Trail Food

[Marknhj]

Howdy all

The Australian Institute of Sport has excellent information on sports nutrition.
http://www.ausport.gov.au/ais/nutrition/
They've also conducted many of the research studies on caffeine and performance. Their article on caffeine is at:
http://www.ausport.gov.au/ais/nutrition ... s/caffeine

I've conducted in depth reviews of many sports supplements because I'm constantly asked questions about them. Like most sports dietitians, I am a "food first" person. No supplement can take the place of proper training and a healthy diet.

Miles of smiles,
Ellen

I visited the Australian Institute of Sport last year and know their web guy. It's a highly regarded sports research facility in addition to being the training center for many of Australia's leading athletes. If anyone needs help digging up studies not shown on the link above, let me know and I'll see what I can do.

[FIGHT ON]

WOW. That article "Caffeine Supplement Overview" says that caffeine used to be a banned substance for athletes who compete in sports. Sounds like it should still be banned to me for all its side effects and when its used to target faster times. Guess I have to start to think when someone says how fast they did their hike or when they zoom past me on a trail weather they did it with caffeine or some other substance or not. My "personal preference" is to have my legs do the pick me up along the trail when I get tired thank you very much.

[AlanK]

If you want to maximize calories while minimizing weight, thr rule is that protein and carbohydrates contain 3 Calories per gram and fat contains 9 Calories per gram. those are the only choices you have. If you are trying to survive for a long time and weight is a critical issue, fat becomes vert important.

However, high intensity exercise requires carbohydrates (the glycogen stores that keep coming up). Running at a fast pace means burning carbohydrates almost exclusively. Walking or hiking can make more use of stored fat. But carbohydrates are still very important.

The roughly 2000 Calories worth of stored glycogen can fuel an average guy for about 20 miles of running. One pound of stored fat contains 3500 Calories. So, one can easily cover any day hiking distance on bodily stores. That does not mean that eating during a day hike is not important, but it is not strictly necessary. One certanly doesn't have to worry about maximizing caloric intake for a day hike. That's why you hear about so many eating schemes that work for people.

I brought up Rick Kent as an example. He puts up some of the most impressive hiking performances you will see on these boards and many times he talks about maybe eating a sandwich or something.

It gets a lot more interesting when one contemplates hard hiking for days in a row. My son and I did the JMT a couple of years ago. We planned to cover 25 miles per day, which we ended up doing. We tried to travel light. It became clear to me in the planning that I was not going to be able to pack anywhere close to the number of calories I'd be burning. It was an interesting experience to go day after day with a significant caloric deficit. Fortunately, my skinny body has a few pounds of secretly stored fat to burn on such occasions. It definitely affected my hiking performance, but it caused no real problems. But I really craved food when it was ovr, starting with the Portal Store burger.

Of course, one can read about John Muir traveling through the Sierra carrying almost nothing.

So, nutrition for day hiking is not such a big deal.

[Ellen]

Howdy Lipbiter

I LOVE working with athletes who need extra calories -- generally I'm working with people to decrease calories

By food first, I meant eating food to obtain nutrients versus taking pills. Like you, I want my pack as light as possible.

We are lucky to have so many sports foods (gels, bars, liquid meals) available. Back when I did the Hawaii Ironman, all we had on the course was peanut butter and guava sandwiches, fried cake donuts, chocolate chip cookies, bananas, and ERG. As a cyclist back then, I carried fig newtons, bananas, and Tiger Milk bars.

I got burned out on sports bars, which is why I use gels. Breakfast bars and Pop Tarts are high in carbohydrate and less expensive. Nuts, seeds, and dried fruit are nutrient and calorie dense foods.

I hope to have the honor of meeting Rick Kent. Based on his accomplishments, I think he is the hiking version of Lance Armstrong As exercise physiologist Ed Coyle said when talking about elite endurance athletes: "Blessed are the genetic freaks."

Fueling during hiking has benefits in addition to performance. Consuming carbohydrate decreases the body's stress response (lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol) and enhances the immune system (less chance of getting sick).

There's also the enjoyment aspect -- sure, I can hike all day just drinking water, but I'm going to enjoy my hike more by taking in fuel.

