On sports gels

One of the things I like about traveling is the ever-present opportunity to put strange things in my mouth. Nothing beats playing a game of menu roulette in a new country and receiving a heaping plate of "what the hell is that?" for dinner.  It may be delicious, it may be gross, it may offend your senses indefinitely, but never is it less than memorable.  Silkworm larvae, squid tentacles, fermented mare's milk, salted pig's fat, and kimchi; all of these, and God knows what else, have passed between my lips at some point in my travels.

One of the things I don't like about running is the ever-present opportunity to put strange things in my mouth.  Run for more than an hour or hour and a half, and your body requires more fuel than you can adequately store beforehand.  Enter the witches brew known to endurance athletes as sports gels.  They are made by a myriad of companies and come in a plethora of flavors, but few disguise the taste of food left to liquefy in the back of the refrigerator three weeks after Thanksgiving.  Make no mistake, these things are vile.

Some have asked what I use to fuel up on long runs, and the answer is this:

It's the lesser of many evils, in my opinion.  I go strictly by taste with these things, and I have found that Powergels do the trick, meaning they are the least likely to provoke my gag reflex.  Vomiting after a run means you're hardcore, but vomiting during a run is nothing short of inconvenient.  I take one and wash it down with water right before a long run, and take them every hour during the run, alternating water and Gatorade.

One of these days I hope to be like Dean Karnazes and just order a pizza in the middle of a run, but until I attain a resting heartrate of 4bpm, or whatever else it is that makes him superhuman, I'll just stick to the Powergels.  Maybe I'll try washing it down with silkworm larvae to get rid of the taste. I'll let you know how that works out.