Morning of Big Race

ocnoc

What do people generally do?
Are people up at 5am shovelling food and dangerous amounts of coffee into them or is it more a personal thing?

I know a lot depends on race distance, terrain, time of start etc.

I would feel I eat a lot on race morning, just wondering on the volume others would consume

Colm

Krusty_Clown

On marathon morning, if it's a 9am start, I would get up around 6:30-7am, and eat:

1 x bowl of porridge, made with low fat milk, mixed seeds/dried fruit/jam
1 x banana
1 x bagel with Nutella or jam
1 x large mug of strong coffee
Around a litre of water mixed with fruit juice
Then on the walk up to the marathon, I'll sip on a bottle of sports drink.

Pretty similar to my pre long run breakfast, albeit without the sports drink.

rainbow kirby

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

On marathon morning, if it's a 9am start, I would get up around 6:30-7am, and eat:

1 x bowl of porridge, made with low fat milk, mixed seeds/dried fruit/jam
1 x banana
1 x bagel with Nutella or jam
1 x large mug of strong coffee
Around a litre of water mixed with fruit juice
Then on the walk up to the marathon, I'll sip on a bottle of sports drink.

Pretty similar to my pre long run breakfast, albeit without the sports drink.

Scarily similar to my own pre-race or pre-long run breakfast. :eek:

Condo131

Read "Marathon Advice - On The Day" - on this page
Also worth reading "Marathon Advice - The Last Two Weeks", on the same page.

I'm planning to update both pages (hopefully in time for them to be helpful for those (including myself) who are doing Dublin. I also want to add a "Marathon Advice - After Its Over" page.

average_runner

What i did for my last two marathons is as follows:

The day before did all my water drinking, probably drank up to 8-10 litres during the day and another 3 in the evening.

Hydration no problem for the next day.

On the morning of the marathon, i got up at 6.30, had my porridge and sports drink and logged onto the lap top. About 7am got in car and headed to town, drinking a sports drink on the way.

kennyb3

ocnoc wrote: »

I would feel I eat a lot on race morning, just wondering on the volume others would consume

5k race as little as possible or nothing, 10k race small bowl of cereal, half marathon regular bowl of cereal and a banana. marathon, guys above have covered this and know alot better than me.

Tipp man running

For a marathon i'd normally stay in a hotel close to the start, get up at 7-7.30 for a 9am start. Good stretch when i haul my ass out of bed.

Banana sandwich made with brown bread
Apple
Breakfast bar
Black coffee

Plenty of water the evening before and sip sports drink going down to the race start.

BeepBeep67

For the Dublin Marathon - I normally have a big fry, then bring a couple of bars of chocolate and can of coke for the 20 mile mark - but then I'm sitting on my bike at the bottom of Foster's watching the pain and suffering while taking a few photos .

shels4ever

BeepBeep67 wrote: »

For the Dublin Marathon - I normally have a big fry, then bring a couple of bars of chocolate and can of coke for the 20 mile mark - but then I'm sitting on my bike at the bottom of Foster's watching the pain and suffering while taking a few photos .

Sounds like my plan for this years marathon

NeedsTraining

For a marathon, my routine is normally

2 hours before race

2 weetabix
Banana
Bagel with Jam
Water

1 hour before

Tin of beans
Banana
Sports drink

half hour before

Muesli bar

The unfortunate thing is, I am normally hungry again by mile 10.

Condo131

NeedsTraining wrote: »

For a marathon, my routine is normally

.......1 hour before

Tin of beans
.............

Are you trying to kill us all? :eek::eek:
Make sure you're nowhere near a naked flame!

...............might work for you, but I'd NEVER recommend beans (of any kind), even the day before a marathon.

.......I'd definetely be over the ditch before 10 miles!

rainbow kirby

Condo131 wrote: »

...............might work for you, but I'd NEVER recommend beans (of any kind), even the day before a marathon.

It's rocket fuel for a sprint for the line :pac:

earnyourturns

I ran my second marathon last Sunday. Race started at 8am, we had to be at at the sports centre to get the bus to the start line at 6.30am. I woke up at 4.20am, wandered into the kitchen and idly ate half a PB and choc chip cookie. Then went back to bed till my alarm went off at 5.40am. Got up and had a cup of tea and a bowl of porridge with a banana and sultanas and golden syrup. And lots of water.

Disclaimer: I have an iron stomach when it comes to running. A few weeks ago about 5 mins before starting out on a 12 miler I ate a choc-orange brownie to no ill effect.

G-Money

Stupid question but how do you avoid eating too much and needing to make a sprint for the little boys/girls room whilst on your run?

