An Athlete's Race-Week Nutrition Plan: Glycogen, Gut Health, and Daily Meal Planning for the Final Week Before Competition

First, a case I’ll never forget

A few years ago, I coached an amateur road cyclist—let’s call him A-Zhe. He trained hard through the winter, pushing his FTP from 240 watts to nearly 290 watts. His power-to-weight ratio was solid, and he handled climbing workouts well. Everyone expected him to place well in a long-distance challenge race lasting over four hours that year. On race day, he followed the pack beautifully for the first two hours, started dropping off late in the third hour, and nearly had to walk his bike up the final climb. After the race, he sat pale-faced in front of the aid station, staring into space.

At first, he thought it was insufficient training or just a bad day. But when I laid out his food diary from the week before the race, the answer was clear: to “maintain weight and look lean,” he had deliberately cut back on starches that week, eating lots of meat and vegetables with a huge amount of fiber. The night before the race, he also had a large steak and a big salad—things he didn’t normally eat. He turned the week when he most needed to load up on glycogen into a fat-loss week, and the night when he most needed an empty gut into the heaviest meal of the week.

His legs weren’t the problem; his tank was never full from the start.

After more than a decade of working with athletes at all levels and everyday active people, I’m increasingly convinced of one thing: most people who fall apart on race day lose because of a lack of planning in their pre-race week nutrition, not because of fitness. In this article, I want to walk you through “race-week nutrition planning” from the scientific foundation to the real-world issues Taiwanese athletes face—eating out, climate, and gut problems—so you can follow it directly.

Why the “race week” deserves your serious attention

Many people write out detailed training plans, but their nutrition plan is just one line: “eat more carbs before the race.” That’s far too crude. The race week actually involves juggling three goals that pull against each other:

1. Maximize glycogen stores in muscles and the liver (fill the tank)
2. Keep the gut in its most comfortable, trouble-free state on race day (don’t let the car break down halfway)
3. Complete training taper at the same time, letting the body recover from fatigue (let the engine rest enough)

These three things sometimes conflict. For example, to store glycogen you need to eat more carbs, but eating more can increase gut burden; to empty the gut you need to cut fiber, but long-term low fiber is bad for your intestines. The value of a race-week nutrition plan is using a “timeline” to separate these three goals so each happens at the right time.

Glycogen: the most important fuel in your body

Let’s establish the core concept first. When carbohydrates enter the body, they’re stored as glycogen in the muscles and liver. Muscle glycogen is the primary, most readily usable fuel during exercise; liver glycogen maintains blood sugar stability during exercise and fasting, preventing dizziness and sudden “bonking.”

The average person’s muscle glycogen storage ranges from about 300 to 500 millimoles per kilogram of muscle, and endurance athletes can push it higher through training and dietary adjustments. Here’s a classic concept to remember: as early as the 1960s, researcher Bergström and colleagues found that after depleting glycogen through exercise, followed by a high-carb diet, muscle glycogen concentration could roughly “double”—a phenomenon called supercompensation (see references at the end).

This is where the term “glycogen supercompensation” comes from. However, modern practice is much gentler; it no longer emphasizes exhausting yourself to the point of depletion. Instead, tapered training combined with a high-carb diet can achieve similar results.

What kind of races actually require serious glycogen loading

This is important because not every race needs a big production. Here’s a simple reference table:

Race duration	Glycogen strategy	Notes
Under 60 minutes	No deliberate supercompensation needed	Eat carbs normally and have a solid pre-race meal
60 to 90 minutes	Slightly increase carbs	Moderately increase carb intake 1 to 2 days before
Over 90 minutes	Glycogen supercompensation recommended	This is where supercompensation is most valuable
Over 4 hours (ultra-endurance)	Supercompensation + in-race fueling strategy	Storing glycogen alone isn’t enough; in-race fueling matters just as much

Modern nutrition guidelines generally suggest that for endurance exercise lasting over 90 minutes, you can consider raising carb intake to 10 to 12 grams per kilogram of body weight per day in the 36 to 48 hours before the race (see references at the end). That’s the upper limit for elite, high-intensity long-distance athletes; recreational athletes don’t necessarily need to eat that much. I’ll give more practical tiered recommendations later.

Here’s a foreshadowing: for ultra-endurance events over four hours, simply filling glycogen stores isn’t enough—hourly carb intake during the race is equally critical. Going back to A-Zhe’s case, he not only failed to load up before the race, but his in-race fueling was also sporadic—a double mistake.

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The daily nutrition blueprint for the week before the race

Now let’s get practical. I like to divide race week into three phases, arranged on a countdown timeline with “race day as Day 0.” The example below uses a Sunday morning race expected to last over 90 minutes (Monday is Day 6 before the race).

