Performance Nutrition with Claire Fudge

Foreign.

I'm charlie redding. And I'm laura sidall, and this is the tribathlon podcast.

They love it when I say, well, actually, do you know what? Have a white bagel with jam on. Like, what? Nutrition is telling me that, you know, but there's times and places for that.

That was Claire Fudge, and this episode is Performance Nutrition. Hey, Sid, how you doing?

I'm very well. I didn't recognize you this morning. Not that the listeners can see this, because obviously we're on Skype, but they're. There is very much a different look about you today. One, you're in a suit and you look like it's a different backdrop, but two, you don't have any glasses on.

I know, I know. It's taking a bit of getting used to, I have to say. Yeah. So last week I went through the whole laser eye surgery thing, which, I.

Mean, I know it's the best thing ever. It's like one of the best things I ever did. I did it back in, gosh, 2009, I think it was, and I just. Yeah, it was amazing. So.

Yeah, well, several people, you included, it said it was kind of one of the best things they'd ever done. And, you know, I've been toying with it for 11 years. Actually, it was 11 years when I first went to the London Vision Clinic, and I was like, do I? Don't I? And then I actually just concluded I quite liked myself with glasses. I think it made me look more intelligent. I need every bit of help I can get, so. So I thought, no, no, no, I won't do it. And then. Right, no, I've snapped my glasses. I'm fed up with wearing a, you know, face mask and glasses is definitely about. Yeah, so. And it's just a practical. I'm like swimming, you know, Like, I don't actually. The surgeon said that you shouldn't wear prescription lenses in goggles, he said. I didn't ask him why, but I.

Well, I have to admit, I was really bad because I hated wear as I was as a kid. I grew up going, for some reason, I really wanted to have braces on my teeth and glasses, and I got both of them and I hated both of them. So I hated wearing my glasses. I would wear contact lenses and I would wear them for far too long every day, and, you know, the risk. And I just hated that, you know, I was really quite blind. So it was like just, you know, waking up first thing in the morning and you couldn't even read the clock. Without. The first thing you had to do was, like, put your hand out on the table to grab your glasses to just see anything. And then obviously, with sport and stuff, I mean, I would go swimming with my contact lenses, which I know you're not meant to, and then just a triathlon and just the hassle of if you lost it and traveling with, like, loads of the daily spares or the liquids and stuff like that, it just. Oh, it's just another. It's so much easier now that, like, you just don't have all of that and you can wake up and you can see first thing in the morning and that sort of thing.

And that's the thing. I mean, I.

My eyes were never really, really. So I would swim without prescription lenses and I could see, but not, like.

If we were at the other end.

Of the pool, I couldn't see the clock.

Yeah.

So it's silly things like that. But, like, I was out on the bike on Saturday and I was cycling on my own because that's obviously, that's the way things are at the moment. And a cyclist was coming towards me, and I was like, oh, that's Dylan, one of the guys I would. You know, one of the posse, one of the guys I'd normally cycle with. So I was like, oh, hi, Dylan. Yeah, good to see you. And I only thought about it afterwards that normally that would have been like, oh, that was Dylan. And it was way too late.

So for the past 11 years, you've just been blanking all your friends that you see when you cycle, and they're going, God, he's rude. Didn't even say hello to me again this time. And now you're like the happiest cyclist in the world, saying hello to everybody because you can see them.

But it is.

I mean, it's an incredibly incredible experience. So I went to this London Vision clinic that a few of my friends had used, and, I mean, I've taken a load of notes in terms of how well they run their business, as to what we can do in our business. It was incredible. I mean, it was so funny, though. I spent more time chatting to the surgeon about cycling than I did because he's a cyclist from South Africa. So we spent loads of time talking about that. But, like, the detail, I was. It was so, like, as you go into the. Into the surgery, you know, you kind of started to get nervous. Apparently. Normally you would get a back massage, but they can't do that at the moment with COVID Oh, wow. So instead, as I lie on the bed and I'm starting to think, oh, my goodness, somebody's about to fire a laser into my eyes. They hand me this little cuddly toy. So I get this little cuddly rabbit to hold onto for the. For the duration of the.

They obviously saw your nerves and they thought, God, we need to control this. Give him a cuddly to.

He's an iron man. He's bound to cry, therefore. But it was an incredible experience. And I mean, yeah, it's only just over a week. I've just stopped having to wear those at night, which not very. They're not much fun.

How many times have you like, gone to move your glasses up on your nose and you found that they're not there?

Not as many as I expected to, actually. It's just dark, actually. The funny thing is you also said that I'm in a suit, which I am. So I spent the whole day in front of a video camera doing a course on an online course on inheritance tax planning and all that. Sort of far less interesting than the traffic. But the funny thing is we've already done some of the content for that course, so I've had to pop the lenses out of my broken glasses, glue them back together and I've been backing glasses for most.

You've been doing it. You've been faking it like the actors do. Now you don't. You now don't have to wear glasses. You're putting them back on all for the camera.

So that's been my week. What about you? How was Challenge Miami?

Well, Challenge Miami was amazing. So I'm now back in Spain. So I got back yesterday. I. The whole. I mean, travel again. Travel. I'm very fortunate to be able to travel. It's not quite as good or as pleasant as it used to be, but touch wood, all safe and stuff. I was so tired from last week in Miami that I pretty much passed out when I sat on the plane and woke up 10 hour or 8 hours later as I landed in Madrid. And then I had a connection through to Barcelona, which was about mid afternoon. And I was kind of like, okay, you need to stay awake for this next flight, otherwise, you know, to get back on time zones. And literally I don't think the plane had taken off and I passed out again and woke up as we landed in Barcelona. But challenge Miami, no, it was amazing again. It was just. There's such a buzz that we can put a race on and the team that the Challenge North American team are an incredible team and all the lengths that they go to with the protocols and everything to make sure everyone is safe. And it was really cool kind of working. So I was doing a pro liaison job, so working with the pros in the event to make sure they were all okay, they knew everything was going on, they were in the right places at the right time, any issues and problem solving and that sort of thing. And yeah, you know, yes, I would have preferred to be racing and I very much had that. I didn't have the pre, the pre race nerves when they're all setting up in transition. I did not miss that bit. But actually sort of getting on, being in a race and the finish line and actually putting all the training into like good use of and doing what we do, that's, you know, my job ultimately at the end of the day is to be racing. Um, I did miss that, but it was, it was great just to see the athletes be involved, be part of a race again. I think the coverage, I hope, you know, maybe, maybe the listeners, if they saw, if they saw any of the coverage on Facebook, they can feedback to us of what they thought about it. But yeah, it was just. Yeah. And it's just a cool race. It's cool venue racing around the track. I got to ride on the track for a bit. So, yeah, it was good fun.

And I was, I was annoyed actually.

I was going to watch it and.

Then I hadn't realized.

I hadn't thought about the timings. And we've been doing a family. Come dine with me once a week. We've been so blessed. Bronwyn, who is age 11, did us a three course Mexican meal. Fion did us a three course Italian meal. So they'd kind of set the bar pretty high. And so Friday night was my night and I was doing a Thai meal.

And yeah, it was like it was.

Going, it went okay. But the point was I was, I was frantically trying to cook two curries, some spring rolls, some Thai fish cakes and Thai pancakes whilst Challenge Miami was all going on. And so I didn't watch any of it.

So how was the racing itself?

Tell us about what was.

Well, it's funny you say that because even though I was there on the ground, I saw very little of the race and I really didn't have a clue what was going on because kind of you're so involved on the ground with making sure like the pros are down at the swim start and that all the protocols are in place and if there's any last minute issues with anyone that's forgotten Anything or things like that. And then because you're on. Because you're on a racetrack and it was quite restricted in places. It was then sort of working out where I could be. And you could only see limited parts of the course. They did obviously have a big screen up with the live coverage. So you're trying to sort of watch that. And then when the women got onto the run, I had to be back down at the swim start to make sure the men, the pro men were kind of okay and stuff. So. But, you know, it was. It was great. It was so in the women's. I mean, there's no surprise. Lucy Charles let out the water. But she wasn't alone. She was with a Spanish girl. I think I'm going to get that wrong. Brazilian Sara Perez. I'm going to get crucified. If she's not from Spain, she could be from. I should know. But she was on her feet basically, and she shot through transition and shot off on the bike before Lucy Charles Barkley had kind of chance to think. So she actually led for most of the race on the bike. Um, this is a very short version. Lucy then got a penalty for questionable, wasn't it? Uh, not really. It was. She knew the rules and so that they'd all been told they had to ride left and pass right. And apparently she overtook on the wrong side. Now the questional bit, questionable bit is, is because you're on a NASCAR track and it's not just an oval. There's a section in the middle that had sort of left and right turns. So there is. There was a lot of debate before the race about, well, with these left and right turns, should you be able to pass overtake either side so you can pick the correct line. And for this race, it was decided, actually, the easiest thing is to just say for the whole race, you ride left, you pass on the right. If you are coming up to an athlete and you need to overtake and it's going to be contradictory to that rule, you need to judge your pacing, you need to manage it. The person, the lead rider has the right of way. So if they are changing their line, the person behind at that 20 meter, you just have to respond. And that was made very clear. So whether that's right or wrong, ultimately Lucy did deserve that penalty and she. And stuff. So we'll look at. We are going to look at things moving forward. But, you know, that was the rule, but it meant that. So when they got out onto the run, I mean, it was amazing. Jodi Stimpson just had a. One of the. She's probably one of the favourites of the triathlon sport, having been overlooked for two Olympic Games. And so it was five years to the day since she'd won last won a race. And also it's about a year on since her dad died suddenly, so. And her mum was out watching and I get goosebumps now. Just. It was. The emotion as she took the win was just, was just amazing. And then Lucy came in second and Jackie Herring, who is an American athlete, mum of three. No, two kids. I get the right two kids. She ran through and finished third, which is a great result for her. And then in the men's race, I mean, it was just. Jan Frodeno is supreme. He really is the best athlete in the world. They're really. I don't even, you know, he wasn't even on. I don't think it was his best form, but it was what he had on the day and he still won in impressive style. You know, he's pretty rusty from not having raced for 17, 18 months, but it was just a supreme display and I think it showed with the comments that came out from the other male pros, likes of Andrew Starkovich, who was leading a lot of the bike leg, and then Lionel Sanders who came in second. They were just like, he is just the greatest triathlon at the moment in his, you know, in his prime and he is really difficult to beat on any day, even when he's not at his best. So, yeah, it was. And then Ben Knuth, who is American triathlete, he finished third, sounded like a.

