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#542 — Fueling for Performance
69 Plays7 days ago
Fueling is one of the most misunderstood—and most performance‑limiting—parts of endurance training.
In Episode #542 of the Grit2Greatness Endurance Podcast, Coaches Rich Soares and Lauren Brown break down why so many endurance athletes train hard, follow the plan, and still underperform on race day. More often than not, the problem isn’t fitness—it’s fueling.
In this episode, we cover:
- The most common fueling mistakes endurance athletes make in training and racing
- Why “eating clean” does not automatically mean fueling well
- How underfueling quietly sabotages performance, recovery, and long‑term durability
- Why short‑course racing still punishes poor fueling
- How to plan fueling instead of reacting when it’s already too late
Using real race‑day examples from supersprint to long‑course events, we connect fueling decisions directly to pacing, performance, injury risk, and consistency—so athletes can stop guessing and start fueling with intention.
Whether you’re a triathlete, cyclist, runner, or endurance athlete of any kind, this episode will help you understand how to fuel the work you want your body to absorb.
🎯 Free Fueling Resource
Grab our Fueling Audit & Checklist—designed to help you identify gaps and build a simple, effective fueling strategy.
👉 Visit Grit2Greatness Endurance Coaching and head to the Free Guide page.
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This episode is brought to you by Vespa Power Endurance.
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Transcript
Intro
Introduction to Fueling in Endurance Sports
00:00:20
Rich
Welcome to episode 542 of the Grit to Greatness Endurance Podcast. We're your hosts, coaches Rich Soares and Lauren Brown, and we are on a mission to help endurance athletes train smarter, race stronger, and build the grit it takes to achieve greatness.
00:00:37
Lauren Brown
In this episode, we're breaking down one of the most and so misunderstood and most performance limiting areas of endurance training, fueling.
Identifying the Real Issue: Fitness vs. Fueling
00:00:46
Lauren Brown
Triathletes and endurance athletes often train hard, follow the plan, and still underperform on race day.
00:00:53
Lauren Brown
More often than not, this isn't a fitness issue. It's a fueling issue.
Common Fueling Mistakes and Real Examples
00:00:59
Rich
We'll talk through the most common fueling mistakes we see across triathlon, duathlon and other endurance racing. Why eating clean doesn't equal fueling well and how under fueling quietly sabotages performance for fueling and long-term durability using real day, real race day examples from short course events to longer course endurance events.
00:01:22
Rich
We'll show you how even small fueling gaps can create big performance spreads.
00:01:27
Lauren Brown
Yeah. So whether you're racing super sprint, sprint, Olympic, or long course, this episode will help you connect fueling decisions to actual performance outcomes, not just during the race, but in training and injury prevention too.
Celebrating Achievements: Athlete and Coach Shoutouts
00:01:44
Rich
Yeah, that's awesome. So we've got a great discussion coming up, but before we get into that, we want to give a real quick shout out to some of our awesome athletes and coaches who raced last weekend. And Lauren, I'm going to kick it off by just giving you and Kevin Cole a huge shout out for Chattanooga 70.3. You crushed it. Congratulations.
00:02:07
Rich
Yeah.
00:02:07
Lauren Brown
Thank you. Thank you. was an awesome race. And then also shout out to Coach April Spilde Racing XTERRA National. She crushed it. She had a monster PR there.
00:02:18
Lauren Brown
40 minutes, right? 40-minute PR? 40 minutes faster than predicted.
00:02:21
Rich
40 minute PR. Well, 40 minutes faster than than predicted actually.
00:02:25
Lauren Brown
She also had a significant PR. But holy smokes, she blew it out of the water. So shout out to Coach April. Super proud of her. Good.
00:02:35
Rich
And want to give a huge shout out to Robina Waterman racing multispa multi-sport nationals last last weekend in Michigan. She raced the super sprint duathlon.
00:02:45
Rich
She raced the aquathlon and the aqua bike. So she's she's amazing.
00:02:53
Lauren Brown
She is.
00:02:53
Rich
And this is coming coming back from a stroke.
00:02:56
Lauren Brown
Yeah, she's she's amazing. She's an amazing human.
00:03:01
Rich
Awesome.
