Fuel your Run – Hanna Tarver

Feeling tired, heavy legged or weak? You may not be fuelling your run!

I’ve learnt the hard way that you have got to fuel your body right to perform well, feel great and most importantly- stay injury free!

But what should you eat and when should you eat it?

This is the tricky part. There are so many differing opinions on the ‘best’ diet or clean eating, often with contradicting theories. But I’m just going to give you a quick overview of my thoughts and what I typically eat as a runner.

Personally I like to eat food that has minimal added ingredients and preferably organic. Yes organic food is more expensive but you typically need to eat less of it in comparison to non-organic produce to obtain the same nutritional benefit.

I also ensure my plate has a good balance of macronutrients; carbs, protein, fat and micronutrients from colourful veg. Green leafy veg is particularly important for women as it contains iron, as well as red meat. I have suffered with anaemia in the past and have also been on iron supplements. If you begin to feel unusually tired whilst running it might be worth having a blood test to check your levels out.

Pre-run fuel

1. Most importantly you want food that will agree with your stomach as there is nothing worse than feeling sick or suffering with a stitch half way into a run!

2. The closer to a run you eat, the smaller the portion.

3. 2 hours is the time period I leave after a medium sized meal before running.

Examples:

·         Porridge or Weetabix- good slow release energy source

·         Banana with nut butter

·         Wholemeal bagel with jam and nut butter/banana

·         Flapjack or oat bar e.g. Clif bar

·         Jaffa cakes- these are good to provide energy rapidly and can be eaten closer to your run

·         Greek yoghurt with honey

Post run fuel

Eat to recover and try to consume enough fluid to replace the water lost through sweat during exercise. I try and eat something within 20/30 mins of finishing a session.

Examples:

·         Protein/recovery shake or smoothie

·         Flapjack

·         Protein or energy balls e.g. Bounce Balls

·         Egg/chicken bagel

·         Salad with protein source and some form of carbohydrate