I tend to be pretty careful myself with what I eat if I've got any sort of long journey or event coming up as I hate those emergency without warning alerts that go off as a result of eating something suspect.

Krusty_Clown

This might sound obvious, but don't eat anything suspect. Also, if you have a tendency towards a dodgy tummy, don't eat anything within two hours of a run. Dodgy: Currys, high fibre, dairy, high fat (deep fried), that kind of thing.

NeedsTraining

Make sure you try the same food/drinks before one of your long runs as you plan on having on marathon day.
Don't try anything new on race day

marchino

NeedsTraining wrote: »

Make sure you try the same food/drinks before one of your long runs as you plan on having on marathon day.
Don't try anything new on race day

Dats gud advice. if its a short run just a cereal shud surfice<i live on fruit n fibre> just as long as your used to it. some apple/orange juice aswell or green tea/coffee. if longer den a 10mile race den d same as above but mayb add a coffee w some toast and jam/ or a bagel even. im not a fan of any jam at all but i do hear d experienced marathon runners in d club recommend it! mayb an actimel or sumtin similar aftr to help settle d digestive system<works for me> instead of jam i use a little coleslaw or egg mayo and nevr any butter! slug away on water den but not to close to d start or yul piss yurself.

hunnymonster

marchino wrote: »

Dats gud advice. if its a short run just a cereal shud surfice<i live on fruit n fibre> just as long as your used to it. some apple/orange juice aswell or green tea/coffee. if longer den a 10mile race den d same as above but mayb add a coffee w some toast and jam/ or a bagel even. im not a fan of any jam at all but i do hear d experienced marathon runners in d club recommend it! mayb an actimel or sumtin similar aftr to help settle d digestive system<works for me> instead of jam i use a little coleslaw or egg mayo and nevr any butter! slug away on water den but not to close to d start or yul piss yurself.

Marchino. Some of us are way too old for txtspk. Please use full english to post on boards. Thanks

marchino

hunnymonster wrote: »

Marchino. Some of us are way too old for txtspk. Please use full english to post on boards. Thanks

ok hunnymonster. will do.

The Hammer

Tipp man running wrote: »

Plenty of water the evening before and sip sports drink going down to the race start.

Water is not something you should be only taking on board the night before a race. to properly hydrate a body, you would need to be doing this from a week before. infact distance runners should always drink plenty of water.

neilc

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

On marathon morning, if it's a 9am start, I would get up around 6:30-7am, and eat:

1 x bowl of porridge, made with low fat milk, mixed seeds/dried fruit/jam
1 x banana
1 x bagel with Nutella or jam
1 x large mug of strong coffee
Around a litre of water mixed with fruit juice
Then on the walk up to the marathon, I'll sip on a bottle of sports drink.

Pretty similar to my pre long run breakfast, albeit without the sports drink.

Wow, looks like I'm consuming way too little before my long runs. Have two 20 milers left before DCM so will have to experiment more. Thanks for the info.
Neil

ocnoc

What about a two day race? How would people handle that?

Krusty_Clown

neilc wrote: »

Wow, looks like I'm consuming way too little before my long runs. Have two 20 milers left before DCM so will have to experiment more. Thanks for the info.
Neil

We're all different. That's what I eat, but I'm a big lad.
On my 20+ mile runs I'd use up around 2,000+ calories, so a bowl of porridge and a bagel isn't much in the grand scheme of things. I generally wouldn't take on any calories during my long runs. A bottle of water, and very rarely an isotonic gel (144 calories).

Krusty_Clown

ocnoc wrote: »

What about a two day race? How would people handle that?

Have never done anything like that, but I guess it would depend on whether or not you have to carry everything with you, whether you'll have heating/cooking facilities, time to stop and eat, etc.

Hunnymonster, jeffontour and Woundedknee would be good people to ask.

liamo123

ocnoc wrote: »

What do people generally do?
Are people up at 5am shovelling food and dangerous amounts of coffee into them or is it more a personal thing?

I know a lot depends on race distance, terrain, time of start etc.

I would feel I eat a lot on race morning, just wondering on the volume others would consume

Colm

For Barcelona marathon in march I brought weetabix etc over with me.. Got up at about 5am on morning of marathon and after getting directions from security man in hotel with terrible english set off looking for shop to get milk.. Needless to say I got lost and after almost getting mugged and propositioned by hookers found a shop that was open.. Got cartons of every milk available and headed back to hotel where after sample tasting the different milk I eventually picked one and had my weetabix!!

I can laugh now but at the time it was far from ideal preparation..

Moral of Story: if travelling abroad dont stay in cheap hotel with no restaurant or find out where nearest 24hr shop is Day Before Marathon..