Berlin Marathon

Lindsey would have easily hit the carb recommendations for a race of this duration by just consuming his Flow Gel, but he decided to pick up some extra gels from the aid stations as he wasn’t having any stomach issues and wanted to keep his carb intake high. He even said he felt like he could have eaten anything with no issues! This is yet another example of an athlete who can consume >90g of carb per hour, and whilst it’s great Lindsey had no issues, he can certainly afford to reduce his intake for future marathons, where 75-90g per hour is usually plenty considering the relatively shorter duration.

Linsdey suffered from cramp in both of his hamstrings in the second half of the marathon, likely due to muscle fatigue since he wouldn’t have accumulated enough dehydration during the race to induce sodium depletion-related cramps, especially given his average sodium concentration was slightly higher than his sweat losses. We know from the limited research into muscle cramps that by measuring electrical activity of muscles (EMG), baseline levels of excitatory activity significantly increase in fatigued muscles shortly before bouts of cramp. This means that fatigued muscles also have problems trying to ‘relax’ between contractions, making cramps much more likely. Reducing cumulative muscle fatigue should be the goal for Lindsey ahead of future marathons, perhaps by including strength work, as well as introducing some more marathon-paced long runs to condition his muscles to run at that pace for long periods.

Lindsey was just below the caffeine recommendations, and based on the robust scientific literature on caffeine and sports performance, using a dose that’s <3mg/kg meant Lindsey would have left some performance enhancement on the table. So, adding another PF 30 Caffeine Gel to his mid-race strategy would likely have helped that last 12km feel less dark.