Great race and yeah, just fantastic that we're getting some racing going on and. Because obviously there's others being canceled around the place. So, yeah, it's.

It's gonna be a weird few months. You know, we've just heard Ironman Texas has been canceled and yet There are other 70.3 races still planned for the next few months. Um, I know there's some races in the UK that are planned sort of for summer. I, I think it's doubtful that there's gonna be anything in Europe, unfortunately in the next few months. But let's fingers crossed and hope that vaccine rolls out rollout and numbers head in the right direction that we can get back to what we know and love of racing soon.

Absolutely. Fingers crossed. I'm still desperately hoping that at my.

Second.

Attempt I'm going to be able to get out there and do Ironman Tarling, but. And I'm sure you've got, you know, you need to get yourself recovered and I'm sure you're desperate to get out racing.

Yeah, I am. Especially now having like being at Miami. I'm more, even more fired up to get back and get on a race start line somewhere.

Well, let's keep our fingers crossed that that isn't too long. So we'll dive into the interview with Clare Fudge.

Claire Fudge works with athletes to optimize their nutrition for performance and is also a competitive ironman herself. She describes nutrition as the fourth discipline and works with a range of athletes range from pros to age groupers, dancers to triathletes, ultra runners to cyclists, as well as helping athletes that have eating disorders. So I really wanted to chat to Claire to understand how we can use our approach to nutrition to improve our own performance, how we can improve our health through our diet, and also to try to debunk some of the commonly heard myths that are out there. So I know you're really going to enjoy this interview with Claire Fudge of the fourth discipline. So Claire, welcome to the Tribeathlon podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. You know, I love talking about nutrition and health and wellbeing and all that sort of stuff, but what a brilliant name for a nutritionist. Claire Fudge. That's, I mean that's, that's just a great name. So thank you so much for joining us. Let's kick things off. So for those people that don't know much about you, tell us a bit about your story, what you do, how you've got into that and your kind of link up to the triathlon world.

Well, yeah, no, absolutely. So my background, for those of you who don't know me, you're absolutely right. Thank you. I think also my name is awesome, called Fudge and yeah, that's not one that I'm going to get rid of, you know, at all. I think, I think it's pretty good for a dietitian. So yeah, so my background is I'm a clinical dietitian, so I can clinically work with patients with medical conditions. And that's kind of the main difference really in terms of sort of between a dietitian and a nutritionist, but I'm also a high performance nutritionist as well. So working in elite professional and age group based sports. So it kind of marries very nicely together and to kind of link in with the triathlon side of things. I'm also an endurance athlete myself, so I also am racing well when races are on. I'm also a really keen competitive triathlete as well for age group. So I guess I really. Well, not I guess I know, like I totally 100% understand how athletes feel and I think that really sort of helps me give appropriate advice as well, because I get it, I understand it, I go through it too. I make those mistakes as well and also can see the benefits as well when you kind of fuel correctly. And I guess in terms of sort of background. So from a clinical point of view, I've been working as a dietitian for 17 years. So I trained, trained in London and then spent time clinically working with probably every specialty you can imagine in hospital. So that's really great. Like, especially when I've worked before with athletes, for example, who might have inflammatory bowel disease, you might know it as Crohn's celiac disease and then also IBS and things like that. So, you know, working with people that have had, you know, half their bowels removed, stomachs removed, and are still athletes as well. So it's really great to work and be able to work with those kind of athletes and really take them through to kind of ironman finishing lines or race finishing lines. And it's absolutely possible. And you know, that's what I find really fulfilling as well about my job is that I can kind of take on all of those different types of athletes. There's absolutely no reason why we can't work around all those kind of issues. And we're not problems, we just problem solve and we come up with solutions, which is really exciting. So that background feeds really nicely into my sports nutrition work and I've been working in Sport now for 12 years, so got lots of experience working with athletes and particularly love working with triathletes obviously because that's my sport. But I'm also a keen cyclist on the side of that and actually had a background in running and equestrian. So I still give advice to kind of different athletes and have a number of athletes who are kind of in the running, sort of athletics world, pole vaulting and a few kind of weight related sports as well. So I do, I do see other people from different sports, but really my speciality is triathlon, cycling, running and swimming. And that's, that's my thing and that's what I love to do. So. And then just another little string to my bow really. I work, I work with some of the younger age groups in terms of the youth talent pathway and I also work with. So through that I work with British athletics and athletics England and hockey, England, netball, England and motorsports as well. So Working sort of with young, sort of 16 to 18 year olds, which I love actually. It's a really, it's a really great age group to work with in terms of, like, education, because education is my thing. And I think that, you know, all athletes really should be equipped with the kind of skills to go out there and be their own nutritionist. And we shouldn't be kind of, you know, prescribing diets to them and, you know, telling athletes what to do. Actually, everybody has these skills to be able to go out and utilise. And that's what I love about also working with that age group is they. They're kind of sponges to that information and they, they make all those kind of mistakes that we all make and probably all make still, actually, to be honest. And then I also work in eating disorders as well. So from an eating disorders background, we clinically, I work, cover some inpatient wards and also outpatients, working with under 16s and over 16s. And unfortunately, you know, that does crossover a lot into my sports work.

Just.

I was going to ask that, actually.

Yeah, no, carry on. You ask. You ask away.

Well, I was going to say, yeah, does it? Does it. I mean, that's immediately what I wrote down. Is there a crossover between the eating disorders piece and the sports piece that you do?

I think, you know, I mean, Charlie, you've got a background in sport as well, and I think you'll probably agree with me here that, you know, when we're looking at sport and as sporting people, you know, most of us are very, very competitive. We're very driven people. Generally, we're pretty perfectionistic. I would say, as a real generalization of competitive sports people, you've got to be able to push yourself and want that kind of goal. And that's typically what we see in some eating disorders. So in a more restrictive sort of anorexia, that's what we tend to see. Very, very driven people and that's their personality. And I think we can get into one of two kind of little ruts, I guess, when we're really trying to set our sights on a goal, we often cut back in lots of areas and people. And especially, actually, we were talking about cycling before from a cyclist perspective. There's always this thing about race weight, about being lighter the whole time, and there's a way to do that. And one thing that I always say is, you know, lighter doesn't always mean faster, it doesn't always mean a podium place. In actual fact, I've, you know, I work with measuring body composition a lot. And that isn't just standing on a set of scales and giving you body fat percentage, because that's not how we work. But you know, when you see athletes and take them through the process of actually getting them to fuel their bodies better and actually eating more, we find their body composition changes. So their muscle mass increases, their body fat decreases, but they could stay the same weight. And they are, you know, they are healthy, functioning athletes actually performing at a much higher level. But it's, it's that education and understanding that cutting back on food is not necessarily going to bring you the results that you want. And certainly, yes, short term, because from an economy point of view, we all know that particularly running from an economy, economy point of view, being lighter means you can obviously run faster. But that only lasts for a certain period of time. And what we see is athletes might say, yeah, but I feel amazing and you know, I've got all my pbs. But then you, you know, months down the line you get injuries and then you can't, you know, you can't continue. So we do see a lot of crossover. And sometimes it's, I think sometimes it's not always. People haven't always meant to get to that place, so they haven't done it on purpose. And there's also something else, and you might have heard of it, called reds, which is relative energy deficiency in sport. And this is kind of like a new coined term, I guess, in the sports world and a lot of the social media, certainly in the last year or so with some of our athletes, our kind of British Olympic athletes have been in the media, you know, talking about things like reds and some of our famous runners actually as well. But there's a fine line between this energy deficiency, which is kind of where we don't match our energy needs. So when training load is really high, you know, sometimes our appetite is knocked off or we, you know, if we're working a full day, we don't have that time or availability to be able to always fit in all that food. So we can naturally kind of get to this point where we're never quite fueling and recovering enough. So that's different because it's not something you meant to do compared to an eating disorder, which is something that's maybe a little bit more planned or a sense of control or obviously a sense of out of control as well. You know, we have people that control emotions by overeating as well or restricting their intake and then overeating later on. And I see athletes from Both, you know, both sides.

And I think this is something I want to keep coming back to, which I've talked about on other podcasts or other episodes, which is about this health versus fitness. It's not just about being the fittest you can be. It's also about being the healthiest you can be because otherwise the fitness will gradually drop off in the future. I can understand why. Sort of triathlete mentality with kind of often addictive personalities. Something I was talking to Flora College about only a couple of weeks ago. I can see that kind of going hand in hand. But it's also the flip side of the case because I remember Chrissie Wellington talking about in her book she had an eating disorder. And essentially triathlon was what one of the things that was a significant help in resolving that. Do you see that triathlon and exercise can also be a help to an eating disorder?