Fueling Tips for Endurance Athletes
00:03:03
Rich
All right, well, let's roll into what we're gonna call 10 coaching tips for fueling for performance. We are, you know, we wanted to get really practical here. We're gonna be talking about, and when we say nutrition too, don't just hear, you know, we're talking fueling a lot, but we're also gonna be talking a little bit about hydration because that is just as much of a limiter in your daily nutrition as under fueling can be. So,
00:03:31
Rich
Coach Lorne, I'll let you kick us off here.
00:03:34
Lauren Brown
All right. so jumping into coaching tip number one, fueling starts before this session.
00:03:45
Lauren Brown
Super important. First coaching tip. So it doesn't start during the workout. It starts before you hit the start button. i always think of it like this where I'm like, do you check your gas tank like once you're already in on the road or do you like make sure ahead of time if you have like a long trip plan do you make sure that you have gas in the tank?
00:04:07
Rich
That is a great, great analogy for that. Right. I mean, from a psych, from a physiological standpoint, like if you're starting out, if your gas tank is empty, if your muscle glycogen is already low, when you start training, you know, intensity and power output are going to drop faster than they would, even for shorter sessions than they would if you were properly fueled from the beginning.
00:04:31
Lauren Brown
Correct. Right. And that means you're not actually training the system you think you are. Right. so that means under fueled workouts lead to underwhelming adaptations.
00:04:44
Rich
Absolutely, 100%.
00:04:47
Rich
Coaching tip number two, training fuel is performance fuel. This is a big one, folks. Athletes think fueling is just for race day. You know, i but you know i unless you' unless you've done this sport, right? How would you know, right? So this is, you know, an important thing for us to bring the surface because not everybody understands this, but the science is clear. Adequate carbohydrate availability during training improves training quality and adaptation. Carbohydrates is what your body is using,
00:05:16
Rich
for fuel. It and is always using it. It's using it even more at higher intensities.
00:05:22
Lauren Brown
Yeah. So if you're consistently under fueling your training, you're asking your body to adapt with one hand tied behind your back. You're you fuel the work you want your body to absorb. And this, I want to share a recent experience that I had with under fueling for my workout. So I had a big training block. I definitely under fueled post training and did not properly fuel prior to my run. And it was literally like the hardest run that I felt like I was doing, even though my pace was slower than I wanted it to be.
00:06:01
Lauren Brown
I wasn't running hills or anything like that, but because I did not properly fuel after my prior workout or before this one, just because of timing and I really didn't plan accordingly, it ended up being like a way harder workout for what should have been a pretty comfortable session.
00:06:21
Rich
Yeah, I love that. Yeah, I mean, and maybe this is just a concept where, you know, we're just making some assumptions that everybody understands. So maybe it's a good thing just to pause on here for a minute, which is, and and we'll probably talk about this, you know, i know we're gonna talk about this coming up, but, you know, after a workout, your your you know, your your muscles, like,
00:06:40
Rich
this is where the the gas tank is.
00:06:41
Lauren Brown
Right.
00:06:43
Rich
The gas tank is your muscles and your liver where glycogen is stored and you just have a limited supply. Even if you can fill, completely fill your tank, you probably only have about 2000, you know, 2500 grams, you know, or, you know, of carbohydrate in your system.
00:07:03
Rich
And that gets depleted over, you know, through exercise.
00:07:07
Lauren Brown
Yeah, super important. So that's leading us right into the tip number three, that carbohydrates are not optional.
00:07:18
Lauren Brown
So it's really like It's funny, I think about, and not to go totally off the rails here with the conversation, but I always think about when people are like, no, I want to just be keto and I can perform well. And even when you think about Vespa, right? Like, and that's, we utilize fat more efficiently, but you still need to have carbs in your system because that is your preferred product.
00:07:46
Lauren Brown
source of energy. Right. And it's not like, that's, that's not an opinion that's exercise physiology. And some of the fastest endurance athletes that we see out there running marathons, ultra marathons, they are relying on carbohydrate. And so I think that sometimes there's this like, well, I want to become fat adapted. And as if that means like, I should be able to just function and optimize my training only off of fat.
00:08:13
Rich
Yeah, that's a really important point to be making here because we it gets confusing pretty fast, right? Because you hear all of these success stories of low-carb approaches. And in fact, you know metabolic flexibility is something that, and periodization is something that is a real concept out there. Which is, you said, Coach Lauren, it is still not an option. You still are going to need...
