Maximize Recovery Nutrition: How To Refuel Post-Race

Congratulations! Your hard training efforts and race-day nutrition plan paid off as you finished with another successful race under your belt. Now it’s time to talk through recovery nutrition strategies that are important to consider. These strategies will be key before you transition to your off-season nutrition plan and will help to speed up the post-race recovery process.

What to expect post-race

Races are hard as you push the envelope on your body’s capabilities. After you cross the finish line, a few physiological processes occur including:

• Central nervous fatigue and high levels of oxidative stress
• Inflammation and subsequent fluid retention and weight gain
• Depleted glycogen, though certainly to a lesser extent if you have properly carbohydrate loaded and fueled during the race itself
• Elevated core temperature
• Elevated heart rate due to increased cortisol and norepinephrine
• Electrolyte disturbances
• Sleep disturbances

For many individuals, weight gain due to the inflammatory processes are common post-race. Now is not the time to weigh yourself and hyper-focus (aka: panic) on body composition and fat loss strategies. Fatigue, increased injury risk, mood swings, delayed recovery and increased risk for RED-S can occur with improper and inadequate refueling strategies. Embrace your hard effort and excellent race finish and focus rather on optimizing your nutrition for recovery.

Please also note, that these physiological processes occur after hard bouts of intense training. Be sure to implement the recovery nutrition and lifestyle-based strategies below after harder effort workouts as well.

Recovery nutrition strategies within 24 hours of race finish

When your race ends, recovery begins! The importance of recovery increases as the frequency, duration and intensity of your race increases. While we take an individualized approach to working with our endurance clients, typically we recommend the following recovery nutrition strategies across all endurance exercise modalities and race distances. Within 24 hours of crossing that finish line, you want to focus on the following recovery nutrition strategies:

Protein and carbohydrates.

Refuel within 15-30 minutes of finishing the race and include a lean protein and high-glycemic carbohydrate-rich food to jump start recovery. Delaying your carbohydrate intake by even 2 hours can slow down the replenishment process. 3:1-4:1 (carbohydrate to protein ratio) is typically recommended for optimal muscle tissue recovery after a harder effort. Athletes should aim to include 0.5-0.7g of carbohydrate per pound of body weight within finishing the race. Chocolate milk, a protein drink with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a turkey and cheese sandwich with pretzels, or even a protein bar with dry cereal are all good examples of post-race recovery nutrition options. Ideally you then also want to eat a full meal within 2-4 hours of finishing the race. It is important to remember that adequate protein and carbohydrate intake is just as important post-workout for plant-based endurance athletes.

Fluids fluids fluids.

Rehydration needs to be a top priority after a hard race as athletes tend to replace only ½ or ¾ of their sweat losses through drinking during exercise. Ideally, you want to experiment with a sweat test to better understand your estimated sweat rate throughout training and racing. This way, you know your fluid needs in different temperatures but in general, you want to aim for 20-24 oz of fluid for every pound lost. Remember to take advantage of beverages that have calories, carbohydrates and electrolytes such as sports hydration beverages. Also remember that thirst is not always a reliable indicator of fluid losses, in fact tends to be a very late predictor of fluid needs. Also, a liquid meal can take the place of solid nutrition if you are feeling any sort of stomach upset. Though certainly review our tips for dealing with gastrointestinal distress if you are prone to this. Drinking cool water and fluids will help to lower core body temperature. 

Electrolytes

Electrolyte imbalances often occur after harder, prolonged bouts of exercise. This can result in unwanted side effects including chronic cramping, headaches, confusion, and even nausea and vomiting. Endurance athletes can replenish their electrolytes in a few ways. Two of the most popular are electrolyte powders and sports drinks. Electrolyte powders are mixes that you can add straight to your water bottle. Some include all four electrolytes (sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium) and others may only contain specific ones such as sodium. Electrolyte replenishment is always important, but particularly important during the warm and humid summer months and also in very dry conditions such as at altitude. 