It's really interesting actually. And you know, this is something that in terms of working with athletes, but also working with people who do sport and have an eating disorder. So people who may go to the gym or they run or so slightly kind of different, I guess is, I think it's one of two things. So sometimes endurance sport like triathlon will, you know, somebody with say an eating disorder like anorexia might come into the sport, realize they get injured, they really love the sport and realize actually two get to the podium and to race and not be injured, they've got to eat. And it almost then gives them the incentive or the earning the right to eat. And that essentially is putting a plaster almost on the problem because essentially they're only now eating because they're doing the training now. If that athlete gets injured and you don't address the real crux of the problem, that athlete is only going to stop eating again. So I think there's two sides that I think it can be. And I have had amazing stories of, you know, and you kind of referenced Chrissy Wellington's book there, where I think athletes realize that actually to do that level of training and certainly if we look at a professional athlete, you know, where Chrissy was at the time, you know, their load is so high, she would just never be able to have performed and recovered and been injury free without really good nutrition and health. So I, I think there's, it's really interesting is what I'd say, because I don't think there's, you know, and I'm not saying that every, every athlete has an eating disorder either. You know, we, we all want to do the best that we can. And, you know, there's nothing wrong with trying to manipulate body composition and change it to be as efficient as you possibly can, but that's also got to balance out with. With health. And, you know, I think, I think I liken it to, you know, without an eating disorder, I think I liken it to, you know, the overreaching over training principle. You know, you've got to. A coach has got to get. And I know there's two schools of thought on overreaching and over training, but I think, you know, a coach has got to get you to that point where you are pushing that boundary to be able to, you know, to progress. And, you know, the same goes with kind of manipulating body composition where, you know, where can you. Where can we get to where you're most efficient, you're injury free, you're performing, you're recovering. And that's a, That's a tight line, you know, to a fine line to walk as well.

Yeah, I mean, I think, I think it's really interesting how those two crossover. And yeah, that's what I was chatting to Flora College about it because she's also, as well as being a pro triathlete, she's also a. She studies people with exercise addiction. So there's kind of another crossover there. But I had the benefit of going. You've got two online courses, haven't you? Well, the Hub and then the Fuel Me course, which absolutely brilliant. And I mean, I studied quite a lot around nutrition, but it gave me a lot of good insights into the sort of work that you're doing. I thought it'd be useful for listeners if we could kind of go through some top tips around nutrition at different stages in this. In the exercise cycle. So maybe we start with the training phase, then maybe the week before, then the day of the event, or even the kind of morning of the event, and then. And then afterwards. So, so what. What would be some of your key principles in the training phase? Of, of the, the training cycle?

Yeah. And, you know, it's interesting you kind of mentioned their sort of, you know, training phase, because one thing that I would say is, and the number one thing that I get asked from, and probably everybody sat listening to this is thinking the same thing. The number one thing I get asked or when I speak to somebody is write me a plan, give me a plan. And you know what? Like, I am all about education. I wouldn't. I want you actually to be able to. To be able to think. You know, I've had a busy Day at work and what do I need? And the reason I say that is because if we think about cycles of training, not only do your cycles of training change and therefore your need for different combinations of nutrients and when you need to kind of fuel yourself, but of course within a day, that's going to change as well. So you can't possibly have one plan that would fit every single day, every month of the year, every training cycle. And it's not that it's not possible and you do have to micromanage and it sounds like it's so intricate that nobody could do it, but actually once you understand the real basic fundamentals and principles, you can actually do that. And one of the things of the different training cycles, so say if you take kind of where we would be usually if we're thinking about racing, you know, coming into, you know, January, February, we could actually start to think about, actually now's the time where for a lot of athletes, certainly, you know, in the UK and Europe, putting in the endurance kind of base aerobic again, you know, from having had maybe a little bit of, not necessarily time off, but depending on what, you know, you and your coach do, you know, certainly maybe for most people, not the time racing is, you can then start to think about, okay, whilst we're doing cerebric work, you know, this base endurance work, what do we need to do then to body composition to get, to get to where we need to be. So you start planning it far enough out so that you're not getting towards race day. You know, I have people that will contact me and say I'm, you know, I'm racing in five weeks time at Roth or wherever it is. I don't know what I'm doing in terms of fueling and I need to lose four kilograms. Well, you know, you've got to plan these things out as you do your training and that's how much things change over time. So it's not just about cutting down on food. It's actually being really clever and really cute about what you do with your fueling. And that could, of course for some people be that actually that time of year when the base aerobic work is happening that we actually try and increase their weight a little bit. So, you know, we've got many endurance athletes that actually really struggle to maintain weight and stay healthy. So we do have both sides and I think we often forget about these people that are just like, they cannot get enough energy and it's really, really difficult. So, you know, through these different training cycles, Your, your energy needs are going to change on a day to day basis. And the number one thing that we work with is very much teaching what do I need and when do I need it? Because there's no point in just not fueling yourself the whole of the day and then, you know, getting to the end of the day and thinking, God, I'm absolutely starving. I've done three training sessions and all I want to do is not only, you know, get in the fridge and eat everything there is now I'm interested in chocolate and crisps and everything else. And of course for anyone that knows me as well, by the way, there's a space for all of these foods and there's nothing banned at all. You know, we don't need to be thinking about food in that way, but it's when to eat appropriately. So certainly that you know that the periodization of training, you've got to periodize your nutrition at that time and think and plan far enough ahead.

And I think one of the things you mentioned kind of in that stage is about measuring, isn't it? It's about kind of keeping a track of what you're consuming. And so talk to us about the importance of measuring and how people are best to do that. You know, is it real trauma to measure your intake?

Yeah, I think, you know, one of the things that I find people doing and I think, you know, any athletes or coaches listening to this will kind of, you know, maybe agree with this as well, is that it's all very well collecting data, but what are you going to do with that data at the end of it? Or you can collect data that is kind of a bit scrappy and you haven't really kind of, you know, you've been really busy at work that you know, the children are running around in your homeschooling, whatever you're doing, you know, and you've half collected a day, but you're trying to do it every single day for 365 days a year. That information is pretty much worth nothing. You're much better to say, and this is what I do in terms of working with athletes to say, well, okay, let's look at where it is right now. So in different training phases, picking up maybe sort of five days, three days, getting some really good data. And you can use an app or you know what good old fashioned like use an Excel spreadsheet, write it down. Whichever way you find is easy. Because we do forget what we eat. We don't mean to sometimes. But you know what those half Biscuits. Like, there might have been five of those half biscuits. Or, you know, you might not have realized that you've ended up eating six yogurts because you're really hungry and didn't fuel properly at breakfast or whatever it might have been. So we've got to get some sort of measure. There's no point in measuring 365 days a year and doing nothing with it. It's a waste of time, essentially. So we often will take periods of time and especially as the cycle or the, the microcycle or the meso cycle changes, so where you are in your period of training changes. That's a really good time for us to pick it up and measure again. Or it could be that somebody says, I'm really struggling, I've got no energy, I'm not recovering. And again, really good time to go. Okay, well, let's have a look. Where is your training right now? What are you doing about fueling? And sometimes that's a really good. Or not. Sometimes that's a really good time to pick up on when people might be deficient in energy, when their training suddenly increases and they're not accounting for that in energy intake or they're overeating and they're not able to manipulate body composition because they're not fueling at the right time. So I think it's very, very useful. But it's only useful if you collect good quality data and don't, don't, you know, don't set yourself up to fail. Do it for some, you know, set period of time and do it really well and do something with the data as well.

I actually went through. So I interviewed one of the episodes that was released right at the start of this year. I think it's the first episode we released in January by Dan Miller, who was also talking a lot about nutrition, and he got me using the Chronometer app to record this data. And I think I did two weeks. But it is really interesting because once you've measured it, I mean, like for two weeks, it's easy enough. I mean, I wouldn't want to be entering that stuff, as you say, for 365 days of the year. But what it taught me in terms of what I was missing and what I was getting more, you know, I was putting some supplements in that I was. I really didn't need. I was deficient in other supplements, but. But it taught me that I was kind of calorie deficient during the weekdays, but probably slightly over consuming at the weekend, which actually balanced out to be about perfect. So I suppose what, what, what you measure brings a much more awareness to the situation, doesn't it?

Yeah. And I think it's a really good way as well to help people understand appetite. And that's something that we very much teach in the course is, you know, start managing your appetite but start recognizing it as well. You know, we're very good at ignoring appetite or being very, very aware of it when it suits us. Thanks very much. So when there's, you know, a big piece of cake or you've done a long ride. Oh, actually I'm really very hungry. I think I, you know, and there should be no this kind of like we all get hungry as athletes and we all know coming up to kind of when our training really intensifies and we're coming up to that peak. Most of us are hungry a lot of the time. But we need to have done the work in the first place to recognize hunger, to manage appetite. And the more that we can manage appetite, we are going to be in a much better position to control. And I say control as in take on board and manage what we're eating to fit around our training. And there's also, you know, there's always scope to have a little bit of what you fancy. You know, I always call it food for the soul. It's, you know, you don't need to avoid those things. But the more we, the more we're not aware of our appetite, the more we end up kind of going to some of those foods that may be not appropriate to be having the whole time.

And are there any particular strategies that people can employ? Like is it as straightforward carbs before exercise, protein after exercise or, you know, how should people be kind of thinking about the different types of foods?

Yeah, so yes, carbohydrates are, if we're talking the basic fundamentals, carbohydrates we know in all the most recent studies are still king. Whatever. You know, we're still doing lots of research into fat and ultra endurance and you know, the research is coming back, still tells us without a doubt, you know, if we're looking at performance, carbohydrates still is king. So if you were going to go in and do, you know, an FTP session or an interval session, high cadence session, whatever you want to call your session, strength session on the bike or a track session, you know, fartlep running, whatever it might be any of your really good quality training sessions. There's absolutely no point going into that half, you know, semi fasted because what are you Going to get out of it. So really thinking about actually having some carbohydrates before you go into that session. Having the right types of carbohydrates at the right time is going to get you through that session. Not only get you through, but it's going to make sure that you push yourself as hard as you can. And surely as an athlete we all want to be progressing, but we have this kind of, and I see time and time again this restriction of athletes restricting food, getting literally just getting through their training sessions done, suddenly they're starving and all the eating happens later on in the evening. And from a body composition point of view, that isn't useful. And whilst it might mean that they recover if they're getting in carbohydrate and protein, because actually from a recovery perspective, we've got to think that a lot of athletes are training twice a day. You know, if we're triathletes generally, like when, you know, that thing called a pool is open or a gym, we know in the far distant future somewhere, you know, we, a lot of us are training twice a day and we can't just think about recovery as protein. We actually need to be thinking about refueling. So carbohydrates, then secondary protein comes with it. So, you know, we've got to really be thinking, of course, rehydration is really important as well. So there's three phases really to our recovery and thinking about, you know, is it in between two sessions? It's sandwiched in between other things.

