IRONMAN® Wales

This was Maddy’s first ever triathlon, after her first marathon earlier in 2024 at the London Marathon. She was initially a bit overwhelmed seeing what top level athletes consume during IRONMAN® races, but wasn’t planning to push her body’s limits for this initial foray into triathlon, instead simply hoping to complete the distance within the 17 hour time limit. By eating something in all of her training sessions, her body got used to metabolising carbohydrates during exercise when blood is shunted away from the gut in favour of working muscles. As a result, she tolerated carbs well on race day without any significant GI distress. Whilst her average intake was almost spot on the Fuel & Hydration Planner’s recommendations, the distribution was much higher during the bike (~80g/h) compared to ~45g/h during the run. This drop off is typical in what we observe across our entire Case Study database, but Maddy may find it more comfortable to slightly reduce her intake on the bike, as she really struggled in the final couple of hours of the run to eat anything. She didn’t consume any real foods during this ~16 hour race, and thankfully didn’t experience any flavour fatigue from the large amount of sports nutrition she took on board. This supports the emerging anecdotal evidence that, when practised appropriately and sufficiently, athletes of all abilities don’t need to rely on real foods to complete long endurance events, though some may still find it a welcome palette refresher to do so.

Interestingly, Maddy had a recurring craving for salt throughout the run. This usually means one of two things; she drank too much plain water, or she wasn’t getting enough sodium. Either way, the brain’s response is to signal the taste buds and make salty things taste really good, in order to balance the concentration of sodium and water in the blood. Maddy hasn’t had a Sweat Test to help individualise her sodium intake, but she has reported large salt marks on her kit after long, hot training sessions, and frequently leans towards the salty crisps and nuts upon finishing those sessions. Considering these signs, it’s likely her electrolyte requirements are higher than average, so perhaps listening to her body and taking a higher relative sodium concentration during the run could help alleviate the symptoms she experienced and support a stronger race performance.