The Food Comment that Almost Ruined My 100 Mile Run🙄
It's hard for me to share the story about my relationship with fuel as an athlete, but I know it's important.
Tl;dr: Listen to the episode of Eat for Endurance here on Apple, here on Spotify, or search on your fave app. 🎧
Two weeks before my 100 mile race, I opened up my training plan to read the day’s workout.
At the top of the workout was a note, which typically says something like “believe in yourself” or “find some extra tough hills today.”
But the note for that day made me doubt myself for the first time in the entire training cycle:
“Many runners gain a bit of weight when tapering for a race. To avoid this in your upcoming taper, reduce the size of meal portions by about 20%.”
Suddenly, thoughts I thought I’d buried many years ago came to mind. 💭 “Oh no, have I been eating in a way that will slow me down? What if I’m hungry this week but eat too much? Should I have chosen different foods? Can I trust myself?”
I caught myself– I knew those thoughts were unhelpful, and also that the training plan note was wrong. (Like really, don’t do that.) I’d already spoken with a registered dietitian about pre-race and race nutrition. ➡️ I knew that cutting calories would hurt me, not help.
Still feeling uncertain, when I texted my running friend about the training note, she replied, “I had the same experience! This is the first bit of doubt I’ve felt about my body in this training.”
Both of us had dabbled in disordered eating well in the past. Both of us had been feeling so strong and confident in our 100 miler training. Both of us felt the rug swept from under us after this triggering comment.
Thankfully, we were able to empathize with each other, disprove the comment, and keep fueling hard. But it made me worry how many runners– especially female– were making poor choices or simply feeling stress because of that little sentence. 😮💨
In the end, we both ate a lot before and during the race, felt great finishing the race, and were proud to have honored our strong bodies for the months of training (and recovery).
A couple months after the race, the note still in the back of my mind, I sent an email to the training plan company– who, for the record, I really love.
I expected them to tell me I was a sensitive snowflake (if they replied at all). I figured they’d tell me I was easily triggered, that it was a me problem.
Instead, they said:
“Thank you for reaching out to us, and for sharing your compelling and personal story. I’m grateful to you for taking the time to bring this to my attention. The workout note is outdated, unhelpful and unnecessary. I’ll see it is removed from all plans. Once removed, it will disappear from the plan after it is reloaded. It will take a few months to completely remove all occurrences from all plans, but you have my commitment to do that.”
Speaking up matters. Sharing our weird food stories matters. Calling out diet culture in endurance sports matters.
I spoke with the lovely Claire Shorenstein for the Eat for Endurance Podcast a few weeks ago. It was a casual conversation with a podcast friend, without any big goals, just to share my experience in one of her Athlete Profile episodes. But damn, was it thought-provoking.
I shared some deeper thoughts on my relationship with food and nutrition than I’ve ever shared before. I talk about how both ultrarunning and the connection with my menstrual cycle got me to much healthier, and happier place– no calorie restriction needed. ❤️
Hear my episode with Claire here, and let me know if any of it resonates.