I left off last week with a mission to find out how much fluid
I lose per hour when running hard. Last Thursday before a hard workout of 2 ½ mile
repeats I weighed myself right before I headed out the door and again an hour
and half later when I returned to the gym exhausted. I hopped on the scale and it said I was 1.5lbs
lighter than when I started out that morning. I hope that doesn’t make me too unfeminine,
because women don’t sweat right?! That
means that on this day I lost approximately 16 oz of fluid per hour (actually
15.3 fluid ounces using 1.043 dry ounces = 1 water ounce near sea level, but I
would rather round up slightly than down). However, I think I will test this
out a few more times before the marathon in January, because I want to make
sure that I get a good average.
Earlier this morning I was filling out the “fluids form”
provided by the Houston Marathon Committee, and I was able to find out where
they will have the fluid tables set up on the day of the marathon.
Mile 3.2, Mile 6.0, Mile 8.6, Mile 11.2, Mile 14.0, Mile 16.6, Mile 19.2, Mile 22.0, Mile 24.6
If my average sweat rate does indeed
turn out to be 16floz per hour than I will need to consume 2 cups of fluid per
hour in the marathon for a total of about 5 cups during the entire race. As you
can see above there will be 9 fluid stations available. So between now and
January I will need to devise a plan of how to use those 9 stations to get in
all the fluids that I will need to help me run my best. But before I can decide
on the best approach I will need to do some more experiments. The most
important of these being, how much fluid I can comfortably consume while running
sub 6min mile pace. It sounds so easy to
just take a drink, but when you take into account that I hope to be running
5:50-5:45 pace or faster, breathing hard, carrying a bottle along for a short ways,
and trying to contend with the other women in the race to get to my bottle, you
quickly realize it is more than just taking a drink. More aptly put by another
fantastic runner, Lauren Fleshman, “When you have never done a marathon, it isscary as s%#!”
Lauren is currently training for the ING New York City Marathon, which will be her first. I have really enjoyed reading
her humorous blogs posts as she trains for the 5 boroughs marathon. I am really
pumped to get to be in NYC on the weekend of the marathon where I will compete
in the NYRR Dash to the Finish Line 5K the day before I watch Lauren and another
inspirational runner – Jen Rhines – compete in the ING New York City
Marathon!
Good luck to these ladies and to any
of my readers who will be running. I will be cheering loudly and losing my
voice in all the excitement!
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