00:08:40
Rich
carbohydrates to replace the glycogen that you're losing. And by the way, if you don't, the brain has a really great way of protecting itself because your brain needs carbohydrate to function. If it does not have glucose to function, you stop functioning. And which is why like you'll feel the bonk if you deplete yourself.
00:09:02
Lauren Brown
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:09:02
Rich
Because the brain is going to say, you are going to sit down and save the rest of that carbohydrate for me.
00:09:03
Lauren Brown
Mm-hmm.
00:09:10
Rich
So it's okay to do periodized metabolic you know flexibility through you know you know teaching your body how to be more fat efficient, you know burning fat more efficiently, but you're still going to need glycogen.
00:09:28
Rich
All right. Tip number four, short races still punish poor fueling. So we hear this all the time. It's only a sprint. It's only a 30 minute run, but even a 20 or 30 minute race or run or bike, it relies heavily on stored carbohydrates. You are still going to, like if if you aren't fueled up, you are still going to deplete that. And that will affect, which we'll talk about later, recovery.
00:09:55
Lauren Brown
And I also think too, with a short races, when you think about high intensity interval training, when you talk about those things, you're like, your body wants carbs for that. It's more so when you, when you think about how people discuss what energy or what fuel source you're using, you think long, slow, steady fat fuel.
00:10:14
Lauren Brown
high intensity carbohydrates and these short races that is like you want carbs you want to be able to and it's like you want to be able to have it readily available so you're performing as as hard as you can and poor pre-race fueling this is where it shows up as pacing mistakes or late race fade right so you want to make sure that you are fueled properly beforehand so you can go hard the entire time you don't want to go hard and then you have like 15 minutes left and you're like, wo wo
00:10:47
Rich
Yeah. wawa
00:10:49
Lauren Brown
nothing left in the tank. So yeah, but going on to tip number five. so So fueling by feel is too late.
00:11:05
Lauren Brown
I would say this too with thirst. If you're thirsty, you're already like, you're already going down the wrong path. So this is another big mistake that we see that you're waiting until you feel low energy.
00:11:16
Lauren Brown
And I've definitely done this before. I am super guilty of this. When I first started doing like longer runs and, you know, i i just was kind of finding my footing with longer distance. Right.
00:11:27
Lauren Brown
i would, i would feel all that like sugar drop where all of a sudden you're like a little shaky and then you're trying to be like, do I have a gel? Can I get my energy back? And if you're waiting until you feel that by the time you're like perceiving that fatigue, your glycogen availability, it's already compromised.
00:11:49
Rich
Yeah, absolutely. You know, and that's why it's important to honestly plan ahead, plan fueling, don't react to it. I mean, you hear a lot of people, you know, drink the thirst and eat the hunger that yeah yeah. Okay. Somebody has figured out how to be, you know, somehow successful without that. And they're dispelling that as, as the, you know, what's going to work for everybody. And it's simply not true.
00:12:14
Rich
So your your body just physi physiologically, if you were to if you were to do a metabolic test and do it under load, like while you're while you're like a ramped running test or a ramp power test, you would you would see from the chart that your body is going to be burning more and more and more carbohydrate the higher the intensity that you're working
00:12:20
Lauren Brown
Sure.
00:12:38
Rich
Shorter races are going to be at a higher intensity by default because you just can't sustain that high intensity for an Ironman. But either way, if you are not planning for it, you will get behind. So put it into a schedule, practice it, rehearse it. That's what those race rehearsals are for.
00:12:57
Rich
All right. Coaching tip number six, recovery fuel protects tomorrow's workout. Recovery nutrition isn't just about the work that you finished. It's about the one that's coming next, it's about the race that's coming next, the workout that's coming tomorrow.
00:13:11
Rich
True story. so one of the things I did a while back is I worked with Dr. an Nigo San Milan at the CU Sports Medicine Center.
00:13:20
Rich
And they basically did what is the equivalent of Doppler weather radar on my leg muscles to see what my current amount of glycogen storage is. It looks, it's like they take like an ultrasound and it,
00:13:38
Rich
The ultrasound brings back an image of stored glycogen and it can actually tell muscle muscle by muscle, muscle group by muscle group, how much stored glycogen is in that muscle compared to what its true capacity is.
