Posts Tagged ‘sugar’

Sweet Victory

Many races hand out oddball prizes to the winners, but the Mawana Sugars Marathon in New Delhi, India, takes the cake, so to speak.

In addition to cash, the male and female winners also received their weight in sugar. How’s that for motivation?

The female winner also received a sewing machine, presumably so she could let out the waist on all her clothes after consuming the sugar.

All right! That takes care of my chauvinism quota for the year!

Redemption

Yesterday through 6 miles – 50:20.

Today through 6 miles – 52:31.

Yesterday, miles 7 and 8 – 19:18.

Today, miles 7 and 8 – 16:26.

I should also mention that yesterday I fueled with a salty bagel and peanut butter, coffee, 24 ounces of diluted Gatorade, and one Power Gel. Today I had coffee and an Entenmann’s chocolate doughnut. No fluids during the run, unless you count all the rain I was breathing in.

Maybe yesterday I should have thought about my pace before running. Sheesh.

Pour Some Sugar on Me

It could be psychosomatic, but I don’t think I need any more evidence.

Tuesday night I did speedwork with the Fleet Feet training group. We did 4 x 880s, with 90 seconds in between. My four splits were 3:43, 3:37, 3:30 and 3:54. Not awesome, but not bad.

Wednesday morning I did a 4-miler in 32:32.

Today I plodded through 6 miles in 55:04.

OK, I wasn’t expecting this morning’s run to be great, after two speed days, but it was terrible. There was one big difference. This morning I ate a bowl of Special K with 1% milk and fresh blueberries, plus black coffee.

Notice anything missing? Right! No sugar! I stink of ketones.

Over the past few months I’ve experimented with every kind of breakfast before my run, and I get the best results from the worst breakfasts. So enough is enough. I’ll eat healthy after running and on my off-days. Before a run, I have to satisfy my sugar jones.

The Kenyan Secret

I’ve told you about my pre-run doughnut exploits and now it seems there might be some basis for my relative success. The Santa Fe Reporter ran a lengthy and interesting profile of the Kenyan marathoners who live and teach at a training camp in New Mexico. Americans are astonished by the Kenyans’ unorthodox diet, which apparently owes more to Michael Phelps than Kip Keino:

Marc Esposito, a 31-year-old director of physical therapy at Santa Fe’s Therapy Solutions, LCC and amateur marathoner, has grown close to the Kenyans, especially Ndambuki, since beginning to help out at Camp Marafiki in 2007. Esposito is convinced the timing and quantity of the Kenyans’ glucose consumption plays a significant role in their running success, beyond the particularly lean physiques, large lung capacities and concentrations of slow twitch muscle fibers that genetics and training may have bestowed. “I really think there’s something to it,” he says. “They ingest an incredible amount of sugar every day.”

This is bad news for the bagel industry.

Junk (Food) Miles

My bizarre doughnut experiment is yielding confounding results. I’m afraid at this point the conventional wisdom regarding nutrition isn’t applying to me. Last night I treated myself to a Taco Bell pig-out: three crunchy taco supremes and two spicy bean burritos. For breakfast this morning I had a cranberry bagel with reduced-fat cream cheese, two 14-ounce mugs of 100% Kona coffee with a teaspoon of raw sugar in each, and an Entenmann’s chocolate doughnut.

I proceeded to run six miles in 47:30 without undue effort. It was 33 seconds faster than my previous best on this route this year and only about two minutes short of my best ever for that distance.

I assume as I increase mileage I’ll need more slow-absorbing complex carbs and less sugar, but if this keeps up I’m planning a best-seller titled, From Boston Cream Pie to Boston Marathon.

Breakfast of Champions

Running has altered my diet, and I am eating food that is better for me in general. But I have to admit I do experience a noticeable sugar burst if I eat badly before running in the morning.

Normally I’ll have a bagel and peanut butter or Kashi cinnamon shredded wheat, with my usual large cup of Kona coffee and two raw sugars. But I was bad on my birthday and had two Homer Simpson-style donuts for breakfast. I mean chocolate frosting and multi-colored sprinkles and all. I then went out and ran my fastest six miles of the year.

The best race of my life, mile for mile, was the 1:41 half-marathon I ran one week after I had fainted about a half-hour after a 20-miler (low blood sugar). It scared me so much I loaded up on sugar and caffeine before the race and I was totally wired on the starting line. I ran what was at the time a five-mile PR over the last five miles of the race and made Roadrunner “mbeep-beep” noises as I passed people.

I’ve never been able to re-create that feeling, though I also never again mainlined simple sugars like I did that day. I’m not planning to switch to a junk food diet, but now I’m wondering if my distance running would improve with a sensible combination of complex carbs and simple sugars just before I race.

I’m going to experiment with this. I don’t want to undermine your good eating habits, but I’ll let you know how it turns out, either way.