• In what Leon described as “the hardest day of racing I’ve ever had”, he fought against the immense heat, a mechanical bike issue and losing some vital nutrition to finish 9th amongst a strong field in Vitoria-Gasteiz
• After exiting the swim to discover his bike had a puncture, he knew it would be a tough battle to catch the leaders
• However, staying calm and maintaining his solid fuel and hydration strategy saw him ride strong, before starting to pick off athletes on the marathon
• In all, Leon was satisfied with his result, but more importantly how he overcame adversity to achieve it

Hydration

• Leon preloaded as he usually does with PH 1500 (Tablets), drinking ~500ml/16oz the night before and ~600ml/18oz the morning of the race. Anticipating the high temperatures (36℃/97℉), Leon topped up his sodium levels thus enhancing his fluid retention and blood plasma volume so he started the race hydrated
• Leon emerged from the swim and as he jumped on his bike, discovered he had a puncture. Thankfully he managed to get a replacement tyre, but not before the leaders were already ~15 minutes down the road
• Without panicking, Leon got cracking with the 180km/112mile solo time-trial, where he drank just over ~4L/135oz of water, averaging ~920ml/31oz per hour. This is higher than we’ve seen Leon drink before, but as the temperatures soared, this will have helped him replace a decent proportion of his fluid lost through sweat
• Combined with his sodium intake of ~5,386mg on the bike, this gave Leon a relative sodium concentration of ~1,330mg/L, which aligns well with his sweat sodium concentration of 1,331mg/L, so would likely have replaced the vast majority of his sodium losses too
• Once he had dismounted his bike, Leon quickly realised he had misplaced his Electrolyte Capsules somewhere, and so headed out onto the run without a plan to take on any sodium
• This was a risky strategy, especially as Leon wasn’t a fan of the on-course electrolyte drinks, and didn’t want to risk making himself sick. However, as the temperatures were approaching ~36℃/97℉ by this point, he knew he’d be fighting a losing battle against hydration
• Leon did manage to take on a very small amount of sodium (~82mg) through picking up cups of Coca Cola, but would have diluted this concentration with the ~2.1L/71oz of plain water he also picked up throughout the marathon
• In future, Leon may want to consider putting a pre-mixed bottle of PH 1500 into his run transition bag and dropping off a couple of bottles at the special needs aid stations. This would be a good contingency plan if he misplaced his Electrolyte Capsules again
• Shortly after finishing the race, and for several hours afterwards, Leon experienced painful muscle cramps throughout his arms and legs. He was given ~2L/64oz of plain water to drink after the race, which will likely have exacerbated his issues by diluting his electrolyte concentration further, perhaps contributing to his bout of cramping

Fueling

Conclusions

• The heat of Vitoria, coupled with some mechanical misfortune and a misplaced pack of Electrolyte Capsules ultimately lead to Leon’s “hardest ever race” which felt like “a bit of a slog””
• Despite the adversity, he executed a decent fuel and hydration strategy to ensure he finished strong and bagged another top 10 finish in only his 5th race over the IM distance
• Overall Leon rated his race satisfaction 7 out of 10, and pointed out that “upon reflection, I did pretty well to ride a similar pace to the front group even though I was riding solo, and I still had one of the fastest run times of the day as people started to buckle in the heat, so I can take a lot from that”