00:13:53
Lauren Brown
That's so cool.
00:13:55
Rich
It's crazy. But if you don't, but the timing of that recovery fuel should be immediately after that workout. That is when your body is most receptive to uptake and store that, you know, glucose that you're drink your you know you're drinking, eating, whatever, and store it as glycogen.
00:14:08
Lauren Brown
Mm-hmm.
00:14:16
Lauren Brown
Yeah, that's where I jumped ahead earlier on talking about with my post workout where I was doing of I was actually doing a race rehearsal and I wasn't hungry after it. And I was like, I'm not hungry. i had to be at a party. And I waited three hours almost to eat after this workout, which is why my run the next day was totally trash.
00:14:39
Lauren Brown
But it's like, even if you are not hungry, you have to eat. And that's where it's like, Again, if you're listening to your body and you're only waiting until you feel it, you're missing the boat. And that happens with post-workout nutrition as well. so And I know, Rich, you kind of alluded to this earlier, where the research shows that timely carbohydrate and protein intake improves glycogen resynthesis and muscle repair. Super important to you guys. We're breaking down our muscle while we're doing our endurance sports, right? I mean, if you're running cycling, those are definitely high demand on your muscular system as well. So if you miss recovery, feeling consistently, your fatigue stacks quietly and you don't want that to happen.
00:15:27
Lauren Brown
So, all right, coaching tip number seven. under fueling increases injury risk and i do want to share a quick i keep on having these little quick asides going share it so when i was dealing with issues with my knee i went to the orthopedist and i ended up having an mri and we were reviewing the things that were going on right so i had like quad tendonitis i had it tb band syndrome my meniscus is a little angry like whatever the things were going on And he pulled me into the office and was like, started going over reds with me, which is for anybody, relative energy deficiency in sports, for anyone who's not familiar with it, or, you know, it's just where you're not fueling properly. And I was like,
00:16:10
Lauren Brown
I got like defensive at first because like, I know I'm fueling. and I know this is not a fueling problem. I know I'm eating enough. But from a doctor's standpoint, he wanted to address my fueling because he wanted to make sure that that wasn't what was contributing to why I was having issues with my knees and with any like breakdown or inflammation that was going on.
00:16:32
Lauren Brown
So did want do that.
00:16:33
Rich
That makes perfect sense. Yeah.
00:16:35
Lauren Brown
Yeah, and like it caught it took me a little bit by surprise and I know it makes sense, but I almost felt like, Like, no, that's not what's going on. But now I've, I really have since that appointment been a lot more like, okay, let me try to eat a little bit more food to and make sure it's timely with my workouts and also just getting my, my calorie intake up because it it can be hard, but you, you have to do it. So again, like this is one that I'm taking seriously as an athlete. We take seriously as coaches because chronic low energy availability it impacts,
00:17:09
Lauren Brown
your hormones, your bone health and tissue repair. So super, super important. And for me, I was like, if that's not going to get me to make sure my nutrition is on point, like I don't know what is because i don't know any endurance athlete or any person listening to this who does not want to increase their risk of injury.
00:17:28
Rich
You know, when, when I have my one-on-one, one-on-ones with my athletes, you know, one of the things coaches will do when they're talking to an athlete is they're going to try to gauge, you know, you know we're always kind of looking for certain, you know, signs, right? You know, if the athlete appears tired or, you know, always sore or always managing something, or maybe even feeling kind of just, you know, grumpy, you know, you know,
00:17:51
Rich
Sometimes that can be a sign that you need to examine your fueling, right? that it It does raise a question. How is the fueling? What is causing you to always feel tired, always feel sore, always be managing something or just in fact grumpy because you know you're you're hungry, you're hangry.
00:18:09
Lauren Brown
Yeah, we've all been there.
00:18:12
Rich
All right. Coaching tip number eight, consistency beats perfection. I love this. Progress over perfection. Always. Athletes love complicating fuel plans, but consistency matters more than complexity. Keep but keep it simple.
00:18:26
Lauren Brown
Yep, so just a simple feeling strategy that you execute every time will outperform a perfect plan you don't follow. And that's like, love that line, right? Where it's like, you could have the best strategy in the world if you're not gonna do it. I say that when people ask me, this isn't triathlon related, this is just general fitness. But when people ask me like, what's the best type of cardio?
