What do you eat before your Long Slow Run?

nellocono

So, yesterday before my long slow run of 15 miles I decided to have a very small breakfast of just a couple of spoons of porridge in the hope that my body might get somehow more efficient by learning to run when low on energy.

I found the last few miles very tough as I was getting very hungry which was making it hard mentally and maybe physically too.

I am wondering if its worth keeping this tactic up, especially on the 20 milers coming up soon. I am thinking maybe it would be better to have a full belly of food and energy and try to get the most out of the training run...

Any thoughts?

Run and Jump

My long run is in the morning, so I have a good feed of pasta the night before, and then only a banana an hour before my run. On a race day my porridge would be around 3 hours beforehand so that I have it well digested by the time I start.

When I run in the evenings, I've had a good hearty lunch and only a light snack before the run. I can't run on a full stomach, so I make sure I'm fed earlier.

Cabaal

For me, on the morning when training more often then not I eat nothing at all,

I can eat without problems but I find even when eating a bowl of porridge I need to wait 2hrs before running to feel right, if i'm starting a LSR at say 7am on a Saturday the last thing i want to do is get up at 5am to eat and then wait around till 7 to start running.

For races its different and as long as I wait I find I'm fine

ThePiedPiper

Better to go with a very small breakfast at least two hours before the run/race, or nothing at all. I'd usually have just a bowl of cereal/porridge, with a pint of water to make sure I'm hydrated. There's plenty of evidence to say that doing the LSR on no food at all is the most beneficial, training your body to burn fat. I love my food too much to do this though!

walshb

There's no exact science behind it but surely a decent meal an hour or 2 before a long run would be the way to go? Not too early before the run. It needs to be somewhat digested. So, a run at 11 in the morning could see you have a good sized bowl of porridge at say 0915 or so?

average_runner

I usually run in the morning, so would have a good dinner the night before. That morning I usually hop out of bed, go to bathroom and straight out.
This works for me.

Slept it in this morning though:(

sideswipe

Have tried a few approaches. I usually do long runs early 6-7am and find having no breakfast better but make sure to have a good carb loaded meal the evening before. I'd often eat a baked potato or home made wedges a couple of hours before bed also to make sure I hit the road fully loaded the next morning, seems to work well for me.

ThePiedPiper

Walshb, there sort of is some science behind it actually.

If you have a decent meal two hours before your long run, your body is using this meal, digested into your bloodstream as the fuel for the meal. You're not really training your body to do anything here from the point of view of fuelling. There'll be for arguements sake, 500 calories in the decent meal you're talking about, enough for around 5 miles of running. After this point, you'll start using the glycogen reserves. Glycogen reserves for a properly trained marathoner are usually extended to in or around 20 miles. This is why long runs of 10 miles hurt when you're untrained, but when properly trained, 21-24 is fine.

Alternatively, if you avoid the meal completely, and have maybe not eaten since the previous evening, glycogen reserves will already be half depleted, and you'll be training your body to burn body fat. This is excellent training to prepare your body for that last few miles of a marathon, or more importantly for ultra marathons.

For a marathoner, a gradual and mixed approach is best in my opinion. For long runs where I intend on running a few tempo miles or PMP miles, it would be better to be fueled, so I'd take the bowl of cereal and the banana two hours before training. If however, the goal of the long run is fat-burning, extending your glycogen depletion threshold, then no breakfast, or just a banana or something is best. This is the approach I take. Trying to do the LSR with PMP miles in it while being in a glycogen depleted state would be tough work.

walshb

RunForestRun wrote: »

Walshb, there sort of is some science behind it actually.

.

Agreed. Just saying that it can differ a fair bit for many people. I think the 90 mins to two hrs before a long run is a reasonable time frame to have a decent meal or feed.

