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The Inside Scoop on Carbs
by Pascale Messier & Beth Mansfield
When you get to the starting line of any inlining race, all the skaters will be genetically predisposed to skate well (some more so than others) and it is likely that everyone will be as fit and well-trained as possible. But it is your daily nutrition for peak health and performance that will make the vital difference between you being a back of the packer or a leader amongst your racing peers.
It never fails to amuse sport dietitians to listen to the pre-race nutrition related bantering on the topic of sport nutrition. ¢t have coffee right? What about during the race should I take some of those gels they taste pretty awful and almost make me gag but all the pros use them!- or should I use a sport drink? I heard that I should stay away from sugar pre-race so how about a Big-Mac, it¢s sugar-free?¢s secret nosh to what Eddy Matzger was seen slurping the day before.
Well, not only should you avoid these nutrition melt-downs, you should also know that the day (or morning) before a race is NOT the time to start changing your nutrition plan by jumping onto someone else¢s bandwagon. Being prepared to race means that you have developed a training program, followed it, and modified it as needed your nutrition plan should have followed suit. Nutrition mythology still exists amongst skaters, so we thought a bit of additional information might help you out.
If you want more information, go to www.peakperformance.ca (an OISC sponsor and a sport nutrition service provider to Canada¢s National team athletes).
The inside scoop on carbs
High carb diets are for winners! Insufficient carbohydrate leads to fatigue, a decreased ability to train and poor performance !- all this to say that if your eating habits are poor, your training will suffer. Your muscles thrive and perform on a carbohydraterich diet. It¢s all because carbohydrate is the preferred fuel source for muscles. The more intense the exercise or the longer you exercise, the more muscle glycogen (the storage form of carbohydrate in the muscle) you will use up. But there is a limited supply of carbohydrate (approximately 1500-2000 kcal) stored in muscle and once these glycogen stores are depleted this leads to reduced endurance, fatigue and exhaustion. The only way to replenish this muscle glycogen is to eat and/or drink carbohydrate rich foods.
Lance Armstrong would have never had any of his Tour de France victories if he had cut down on carbs !- as his coach Chris Carmichael said, ¢s carbs to over 70% of his total daily calories to ensure that he had enough to race hard each day.
What is carbohydrate?
Carbohydrate is a big word to describe a group of molecules that includes sugar, starch and fiber. All carbohydrates start with the first type of carbohydrate the simple sugar molecule. Sugars are either monosaccharides or disaccharides (single or pairs of sugar molecules bound together).
Monosaccharides include:
- Glucose
- Fructose (fruit sugar) and
- Galactose
Diasaccharides include:
- table sugar = sucrose (combination of glucose and fructose)
- milk sugar = lactose (combination of glucose and galactose)
- corn syrup = combination of glucose and fructose
All of these sugars are broken down (or converted) to their simplest forms of glucose and fructose before they enter the bloodstream to give the body energy. Fructose is absorbed into the bloodstream by a passive transport process!- it¢s like sitting in a traffic jam!-it takes a while to get moving into the body. Glucose is actively transported into the bloodstream like commuter buses that have a lane reserved for them, glucose is always on the move. And it gets to where it wants to go (to feed your brain and muscles) quickly. Table sugar, honey, corn syrup all contain glucose and fructose in various amounts. Many people think that honey is more nutritionally superior to refined sugar. If you prefer the taste: great. But it is not superior for performance. Health-wise it may have some antioxidant capabilities which can impact your health and help with recovery from exercise and injury.
Sports drinks (and sport gels) have a combination of sugars (glucose for quick energy and fructose for a long, slow release of energy) and polymers of glucose. These polymers are chains of glucose linked together your body just sees them as one molecule rather than a chain of 5, 6 , 7 or more glucose units. So the polymer can be absorbed as quickly as an isolated molecule of glucose. The advantage is that a lot more energy can be absorbed at any one time. So sports drinks sweetened with polymers provide more energy with less sweetness than regular sugar provides.
