Whether you’re gearing up for a marathon, a triathalon, a Hyrox race, or a weightlifting competition, your body’s performance depends largely on the fuel you provide it before (and sometimes during!) your big performance.
You’ve probably heard of “carb loading” before, or maybe even tried it once or twice.
If you played sports in high school, I bet you remember heading over to one of your teammate’s houses for a pre-game pasta night or something similar. Ring a bell?
The actual strategy of “carb loading” is a bit more complicated than that (if you want to do it “right”), although the main concept of the pasta night is still right on target.
Carb loading involves increasing your carbohydrate intake in the days leading up to an event to optimize energy stores, aka glycogen in the muscles.
This blog post will delve into the science behind carb loading, its benefits, and how to effectively implement this strategy for both races and weightlifting events.
The Science Behind Carb Loading
Carbohydrates are your body’s primary source of energy.
They’re stored in the form of glycogen in your muscles and liver in the body. When participating in endurance activities like races or intense weightlifting sessions, your body taps into these glycogen stores for energy.
Carb loading aims to maximize and top-off these stores, giving you a readily available source of energy to perform at your very best.
Eating adequate carbs for high-intensity and high-volume training is paramount for optimal performance-based outcomes.
Think about it like loading your muscles with all of the glycogen possible so that you can be as powerful and as mighty as possible when it’s time to show what you’ve got.
Benefits of Carb Loading
- Enhanced Performance: Carb loading can significantly improve your endurance and performance. Having ample glycogen stores delays the onset of fatigue and allows you to maintain a higher level of effort for a longer duration.
- Delayed Fatigue: For endurance athletes, such as runners or cyclists, carb loading can delay the point at which muscle glycogen becomes depleted. This postpones the onset of fatigue and helps you avoid “bonking” or “hitting the wall”, helping you maintain a strong pace and effort throughout the event.
- Improved Strength and Power: Even Hyrox athletes or weightlifters can benefit from carb loading. Increased glycogen levels can enhance muscle contractions, leading to better strength and power output during intense lifting sessions.
Carb Loading Strategies
- Tapering Exercise: In the days leading up to the event, reduce the intensity and duration of your training sessions. This allows your muscles to rest and glycogen stores to increase. If doing a long distance race such as a half or full marathon, you likely want to be tapering down your exercise for something like 10-14 days prior to race day.
- Increase Carbohydrate Intake: Gradually increase your carbohydrate intake, focusing on things like pasta, bread, rice, fruit, etc. You may end up eating something like 300-600+ grams of carbs in preparation for your big day, and that’s a good thing (even if it feels a little scary – trust the process!)
- Distribute Intake: Spread your carbohydrate intake throughout the day, incorporating them into every meal and snack. This will help minimize digestive woes or discomfort as you carb load
- Stay Hydrated: Getting in plenty of water and fluids is crucial for carb loading to be effective. Water helps transport carbohydrates to muscles and supports overall performance
- Avoid Sudden Changes: Now is probablyy not the time to try new foods or to try something new. Stick with what you know and keep with foods you know won’t hijack your tummy or cause bloating or issues.
- Reduce Fiber Intake. You likely want to reduce your fiber intake slightly to reduce any potential issues of digestive distress before maxing out. This includes reducing your overall cruciferous vegetable intake and eating more fast-digesting carbs like candy, breakfast cereal, tortillas, bread, bagels, etc
1-2 Day Carb Loading Strategy
Carb loading strategies will ultimately always depend on the event and how long the race or performance will take, but we’ll outline some general pointers and thoughts below.
The biggest thing is that you’ll really want to trial and error and see what works best for YOU and your body.
It’s also worth noting that you can “do all the right things” and still experience some GI distress or tummy woes on your big performance day – especially due to nerves, competition day jitters, and dehydration during your event, it just comes with the territory and may be something that happens sometimes.
So don’t freak out if things don’t go perfectly as planned. You’re a living breathing human being – not a robot (:
There’s tons of different carb loading suggestions out there, but one of the most updated models is as follows:
- consume 10g of carbs for every 1kg bodyweight one day before the race / competition day
Example:
- person weights 150 lbs
- 150 lbs / 2.2 = 68 kilograms
- 68 kilograms = 680 grams of carbs
- This means 150 lb person would aim for ~680 grams of carbs the day before their big race or competition
Carb Loading Food Ideas
Liquids: fruit juice, smoothies, Gatorade or similar electrolyte drinks, lemonade, coconut water
Starches: white potatoes, sweet potatoes, white rice, breakfast cereal, white bread, pasta, bagels, cream of wheat, cream of rice, tortillas, oats, frozen waffles, pancakes, pretzels, animal crackers, english muffins, crackers
Fruit: bananas, oranges, watermelon, applesauce, dates, pineapple
Other: honey, maple syrup, gummy candy, Greek yogurt, energy gels or blocks, Rice Krispy treats
Avoid: creamy sauces, muffins, crackers, chips, cookies, pizza, baked goods, ice cream, French fries, donuts, high-fiber protein/energy bars, beans, broccoli, chickpeas, chia seeds
Conclusion
Carb loading is a strategic approach that can significantly impact your performance in races and weightlifting events. By optimizing your body’s glycogen stores, you provide yourself with the energy needed to excel and push through the challenges of the competition.
Remember, carb loading is not a one-size-fits-all approach, so it’s essential to experiment during training to find the right strategy that works best for your body. Individual carbohydrate needs can vary based on factors such as training intensity, duration, and body composition.
With the right combination of training, nutrition, and rest, you can harness the power of carb loading to achieve your personal best in any event.
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