Q&A | Fuelling for Triathlon
Q: Is it normal to be hungry all of the time when training a lot?
A: Athletes tend to feel hungry a lot when they don’t match their food with training. So, eating around training (before, during and after) with regular protein throughout the day will help fuel you and meet your energy needs. We find the training loads plate model helpful when serving meals.
Q: Any good advice for a tight budget? (gels, drinks, ... are pretty expensive)
A: Fuel with real food first. Vegemite or jam sandwiches are good for long rides and eating fruit, yoghurts, milk, and breads around training are also good options. General powdered sports drinks like Powerade/ Gatorade are good for big or long training sessions and racing too. But aren’t necessary for all training sessions. If you need to use sports foods in a race, practice with them in training at least once a fortnight or every 3-4 weeks. You don’t need to practice every session.
Q: I end up getting sick during events longer than halves. Could it be to much sweet food? E.g gels and electrolyte?
A: For longer events like Ironman 70.3® & Ironman®, having the same type of carbohydrates can make you feel sick because the body often reaches a limit on how well it can absorb and use one type of carbohydrate. This can happen often if you use gels and sports drinks with mainly maltodextrin, for example. So, alternating with glucose, fructose and maltodextrin can help manage gut upsets. Alternating with savoury foods or less sweeter options can also help - like vegemite or peanut butter sandwiches, steamed potatoes, or fruit buns.
Q: How do nutritional requirements differ for mature athletes those over 55?
A: For mature or master athletes, requirements are still relative to your level of training, fitness and body composition. Eating slightly more protein throughout the day and regularly (~20-30g every 3-4 hours), with ~15-20g protein just before bed maximises recovery and lean muscle growth overnight. For women over 55 yrs, eating some protein (10-15g) before training, and eating higher quality, less refined carbohydrates is important too for managing body composition, energy levels and performance. Regular calcium intake is also important throughout the day - aim for around 4 “serves”
1 cup cow’s or fortified soy milk
2 x sandwich size slices of cheese
Single serve or 150-200g yoghurt
Salmon
Tofu or tempeh
Eat a combination of broccoli, almonds, and seaweed
Q: For athletes who struggle to maintain weight, how should they fuel differently or more?
A: Focus on fuelling more around training and regularly throughout the day with both carbohydrates and protein. Adding extra foods to snacks and meals to boost nutrition and energy can help - such as: sprinkling cheese over meals; using macadamia or extra virgin olive oil over salads, pastas, and in cooking; and add protein powder or sustagen or milo in smoothies, yoghurts, porridge and as extra drinks. Having higher energy drinks with meals or soon after can also help (milk, fruit juice, protein shakes).
Q: I don't like using gels or electrolyte powders and want something natural to take on longer rides - what do you recommend?
A: If it is not a race, you can take food like sports muffins, rice triangles, energy balls, sandwiches or baked foods. Store in alfoil so you can open with one hand easily. You might like to try Christie’s bike brownie recipe.
Q: How should how nutritional habits change during off season/pre season/race season?
A: Match your day to day nutrition with your energy output. So, if training is reduced or you’re having a break, you don’t need to eat as much if you’re trying to maintain body composition. Off-season is the time to build your foundations of good nutrition; pre-season is the time to continue this and focus on practising race nutrition strategies; and race season is the time to continue these habits to support your body under higher stress. Your overall total hours of training may reduce during race season, but the intensity may increase, so maintaining nutrition around training and recovery is important to support your immune system, energy balance and adaptions.
Q: Do you recommend/ believe that doing some training fasted may help to improve your aerobic and fat metabolism , improving your performance?
A: To do fasted training and alter fat metabolism, it will depend on your body composition, age (not helpful for peri and post menopause women), and how your body priorities foods for energy and what your performance goals are. Sometimes we will get athletes to “sleep low, train low” for performance adaptions over a few weeks, but this isn’t long term, and working with a Dietitian to do this effectively is important.
Q: How do I time my carbs around training to achieve weight loss?
A: You need to match your carbs with your exercise... so if you train in the mornings, eat your carbohydrates close to your exercise. Look at portions and the quality - aim for less refined and whole grain types.
Q: Should vegan athletes take a leucine supplement if their goal is to build muscle?
A: If you need to build muscle, you first need to make sure you are in energy surplus... then focus on enough protein and spread it out 20g at a time over the day... many vegan sources of protein contain leucine, and to get enough protein you can get enough leucine, but a 3g leucine supplement per day, twice a day can also help.
Q: Best recovery food options?
A: To recover well, what you eat will depend on the time of day, session and when you can next eat… If you’re going to be eating a meal within the next hour, then you don’t really need to eat anything straight away. Ideally you want to aim for 20-30g protein soon after, and then every 3-4 hours across the day. However, for women, it’s helpful to eat a protein rich snack within 30 minutes of training to support signalling to the brain and muscles to recover and build lean muscle.
If you don’t have time for a meal within the first hour, have a quality protein and carbohydrate rich snack, like some of the below. What you eat before training and during, will also help your recovery. So, if it’s more than an hour long - eat some food before, and if it’s longer than 90 minutes, eat some carbohydrates during.
Q: How do you manage lack of appetite post training?
A: Just like we train our gut to take on food before and during training, you can train your gut to take on food after training. With longer exercise (over 3 hours) digestion can be slowed though, so eat smaller amounts of food, more frequently. Milk based drinks and smoothies can helpful; or nutrient energy packed foods like protein bars, energy bars, or protein / flavoured yoghurts.
Q: Which foods are best to consume in order to build muscle mass?
A: Eat quality protein foods soon after training with carbohydrates, and regularly throughout the day. Protein foods rich in an amino acid, leucine, is helpful for building lean muscle. Aim for 2-3g leucine in your recovery meal with about 20g protein - you can do this by eating some of these foods. Eat about 20-30g protein every 3-4 hours across the day too, to meet higher protein needs - aim for approx. 2-2.5g protein per kilogram body weight. It’s also important to eat more overall than your body needs to build lean muscle. Eating more energy than you use throughout the day is also important for building muscle.
