Written by Babs Pinheiro
Don't worry, I'm not here to tell you about another injury (knock on wood, I hope to stay injury free for a long, long time)! But I think you're learning that I'm a very special person (in more ways than one!).
In 2013, I found out that I was gluten and dairy intolerant right before my birthday. My world was already upside down due to two bereavements earlier in the year and this just made 2013 even worse for me. I was rowing at the time and on top of dealing with loss, I struggled to know what I could eat to keep me fuelled for the long days of work and then training sessions in the evenings. So, for a few months, I worked with a nutritionist to help me relearn to manage my "diet". During this period, I also found out that I was intolerant to sugar - and I mean all types of sugar, natural, processed, fructose, the whole lot. My body reacts abnormally to it and I can only describe it as being a state of euphoria and then hangover with massive headaches as the aftermath - given that I’m t-total, it’s all guess work here.
Hence the triple threat = I'm intolerant to dairy, gluten AND sugar.
The fuelling on days of boat races back in the day was fairly simple - have something that was quick releasing before the race started and the boat races were over fairly quickly compared to any running competition longer than a 5k.
Switching to running, when I started training, I didn't know what nutrition during a race was so I was running on maybe a sip of water by the water stations and that was it. This strategy worked OK till I did EHM in 2022 when I was going for a sub 2:05 and, at the 19K mark, I was literally running on fumes and wasn't sure if I'd manage to finish it that day. I did do a PB that year but I realised that, if I wanted to be serious about doing a sub 2 hour HM, I needed to be as serious about my nutrition during the races. For a person with fewer health concerns than me, this would be a less complicated decision however, in my case, it sent my head into a spiral. I'd mastered the art of reading labels when food shopping but the whole sugar intolerance still worries me on a daily basis.
At first, when I was racing, I used to take dextrose tablets and alternate them with Bounce balls, which had been my race fuel during my rowing days and I can say that this strategy worked for a while and for HM races. I went along with it for the whole of 2023 and it did help me get my sub 2 hours just before the end of that year. I used it again for my 1st Marathon in 2023 with no problems - think I was too focused on my sprained ankle - but by Newport last year, I realised that I needed something completely different. Besides my wacky strategy to run Newport as a 28K HM, my body started to reject the mixture of dextrose tablets and bounce balls. My mouth couldn't handle the chewiness of the Bounce balls and, at 30K, I couldn't eat anything else. Which meant that, for 12 and a bit km, I didn't manage any fuel to keep me going and was feeling somewhat sick.
So, I had a decision to make: either I could stick with the strategy that I knew wasn't going to work for me or be brave and find out how my body would cope (or not) with the nutrition that other runners use.
I spoke to a couple of people and they recommended different things, like gels (that was a hard pass for me since just the thought of the texture makes me want to throw up), chews and bars that are like pure sugar. Let me tell you, for someone who hasn't had sugar in 11.5 years, just opening a packet of those bars probably got me high! The smell was so sickly and sweet that I almost changed my mind but I needed to give it a go!
A lot of it has been trial and error (with a massive headache in between) but the errors have been fewer lately and I'm getting used to fuelling better or differently during my long runs, at least I think I am. I've discovered that I like to alternate between the chews and the bars, the different textures definitely keep my brain entertained and my stomach seems to tolerate it all. I’ve also got a protein bar to try before I start running and see if that’s a good move or not. I've been increasing the amount of carbs during my long runs because training is not just about the running itself, it's also about getting my body used to being force-fed sugar for a long period of time! Trust me, for someone who hasn't really eaten anything with a high sugar content, sometimes that's what it feels like! I’m slowly working my way up to 60g ish an hour and I have 11-ish weeks to keep trying, right?
By the time I'm writing this blog, I'm 5 weeks into London Marathon training and all is going according to plan - again, my problem is almost never with the training journey. Having said that, these are the easy weeks of the training plan, even if I've been doing 60k training weeks already. Long runs have been a mix of solo runs and running with Eagles part of the way or crossing paths with Eagles, which makes Eagle spotting very entertaining. And obviously, I'm loving the temporary club route (wonder who temporary it will end up being) since I get to run along the river where most rowing clubs train on a Sunday morning! See you out there, Eagles!
