transition area is ready to go, check out the swimming course and avoid stressing yourself by mingling and listening to the other competitors.
You should also scope out the best bathrooms early, and make sure you empty your bowels, but this should be no problem.
Get a small mp3 player and fill it with uplifting music that you like, this will block out all the trash talk going on and leave you to relax, run your race without being upset by the rumors and lies usually discussed by other competitors before a race.
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