00:18:46
Lauren Brown
I'm like, whatever the cardio is you're going to show up for, right? If it's something that you're gonna consistently do, do it. I don't, if you love Zumba, do Zumba. If you love, you know, like rowing, row. But same thing with your fueling strategy. It has to be something that you're going to follow that you know is going to physiologically reward, physiologically reward you, right? And physiology rewards predictability. And it's also a great way to make sure that you know what's going to happen on race day.
00:19:15
Lauren Brown
If you're, if you're somebody who's always changing it up, it's like you want to know what works for your body and your gut. Sure.
00:19:22
Rich
Absolutely.
00:19:24
Lauren Brown
All right. Onto coaching tip number nine, race day. Oh, this is perfect segue race day. Fueling should feel boring. It should feel if if it feels exciting, it's probably risky. The gut adapts to what you practice. I know it's like, look and see what's on course. I i use more in gels on race day. I know they're going to be on course on race day. So like,
00:19:49
Lauren Brown
Use what you know is gonna be out there. It shouldn't be new and exciting.
00:19:55
Rich
yeah I, yeah, love that. And, and this is where the practice really makes perfect. And when we say practice your fueling, we mean practice your fueling under the intensity that you will be racing. It is one thing to be going out there for a leisurely ride and, you know, trying to get down the, you know, two or three gels an hour or whatever it is that your, you know, your, your nutrition, your body demands.
00:20:21
Rich
But if you have not practiced, this is not something your body can adapt to like overnight. This isn't something that you'd like cram for the test. This is something that you really want to rehearse and do it under intensity.
00:20:31
Lauren Brown
Yeah.
00:20:32
Rich
Like I said, like it feels, it feels way different to be trying to put down carbohydrate and, and fuel when you're in that zone three zone four area versus that zone two level of intensity.
00:20:46
Rich
All right, let's bring it home with coaching tip number 10. Performance phases require performance fueling. This is our final coaching tip here. Fueling has to match the phase you're in. This is part of that periodization we were talking about or alluding to earlier.
00:21:01
Rich
Performance-focused training blocks require adequate energy availability. So whether it's a one-day, like it's up, you know, where you you're going to probably double your carbohydrates for a big day.
00:21:18
Rich
If it's a big training week or a training camp, you might be increasing.
00:21:22
Lauren Brown
Yeah. Yeah. And I always say like, if I ever have an athlete who is thinking about weight loss goals while they're racing, I'm like, that's that's not the time, right? In season is your body's gonna land wherever it's gonna land. And the training that you're doing is naturally gonna probably make things like shift.
00:21:44
Lauren Brown
But if you are doing endurance sports, your goal should be for most of us. and I don't want to say for everyone, but it should be for most It's performance. And it's it's performing.
00:21:54
Rich
Thank you.
00:21:55
Lauren Brown
And when I say performance, I don't mean, oh we're going to podium. And that's that's what the goal is. The goal is that you want to be able to get through a race feeling as strong and as good as possible. Because I really don't think anybody enters a race thinking like, I hope I feel like...
00:22:09
Lauren Brown
really bad the whole time, right? You want to feel good. So, but trying to aggressively restrict calories during peak training and racing that often backfire. So fuel prefer fuel for performance first. And like I said, everything else will will follow suit however it's supposed to be.
00:22:29
Rich
If there's one thing we want you all to hear, fueling isn't about just simply eating more. It's about fueling with intention.
00:22:35
Lauren Brown
Yes. Aligned to your training, your racing and your long-term durability.
00:22:42
Rich
And because we want you to succeed, that is exactly why we built our fueling audit and
Tools for Improving Fueling Strategies
00:22:49
Rich
checklist. So go to the grit to greatness, endurance.com website, go to our free guide page, send us your email and we'll send you the fueling audit and checklist. It'll give you a way to just see and score yourself and see how you're doing and give you a checklist for the future.
00:23:06
Lauren Brown
I love that. All right. You ready for the fun segment?
00:23:10
Rich
Oh my gosh, let's go for it.
00:23:13
Lauren Brown
All right. fun It is Tales from Bonk.
