Earlier this year I tried lowcarb by itself and had a poor race. Yesterday I did another race. Rather than strictly lowcarb, for about 4 days before the race I loaded up on carbs: lots of potatoes, bagels, pizza.

The race was a 52 mile run outside of Laramie, WY at about 8000ft altitude. Dinner the night prior was a Subway chicken sandwich and half a sleeve of pringles. Race morning breakfast was half a bagel. For the race I wore a camelback. That's a backpack with a bladder that holds nearly 4 liters of fluid. A tube attached to the bladder makes it easy to drink fluid. I filled it with gatorade. Every four miles there was an aid station. At each station I topped off the camelback and ate a 100 calorie snack bar.

Most of the run went as well as expected. I had problems with the heat. Gatorade didn't seem to give me enough sodium but when I added salt pills things got better.

Around mile 40 the wheels came off my trolley. Suddenly I had a lot of leg pain. I could keep moving but mainly at a walk. I noticed my fingernails were white as chalk. I don't know what that means but it was curious nonetheless. I thought I had been hydrating adequately. I peed at least 5 times during the race. I was augmenting the gatorade with salt pills. I took 800mg of ibuprofen. Nothing much helped.

The course is quite hilly. Running hills takes a toll on one's legs. Downhill is worse than uphill. Typically a marathon--26 miles--will take me 4 hours. The first 26 miles took me 5.5 hours. Considering the terrain, that's a decent time. I finished the 52 miles in 12.5 hours.

A marathon runner can load up on carb and it will be enough to run a good race. A few years ago the winner of the Austin marathon was muslim and the race was held during Ramadan. He didn't eat or drink anything during the race.

For races beyond the marathon distance, it becomes more difficult to run well on carbs. And that's all one can expect at the aid stations. A trained runner is using carbs and fat for energy. Those at the front are using more carb. The slower runners at the back are using more fat. A marathon is 26.2 miles. The body can store 2000-2500 calories as glycogen. So theoretically the race can be done on carbs alone. But for slower runners, glycogen is being used to help the fat-burning furnace. "Fat burns in a carbohydrate flame".

So what happened to me? I'm definitely a slow runner. My carb stores were fully stocked on race day. I was ingesting pure carb every 3 or 4 miles. My guess is somewhere around mile 40 I ran out of carb and was forced to burn fat. Burning fat without the 'carbohydrate flame' is next to impossible. Every 100 calorie snack bar would give me a boost of energy but it would only last a couple of miles.

It's not as if I ran out of body fat; I'm probably 15% body fat now. The obvious answer is that I'm still depending on carbs. I've read of those who compete well on a ketotic diet. But do any of these guys run for 13 hours straight? And that's not a large amount for ultra runners. I've done 24 hour and 100 mile races. There are 6-day races. Yes, that's running for six days straight. So the next step for me is moving on to a non-carb diet. I've resisted that because I don't like ingesting meat or fat.

I would have to find a vegetarian diet that is high in fat: nuts, seeds, avocado? I know it's possible. There is a monk sect in Japan where the monks run for 100 miles or more, all of it on a vegetarian diet.

That's a remarkable feat, kaypeeoh. You really are inspiring!

Have you considered contacting Stephen Phinney? I'm sure you'd get a response from him about this issue. I dont know if he is still at UC Davis, but at the time of his video interview last fall about low-carb and athletics, that's where he was.

Both muscle fat and carbohydrate burn in an amino acid flame.
http://www.sportsnutritionsociety.o...1-2-7-11-04.pdf

Okay, this one I downloaded. Looks very interesting. Thanks for posting this.

I'm good for about 16 miles on zero carb, and I'm continuing to push that as well. But I don't ingest any carbs except for those in eggs. It seems if you "back-and-forth" a lot, vacillating between carbs-low or no carbs, it's possible you will never truly fat-adapt.

Have you read anything by Dean Karnazes? That guy is just freaky.

When he's at home, he eats a great diet and somewhat low-carb, apparently. He eats a lot of wild salmon.

When he goes on an extended run, which is his case are these insane days-long runs through Death Valley and the like, he eats unbelievably - he orders pizzas and eats them while running, that sort of thing. But his running goes for so long that he still loses weight from those events.

I'm not even sure how his stomach handles that. Crazy.

Congratulations, Kaypeeoh
That seems like quite a run!

I've got a signed copy of his book. I've talked to him via email as well. He will eat an entire cheesecake or pizza while running. I don't know either how his stomach handles all that but apparently it does. My guess is he's enough of an athlete that for the speeds he runs at he is burning mostly fat. So a fatty pizza or high-fat cheesecake enters his digestion quickly to be used for energy. At the same time the carbs prevent him from going into ketosis.

The appendix lists the foods he ate during a 200 mile relay. Examples: One pizza 4500 calories, one cheesecake 3000 calories. But most of what he ate were pure carbs: Doritos, cinnamon buns, donuts, fries. The food totaled 27,934 calories. Divided by 200 miles it comes to 140 calories per mile, about equal to 1/2 of a large chocolate chip cookie.

I agree 100% The body will adapt to fat burning.....if you give it a chance.

I understand the theory. I lurk on 5 or 6 running websites and have repeatedly asked if anyone is running with ketosis. Nobody has ever responded so I assume there are very few runners doing it that way. I'd love to find one person who is running ultra distances in ketosis.

kaypeeoh... ive probably visited a lot of the same sites. I am no where near that level of running... i will be quite happy when i am running 4 miles at an 8 min / mile pace, 5 days a week. But, i have noticed a very definate anti-low-carb bias on running forums. Before i learned to just ignore the carb-happy weirdos, i got into more than one post that degenerated into a "you will kill yourself" flame war.

it's weird to me that so many, successful athletes have adopted a low-carb lifestyle, yet the popular wisdom is that it is still the right idea to just load up on whatever carbs you can find. 10 years from now... i dont want to be one of those fat runners you see competing in marathons. There are just too many health problems associated with grains and dairy for me to imagine that getting energy that way is healthy.

i am in awe of your running abilities.

Sometime this fall, probably in september when the weather cools a bit, I am planning on doing something like this. This will not be an organized race, just something I will do on my own. I'm thinking of running for a specific period of time. I'm thinking 6 hours. I'll see how much distance I can cover in that amount of time. I'll let you know how it goes.

September 1st and 2nd there will be a race in the Grand Tetons, outside of Jackson Hole, Wyoming. It's a 25 mile loop. I'm planning to try for four loops, 100 miles.

Awesome. Be sure to let us know how you do.

I'm still planning on doing this. The absolute minimum distance I hope to cover is a marathon....26 miles. But I'm really thinking at least 30 miles seems quite doable. I will do this on zero carb.

Yesterday was the day. I had to quit after 5 hours though. I did manage to get in 26.5 miles. The pain in my knees and hips became unbearable. Energy was not a problem. I did not hit the wall or bonk.

With the way I felt last night, I was fully expecting to wake up this morning and maybe not be able to even get out of bed. That's how bad the pain was. To my surprise, I felt fine this morning. No pain at all. My legs felt a little tired, but that's all. Dr. Mike Eades has said that animal fat is anit-inflammatory......perhaps that is why I recovered so quickly.