Miles of smiles,
Ellen

[Rick M]

Thank you for that last post Ellen.
Sounds like I still carry the things you did way back when in Hawaii. When I worked at REI and customers would ask me about the many sport bars and drinks and such and what I use. I would say go to the supermarket and by "normal foods" like the dried fruits, nuts, chocolate, candy and fresh fruits that you eat whole (like apples). They would say something like how much does an apple weigh for the calories you get and I would say how much does a sport bar plus water weigh? And what are the costs? Once an assistant manager overheard me talking once and later said they appreciate my experience and helping customers but could I not talk down the merchandise.

Also, I've hiked with people who would carry very little on the assumption that we were only going out for the day or two but if something came up (either an additional peak, day, or emergency) I ended up feeding them. Not that they wouldn't have survived without it (your recent experience on SanJ). You really don't need to carry a pack if you're running a marathon but going the distance in the mountains can bring up unforeseen circumstances. When I was with desert rescue, many people that would hang out on the beach, play soccer, go running, etc where a drink was just an arms reach away would think like maybe hiking in the hot desert is no big deal.

Perhaps to cut a few seconds off a race or minutes off the c2c dictates the modern nutritional stuff but for me, good old standbys are great.

[Marknhj]

WOW. That article "Caffeine Supplement Overview" says that caffeine used to be a banned substance for athletes who compete in sports. Sounds like it should still be banned to me for all its side effects and when its used to target faster times. Guess I have to start to think when someone says how fast they did their hike or when they zoom past me on a trail weather they did it with caffeine or some other substance or not. My "personal preference" is to have my legs do the pick me up along the trail when I get tired thank you very much.

FIGHT ON: caffeine was dropped as a banned substance by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) about five years ago. It was mainly a "common sense" decision. Athletes would be considered positive if they had 12 micorgrams per milliliter in their urine sample, which one leading sprinter, Inger Miller, did in 1999. With doping being the norm in all pro sports for the last few decades, they did not want to ban people for simply drinking too much coffee, Red Bulls or coke. But, they added other stimulants that until a few years ago nobody would have dreamed athletes would take eg modafinil, an anti-narcolepsy drug. They also dropped pseudoephedrine, as people were getting busted for taking a Sudafed, but kept ephedrine itself banned.

I'll definitely need some form of caffeine if I'm to hike longer; I'm glad this thread appeared as I was wondering what to use. Mind you, I still think Cynthia's expresso cart, halfway up Skyline, has potential!

(Anyone who wants to use a PED for hiking would be better off considering Erythropoietin (EPO). A red blood cell producing drug, developed for cancer patients and also used to treat kidney disease. They have caught a lot of endurance athletes on it . NB I'm joking. Don't take it!)

[FIGHT ON]

Marknhj. I know I read that. I just thought it was funny that it was only five years ago that it was a banned substance. That's not that long ago. Caffeine is a stimulant that has no taste and no nutritional value. Just because it is not banned now doesn't change what it does to your body. Makes your heart beat faster than it normally would. So when athletes or anyone use it during their run or whatever, targeting their natural tiredness, it is the same as the other banned drugs. It just doesn't make sense to me why anyone would take it just to improve their time or perform better. It's like cheating.

[FIGHT ON]

Food first kinda person? Food first and then what second? "Whatever it takes second"? If the food first doesn't work out then take drugs second? [u]There's also the enjoyment aspect -- sure, I can hike all day just drinking water, but I'm going to enjoy my hike more by taking in fuel.[/u] Fuel? Caffine is fuel? Caffine is a drug. For me I am a food person first and last. Sure I could take drugs on my hike all day and have an "altered experience", but I am going to enjoy my hike by avoiding body and mind altering stimulants. I guess thats just my "personal preference".

[simonov]

I apply the nutrition recommendations for endurance and ultraendurance sports to hiking. Research indicates that consuming carbohydrate before and during endurance exercise improves performance -- the athlete can maintain high intensity exercise longer and/or sprint harder at the end.

Ellen,

I found this single post so useful and informative I have formatted it as a PDF for distribution among my hiking club members (you met some of them on the tram just before your recent most memorable hike). The file is available for download here. I'd like your permission to publicize the download.

Thanks.

[lipbiter]

FIGHT ON, clearly caffeine is not for you.