00:23:13
Rich
What's today's segment called?
00:23:18
Lauren Brown
All right. So everyone gather around, pull up a folding chair, grab a gel, because today we were doing something sacred, something so deeply, profoundly humbling that most of us would rather get a root canal in transition, then talk about it out loud.
00:23:38
Lauren Brown
That is a bold statement, right, you guys? So today we're telling tales from the bunk. We just spent a whole episode trying to save us and you from this exact thing, that magical moment where your legs file for divorce, your watch starts beeping accusations at you, and your brain attempts the math. It is no longer qualified perform.
00:23:59
Lauren Brown
perform So every single one of us has a bonk story and almost none of us wants to tell it. Our worst DNF, sure, our ugliest transition, fine, let's laugh, but the bonk, the bonk is personal.
00:24:16
Lauren Brown
The bonk knows things about us. So it's confession time. I want your bonk story, the real one, what race, what mile, and the exact moment you knew the wheels were coming off.
00:24:28
Lauren Brown
Rich, do you to share first?
00:24:32
Rich
I'd be glad to. know, one of the things you've probably noticed about me, Coach Lauren, is that I am very, very data driven when it comes to nutrition
Personal Experiences with Fueling Mishaps
00:24:44
Rich
plans.
00:24:44
Rich
You've seen my nutrition calculator and the burndown chart.
00:24:47
Lauren Brown
Yep.
00:24:49
Rich
There is a reason that that came into existence. Right. And it was really to help solve my own problem. This is something that has always, from my very first 70.3 to my last Ironman, has been something that I have had to you know to to manage.
00:25:08
Rich
And I would probably say my very worst bonk was Ironman Boulder, 2014. And...
00:25:15
Rich
and You know, I knew i was playing catch up most of the day and I was trying some new, honestly, i had really kind of gone through this this kind of fat adaptive cycle with a with nutritionist.
00:25:32
Rich
And one that I kind of thought, you know, had had it pretty dialed in for events of this type. And this is before I became a coach, before i really knew what I was doing. And I knew i was in trouble.
00:25:43
Rich
when it When I was on mile six of the marathon, mile six of the marathon, and it felt like I got hit over the back of the head with a frying pan, I could not run any anymore.
00:25:59
Rich
And within a mile, i was vomiting. i And I walked the next 19 miles of that marathon, right?
00:26:09
Lauren Brown
oh
00:26:09
Rich
i got I got up to a little bit of a jog going past the crowd, going past my family a couple of times. And I finally was able to run the last mile.
00:26:19
Rich
And I, you know and you know, because short-term, you know, short-term experience. At that time, I was actually getting, i was able to get some nutrition in. it I was starting to come back. But yeah, a 19-mile walk.
00:26:31
Lauren Brown
Holy smokes. That is brutal.
00:26:35
Rich
And i still I still beat my brother.
00:26:40
Lauren Brown
Oh my God, that was great.
00:26:43
Rich
Sorry, Roger.
00:26:46
Lauren Brown
Oh my God, that was my my favorite part of that story. But holy smokes, 19 miles walking and like, o so I can't top that, but that totally explains your spreadsheet and everything that went into it because that is like, that's borderline traumatic to go through that.
00:27:06
Rich
Yeah.
00:27:07
Lauren Brown
So I have nowhere near matching that, but I'm going to go with a different type of bonk because we brought up, you brought up hydration earlier on. And I used to be somebody that was like, I don't need to worry about taking eight at eight stations. I've got my run bottle. I've got what I need. And I, this was just a half marathon. So it wasn't a super long race, but I forgot all my little cooler with my morning nutrition at work. And I left straight from work to drive down to Virginia. And I got to the hotel and I was like,
00:27:42
Lauren Brown
where's all my stuff? I'm like, I guess I left in the car, I'll get it in the morning and I didn't have it. So I had no electrolytes, I had no food, didn't have anything with me. i had a little bit of food that I bought at the store, so I had a bagel, but I got to the course and I'm like because it was at half marathon, there was like, I couldn't find any electrolytes.
00:27:59
Lauren Brown
And so I ran that race without any electrolytes. It wasn't super hot, but that doesn't matter because I'm a sweaty person and a salty sweater.
