DIY energy drink/gels

So...  I've been curious about making my own energy gels for some time now.  There are numerous recipes on the interwebs to do it.  But I recently stumbled onto a product called UCAN that a lot of ultra runners use.  And then stumbled onto a great article and recipe here: http://theplantedrunner.com/tag/cornstarch-endurance-fuel/.  I recommend reading Claire's article on the background for using starch as an endurance fuel (scroll down the page to the oldest article.)  It's a quick read, and very interesting.

It took a couple tries to get my version of the recipe right, and I'm still working on it.  But I have my own "chocolate fudge" recipe that I tried this weekend.  It turned out pretty good!  My goal was to have something that was nutritionally similar to Vanilla Gu (which is what I usually have on long runs/skates).  I also wanted to add protein to it, and increase the caffeine.  Unlike Claire's version, I wanted to add sugar to mine (instead of Stevia) so that I could make it more calorie dense.

During the skate, it was a little tough to get it out of the bottle.  I had to squeeze & suck a lot harder than I wanted to.  (Insert dirty joke here you perverts!)  Halfway through my skate, I added a little more water to the bottle and the consistency was much better.  So the next batch I will probably use a full cup of water and see how that goes.  I'd also like to find some Morton's Lite Salt, so that I can just measure that instead of separately measuring table salt and 'NoSalt' for the sodium and potassium.  Anyway, here's the recipe if you want to try it!

Mark’s DIY UCAN – Chocolate Fudge

Liquid starch-based fuel that is an alternative to gels or chews.  Recipe makes roughly 16oz and is nutritionally the equivalent of around 10 gels.  The amount of water can be adjusted to make the consistency thicker or thinner.

Ingredients

• 1¼ cups Argo corn starch (https://www.amazon.com/Argo-100-Pure-Corn-Starch/dp/B00JPT9BFW)
• 2 scoops Dymatize Chocolate Fudge Whey Protein (https://www.bodybuilding.com/store/dym/elite.html)
• 3 tbsp Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate cocoa powder (https://www.amazon.com/HERSHEYS-SPECIAL-DARK-Cocoa-Ounce/dp/B00J50PJUM)
• 1 g (~ 3/16 tsp) table salt
• 1.3 g (~ 3/16 tsp) “No Salt” (https://www.amazon.com/NoSalt-Sodium-Free-Salt-11-ounce/dp/B019G3FI7G)
• ¾ cup granulated sugar
• 4 "Motivation" Herbal Caffeine capsule (https://www.amazon.com/Motivation-Caffeine-Vitamin-Supplement-Capsules/dp/B00C5U96FI/)
• ¾ cup water – can adjust more or less, depending on preferred thickness

Instructions

• Mix all dry ingredients except water in a small measuring cup with a spout.
• Slowly add enough water to your desired thickness.
• Stir thoroughly and pour into a small running bottle.
• Shake before drinking.

Notes

• 1056 calories, 204.4g carbs, 51g protein, 5.5g fat, 640mg sodium, 495mg potassium, 400mg caffeine
• Based on absorbing 60g glucose/hr, entire amount could be consumed in 3 hours (or more)
• About 25% of the energy comes from protein.  Research I found online seemed to indicate 15-33% was okay.
• Most of the carbs are from glucose.  Only 12% are from glucose.  Ideally 33% of the carbs would be glucose.

I'd like to play with some more flavors - I may experiment a bit with a lemon flavor like Claire has on her page.  The chocolate tastes great, but I'm sure I would get sick of it after 7-8 hours.  I do plan on using this at Athens to Atlanta this year.

If you try it, or have ideas to change/improve it, please let me know!  :-)

Training Update!

Well, ideally I would have had some race reports over the summer...  But I unfortunately had another sciatica flare-up that knocked me back for a few months.  I had to cancel a 50k trail race (Wicked Grit) as well as a Toughest Mudder race that I had signed up for.  But I'm feeling better now, and gearing up for my fall events.  I'm slowing ramping up my trail miles (did 15 last week - next long run will be 18 miles).  I'm also ramping up my skating miles in preparation for Athens to Atlanta in a couple weeks.  (48 miles today!)

I started going to physical therapy to address the muscle imbalance that's contributing to the sciatica.  I'm going to do a running gait analysis this week (on my birthday) to see what I can do to correct any imbalance there.  The goal now is to reduce the chance for injury going forward.
Every time I've gotten injured in the past 10 years, my weight has gotten out of control.  Last year, I lost 40 pounds to finally get back into racing shape, only to get injured again.  You can see on the charts below, that my weight and body fat percentage started going up as soon as I had my flare-up back in May...


Unlike previous setbacks, I didn't let my weight get too far gone before I started exercising some discipline in my diet.  And it wasn't too long before I was maybe 90% better, so I could start running a little bit again.  So the weight is coming off again, and (more importantly) body fat % is going down.  And I'm doing it without obsessively tracking every calorie I eat - although I'm certain I'd get the weight off faster that way.  But I think I'll see if I can manage it this way a bit more first.

Upcoming events:  Dragon OCR (5k obstacle race) on Sept 30.  Athens to Atlanta (87 mile skate) October 8.  Tough Mudder Carolinas (10 mile obstacle race) on Oct 21.  Eno River Run (11 mile trail run) Oct 28.  Green Beret Challenge (5k obstacle race) Nov 11.  I'm also super-tempted to sign up for Frozen Rock 720 (12-hour trail run), but I'm not sure I'll be ready in time for that.  It might be a last-minute decision...  :-)

Further out, I have South Mountain Marathon (26-mile trail race) in January.  Umstead Marathon (26-mile trail race) at the beginning of March.  And of course Georgia Death Race (70ish mile trail race) at the end of March.  I want to get a 100-mile trail race in sometime in 2018, and eventually do the PR150 run in Puerto Rico.  (You have to have previously completed a 100-mile event to qualify.)