Should I EAT the morning of a TRI?

What is the distance?  Are you used to eating before long taining days?

Tomorrow is my first tri and I just usually eat rasin bran for breaky, maybe a ham sandwich, lots of fruit for lunch and a salad and chicken or beef for dinner.
Then I hit the gym after school and hav ebeen training in all three areas. It is a sprint tri.

Edited by triitagain 2009-06-20 12:50 PM

Absolutely.

Not unless you are eating 3 hours or more before the start.

ESPECIALLY true if you have not eaten before doing an intense workout which most people haven't.  Your digestion will be taking away "resources" and your performance will suffer.  And that is just the good part.  Bad part would be the GI distress and possible issues from that during the race.

I eat 1.5-2hours before a race.. maybe you people with weenie stomachs have problems. I'd have more problems if I didn't.

If you have not previously eaten in the morning just before a workout then I would go simple and relatively small like 1.5 - 2 hrs before the event  - maybe cereal and banana or oatmeal - so there is something available in the small intestines - nurse some gatorade the hour before and start practicing on your weekends different things to see what works best for you. Good luck.

oatmeal two hours before
a banana 30-60 minutes before
and usually a gu/gel right before the swim

and water and a caffeininated drink throughout the whole morning...

I generally like to find an all-night all u can eat buffet. 

Great question.

Yes. I think the conventional wisdom is yes.

I eat a little zero-fat yogurt with fruit and granola about 4:45-5:00, which is usually about two hours before my heat.... plus a half a bananna while I am stashing my stuff at the bike rack.

One time I ate too much before a half marathon ...freakin' stuffed myself on my yogurt-fruit-granola bowl.... but I PR'd, so go figure.

I'll eat 3 hrs before race start.  When waking up at 4:30 just ain't gonna happen I'll go with 2 to 2.5 hours before and it hasn't been a problem for me.  Once I had enough time to eat, go back to bed, then wake up and get ready for the race!

Brian

yes, always; preferably around 3 hrs before the race so my body can digest/absorb it all as fuel and get me ready to start with my fuel tank top off and ready to rock...

I like to eat a breackfast burrito. everything is cut up in small pieces so it digest easily. Plus it gives me a turbo boost option for the run or bike

I like a Whole Wheat Begal with Penut Butter.

Or oatmeal.

Dont do anything you havent tried in training - Race day is not the day to try something new.

I'd like to find one about mid-race.

I guess I have a stomach of steel based on these responses. I always have at least 1 cup of OJ and a banana or oatmeal before a workout or race (up to 30 min before a high intensity workout, about 2 hrs before a race). If I do a long ride, I usually have a cheese omelette, and some toast with butter and jam.

Bagel and PB 3 hours before the race gel 30 prior to start. As previously stated best to try things prior to race.

Heh. That's an individual deal. You have to experiment.

The 3-hour before crowd is giving you the book solution, because it's right. They're telling you to top off your tank, which is right, if you didn't top it off the night before, have a standard tank, and know what to put in it.  

Every other post is anecdotal and works for them, but that's the key point, it works for them. I, for instance, have a stomach that can deal with anything pre-race, and make good. Not everyone works that way, I wouldn't recommend what I do for anyone else. I know me. 

It takes trial and error. Period.

There is no standard.

As others have said, I wouldn't eat within 3 hrs of the race if you haven't done so before an intense workout in the past to see how you handle it.  Everyone's a little different.  (F'rinstance, a lot of people like bananas before a race...my stomach can't handle them.)

I really like Kellogg's Nutrigrain bars.  Depending on the length of the race, I'll typically eat either one or two right after getting up in the AM before a race.  I might have some yogurt if I think having some added protein is going to be helpful, but usually I don't.  In general, I don't like much in my stomach at the start of a race.

Like everything else the advice."Don't do anything new on race day" also pertains to eating. You need to experment in training. I found that it made a difference what I ate and when I ate it if I was swimming first. I could eat just about anything within reason and as close as 30 minutes before when I was just doing a bike ride, but if I swam first I had issues if I ate much of anything. So Saturday mornings before I went for my long bike ride I swam first to experiment to find what works for both to simulate a TRI. I found I could eat a Clif bar along some water about an hour before swimimng and take an Acel Gel before the bike ride along with one about every hour on the bike ride worked well for me.

But that is me. You need to try different things in training to find out what works for you. I found less works better for me. I eat a well balanced meal the night before and keep it light the morning of the TRI. This has worked for me for sprints, and olympics I have done so far. I training for HIM right know and experimenting to see what will work for longer TRIs.

Personally, I don't usually eat solid food the morning of a race as my stomach doesn't do very well with it.  I have a bottle of Ensure about 2 hours before a race and then a gel and water about 15 minutes before the start of a race.  It took some experimenting to find something that worked for me.

x2 I eat when I get up, whatever my normal breakfast is, so right now a protein shake. Since I like to get to the race 2 hours before it starts and my wave is almost always one of the last to go, I also eat a banana or a protein bar at some point while getting ready. Sometimes both.As long as I stop eating about 1/2 hour before the swim, I'm fine.

Edited by MacMadame 2009-06-21 10:38 AM

I did my first oly this morning and ate a bowl of cereal, a banana, and a bunch of strawberries (basically stuffed myself about an hour or two before the race), took in four gu's throughout the race and was already hungry on the swim and starving by the time I got about halfway through the run, so yes, imo, eating is a must.