Fueling Endurance - Nutrition for Runners, Cyclists & Triathletes

Triathlete Jenny Zenker joins us to describe how she manages double sessions alongside managing a major scientific research group at Monash University. From (very) early morning starts, commuting to and from work by bike, and managing the risk of gut issues in the evening session, Jenny tells the story of her journey to optimising her nutrition for these complex training days. Also listen out for a huge announcement about the future of the podcast.

The double-session day. It's common amongst triathletes, but increasingly popular amongst runners and cyclists too. But are you running out of gas in the second session, or even in the afternoon at work? In this episode, Alan & Steph explain the nutrition priorities for double-session days, as well as some practical tips on how to make it happen when you're flat out at work between sessions.

With a single genetic variation, some of us are fast, moderate or slow caffeine metabolisers. So should competitive athletes be doing genetic testing to inform their race day caffeine strategy? Just last week, a new meta-analysis was published that tries to answer this question by bringing together all the studies published to date. Two of the authors, Gabriel Barreto and Dr Bryan Saunders from the University of São Paulo are here to explain their research and the implications for runners, cyclists and triathletes.   Read the research paper: Barreto G, Esteves GP, Marticorena F, Oliveira TN, Grgic J, Saunders B. (2023). Caffeine, CYP1A2 Genotype and Exercise Performance: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Med Sci Sports Exerc. In Press: https://doi.org/10.1249/MSS.0000000000003313   Read the summary Twittter/X thread: https://twitter.com/Bicycle_Bryan/status/1714311368709460319   Follow Bryan on Twitter/X: @Bicycle_Bryan   Follow Gabriel on Twitter/X: @nutrigabarreto    

Metabolic adaptation, adaptive thermogenesis, metabolic compensation or even metabolic damage. These terms are thrown around a lot online, but what exactly do they mean, how much is science vs hype, and what's the relevance to runners, cyclists and triathletes? Dr José Areta (Liverpool John Moores University, UK) is a researcher and co-author of a recent paper looking at whether the metabolic adaptations to an energy deficit in athletes is different if the energy deficit is induced by increased training load, or reduced calorie intake.   Follow José on Twitter/X: @jlAreta   Watch the talk mentioned from the The Royal Society Meeting in October 2022: https://www.youtube.com/live/hkuktx5FUto?feature=shared&t=17901   Read the accompanying paper: Halsey LG, Areta JL, Koehler K (2023). Does eating less or exercising more to reduce energy availability produce distinct metabolic responses? Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 378(1885):20220217.  https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2022.0217   The Energy Stress Meeting at Liverpool John Moores University in September 2022 (José was an organiser and presenter): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLyoTPwnnO4j3vpPsjU8AqWmdpYYekfiPw    

In the last episode, Steph and Alan discussed how general nutrition advice may not always be suitable for runners, cyclists and triathletes. In this episode, we chat to distance runner Elise Beacom about her experience coming into the sport, trying to figure out sports nutrition vs general nutrition advice, and what she had to learn the hard way. And what it's like to run a half marathon in North Korea.

Nutrition advice can be confusing for runners, cyclists & triathletes. With a firehose of information coming at you, from general nutrition professionals, sports nutrition experts, and wellness gurus, sometimes it can be hard to pick it all apart and work out what’s relevant to athletes, and what’s not. Today we’re going to look at those general nutrition messages, which whilst sensible for the general population, may be doing a disservice to runners, cyclists and triathletes. We’ll examine where the message comes from, why it might not be the best advice for you, and what to do instead. 

It’s called the sunshine vitamin, and given we’re just coming to the end of winter here in the southern hemisphere, our Vitamin D stores should be at their lowest point of the year. So what exactly is this nutrient that we can get without eating any food? Why is it so important to runners, cyclists and triathletes? How much Vitamin D is enough, when should you get tested, and when, how much and what type of supplements should you take to prevent or correct a Vitamin D deficiency? Today, we’re speaking to researcher Dr Dan Owens from Liverpool John Moores University in the UK, whose research is aiming to answer these and more questions about Vitamin D for athletes. We’ll also discuss the different types of Vitamin D in food, supplements and the body, ethnic differences and their relevance to Vitamin D testing, and how much sun exposure is enough to meet your Vitamin D needs.

In our last episode, we discussed with Dr Dana Lis how to decipher sports nutrition information you come across, and Dana shared with us her five step process for filtering that information. One of those steps was to figure out what is the cost and benefits of different nutrition strategies, your Return on Investment if you like. So today, we’re going to have a look at some of the most common nutrition strategies that can be employed to improve performance on race day. We’ll discuss some of the practical pros and cons, and find out what the science says about quantifying the actual performance benefits you might expect from each one.

As runners, cyclists and triathletes, you often come across new information about nutrition for your sport. It can come from anywhere - a fellow athlete, a coach, an article you saw online, or even this podcast. But how do you filter that information and decide if it’s valid, useful, and most importantly, worth implementing for yourself? In this episode we’re joined by Dr Dana Lis, a Canadian sports dietitian based in California who’s constantly asked this question with the athletes she works with: the EF-Tibco-SVB pro cycling team, and the Golden State Warriors (NBA). Dana will give you a framework to use when you encounter new information about nutrition for your sport, that you can use to decide whether it’s worth pursuing or not.

We often hear the message that plant-based protein sources are inferior to animal sources, and recommendations from sports nutritionists often emphasise the use of dairy and other animal-based protein foods. In this episode we speak to protein researcher Dr Alistair Monteyne (University of Exeter) who’s done of the more recent animal vs non-animal protein comparisons. We’ll look at where this common belief came from about animal proteins being superior, how the research has evolved just in the last few years, and what that means for this common sports nutrition assumption.