KielyUnusual

I always have a bagel/toast with some butter and jam, an orange and a cup of tea before a long run/race. The cup of tea is essential.
I wouldn't worry about flagging at different points during a long run. This is gong to happen. It could be due to a multitude of factors but the main one is that running for a long distance is tough. From experience, I find that you might think you are spent after 15 miles but if you had been going longer, you might have picked up after 17/18 miles and felt strong at the end. There's invariably one or two periods during a long run where you are a bit dead on your feet. Ninety per cent of the time, if you keep plodding onwards, you'll eventually get back to feeling strong again
In my opinion, the main thing food wise for a long run is that whatever you're eating beforehand doesn't lead to stomach cramps or stitches.

BeepBeep67

I've had some stomach issues in races and have experimented with various options.
Porridge: seems fine in training, sometimes find it hard to digest on the morning of a race.
Cereals: Strawberry granola works fine, but has a high sugar content, so don't eat that anyone as I don't want a sugar spike.
Wholemeal Bagel: with hummus, marmite or peanut putter, again generally fine but on race day can be difficult to get down.
What I've settled on and is working to date, is get up have an espresso (gets the pipes moving), sip 250 mls of water, a plain bagel with Forlan's strawberry jam, not spread I just dip a corner of the bagel in and a large cup of tea with only a splash of milk. I've ran up to 22 miles after this with no additional intra-run hydration or nutrition and ran a HM last week with a 2 mile w/u and 5 mile w/d, again no issues.
I've only recently added taking a gel during long runs with MP miles, just to get used to taking it on board on the fly.

nellocono

Alternatively, if you avoid the meal completely, and have maybe not eaten since the previous evening, glycogen reserves will already be half depleted, and you'll be training your body to burn body fat. This is excellent training to prepare your body for that last few miles of a marathon, or more importantly for ultra marathons.

THis was the question I was trying to ask. How many of you runners use this method to prepare for a marathon? My Long slow run is done at about 10 min/mile pace, so a 20 miler would take just over 3 hours...Thats a long time to go when your hungry but as its a training run i think it is excellent preparation for the actual race...My only fear is that maybe I am not getting as much as I could from the run due to being in a depleted state and would be better off running it at full strength.

My training plan has 3 x 20 mile runs in it, so I will treat one of those as if it was a full race i.e full breakfast before, water and gels on the run

Ruu

Found that the big meal the night before was not working too well, so the biggest meal is now my breakfast. Large bowl of oatmeal with gf granola, gf bagel and two cups of tea. Get some light weights and indoor exercise and then I am ready, no problems at all.

Carlow2011

My long run is usually on Saturday at 9.15. I have a bowl of porridge at 7.45 smaller that normal portion, about 25g with some sugar. A berocca boost at around 8.45 and that usually keeps me going. That's for about a 20-25k run.

randomCluster

Just on the subject of long runs, this article might be of interest to some.

Personally, I prefer a decent meal the night before. Then in the morning a mouthful of water, clear the pipes, and hit the road. I tend to carb load after the run with a pack of Doritos!

EauRouge79

Not a lot really, a bowl of porridge 60-90 mins beforehand and thats fine for long runs even as long as 22miles.
Would have food in the car for afterwards if I have driven to a meeting point for that run as I tend to eat like a horse afterwards.

wrstan

nellocono wrote: »

THis was the question I was trying to ask.

I rarely eat anything before a LSR, but in my case there is definitely no science in it. In other words it is not to train my body to burn fat, it is because like many others, I usually do my LSR's early on a weekend mornign and my experience of eating, even a couple of hours before running has not been happy. I have never felt it cause me any problems.

Bludub

wrstan wrote: »

I rarely eat anything before a LSR, but in my case there is definitely no science in it. In other words it is not to train my body to burn fat, it is because like many others, I usually do my LSR's early on a weekend mornign and my experience of eating, even a couple of hours before running has not been happy. I have never felt it cause me any problems.

I generally get up at7.30on a Sunday morning to watch match of the day and have a bowl of porridge, glass of water and a cup of coffee all finished about 30 mins before heading out at about 9.00. I found that this works up to 20 miles anyway. I normally would not have a gel or water until 15 miles. I will probably increase the water intake as the weather warms up. On marathon race day I expect to follow something similar but allow more gels during the race.