The Best Foods for Carb Loading for Your Race

Carb loading can improve your performance on race day and can help you shave MINUTES off your race finish time. Carb loading for a full marathon, half marathon or triathlon is one of the best things that you can do to prepare for your race.

What carb loading is NOT: eating a big plate of pasta the night before your race. I’m going to help you learn how to properly carb load for your race so you can set yourself up for a strong race.

Today we’re going to dive into the benefits of carb loading, how to carb load, the type of carbs to focus on and a list of the best foods for carb loading.

The Benefits of Carb Loading Before a Race 

Your body largely uses carbs for energy during running, especially during higher intensity efforts like racing!

To put it simply, when we eat carbs the body breaks it down into simple sugars. Those simple sugars are absorbed and converted to usable energy. Our body also stores that sugar as glycogen in our liver and in our muscles.

Having optimized glycogen stores is the goal because we dip into those stores to use as energy. Think of your glycogen stores as your energy tank. High glycogen stores= a full energy tank.

Starting a race with a full energy tank (along with taking in sufficient fuel during the race) will enable you to feel more energized, run longer, postpone fatigue & will help you avoid hitting the wall.

Research shows that carb loading before a race optimizes glycogen stores which can improve performance in races that are >90 minutes. 

As previously mentioned, carb loading is a lot more than eating a big plate of pasta the night before a race. You’ll actually want to carb load for a full 2-3 days leading up to your race. So if you’re running a marathon on a Sunday, you’ll want to carb load Thursday, Friday and Saturday. 

During each day of your carb load, you’ll want to aim for 8-12 g/kg/day (grams of carbs/kilogram of body weight/day). For example, a 176lb (80kg) runner’s carb loading goal is 640-960 g/day of carbs. At minimum they’d want to aim for 640 g/day each day of their carb load.

The Best Type of Carbs to Eat During a Carb Load 

There are 2 types of carbohydrates- complex carbs which are high in fiber and simple/refined carbs which are low to no fiber. 

Most people refer to these carbs as “good carbs” and “bad carbs” but we’re not going to use these labels because BOTH types of carbs have a place in runner’s nutrition (and food has no moral value). 

The type of carbs that I recommend to focus on during your carb load is the simple/refined carbs. When you carb load you will increase your daily carbohydrate intake and if you’re eating all high fiber carbs, you can actually eat too much fiber which can result in GI issues.

Fiber is also filling which can make it really challenging to hit your daily carb loading goal. To avoid these issues, make simple/refined fiber carbs the priority. 

The Best Foods for Carb Loading

While there are many carb loading foods that you can work into your plan, here is a list of some of the best foods for carb loading (and some of my favorites)!

• Pasta 
• Bread
• English muffins 
• Rice
• Bagels
• Waffles
• French Toast 
• Pop-Tarts 
• Potatoes 
• Cereal 
• Pretzels
• Graham crackers
• Bananas
• Honey
• Maple syrup
• Fig bars
• Sports drinks with carbs/sugar (Gatorade, Tailwind, Skratch Labs)
• Chocolate milk
• Fruit juice

Carb loading meal examples:

• Bagel with cream cheese and lox 
• Rice bowl with chicken/salmon/tofu
• Pasta with meat/fish/tofu

Examples of snacks high in carbs:

• Cereal with milk
• English muffin with peanut butter, banana slices and honey 
• Fig bar and dried cranberries 

Carb Loading Tips

You may notice that you feel bloated, a bit heavy in your body and that you gained weight during your carb load, but I want you to know that this is all completely normal. 

The reason for this is that your body is storing extra carbs as glycogen (which is the whole point of carb loading) and your body stores a ton of water with it (for every 1g of carb your body stores, it stores up to 3-4g of water with it). 

So please don’t freak out. Know that this is a normal part of carb loading and as soon as you start running your race, all of those feelings will go away and you will experience all of the great benefits of carb loading! 

My second tip is to create your carb loading plan, shop and meal prep ahead of time so you fully execute your carb loading plan!

Takeaways

Carb loading for races that are >90 minutes can improve your racing performance, postpone fatigue and can help you avoid hitting the wall. Carb load the 2-3 days leading up to your race at 8-12 g/kg/day. 

Focus on simple/refined carbs which includes white bread, white pasta, english muffins, bananas, maple syrup and carb-rich sports drinks.

Carb loading is only a small (but significant) piece of runner’s nutrition. Learn how to Eat Like a Runner and nail your day-to-day nutrition so you can have the energy to run and enjoy life outside of running!