Week 1
After putting all the pieces together and making a training plan, my dad and I were good to go. So that’s what we did.
On Wednesday, we went for our first trail run training. Easy 21K at low intensity with an altitude difference of 300m. Besides all the mud we had to encounter, the run went very well. Except for one thing: we need to EAT during our run.
GI distress
This might sound rather straight forward, but the problem for me is that I often have GI distres. GI what?! Gastrointestinal distress, often referred to as abdominal pain. This can be feeling nauseous, diarrhoea but also vomiting can occur during multiple hour training session (luckily, I don’t experience the latter one). To explain it simply: if I eat during my run, it goes in through the mouth and, 8 out of 10 within half an hour, out through my 💩. Luckily, the more I get my stomach used to it, the better I can reduce my GI distress. Also savoury food instead of gels makes a huge difference for me.
Early wisdom
So although I already knew these things (that I should eat during a long training), I still forget them too from time to time. Which actually is a good thing, because it is better to be more aware of these ‘weak points’ early on so I can focus on then. Training for events such as an ultra (or marathon) is all about experimenting what works best for you and implement it into your training schedule.
During my first week, I logged 14h of training and my body still feels ‘OK’ with the training load. Lets get another week started!
