Runners (or cyclists): Jelly Beans vs. Gu

Except I will say, gummy bears is not real food, it's more likely to be detrimental to overall performance in the long term. They may provide a short term spike that may make you feel energetic, but there's no long term substance behind them. Eventually, it'll probably turn into a thing where you are just gobbling gummy bears for no real benefit - even a cyclical thing where you need gummy bears to run because you're eating gummy bears.

They're not the only thing I'm eating for fuel. Gee. Didn't know it was a sore spot.

Gu and other gels are not just straight suger like cheap candy. They provide sodium (50mg) and electorolytes that help with cramping. However, they are not needed on anything less than an hour. I am a cyclist and will ride sometimes for 4 hours at a time. At times when I have failed to use Gu I have had cramping in my hamstrings. I swear by the energy gels and believe they not only provide the energy that candy would provide but provide additional benefits to keep your muscles performing over long periods of time.

Good answer...I wonder what other electrolytes we're talking about, other than sodium. I'm going to look in to it. Some of the ones I've tried have caffeine too, which I appreciate greatly.

I believe a lot of them have potassium. It's the other side of the equation when staying hydrated.

I don't like to chew while I am running, so the gels work better for me. That being said, you don't really need them for anything under 90 minutes. Your body should have enough fuel stored for that time period. With THAT being said, I think it's better to train without supplemental nutrition and use it on race day. Train the body to use it's own fuel stores as efficiently as possible and then supplement that on race day when you really need it.

I hate when people say that you don't need them under 90 minutes. Everyone is different, and I can say, as a smallish girl in a calorie deficit, I absolutely cannot run for 90 minutes without Gu. I can do an hour. That is all. My body simply doesn't have enough stored energy to go past that and I can feel the energy depletion and I've ended up stranded a few times because people kept saying it's all psychological so I kept trying. I can run a half marathon, I'm not an amazing runner, but I was doing a 13 mile run weekly for a while. I tried carb loading the night before, the day before, the day of, and I cannot run more than 60 minutes without supplemental energy.

I bought my last box of Gu from Amazon and they had mistakenly posted a box for the price of a unit ($1.36), so including S&H my box was like $6. It made my day

Gu and the dream of beer at the finish line..................

Any kind of candy will work. Jeff Galloway recommends plain sugar cubes. If you are concerned with electrolyte then you can just drink it instead of plain water.

You could actually use Molasses too since it's loaded with electrolytes. You simply add molasses to white sugar (making brown sugar) and then form them into cubes. Molasses is also very hygroscopic like honey - good for keeping in water/hydration.

GU vanilla bean

Jelly Belly makes Sport Beans... They are really good.

I despise GU's -- The consistency makes me want to yack.

NUUN is a tablet that you pop in with your water... It is an electrolyte tab and tastes great.

This thread reminds me of a story from my first marathon.

It was the 1980 Columbus Banc One Marathon. I trained with a running group and several of us were doing the marathon so we ran together at the start of the race. One guy in our group--Danny- was an atypical runner. He was not fat, but he was about 5'8", 180lbs and built like a fireplug. He was at least 10 years older than the rest of us and had a physical, blue-collar job. His 10K time was 5-6 min slower than mine, but he had a dogged determination and never stopped on a run, no matter how bad he felt.

We ran together for the first 1/2 of the marathon. At about 11 miles, Danny started complaining that the pace was too fast for him. He went on and on to the point where I was both annoyed and also felt bad that maybe I was ruining his race. I was feeling really comfortable, so, at 13 miles, I started running faster. While I felt fantastic for the next 5-6 miles, I was undertrained and it started to catch up with me. By 20 miles, I was struggling and by 24 Miles, I was walking.

As I staggered in the last 2 mi, Danny came roaring past. As usual, his face was beet-red, and he appeared to be on the edge of a heart attack. He yelled at me to run with him, but I was unable to do so. I finished a few minutes later and I mentioned that it looked like the pace WASN'T that fast after all, given his finish. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a plastic blag full of sugar-covered jelly beans. He said that he always carried them when running marathons--he started sucking on them around mile 16-17 and said it gave him extra energy to finish the race strongly.

He then thanked me for helping him set a marathon PR and walked away.
I think I flipped him the bird behind his back.

I use Honey Stinger Organic energy chews on my long runs of over 1 hour. I like to train to eat on the run so that on race day I can eat on the run. I can feel the energy burst a few minutes after eating one. I start early in my run, though, with 1 every 20 minutes or so for the first hour and then one every 10-15 minutes after that. Basically I go through a pack of 10 on a 90-120 minute run. It's 160 calories in total and they're all organic. No, I don't sell them. I just like them more than anything else I've tried.

http://shop.honeystinger.com/categories/Organic-Energy-Chews/