The second type of carbohydrate found in food is called starch. Starch is found in plant foods such as grains and cereals, vegetables, some fruits and legumes (chick peas, hummus, lentil soup, black bean dip, etc). The bonus of eating starch containing foods is that they give you lots of energy and they tend to be full of fiber.
The third type of carbohydrate - fiber helps ensure that you do not become constipated or suffer from hemorrhoids. Fiber traps fluid in your gut to keep you well hydrated and add bulk to your stool. Fiber also helps to speed up the passage of some foods through your system and slow down the transit of others. The bottom line is that fiber is a must-have for active people and even more so for those involved in sport.
Ray Vermette's fuel challenge Ray¢s pre-race ritual may include ¡ ;-) Seems he can¢t stomach anything substantial before a race, so he tries to go with a little bit of oatmeal with maple syrup (:-p yum), juice, and coffee about two hours before, and a power gel just before the start. He¢ll make an effort to be well hydrated before the race which means that you will find him in the port-a-pottie line up just before the start gun goes off...
Prior to exercise: you want to include sugar and starch types of carbohydrates in your diet. This is a good time to avoid a lot of fiber as it may give you diarrhea when combined with a nervous pre-race tummy. So refined grain cereals such as instant oatmeal, cream of wheat, regular pasta, white rice, fruit juice, milk or yogurt will give you a fast release of energy so that you have it available during your race. The bonus of oatmeal is that even when processed into ¡ it still contains some fiber to help maintain a long slow release of energy throughout the race. Oatmeal is a pre-race favourite of many endurance and power athletes alike. And coffee is an okay choice but turn it into a café au lait and you have a recipe for success milk sugar for energy and some caffeine has an ergogenic (performance enhancing) effect!
During exercise take advantage of readily absorbed sugars. Sport drinks such as Gatorade, Powerade, Cytomax, etc. as well as gels, candies, dried fruit, skim milk/yogurt can all work well. For prolonged endurance events or activities eat small carbohydrate-rich snacks (approx 15-20 gms/60-80 kcal of carbohydrate) every 20 minutes or so. Examples include dried fruits, fig newtons, oatmeal cookies, candies or sport gels. Carbohydrate during exercise has the potential to delay fatigue and enhance your performance. Remember that everyone is different and that what works for you is not necessarily the best choice for one of your training buddies! Work with your sport dietitian to make a list of potential ¡ foods and fluids for you to try out during training to see what works best for you.
Make Your Own Sport Drink!Courtesy of the Sport Nutrition
Total carbs for this amount: 57g made with orange juice, 52.3g made with lemon juice Directions: In a bowl, combine the sugar, salt and boiling water. Stir until sugar and salt are dissolved. Cool and add juice and cold water. |
After exercise your muscles will be very receptive to re-fueling. The tougher a workout/race is (a function of intensity and duration), the more important it is for you to refuel...ASAP. To maximize muscle glycogen stores, carbohydrate-rich foods should be consumed immediately after exercising. Timing is critical. Research shows that athletes who want to store maximal amounts of muscle glycogen for optimal training and peak performance should shift their intake of carbohydrate-rich foods to immediately after workouts. In fact, the best way to rapidly replenish muscle glycogen is to eat or drink carbohydrate-rich foods immediately after exercise. When carbohydrate is combined with protein, this muscle glycogen storage is enhanced after exercise.
- Skim milk fruit yogurt, liquid yogurt drinks, or chocolate skim milk are LIQUID forms of carbohydrate protein combinations;
- Make your own power punch for recovery nutrition by combining fruit and/or fruit juices with milk or plant based beverages;
- Make a peanut butter and banana sandwich and wash it down with a glass of milk;
- Have a bowl of lentil soup;
- Mix some cereal with trail mix and chase it with a sport drink;
- Have a café latte or a hot chocolate;
- For those with a really sweet tooth now is the time to drink that Coke, Pepsi, or eat those ju-jubes the sugar will go straight into muscle storage rather than being turned into fat and being stored more permanently on the tummy, hips and thighs.