That reminds me that years ago I remember reading or being taught about the principle of trying not to. So you could have not mix your carbs with your protein in one meal you have one protein based meal and then the next meal might be a carb based meal. What are your thoughts around that, particularly given what you've just said?

I think, oh, interesting. Actually, at university, that's what I did my dissertation on. Well, we've picked the diet of the 1960s. I think that's the original anyway. Well, like anything, you know, first of all, ask yourself, why are you choosing to do it? What, what is your aim, first of all, for following such a, let's call it diet. And I actually, even though I'm a dietitian, I actually hate the word diet. I think it has a really negative connotation to it because I think we see it as restrictive and it's terrible. And you know, actually from a clinical perspective, oh my God, the dietitian's coming. This is like the police that you Know, the diet police are out to get me kind of thing, you know, I think. And that kind of leads me on to like these diets that people follow. It's like some sort of, you know, these rules that I've got to kind of, you know, got to follow. And like anything when you restrict a nutrient, you're always going to be deficient in something. And of course, if you really stick to that, if you take out one of your big macronutrients, you are going to be deficient in energy across that day. So of course it's going to work in terms of weight loss. And most people are doing it, let's face it, to manipulate weight. And even actually the athletes that I find that are doing fasted training sessions are not doing it for the metabolic physiological training adaptations, they're doing it to manipulate weight. And there's, you know, there's a number of reasons why we do that and how we do it. And it's not about just not eating carbohydrates. And I think, you know, you can, if you went out and did so if we're looking at an ultra distance runner or you went out on a long, slow, aerobic, two hour run at the weekend. Yeah, most of us as endurance athletes could get through that on fat as a fuel. We could on protein and fat. Is that beneficial to do every single weekend? Maybe not. You know, why are you doing it? What's your outcome going to be? What's your aim? How are you going to refuel afterwards? You know, you can't just follow that and take that into a really high intensity session because you're not going to be able to push yourself to the degree that you would be able to. So just layering. And this is where I come back to, you know, give me a meal plan. It's not just about a meal plan. There you go. Go and follow it. Because actually every session needs something different. I think that highlights it really well. You know, if you were just having more carbohydrates at one meal and protein at the other. You know, if you think about what I've kind of just said, you're either never going to be fuel for a session, we were never going to recover properly and refuel. So it's. But, but you know, ultimately if we play with macronutrients where we're going to create an energy deficit because there's only so much we can eat of one of one thing.

And I kind of seem to remember it being almost a digestive principle in that we digest our Carbs better if protein isn't there and vice versa. Is that the case or is that something that was again, a myth back in the 60s that sort of hung on.

Well, I think it's not a myth if you actually look at it from a digestion point of view. Of course, proteins and fats have slower gastric emptying, so they, they empty from our stomach more slowly than a carbohydrate does. So if you've got carbohydrates, proteins and fats in your stomach, you know, you're not going to say. So if you went into, say you're about to go and race and an hour before you had a meal that was like a big piece of fillet steak, you had a bit of carbohydrates and you had a plate of chips. Well, I had plate chips, say that a fries. That's your carbohydrates, your fats and your proteins. You were probably going to have a terrible session. Now it was time because that food is literally going to sit there. So that's again, you know, part of the education is what carbohydrates do I need when. So, you know, when I say to people sometimes, okay, well, if you, if you're really struggling and you're struggling to get back from work and eat and you've only eaten, you know, lunchtime, what's a quick release carbohydrate that we can use? And, you know, they love it when I say, well, actually, do you know what, have a white bagel with jam on? Like what nutritionist telling me that, you know, but there's times and places for that. There's, you know, and I think it's, you know, from a digestion point of view, you're absolutely right. But in terms of, you know, on a very basic level, talking about foods that empty more slowly that, that take longer to digest. So we've got to play with that and we've got to say, well, actually, when's my next training session? What do I need? You know, And I, that's what I get athletes to do, you know, and, you know, part of the way that we work is, and almost like our formula, I guess, is getting athletes to really think, you know what, rather than being dictated to by a book or by a diet or a meal plan, get them to think, you know, well, what do I need right now? How do I feel? How did I recover? Because the more you know about yourself, the more that you can change, you know, your own nutrition. And of course, there's theory and practice and that's very much kind of one of the things I've learned In the last 17, 18 years is, you know, we have all this theory, we have evidence, but at the end of the day, we're all individuals and we do all react slightly differently. So just because it's theory doesn't mean to say it's going to 100% work for you.

I think Damian hall was talking about, I asked him what the worst piece of advice he hears is. And his, his worst advice was fat fueling. But even he said, look, for a few people it works really well, but the research shows for majority of people it doesn't. So as you say, we're all different, aren't we? And therefore we've got to probably be a bit scientific and try and work out what works for us.

Yeah, and sometimes there isn't, you know, sometimes. And it's the same as medicine, sometimes there isn't an answer, unfortunately. Sometimes, you know, we can try and work it out. But actually, you know, and again, one of the things that I found, you know, over the years working and with my experience of working with athletes and clients and patients is, you know, as long as you can make a diet balanced and the person is healthy, really if you don't know why something works, ultimately it doesn't really matter as long as it's not a clinical condition and we're trying to diagnose something, if it works for that person, you find the perfect formula for them. That's amazing. Do we really need to know why it doesn't follow a theory? Not really. Because if it works for you and it's balanced and you're happy and you're healthy and you're performing and you're recovering, then we found it and that's your formula. And that's really how we work. And we work on such an individual level with athletes. It's not about, it's not about the generic, you know, and I, unfortunately I do and I use training peaks as well. And I've worked with lots of coaches in the past, but, you know, we're not, we're not the training generic peaks. You know, we do work and I know a lot of amazing coaches that, you know, will use training peaks and don't work generically. They work very individually. And you know, when you work individually with a coach, that's where you see results because it changes for you. You know, not every athlete is going to be able to tolerate the load a coach puts in front of them. You know, even on paper it makes Sense, like, why are you not recovering? Because I'm an individual and, you know, life happens and there's life stresses and I didn't sleep and the children were up and, you know, I worked till midnight and I didn't mean to. And, you know, and I think that's where our individual formula, I guess, comes from. And the experience that certainly I've gathered over the years is, you know, you've got to work with the individual and the athlete is the center of that. You've got to get their feedback. You know, what's working for you. Just because I said it might be a good idea doesn't mean to say it actually works for you.

Okay, fantastic. I think that's, yeah, that's, that's advice that we've heard a few times on this is, you know, it's got to be bespoke to the athlete. And Laura Penhall, who was top performer, performance coach in both the sort of Paralympic world and also, you know, helping Mark Beaumont cycle around the world in less than 80 days. That's exactly her message. So just coming back to this fasted versus non fasted thing. So during that training phase, you know, not a typical morning for me would be up at 5:30 and out running by 6:00'.

Clock.

So if training fasted is not so good for me, what can you give me some sort of kind of like tips as to what I might be able to eat in that first half an hour of the day that isn't going to then be my. Isn't going to be like the steak and chips sitting in my stomach for the run.

This is a classic. Okay, so this is a classic because as triathletes or as runners, cyclists, whatever, you know, we're often getting up ridiculously early, we're going to the pool or going out for a run, trying to fit everything, you know, jam everything in around this very busy day for a lot of people. Most people say to me, I don't have anything to eat before I go out. Well, ultimately, is that bad? Well, and you kind of rightly said that, is it a good or bad thing to do? If we know why we're doing now, I'll call it glycogen depleted. So carbohydrate depleted training rather than fasted training. If we know why we're doing it and we plan it out, it's not necessarily bad because we know what the outcome is going to be. But of course it's very stressful for our body. Constant. And I use stress in the word of how Our body responds and how we recover. So it's very stressful for our body to be in that situation the whole time. But if you went out for like a 30 minute aerobic run, fasted, you will probably, if you ate carbohydrates last night, you will have enough carbohydrate to get you through that session. Your muscles can store 400 grams of carbohydrate, your liver is a little bit less. So we would have enough energy to get through the session. If that session was one of your key targeted high intensity sessions, I probably wouldn't go out fasted because you're never going to get what you need to from it. So really quick, easy things to do is don't try and fuel in that half an hour. You either fuel an hour before or you fuel 10 minutes before. And if it's 10 minutes before that, you're going to do it something liquid based because we don't want to be eating something that's just going to sit in our stomach. So I often use things like smoothies, fruit juice, low fat fruit yogurts. Say something that's got carbohydrate in, that's quite liquidy. Even down to things like rice pudding, custards, whatever kind of suits you at that time in the morning. You know, coffee, espresso, whatever you, whatever you want. But you need to have some carbohydrates in there. And those examples actually give you the basics as in the tiniest amount, the base amount of carbohydrates. And again, people are real individuals. You know, I've got certainly some of my younger athletes, like my 6, some of my 16 year olds will literally, I'm not joking, we'll go out on a full cooked breakfast, out to a competition having eaten three quarts an hour before. And I have no problems because of course we can train our guts. And I think athletes forget that, that, you know, our gut is an organ, we can train it.

That's something I've really learned from the ultra running world, from the triathlon world. You know, it's mostly gels. Gels, gels. You know, maybe a lot of the pro athletes don't even seem to have bars on the bike. It's just gels all the way through. And yet you speak to these ultra runners and they're eating, you know, baked beans on toast or fish and chips midway through a run or pizza. You know, it's, it is interesting how you can train, train your gut to deal with solid food while you're, while.

