Hey Reader,

Happy New Year! It’s so weird to me that this is the first official newsletter I’m sending this year and it's already Jan 8!

And this newsletter is a little out of my normal scope of topic…

As a running coach who specializes in strength training for running, it might surprise you to hear that one of my number one predictors of injury (or underperforming) in running has nothing to do with strength training.

It’s under fueling!

It’s certainly something I talk about with the athletes I work with personally because of how important it is but not something I talk about a lot publicly.

First, it’s not my zone of genius. I firmly believe we can build resiliency through strength and stack the deck in your favor by addressing your movement efficiency. I love getting down into the nitty gritty of form and biomechanics and designing purposeful strength programs to do just that!

I’ve got a few things in the pipeline this month along those lines:

• The relaunch of Glute Accelerator: My FREE 7 Day Crash Course on Building Strong Glutes for Female Runners. This is by far my most popular program ever with over 1000 runners completing it to date. The original version was released in January of 2022. This year it is getting a refresh! Whether you’ve already done it or it’s all new to you, you don’t want to miss it!
• The public launch of my new program Strong & Stable: The Ultimate Hip Strengthening Program for Female Runners. Those that took advantage of my Black Friday presale got access this week and are giving it a test drive with some awesome feedback already.

AND without the fueling to support your training it won’t get you very far!

I also don’t talk about it much because it’s something I struggle with personally.

By the way, if you prefer to listen instead of read, this was the topic of this week’s podcast episode too. You can listen here or anywhere you enjoy podcasts.​

I don’t feel like my struggle outwardly comes from a place of trying to diet and shrink myself (though if I’m honest, those messages are probably still sitting there trying to back seat drive). It’s surely compounded by 3 pregnancies with gestational diabetes, having to limit carbs with strict (and small) definitions of what a serving of carbs is, and knowing it makes me more likely to develop type II diabetes later in life. I kill it on protein though 🤣

It’s also something I simply struggle to prioritize. I’m absolutely someone who will get busy and forget to eat and someone who would skip eating if it means having to spend time preparing. I did a lot better with this when I worked outside the home and was forced to prepare ahead of time.

I hired a dietician a few years ago to help me create better routines around it all. And it’s still something that takes work for me.

If you follow my IG stories, you know I’m training for a half marathon and it’s been going really well! I rocked 10 miles last week and the week before. This week I finished 11 but it wrecked me! Absolutely wiped for the rest of the day, was an absolute B to my family, struggled to sleep (classic signs of underfueling that are listed below).

After sitting and reflecting, with last week being that weird off week, no food related holiday to provide the calories but no routine either, I for sure didn’t eat enough. I know for a fact I under-fueled on both Saturday and Sunday. It’s no wonder that my body said WTF after I made it run 11 miles on Monday. I made it through the run with a gel every 30 minutes, but you can't out run overall bad diet with intra-run fueling!

That experience, some recent coaching experiences over the past few months and a recent study of fueling/performance in the Boston Marathon made me want to talk about it more.

Bottom Lines:

Performance and recovery both require fuel!

You (I) need to seriously look at food intake as the energy needed to continue to train, recover and make progress.

Eating enough to support your training needs to be a part of your (my) plan.

Let’s start with that recent study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. They looked at the correlation between performance, intra-event medical encounters risk, and low energy availability (aka. under fueling for the energy demands).

A little over a 1000 runners completed a survey 1- 4 weeks pre-race which screened for low energy availability, training and medical history. They linked that data to timing chips and medical encounters data on race day.

Nearly 43% of females (17% of males) were identified as having low energy availability!

Low energy availability (LEA) female participants was defined as meeting one or more of three criteria:

• Self-report of diagnosed current or prior eating disorder.
• A global score above a certain threshold on the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q)
• A score above a certain threshold on the A LEA in Females Questionnaire (LEAF-Q) which includes data about height, weight (including weight history), gastrointestinal function, menstrual function, training and injury history.

Participants with LEA statistically demonstrated worse finish times compared to their non-LEA peers.

LEA runners were nearly 2x more likely to end up in the medical tent.

Runners with LEA had higher occurrences of overuse injury and illnesses pre-race and many experienced lost or modified training time as a result.

Eating enough needs to be part of your training!!

Proper fueling enhances performance. You can run longer, harder, faster.

Proper fueling protects your body and immune system. Chronically underfueling may result in getting sick or injured more often, resulting in missed training and reduced performance.

Proper fueling protects your muscles and refueling post run provides the nutrients needed to build and repair muscles. We don’t just need to fuel pre/during. We need to fuel after and regularly, even on rest days!

As mentioned above, here are some signs you might not be eating enough:

• Low energy
• GI Issues
• Constantly sore
• Difficulty sleeping
• Decreased mood
• Not progressing in fitness with training
• Chronically injured
• Missed or irregular periods

​

It is NOT normal to lose your period with increased training!

A fueled athlete is a fast athlete.

Your aesthetics do not determine your athletics.

This is something I know I can improve on myself and I can’t wait to see where it takes me performance wise.

PS. Some of my favorite accounts to follow when it comes to fueling are:

• ​Alex Larson Nutrition (who I personally worked with a few years ago)
• ​Marathon Mama RD - Jenn Scott (who as presented to my Women’s Running Academy several times and has the best visuals)
• ​Marathon Nutritionist - Kristy Baumann
• ​Featherston Nutrition - She has lots of great downloadable resources.
• ​Fueling Young Athletes (this content is gear towards teens but I love the convenience and simplicity of her suggestions)

Your Coach,
Alison

Alison Marie Helms, PhD Certified Personal Trainer and Running Coach Unlock your full running potential through physics and physiology. ​Work with me.​