Recovery nutrition strategies within 5-7 days of race finish

Eat what you want and need while enjoying flexibility.

Focus on well-balanced meals while enjoying a tasty treat (or two!) post-race. Fortunately, the healthy and balanced meal options are near endless with this one. Ideally you want to include a healthy balance of protein, fat and carbohydrates at each meal. One of my favorite satisfying and balanced meals is pasta with homemade spaghetti sauce and an extra large side salad.

In general, emphasize lean proteins such as poultry, fish, beef, eggs, dairy including Greek yogurt and cottage cheese, tofu, tempeh, and edamame. Choose anti-inflammatory fats such as flaxseed, chia seed and walnuts. Research shows that regular consumption of omega-3s can help reduce inflammation from training and racing.

Do not neglect your appetite.

Increased hunger is extremely common after longer, more intense bouts of endurance exercise including racing. Honor your appetite and enjoy an extra snack to meet your recovery nutrition needs. Stuck in a snack rut? Reference our high-protein snack list for a few ideas!

Optimize magnesium-rich food sources

Magnesium can help to reduce muscle cramping and help improve sleep-quality. A simple strategy for increasing magnesium intake is by adding pumpkin seeds into your no-bake energy bites, which are a convenient on-the-run snack (literally). Or try nibbling on dried edamame mixed into an easy homemade snack mix. Slivered almonds or chia seeds are a great addition to an easy oatmeal bake. Even consider enjoying a small square of dark chocolate (a personal favorite) as an occasional post-dinner treat.

Add color with anti-inflammatory foods

Antioxidant-rich fruits and vegetables are going to be key here and the more variety and color, the better. Challenge yourself and aim to include a serving of fruit and vegetables with each meal. 

Tart cherry juice

Research shows that 8-12 oz of tart cherry juice (1 fluid oz if in the concentrate form) twice per day can reduce blood markers of inflammation and oxidative stress after strenuous exercise. Tart cherry juice can also be the perfect addition to a high-protein breakfast smoothie. Increasing research around adding beetroot juice in your post-race nutrition repertoire is also forthcoming.

Endurance Eats YouTube Series

Tune in as Alex and her dietitian team discuss different endurance nutrition topics, and make sure to tap that subscribe button to catch future videos!

IN THIS EPISODE:
(0:00) – Welcome
(10:45) – Is it ok to train fasted, on an empty stomach?
(24:45) – When increasing training is it better to increase fat, carbs or protein to account for it?
(36:45) – How to eat after a big event?

Lifestyle-based strategies for maximizing recovery nutrition

Though I am wildly biased in emphasizing how adequate nutrition can speed up or slow down the post-race recovery process. Fortunately, there are other strategies for optimizing recovery including:

• Light movement such as walking, spinning out your legs on the bike, and even yoga. Regardless of how beat up you may feel, it is important to keep moving.
• Stretching, foam rolling, using a percussion massager, and even relaxing and putting your legs up on the wall. Consider treating yourself to a deep tissue massage.
• Sleep, sleep, and more sleep. Now that your training load has decreased, it is certainly not the time to tackle every item on your to-do list. If you are used to 6-8 hours of sleep, opt for an extra 30-60 minutes overnight or even a short siesta mid-day.
• Cold and heat therapy. Cold therapy, such as an ice bath, reduces swelling and tissue breakdown and shifts lactic acid away from the muscles. A sauna or warm magnesium-rich epsom soak can be helpful for helping muscles to relax in warm temperatures.
• Consider cross training. Cross training is typically practicing any sport other than the main one. Doing this forces the body to use muscles in a different way or completely use different muscle groups. For road and trail runners, consider logging some miles on the bike or even laps in the pool.

We are here to support you through your athlete adventures. If you feel that your recovery nutrition strategies need major improvement, reach out and check out my 1:1 performance nutrition coaching. We are an experienced and passionate team that can get you fueling your best to support your every day and performance nutrition goals.