IRONMAN® Cozumel

Angela’s race was a big success in many ways, from a 4th place finish and the fastest bike split, to her strong energy levels and carb intake. Even with a delayed race start due to a cancelled swim, she still managed to time her PF 30 Caffeine Gel for pre-fuelling perfectly ahead of the time trial bike start. The majority of her carb came from gels and chews, as she largely separated her fluid intake from her carb. This, along with her being used to a relatively high carb intake, led to her rating her gastrointestinal comfort for the race as a 10-out-of-10. While her carb dropped by ~25g/h from bike to run, this is similar to what we see in our other IRONMAN Case Studies and still facilitated an excellent average of ~89g/h overall.

In preparation for this race, Angela worked on increasing her fluid intake to ~1 litres per hour to reduce her body weight change percentage from ~4% to ~2% to proactively limit the accumulated dehydration that she’d likely experience in the Cozumel heat. She ended up grabbing three additional bottles of water on the bike, on top of the ~5L she planned to carry, leading to just under 1.5L/h on the bike. Since Angela’s Sweat Test showed her to be a moderately salty sweater she mixed PH 1000 in her carried fluid but also relied on salted gels, chews and capsules. By the time she got to the run, her relative sodium intake was under her target and she noticed a few twinges, though no full cramps. Carrying extra capsules on the run was key, as she paired them with aid station water to increase her sodium concentration to well above her known electrolyte losses.

Angela’s caffeine intake relative to bodyweight put her above the general guidelines for performance improvement. However, she’s a regular coffee drinker (even had a cup on race morning) so her tolerance allowed this strategy to play out in her favour. Combined with the long duration of the race, ticking over the scientific recommendations is understandable and we wouldn’t adjust anything here.