00:28:10
Lauren Brown
that I probably had about like two miles left and I've never felt anything like it in my calves in my life. And I hope I never feel it where it felt like there was like an alien trying to come out of my leg with how the rippling was in my my leg. And it kept feeling like my foot was just like, like I didn't feel my foot.
00:28:30
Lauren Brown
And I was like, dang it. I was, and i was on such a good pace where I knew I was like super close to getting a PR. And i was like, come hell or high water, Lauren. don't slow down. And it was like every now and then i feel like my leg was giving out and I ended up PR-ing that race somehow.
00:28:47
Lauren Brown
But as soon as I finished the, across the finish line, I couldn't walk and I fell and I couldn't get up. And thank goodness this, wonderful, wonderful woman had pickles and pickle juice.
00:28:58
Lauren Brown
And so she gave me pickles. There was a girl that walked by that had noon in a cup that she got from one of the vendors, I guess, or whoever was there. and she was like, are you okay? Do you, do you want my noon? was like, you're new and I don't care if you drink out of that thing. I cannot stand up and walk right now. So not a fueling, but a hydration. That was my worst hydration, we'll call it a bonk ever, where I was like i don't know if I could drive. i don't even know if I can get to my car and I was alone. So that was a a good learning curve of make sure you've got your electrolytes, take aid at the aid stations. Don't just think you're gonna wing it and be okay because you probably won't.
00:29:41
Rich
I love the desperation, like how how far desperation will, will, will, will take you.
00:29:52
Lauren Brown
Terrible.
00:29:52
Rich
i used to I used to train with and a neighbor who's an ultra runner, and i once paced her over on the level 100. And she talked about a story where she was racing and she was so depleted that she found an opened ketchup packet on the ground ate it.
Desperate Measures and the Importance of Planning
00:30:19
Rich
so no
00:30:22
Lauren Brown
We'll do anything. Oh my God. That's so funny. Oh my God. yeah i mean, well, I drink a stranger's noon, so i guess that's kind of gross too after a race. So whatever.
00:30:32
Rich
Yeah. I mean, anyway, great, great discussion. That was fun.
00:30:37
Lauren Brown
Yes. All right. So here's your homework for our listeners, right? Because misery loves company. Head over to our G2G Endurance Facebook page.
00:30:50
Lauren Brown
and jump into the comments on today's episode post and confess confess your bump. Bonus points if you tag a friend who once told me you don't need a gel for a sprint, it's only 20 minutes. these Those brave enough to confess will get a grit to greatness. Shout out on next week's show. And here's the real reason coaches gave a whole episode to Fueling, so that tales from the bunk can someday be history segment instead of a weekly diary entry. So train hard, eat well, and for the love of all that is holy, grab it at this aid station, not the next one.
00:31:30
Rich
I love that. That is awesome. You know, and all of this, you know, and we've already mentioned it, right? All of this discussion around nutrition, you know, we, we are lovers of Vespa Power. Vespa Power Endurance helps you tap into clean, steady energy. so that you can stay strong, focused, and in the zone longer. Now, and we've been talking about carbohydrate. You're still going to need carbohydrate.
00:31:55
Rich
Vespa is not a carbohydrate. It is a metabolic catalyst that helps you shift from using that much needed sugar and glycogen. It allows you to use more fat so that the current glycogen and sugar that you have stored lasts you a little bit longer.
00:32:12
Rich
kind of helps your you know your fuel mileage, if you will.
00:32:12
Lauren Brown
Thank you.
00:32:16
Rich
So, less sugar. higher performance, faster recovery, check out Vespa Power products. We've got the link here in the show notes, Vespapower.com.
Conclusion and Vespa Power Product Details
00:32:28
Rich
There is a coupon, a discount code here in the show notes. G2G Vespa 15 will get you 15% off of anything in your cart.
00:32:37
Rich
There are so many goodies here, right? Share this episode with somebody else. Share your story. Download our downloadable. Go to the website, grit2greatnessendurance.com.
00:32:48
Rich
Contact us. We will send you the download. And folks, thanks for spending time with us today on the Grit to Greatness Endurance podcast. If you've enjoyed the episode, please follow us and leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or YouTube or both. It helps us reach more athletes just like you.
00:33:06
Rich
Stay gritty, train smart, and keep chasing greatness.