You'Re out and we absolutely can and you know, for different individuals actually if you took, you know, we talked about training cycles, you know, 12 weeks really to train your gut properly and you know, but you've got to remember with ultra runners they aren't. Even if you took Ironman versus ultra running, our heart rates are so much higher. You know, even racing Ironman and it depends on what level you're racing of course but if you're taking the pro athletes and kind of our elite level, even age groupers, you know, we're racing with much higher heart rates and, and we're going to be cranking three more carbohydrates. So there is a difference between being able to run and eat as an ultra runner and using fat more as a fuel as well and using more real foods. But I have had athletes that have wanted to race Ironman on real food and believe me, like it took me a long time to work out a schedule that worked for somebody but we tried it and actually it did work for her. I think realistically for this one athlete I worked with, I think if she had used more quicker release carbohydrates she probably would have performed better. But it depends at what level you're racing at. You know, if you were going to be racing a lot more slowly then probably you can tolerate a bit more. But you know our guys that are quick, it's, it's finding something that works for you ultimately and like I say, sometimes it doesn't match the theory.

So while we're touching on the subject of gels and I just want to come back to that whole fitness versus health thing because when I first got into cycling initially it was all about being the healthiest I could be and then I needed to fuel on the bike and suddenly you're looking at these gels and energy bars that look like a chemistry experiment. You're like does that really fit in with my primary objective and that you've obviously got other. So you've got the sort of traditional sports nutrition then you've got Warren from 33 fuel on here who's very much kind of health based endurance fuel is other companies like Spring Energy that Beth Pascal uses and, and you know, others. Where do you sit? Where do you stand on this whole, you know, is it just the traditional gels and just cram as much sugar in as you can or do you prefer the sort of more whole food based approach?

I think, I think it comes down to training your gut. It comes down to the individual and your ultimate aim. What's your aim, what's your race distance, how fast are you racing? You know, what's the environment like? Because of course, being higher altitude, being hotter, you're going to utilize more carbohydrate, higher race intensity. So our sprint athletes are going to be racing much faster than our ironman athletes. You know, they're going to be cranking through carbohydrates. And of course, you know, I often have this conversation with athletes about athletes are scared of having sugar. As athletes, even outside of training, we are more sensitive to insulin. So we are. So insulin is the hormone that takes the sugar out of the blood. So we were very well adapted to coping with carbohydrates. Now, if you're fueling through a session that, you know, through a race, you're not going to be storing any of that carbohydrate away. You are going to be using that carbohydrate, you're not going to be producing insulin that's taking the sugar out of the blood. You're going to be cranking through that sugar. Ultimately, that's really quick release. That's what your body needs straight away. So if you think about all these workmen, you know, in your mitochondria, in your cells or cranking away, you know, they're using it straight away. They don't want to be going into the back office to go and get some fat out from somewhere and then finding a trolley to bring it to the front because essentially it's a much slower system and we can train that system. And that system is kind of in the background and working away. And as endurance athletes, especially if we trained it, it's going to be relatively efficient. But is it going to be as quick running as, you know, all our little front runners? Absolutely not. And we, and we know this from our, you know, a lot of the, Even now the most recent research has been done in fat versus carbohydrate. It's been done in race walk. And you know, we know Olympic race walkers and we know from that who race it quite high intensity, by the way, you know, we still know from that that actually, you know, having carbohydrate board is really important for performance. And we know that those can, those that can take in more carbohydrates are going to perform better. Now we do have some of those newer fuels that are slower release carbohydrates. But ultimately if you are going, you know, comes back to the instant sensitivity. But also if you're going to be racing at a higher heart rate and you're going to be, you're going to be needing more carbohydrate. There is also absolutely nothing wrong with having fast release carbohydrates. But most of our gels now are multi transportable carbohydrates. So there's. And simplistically you've got lots of different types of carbohydrates so that you've got lots of systems essentially to get it into the cell. And where we come across problems is where we've got one carbohydrate source. And essentially if you think about it like, I think about it like ferries, boats going or cars coming onto the ferries to go across the sea essentially. And if you've only got one ferry that's going across that day, you know you can only fill it with that one carbohydrate to get it across. There's going to be a saturation point. You can only get so much across. If you've got a number of different ferries that are going across a number of different carbohydrates, you can load those up and send them all across. You then got three going across rather than just one. You are going to be able to get more carbohydrate into the system. So some of the newer, well, they're not so new now, but are multi transportable. Carbohydrates are far more effective at getting enough fuel into the system and ultimately we can tolerate up to 120 grams an hour, which is a fair whack. But most athletes, I mean, even some of the professionals I work with are fueling and albeit female triathletes are fueling it kind of like 40 grams an hour, which one of the things I get them to try out with is let's see how far we can get with carbohydrates. Because you know what, you're going to find that this whole race a lot easier if we can see how much you're able to tolerate.

And are there any particular products in that space for, for fueling your race that you particularly like, you know, that deliver these multiple carbohydrates?

I think, well, there's loads of different brands out there and you know, particulars.

That you, any particularly you really, you get on with or you recommend.

I use lots of different types and you know, one thing that I would say is try different brands out because just because they work for one athlete isn't going to work for another. And you know, I'm, I would never be one to sit here and say I'll Tell you what, you know, this is really good. It works for me or it works for so and so. Actually, I've got athletes that say, well, I really like, you know, the flavor of fuzzy peach or whatever it is, or bonkers banana or. I love that, you know, that caffeine shot. I really like a thick gel. I really like a thin gel. I really like a gum. I really like, you know, so I really work with so many different brands and I would never just work with one brand, you know, because they're, you know, as long as I, as long as I feel that that product is appropriate for use and a tested product, of course, because we've got to make sure that, you know, our products that we're racing with our batch tested, which is really important. And, you know, so I think it is just finding a product that works for you and it's thinking about taste, consistency, you know, and also in the winter, you might really like one thing, cycling. And actually in summer you get out to a hot race like, oh, my God, this is sickly and it's disgusting. So, you know, you've got, you've got to find what works for you. And that comes with practice and that comes with training, training your gut and training yourself to go out on those rides and use it and find out what the problems are.

And training your gut in the sense of trying to get it used. Because I know from personal experience, I've had GI issues with, with taking gels. Is that something that people tend to get over or do they just tend to have to find different gels that work for them?

People get over it is really training the gut and finding, finding something that suits you. And the other thing, of course, is if you're dehydrated, you're going to get more gastrointestinal issues. If you haven't fueled properly or fueled early enough on, you're going to get more gastrointestinal intestinal issues. If it's hot, you know, if you're altitude, if you've been in a, like, you know, you've been swimming in the sea and it's been really rough, you know, you can actually get, like seasick. So there's, there's so many things that affect your bowel and, you know, people often think, or often don't think enough about what they eat three days before because you've got to start thinking. And this is, you know, this is another one of our fundamentals and principles is thinking far enough ahead, planning out your race day. There's no point in getting to, you know, even before your race and go, what am I going to eat? Well, we should have actually planned this seven days ago and actually started making changes and really planning for what we're going to do. You know, down to timing. The last 48 hours are crucial in terms of what you're doing. You know, we forget this. It's, to be honest, it's one of the cheapest things that we can do. You know, you can spend £10,000 on a bike, that's all very well, but are you going to finish the race?

And you've just kind of led me on. The next piece I was going to come on to was what should we be doing in the, in the week leading up to the event or the days leading up to it? And you've kind of just made me think of two things. One, one is, I remember, I don't know where I saw, read, heard that, but when I started long distance cycling events, I was told to eat not beetroot every day in the, in the, in the week leading up to the event because of it boosted nitrates. And then when I was interviewing Ruth Astle last week, she said about the, I think her first Ironman, it was, she took, she told somebody told us to salt load the day before. And she had really bad GI issues as a result of that. Firstly, just cover off those two myths or kind of those particular aspects and then is there anything else that we should be doing in that week leading up to the event?

Yeah, so to cover the beetroot issue. Not issue. Beetroot is really, and it's not just beetroot, by the way, it's any of our, any of our plant sources that are high in nitrates. Now it's really good to include those food sources anyway as part of our general sort of training diet because we do know that that is effective, particularly in, we may think in endurance sport, but particularly in things like a time trial, for example, that you might go and do like a cycling time trial, but like anything, you've got to practice with it. You know, if you go, if you go and give yourself a whole load of beetroot, you've got that your gut is not used to eating. You are going to get gastrointestinal distress because it's a fermentable carbohydrate. So some people have guts of steel and they're really lucky and other people don't. So don't, Number one, do not do anything new in that, in that week leading up to an event. It's Just not worth it, you know, and we always kind of see, you know, in all our race guides, don't know, don't try new things at the expo and all of those kind of things. And it's so true. But don't try something you haven't tried before. You know, this comes back to planning. We have to plan and manage ahead. We can't just pick up the phone five weeks before and say, you need to help me. Yes, I can help as much as I can, or we can help as much as we can, but certainly not the week before. Don't try and make any changes. You could make some small tweaks and that's certainly something I could guide with, but you would have none of this evidence that we were talking about in terms of collecting all this information, doing all this background work. And that's where our Fuel Me course talks about collecting data. Collect this first, don't skip this module, collect this first. Because you've got to know what you're doing, you've got to have that information. So beetroot is really interesting and that's where the concentrate of some of the beat shots have come from. But again, some athletes do find they have more gastrointestinal issues from it. But perhaps training their gut to take it would mean that they wouldn't as well. So to get enough nitrate in, most of the studies have been done with like a concentrated amount because you could never really get that amount in one go. But there are some studies and certainly having been in a conference not so long ago, we were talking about nitrate and you know, certainly by including more in your diet is going to likely be beneficial. Would it give you the extra edge? Maybe if you're at the top of your age group. Absolutely. You know, all of these little things, but try it out. Fight. Does it, does it work for you? Do an experiment. Does it work for you or does it not work for you? You know, that's the other thing to do. You know, it's all very well if you know Jay down the road does it, and he podiums every time, but does it work for you? If it's going to give you gastrointestinal distress, you're not going to finish, so don't make any last minute changes. The other thing about salt loading, so salt and sodium are two different things. If we think of sodium, it entirely depends on your sweat rate. So we actually measure sweat rates as well. So sodium sweat loss, because sodium is the main mineral or iron that you lose in sweat, you do lose other minerals as well. But that's your main iron that we would need to replace. And some people are really salty sweat as some people aren't. So you, you know, in terms of loading with sodium, it's unlikely if you loaded properly and knew what you were doing with sodium, that you give yourself gastrointestinal distress. But it's again, it's understanding it and doing it in the right way. There's no point in suddenly fluid overloading yourself and giving yourself way too much. But if you're a very, very heavily salty, salty sweater, then actually pre hydrating the day before is a really good idea, you know, to almost hypo hydrate, hyper hydrate. Sorry, you know, a little bit before the event, especially if it were, you know, a hot and humid event. But I think this, you know, both of those examples you gave me comes back to don't try anything new because, you know, you've also got nerves on the back of that as well. You're going to get gut issues.

