The running free lottery this year blessed me with the ability to pick up a bounty of GU products and I was like a kid in a candy store trying to decide on what to bring home. GU provides so many options such as Gu Brew Electrolyte Tablets, GU Electrolyte Brews, GU Gels, GU Roctane Gels, GU Chomps etc that I had a hard time picking only a few.
I decided on picking up an assortment of GU Gels, GU Roctane and GU Tablets. Like many of you, I already had my favourite GU Gels, but this opportunity allowed me to try the Roctane and Tablets for the first time.
Each persons’ preference on taste and consumption times for Gels differs, but my personally favourite are Tri-Berry and Strawberry Banana. I find these are delicious and don’t leave an after taste. I do find that consuming 4 or more during a marathon leaves me not wanting to have any more gels for a while, but it is less to do with the taste and more to do with the fact I just had 4 of them.
It’s hard to really rate the effectiveness of something that you can’t have black and white results on, but we all know that our body needs nutrition over longer runs and I do feel stronger during and after the long runs in which I gelled, compared to the runs that I didn’t. There are so many other variables which could lead to this outcome as well, but on-run nutrition is something each individual needs to determine for themselves.
I have recently started taking a gel before a race as I was finding myself starting to feel hungry between my breakfast and the race start. The gel settles nicely for me and provides me with the added intake I need to feel strong at the start line.
I only had the opportunity to try the Roctane Gels a couple times during the summer training and it is very difficult to say whether they are more effective than the GU based on a few attempts.
Below is a brief description of Roctane compared to GU:
Roctane Ultra Endurance Energy Gel contains more of the ingredients that matter during long or intense activity while still being based on the proven ratio of simple and complex carbohydrates found in GU Energy Gel.
•3 times more Branched Chain Amino Acids
•10 times more Histidine
•2-3 times more electrolytes
•Ornithine Alpha-Ketaglutarate (OKG)
It should also be noted that it is recommended to drink 24-30 ounces of water each hour when taking the Gels. I don’t think I could consume this much water while running if I tried, but have not had stomach issues with the much less amount of water I drink. It will be different with every person and suggest trying these things out on your longer runs to find what works for you.
I wasn’t able to try the tablets this training cycle but am excited to see how this tastes and works on my runs in the future.
I started out running without thinking about nutrition in the least and now that I am running 2-3 hours every Sunday I am glad that GU has done the research for me and offers the products they do. I was a GU user before the lottery and will continue using their products once this supply runs out. And please as runners, after taking a gel or anything else while running, put the empty pack back in your pocket. I hate seeing an empty gel on the road or a trail.
Thanks for reading.
