An excellent post by our friends at iRunFar highlighted the differing nutritional strategies by some of the US and European elites during recent 100 milers. A number of the US runners move swiftly through the aid stations grabbing a few food items that they can chew on on the first few yards when leaving, whereas the EU runners and Kilian in particular prefer to linger longer, taking on board more substantial calorie and liquid intake.
I was lucky enough to capture these differing approaches on video at this years Western States 100 whilst waiting to pace Andrew from Foresthill Aid Station. In this video you will see Kilian and Jez Bragg arrive together closely followed by Nick Clark, Hal Koerner and Mike Wolfe.
Wow – great video there Marcus.
First time I’ve seen that – can’t wait to see what else you have in store, I know you keep telling me about all these video treasures and it’s great to be able to post up.
My takeaway from the video is first up – Hal was trashed! It’s no wonder he dropped 14km further on at Cal2. Poor bugger gave it everything.
Secondly – the guys are so calm, cool and collected coming into the 100km point, they know and trust all those around them and each person has a job to do. The athletes job is to get the nutrition in, relax, and then head on out. Imagine Kilian’s HR, it would be back to low 40’s by the time he heads back out in that clip, nice bit of recovery.
Love that he wears an Ipod too, should make for an interesting debate on CR!. hahah I know from previous interviews what songs were on there as well.
Just watched it a second and third time, I am now positively itching to run 100 miles….. next week , next week. Love it.
I think another telling observation is the placings at 100km and the final finishing positions. As you mentioned, Hal came in high up the field but DNF’s shortly after, but Mike Wolfe came in quite a few minutes behind Kilian but was able to keep the Catalan honest to the very end. A few extra minutes making sure you are good to go when at an aid station pays dividends in the end. Nothing worse than leaving an aid station and forgetting something crucial like refilling your bladder or your head torch etc.
And yes Andrew, plenty more little gems to come from WS100 and other international races.
Excellent article Marcus, as usual. Can I just be a pedant and ask that European athletes are not referred to as ‘EU’ athletes? The EU is not representative of the whole of Europe in the same way that the US is the actual United States?
Cheers, Alun :O)
Thanks Alun, good point, will refer to my Pommy roots in future and take my fellow European descriptors from Jeremy Clarkson 😉
Seems fair!