So the hydration is absolutely key. Something I wanted, I wanted to talk to you about. Is there anything scientific you can do to get this more accurate as opposed to, you know, just popping salt tablets in the hope that that's going to be offset the right amount?

Absolutely. So. So I was through fourth discipline. We partner with precision hydration. So we actually are a sweat test center. It's really easy. And you know, as a clinical dietitian myself, actually the principle behind the sweat testing is not something that's wacky at all. Like, it is evidence based and it's actually based on tests we do with people with cystic fibrosis to test sodium sweat losses because they have high sodium sweat or sweat sodium. So, you know, to me it sat very comfortably because it's something that I know that we use in medicine and there isn't, you know, some wacky sports science that, you know, every athlete needs to do. But one of the things that, that is very, very interesting about testing sweat sodium is it's really quick and easy. For one, you only ever have to do one test because it's pretty much genetically determined how much sodium we sweat out. And it can be an absolute key, key change that somebody can make. If they're sweating lots of sodium, they are going to really struggle in hot weather, without a doubt. You know, I have athletes that have, you will say, oh, I'm amazing racing in, you know, like wintry conditions like Europe, well, not even Europe, but, you know, in, in kind of England and Wales doing those races. I'm Absolutely fine. Take me to a hot country. I'm terrible. And actually some of the tests that I've done, it's like, actually you're. You sweat loads of sodium. I wonder whether one of the reasons that you felt so blooming awful and not being able to finish or certainly really slowed down. Yes, that could be off the back and probably a combination of things off the back of nutrition and not fueling. But I'm having gut issues as well. If you're sweating out loads of sodium and not replacing it, you're going to have more issues in terms of dehydration. So we have very, very heavy salt sweaters. A lot of us kind of sit in the middle and then we've got people that don't sweat very much sodium at all.

And what does that test look like? How do you do a test for how much you're.

Yeah, so it's nothing exciting. You don't have to get on a treadmill and sweat, unfortunately. So for a lot of athletes, they turn up and go, oh, I've got my trainers on. I thought I was going to do a run test.

I've just been doing the COVID antibody test today. So I don't have to. I don't have to prick my finger or anything like that?

No, you don't have to do anything. So it's non invasive. Basically, it's some electrodes and you've got two electrodes that you have on your forearm and it takes about 40 minutes, essentially. And we ask you a few questions about, you know, you're kind of racing, whether you're a runner, cyclist, whether you race a lot in hot weather, how you feel. So whether you think you sweat a lot. And we'll often get athletes to. And I do this on a, you know, one of the fundamentals, and we talk about this in the course, is collect your sweat data, you know, tell me how much you're sweating because. Do you know, because I've got athletes that say I sweat loads. Well, yeah, you're inside, you've got the radiators on and your mat in front of a turbo is probably going to look like a pool. But ultimately, are you sweating a lot or does it just look like a lot? So by doing some simple measurements at home, by weighing yourself down before training, train, weigh yourself afterwards, that gives you a really crude measurement of the amount that you've lost in weight, essentially equates to the liters. You've so kilograms you've lost in weight equates to the kilograms that you've lost in fluid. And it's quite interesting because some people say I sweat loads. I was like, actually, you don't sweat that much as much as you think. But of course we need to again measure that across different racing or training scenarios. So your sweat rate's going to be different in hot weather compared to inside in front of a radiator, you know, outside in the snow, in a pool. If people forget to do their pre and post sweat tests after swimming. But of course we sweat in a pool, they forget to drink in a pool for some reason. So we would use that data. So collecting actually how much physical liquid is lost, fluid is lost. And then we do a sweat sodium test. So that's with the electrodes and you basically have one electrode that's stimulating the, the sweat duct.

And.

Once it's been on there about five minutes, we then have a little collection disc with some dye in it and that draws on the sweat duct that's been stimulated to sweat. And you've got like a little blue dye that fills up. It's a nice little experiment, fills up a little tube. And again, like, there's nothing basic. It's literally a couple of discs on your arm. And then we put it through a little machine, the analyzer through a little machine literally is a tiny amount of fluid that you've collected, this little blue dye. And that blue dye will tell us how much sodium that is in that sweat. And from that data we can then say, well, actually, you're really salty sweater. This is how much you're going to need to think about for training, you know, for your racing, for pre racing. So we go into it in a lot of depth. But again, you know, it's then finding the right formula for them in terms of what's going to work for them.

And is that something that involves coming to your kind of lab or is it something you can do remotely or.

So there's a number of different sweat centres across the country and we're based in the West Midlands, so we, we're quite a good hub actually, for, for the area and kind of surrounding areas in London and things as well. So, yeah, they need to come to us. So once we're back open again, we'll be fully up and running to do all our. All our sweat testing and body composition testing and things as well. But I would say, you know, if, if you're somebody who's really struggled in the past and, you know, the kind of person that just feels absolutely terrible even after long training sessions, like not being able to recover properly. Got headaches, you know, feel a bit kind of wheezy or a bit dizzy. Lacking energy. Yes, there's a number of reasons why, but have you actually ever thought about, you know, people would drink liters and liters of fluid and not replace sodium and you know, they're not going to rehydrate that way at all, they're just going to end up peeing out. So, you know, we, it's, it's something to be honest, for, you know, just over a hundred quid to do a test, it's going to make such a difference because if you're really heavy sweat sweater, in terms of sodium Sweat, literally that 40 minute test you don't have to do again and you'll know exactly how much sodium you have to replace. Um, so it's really, it is really, really, really interesting and actually I think you would probably know if you're very salty sweater, typical things actually. So we're not talking about like racing the sea, but yes, there's the white marks on black clothing, but even things like your eyes really sting when sweat drips into them. So yeah, we might go, oh yeah, sweating a bit. You know, we might know that, you know, our sweat tastes salty, we all kind of know that. But you know, those little things like really salty kind of stinging in your eyes. The like I say, feeling like very lethargic, headaches, not being able to catch up with your thirst afterwards, really slowing down in races, which could have of course been nutrition as well, but all these kind of little snippets and having, you know, spoken with lots of athletes, I'm always quite on it actually in terms of, you know, when I hear them say things, I'm like, oh, that's really interesting. Do you know how much you sweat? You know, have you, do you use any electrolytes? And of course a lot of the electrolytes we have off the shelf now are only about 200 milligrams of sodium. So it's not huge amounts and to be honest, probably suits a lot of people. But if you're really heavy sodium sweater, you would know when, how much sodium you need to be replacing.

So for somebody that hasn't done this test, would you be suggesting that they have electrolytes in their, in their drink during exercise most of the time? Occasionally.

It entirely depends. It depends on what you're doing. You know, there's no point just sat there drinking them all day. I think if you're, if you're somebody who isn't particularly good at hydrating and then you suddenly got to the end of the day and you're going to do a 9 o' clock turbo session after the kids are in bed, you know, and you haven't, you haven't drunk particularly. Well then actually, you know, having a bit of a preload with a bit of sodium, you know, electrolyte tablet isn't going to do you any harm and probably would be beneficial, you know, along with a long indoor turbo session that's two hours at a weekend. Or if you're out on a ride and it's, you know, it's hot, then yes, absolutely. Replacing some would be, would be, would be useful. Do we need to do it the whole time? Maybe not. But, you know, the answer, unfortunately, entirely depends. And you know, I think the answer to a lot of these things depends on the individual. And that's where it comes back to what we said, you know, right in the very beginning, is it really is about an athlete as an individual. And there are no unfortunate, unfortunately, there are no kind of, you know, nice boxed answers sometimes to the questions that come with a little gold medal and a gold magic bean and a wand if we want one as well. Wouldn't it be nice though, however?

It would, wouldn't it? So we've kind of talked a bit about during the race, we've talked a bit about, is there anything else you want to add in the lead up that week leading up to the race that you kind of think about other than don't do anything new.

Don't do anything new. And again, it comes down to the individual. So we, we would very much say, when we're coaching athletes, we would very much work through their race season. So, you know, they know exactly what they're going into the race that they're going to do is their race plan. And I often get them to have, you know, an A, B, possibly even a C race plan in terms of what's going to go wrong, what can I do next? What happens if I drop things? And having that week before that, you really know what you're going to do. So, you know, when you get there, what cooking facilities have you got? Where are you going to buy food? What are you going to take with you? You know, knowing what your gut's like beforehand, you know, are we going to be cutting back on fiber? What are we going to do the night before? Are you eating with other people? Are you going out? So we go through all of these things with athletes, you know, right down to some of our athletes that we, that we that we coach on a very, very individual, one to one basis. You know, we will do flight plans, you know, walking them through an airport, as in, you know, if you remember what airports were, one of those things that we used to use quite often, you know, going right through in terms of making sure that athletes is arriving as healthy state as they can. And you know, because we, again, you know, we can do all these months of training and you can literally just, you can literally DNF a race. You know, you might have flown to America, spent all that money and you know, it could be down to your, your high sodium sweat rate that you have, you're not replacing sodium, that you've decided to try something new the week before, that you've not thought about your nutrition 48 hours out, that you've not even planned your race nutrition and decide you're going to use something wacky that Jay down the road uses works for him but doesn't work for you. And I always come back to these things because it's. Yes, all these things cost money in terms of working with a nutritional coach or working with a dietitian or whatever it might be. But it takes time to make these changes and it's not something you can do overnight. It's not. I mentioned this before our call. You know, it's not as easy as jumping on the Internet and saying, well, you know, to make me faster, I'm going to buy that new set of carbon footprint wheels, I'm going to buy a new pair of carbon cycling shoes and you know what, I'm even going to get a wind tunnel tested helmet. Yes, all of those pieces of the jigsaw, of course are going to help. Of course they are. Um, but if you get the fundamentals wrong, you're not even going to finish the race. Um, you know, and we, we pin, I think as endurance athletes as well. We pin maybe not so much, you know, and are in our fast or shorter distance athletes. When, when you're racing, you can race back to back. And yes, these, you know, these races are really tough. And you know, having gone back to doing some short distance races after doing a lot of years of endurance, I totally respect our short distance athletes because that's crazy. It's fast. And yeah, I, I really enjoyed a summer of doing some fast races and I was terrible. Um, but it makes, you know, really, and it actually really made me think, if I'm really honest, it made me think about how I would think slightly different about helping some of my shorter distance athletes in terms of Fueling, because again, you know, the time everything, you know, your heart rate's so high, like you'd never eat a bar. Like I wouldn't actually suggest that running anyway. But you know, those little things that make me really think as an athlete actually how can I help someone out a bit more? Because this isn't realistic if I'm running at a really high pace, you know. So I think, I think, yeah, we really need to think about planning and I think if I'm really honest, it's one of the most cost efficient things you can probably do to perform better. It's just we don't think about it, unfortunately, until, until something goes wrong, like all of these things. Suddenly we decide when we're injured we need, you know, we need a physio and to do get in the gym and do some strength and conditioning. Well, you know, actually we need to think about strength and conditioning a lot. You know, we need to all as athletes think about that and optimizing every, every area.

So we've talked about the macronutrients. What about the micronutrients. Do you know, where do you, Are there any particular, I mean, you know, and not just micronutrients, but I suppose the whole supplement world and you know, you know, I've heard mentioned a few times coenzyme Q10 and, you know, all those sorts of different things. How do you, how do you help an athlete with them? And are any particular things you think that the athletes should be looking at?

It depends.

I figured that might be the answer.

Yeah, it does depend and I think, you know, again, this shows, you know, the individualistic approach that we need to have. You know, if an athlete has a medical condition where we need to supplement something and we know it's low. So first of all, don't supplement something if you don't know it's low. Why would you do that? Would you take a pill for something that you don't, you know, what are we putting a plaster on something for? So first of all, looking at your base diet, you know, are you meeting your needs? If not, why not? Can we with food? If we can't, what can we do about it? If you're going to take a supplement, it's got to be tested. You know, ask yourself the question, what's it going to do for you? What, what are the risks of taking it? And if you take it, are you going to take something else out of your diet? You know, are you? You know, I have athletes say to me, are you? I don't really I'm not really that keen on fish. You know what, I'll just take an Omega 3 supplement. Okay, that, that, yeah, I understand that, I do, I do get that. But actually, if you're open to having some oily fish, wouldn't it be lovely for us to get those nutrients in and those good oils rather than us just popping a pill. We also don't know about the absorption rates of some micronutrients. So if we're talking about iron, iron has a terrible rate of absorption. And if you're a plant based athlete, I mean, it even surprises me the more I read about certain nutrients actually how much we absorb of a supplement versus food we can absorb. And we know for most things we can absorb micronutrients far better in a normal food source rather than a supplement. And of course a lot of supplements, if we're doing micronutrients, interfere with other micronutrients. So you've always got that battle going on between certain nutrients. If you look at iron, for example, well, if you, you know, even if you have, let's take a plant based athlete, you have, you know, baked beans on wholemeal toast or whatever, that's great, it's a really good source of plant based iron. But then you have a cup of tea to go with it. You're negating really the amount of iron that you can absorb because iron, because the tea will interfere with, with the tannins, interfere with the absorption of iron. So, you know, we've got to really sort of think about our diet in terms of get as much variety in as possible, as much colour. And I sound really primary school when I say colour and I say that to athletes the whole time, you know, look at your plate, how much colour does it have in it? Because if it's not colourful, it's going to be lacking in something. I'm not expecting you. If we're talking about going out for a long run and cutting down on fiber, you know, I'm not expecting you to eat plate of salad and vegetables. It's colorful because that might not suit your gut and it might look a little bit beige. But you know, our meals in between need to have lots of colour, lots of, you know, lots of variety. And when it comes to supplements, you know, there are appropriate times to use supplements. If we're talking like protein supplements or collagen or tart, cherry, beetroot, you know, whatever we're talking. But you know, I will always get athletes to write down what supplements they're using, what they feel the Benefit is of them, when are they using them? Because again, quite a few athletes I come across have no idea what they're using it for, when to use it, they're not using it at the right time, and it almost becomes a waste of. Well, when I say almost, it is a waste of money, essentially. And I actually gave the example to one of my clients today. I've worked with a number of athletes before that have listed so many supplements. I said, actually, do you know what? Just bring them all in. Bring them all in with you. And I once had a table, desk full of supplements and I literally spent the whole session. That wasn't what I was going to do. But this is where the key to education comes. So actually I thought, well, how can I educate this guy? He was so set on having all these supplements. And I'm not going to sit there and say that something, you know, if you really believe in something, I'm not going to say don't, don't use it, but getting people to think and educate them. So we went through the whole table and educated, you know, asked why he was taking it, what's the benefit? Does he know if it's tested, what's the risks, what does he get out of it? Is he going to continue to use it? When does he use it? And we went literally through and we filled out. So I always get athletes to fill out like a table of what they use and when and why they use it. And we probably came down to a core kind of four that we would end up using. Now, that was really uncomfortable for him to go through because I was effectively saying, what you've been doing is wrong. It's not wrong. It's just, you know, we do have to ask ourselves question, why are we using it?

You know, sounds like good advice because it's, it's, it's very easy just to pop. Add another supplement in there in the hope that you're offsetting something or. But actually it just compounds up over time, doesn't it? I know that a big thing about what you're aiming to achieve is educate as opposed to just preach. And you, you've done a brilliant job of that through your online courses. Are there any book, I mean, there's so many books in this world. Are there any books that you particularly like, you find yourself recommending that people could read to kind of educate themselves further on this?

I'm trying to, trying to think, I think rather than kind of go to books, I think there are a lot of really good scientists out there. That you could follow. And actually following them on Instagram and following them on Twitter and things I think is probably the better way to go if I'm really honest. And it depends what you're into as well. You know, one of the things that I would say about, about reading a book, you know, sometimes people really love the kind of science aspect and there's some real science y writers and that doesn't suit everyone either. You know, I'm a bit of a nerd when it comes to stuff like that. Like, I, if I recommend a book, some people go, oh my God, you like, read that before you go to bed. It like made me go to sleep, which is amazing, by the way, because that comes on to the enough sleep for athletes. But I think it depends on, I think it really depends on what you like to read. But what I would say is with anything, you know, question that information, don't just take it as, you know, kind of the Bible, you know, where's that researcher come from or who's writing the book? You know, is it based off anecdotal kind of, this is what I did or this is what I do? You know, and actually it's very easy, isn't it, for somebody to say, whether that's a professional or a coach or an ex athlete, this is what I did. You should try this. And there's lots of people that will come to me and say, oh, my coach told me to try this, or because that's what he used to do, or that's what she used to do, or my GP said to do this because she said that was really effective. Well, you know, question it. Why would it, why would it work for you if it worked for them? You know, what, what is it about that? So I think there's lots of really good quality evidence out there, but it's very much about, you know, ask yourself these questions. How well qualified are they? Are they working for a company? Where's the research being done? How do you like to read? Do you like to read like a little snippets, you know, do you need to read further? Is it a book you want to get your nose into? You know, and so there is so much good quality evidence out there. But even for somebody who's qualified, like, sometimes I have to ask myself that question, like I'm reading something. I think, oh, my God, this is really interesting. I'm like, actually, where has this study been done? Because that's very interesting now because actually it's been done by a really big company. How Much can I trust the evidence? And it's not that the evidence is wrong, it's just maybe how they've presented.

The motivation behind it.

Yeah, so I think it's. It's a really tricky world out there in terms of nutrition, you know, and for the years that I've been working, quite frustrating at times. I've found it very frustrating and having to often fight a corner in terms of, I think us as performance nutritionists and clinicians, sometimes we're fighting against the, you know, the world of the sports supplements. You know, the newest thing that comes on board, you know, the newest diet, whatever it might be. And that's again, you know, it's just sticking to the principles of if we educate these athletes, then that's the best job that we can do because then you have, you, you can make an informed choice. You know, you can say, well, yes, that's what the evidence shows. It works for me. Don't know why it's tested, fine, take it. If you feel that works for you, if it's tested and you've got no problems, then yeah, fine.

So one final question, Claire. What are you most excited about in the world of sports nutrition? Kind of looking forward. What's coming over the horizon that you think is going to be really interesting?

Racing again, actually, sports nutrition.

You might not be the first person to have some said that anything other than just racing.

I think, I think there's some really interesting things that are happening in the world of sport. I think the, the debate is not dampened for the fat fueling. I think I know for sure there's still more research being done in the world of using fat as a fuel at the moment. We still know carbohydrate is king. I think that's a space to watch. The world of protein is also still pretty interesting. It's the most debated kind of subject actually. Creatine is really interesting. So our old friend creatine, that is the best research supplement, got really good quality evidence for its use, possibly the use of creatine in helping to prevent concussion. Really interesting in the world of the world of kind of games, you know, as team sports, and also in injury as well, you know, whether we use creatine in injury and helping to preserve muscle mass. So that's quite an interesting area, the world of collagen. So I do work as an advisor actually for trr, who's a collagen company. So just putting that out there in terms of who I work with, but the world of the world of collagen is really interesting because I'm, I'm kind of passionate about, you know, protecting ourselves from injury and doing everything we can to, you know, keep an athlete as healthy as possible. So I think that that area is fascinating, but it's very new, essentially new everything.

It sounds like that's the sort of subject we almost need to get you back on for another podcast follow up on just those.

There's so much of that nutrition, so hence why I never say at a dinner party that you know what I.

Do.

Always comment on what I'm eating.

So for sure, everyone's always looking closely.

I'm sure.

Claire, it's been absolutely brilliant chatting to you. There's so much great advice in there for the triathlon listeners. So thank you so much and I look forward to seeing what you deliver next.

Yeah, fantastic. Thanks very much.

You can find out more about Claire and her work@fourthdiscipline.com that's for the number4th discipline.com and also if you use the discount code tribeathlon10, that's all Capitals Tribe athletes Athlon10, you'll get 10 pounds off the online courses that are the 4th Discipline Nutrition Hub, the Fuel Me course, and also and initial consultation. So that's the discount code tribeathlon10 and go to fourthdiscipline.com.

So what did you make of the conversation, Claire? And in particular, because I know you work with Claire. How did, how have you got on with that so far?

Yeah, I guess. I mean, it's always interesting because I love working with Claire. It's early days. We've only been working together. Gosh, I'm trying to think now a few months. I'm pretty sure she's tearing her hair out and I'm testing every strategy and capability she has. It was probably good timing listening to the conversation, having just come back from, from a week in Miami and airport and travel on the plane to kind of get me back on track because things did go out the window a little bit last week and I guess it's kind of, you know, things that resonate. She's been really good at, you know, I'll try and I try and send through my training for the week and then she gives me some guidance on what I should be eating, when to fuel and refuel, those sessions. Also, like, she's been great. And again, a lot of it, it's funny, a lot of like what she said is about educating the athlete as well, which sometimes I actually just want to be told because then I don't have to think about it. But then it's so hard for them someone to do that when your schedule is a little bit flexible and training and they don't know fully the, the intensities. And also at the same time I don't like being stuck to a complete structure. So she's in a no win situation with me. But yeah, that educational piece like she. We've just been trying to work together in terms of her giving me examples of the types of food I should eat when and the quantities for the training I'm doing. And then I really liked, she was really useful for me then when I was traveling so for my flight, giving me. Right, so you want to eat, you know, try and eat X, Y and Z or have a big meal or something pre flight and then because at the moment on flights and flying the food's pretty limited with what they can offer you. And it's also not great at the moment. So it was kind of making sure she would guide me on like what snacks I would should take with me and that preparation side of things. So that's, that's what I like. And I think she's got that really great balance between. She's not specifically adhering to a specific, I'm going to say diet, but eating fad, but she will adapt the style of eating depending what your requirements are. So whether it's coming back from injury or whether you are trying to change your body physique. But what I also like and sort of what she touches on is like there's no. That you don't need to restrict or take like it's okay to have chocolate kind of thing and it's okay to have like the ice cream or stuff like that. But it's just often it's the timing of that which is more important than actually what you are eating. So and I think we sort of said offline it's. There's not necessarily a restriction around what sort of gels you have or what kind of foods. It's often the timing of those foods incorporated into your day and your timing, which is the interesting thing. And the thing that I think is the value.

I think that was really interesting in.

That, you know, there's certain things like the gels of a classic example where I look at the ingredients thinking I wouldn't want to put, you know, it's like a chemistry experiment. I don't want, you know, I'm trying to live a healthy life. It seems counterintuitive to put that in. But the fact that you're Immediately going to burn that off because you're doing it mid exercise. I haven't really contemplated, so I thought that was really interesting. I'm also intrigued when she's guiding you on that kind of eat eating strategy around your flight. What sort of things was she saying? Because that's always a nightmare, isn't it? We all know that when we're traveling, everything goes out the window and it's like, oh well, you know, I'll just have the greasy burger because it's, it's easier.

Yeah.

So what advice was she giving you specifically on what to eat when Just as some examples would be useful.

Yeah. So a lot of it is more like having, being prepared to have the snacks and things so that you're not. Then you don't get to that stage of hungry where you are just going for like that quick fuel, desperate desperation. So like, you know, nut bars, bags of nuts, that sort of thing. And fruit where you can also chewing gum, which was interesting because I think that helps with the saliva production and stuff. And it also gives you something to do when you're sat there rather than thinking you're, you're hungry as well. And obviously just making sure you're hydrated so keeping up the fluid intake as well. There was. And also. But what, what was interesting in that. And it was another level of what's the word? Help that she gave. Like I sent her through my travel details when I was going out to Miami and she went and looked online at all the airports and sort of. Right. The. And I said what access to lounges and stuff I had. So it was kind of like, right, you've got access to this lounge and this is the types of food. So get a meal in here before you get on this flight or whatever it was and make sure then, you know, I was staying overnight in Miami and she's like, okay, there's a, there's a lot. I was landing late, having been on a plane all day, so I didn't have many food options, but there was a subway open where I was staying overnight in Miami. And she's like, that's okay, just go for the salad with a bit of protein in the subway and you know, don't have the, don't have the heavy. The, the subway.

That's not allowed to be classed as a bread in some countries because the sugar content is too high.

Exact. Exactly. So, you know, it was things like that, that guidance of saying, you know, have that and then when you wake up the next day you can have, you know, get some breakfast in the lounge and a coffee sort of thing. But focus on, you know, at times it's like, make sure it's higher, like today. So she sent me a message. I'll read it out, actually, because I can pull it up. So she knows I had. So I had a nightmare traveling home from a nutrition point of view, because she said, right, make sure you get a meal before you get on your flight in Miami and then have these snacks that you can buy during the flight, etc. Now, as it happened, the lounge wasn't open in Miami. All the shops were shut. I hadn't had a chance to go to the supermarket on the way to the airport. So I was like, I'll just buy stuff when I'm there. Everything was closed. So I was in a bit like, I have no food on the plane, which means I'm just going to be like searching and just hangry and not. And in the end I slept all plane, so it's fine. It didn't, it didn't matter. But then she sent me a message today saying, you know, remember, jet lag will make you feel hunger, hunger which may not be real. So rehydrate and ensure protein and fat in the meals and snacks to help manage your appetite so that it's that kind of thing. She's constantly like just checking in. I have a, I have a habit of not eating enough through the day and then just eating everything and wanting to crave at night. So we're still, man, we're still trying to, trying to manage that at the moment.

I think that's, that's great advice, isn't it? Because what you, what you've got there is planning in terms of. Right. How can we anticipate the fact that it's going to be really difficult? So take this with you and that with you and go to this place, not that place. Because we all know when we're walking through the airport, we're thinking, I'm sure there's somewhere that will sell a salad somewhere. And then you're going past subway and you go, well, actually, I haven't found anything better. I'll just go for the greasy baguette or whatever.

Whatever.

Yeah.

But then also the aftermath of going, you're going to be tired, therefore actually be aware of that and kind of. And deal with it in advance. I think that's really, really good advice because it is difficult when you're on the move or when you're tired. And we all know that we eat more when we're Tired. So. So yeah, I think that's really interesting.

And I think it is like, it's when you're tired, you also crave those. That sugary stuff, that just easy quick burger or pizza or whatever it is. For me, it's kind of like the chocolate is the easy option. So it's how do we. And she's great. Which is probably the worst thing she could say to me is like, it's okay to eat chocolate. And I'm like, right, done. That goes. Where's the stash? Again, isn't quite what she means. But it's kind of like it's okay in like, don't starve yourself of it because then you will binge. But it's okay to have it in moderation and we just need to time when you have it.

So when's the right time to have chocolate?

Well, I just keep ignoring her on that one at the moment. She hasn't quite got me dialed into that one yet.

Once an hour, whether you need it or not.

Exactly. Yeah. And it depends if I've been back to the UK and got my Cadbury's chocolate buttons, which then tends to us to be all the time.

Right. That's the go to.

You know, and obviously, like, dark chocolate is better, you know, as we all know is better for you. Just haven't found a dark chocolate that is that satisfying.

Hotel Chocolat is as good as I found.

Yeah, that is pretty good. I do remember that when I was back in the uk. Yeah.

But I agree, milk chocolate still rules.

Yeah.

Right. Well, on that note, we'll, we'll wind it up today, but thank you, Sid. Great to chat to you as always and it's been great to chat to Claire and for everybody else, just keep on training.

And remember, this podcast is brought to you by Brits Superfoods. You can find out more@britsuperfoods.co.uk but if you use the link in the show notes or you use the Referral code of Tribeathlon, you'll get 10% off your orders. You'll get a free bag of juices worth £15 with every order. And those will happen forever as long as you buy from BritSuperfood. Having started with that referral code, you'll get those forever. In addition to that, you'll also benefit from that 110% money back guarantee. So if you don't see the value in it, then, then you can. They'll give you your money back and an extra 10%. So go check out the link in the show notes or go to BritSuperfoods.co.uk and use the referral code Tribeathlon and you'll get that 10% off free shipping and free juice on every order. And don't forget to download the Tribathlon app for more amazing podcasts, but also to help you you train, compete and to build your tribe.