Three-phase overview

Phase	Days	Training	Nutrition focus	Fiber
Phase 1: Normal maintenance	Days 6 to 4 before race	Taper, maintain intensity, reduce volume	Balanced diet, normal fiber, repair the body	Normal
Phase 2: Glycogen loading	Days 3 to 1 before race	Significantly reduced, nearly rest	Increase carbs, adequate protein, lower fat and fiber	Gradually reduce
Phase 3: Pre-race gut clearing	Within 24 hours before race	Complete rest or very light spin	Easily digestible high carbs, low fiber, low fat, controlled portions	Minimal

Phase 1 (Days 6 to 4 before race): Repair the body, don’t rush to stuff yourself

The focus of these three days isn’t cramming carbs—it’s recovery. Training should start tapering so accumulated fatigue subsides. Keep a balanced diet with normal fiber intake to maintain gut and immune health.

These days, I usually remind my athletes: this is not a binge week, nor a fat-loss week. Many people hear “eat more carbs before the race” and start gorging from Monday, only to ruin their appetite by the three days when they actually need to load glycogen, or inexplicably gain two to three kilograms (mostly water and gut contents).

Plate principles for this phase:

• Carbs: About 5 to 7 grams per kilogram of body weight per day, enough for normal training needs
• Protein: 1.6 to 2.0 grams per kilogram of body weight per day, to support recovery
• Fat: Moderate, mainly from sources like olive oil, nuts, and fish
• Vegetables, fruits, whole grains: Eat normally—fiber is still your friend here, keeping your gut regular
• Fluids: Stay well hydrated, build a habit of drinking water regularly; don’t wait until race week to think about hydration

Phase 2 (3 to 1 Days Before the Race): Glycogen Loading Period

This is the core of the entire plan. Training nearly stops (or only very light spinning), and the energy saved is redirected toward storing glycogen.

Key concept: Carbohydrates go up, but total calories don’t need to skyrocket. How? Slightly lower the proportion of protein and fat to make room for carbs. Since training volume is reduced, you don’t actually need as much protein and fat for fuel and recovery.

Research also supports that the loading period doesn’t need to be drawn out: even a single day of high carbohydrate intake at 10 grams per kilogram, combined with reduced activity and no exercise, can bring muscle glycogen close to maximum (see references at the end). However, in reality, most people aren’t completely inactive the day before a race (there’s travel, check-in, and a test ride), so a 48-hour loading rhythm is usually safer.

Take a 65 kg amateur rider as an example: if the target is set at 8 grams per kilogram (a practical version for amateurs), that’s about 520 grams of carbohydrates per day. That sounds like a lot, but broken down, it’s not so daunting:

Meal	Food Examples	Approximate Carbs
Breakfast	3 slices of white toast + 1 banana + jam + unsweetened soy milk	About 90 g
Morning Snack	1 rice ball (onigiri) + 1 sports drink	About 60 g
Lunch	1.5 bowls of white rice + chicken breast + low-oil side dishes	About 90 g
Afternoon Snack	1 bagel + honey	About 60 g
Dinner	1 serving of udon noodles + a little lean meat + peeled vegetables	About 100 g
Before Bed	1 bowl of white congee or cereal + honey	About 50 g
All-Day Drinks	Diluted sports drinks, juice to top up	About 70 g

Key reminders:

• Small, frequent meals are better than cramming it all at once—less strain on the stomach and steadier absorption
• From this point, gradually reduce fiber and fat; “white starches” like white rice, white toast, and udon noodles become the main event
• No need to stop protein; maintaining about 1.4 to 1.6 grams per kilogram is enough, choosing easily digestible lean meat, eggs, and soy products
• Don’t forget that carbohydrate storage brings water along with it (each gram of glycogen stored carries about 3 grams of water), so a weight gain of 1 to 2 kg over these days is normal and necessary—don’t panic and start dieting because of it

Phase 3 (24 Hours Before the Race): Gut Emptying and Final Loading

On this final day, the goal shifts from “storing” to “clearing” and “stabilizing.” Carbohydrates continue, but choose the most digestible, lowest-fiber, lowest-fat forms so the gut feels light on race day.

During exercise, blood flow is diverted from the gastrointestinal tract to the muscles, skin, and lungs, causing noticeable changes in intestinal motility, tone, and secretion; high-fiber, high-fat, or hard-to-digest foods slow gastric emptying, increasing the risk of cramps, bloating, and urgently hunting for a restroom mid-race (see references at the end). So the low-fiber strategy the day before is essentially about “decompressing” the gut for race day.

In practice, keep fiber relatively low in the 24 hours before the race (e.g., around 10 grams per day; if the transition is too tough, loosen it to 15 to 20 grams), focusing on white rice, white toast, low-fiber cereal, peeled fruit, very soft cooked vegetables, and sports drinks (see references at the end). But note: don’t maintain a low-residue diet for more than a few days—long-term, it causes nutritional deficiencies and constipation, so this is a “pre-race short play,” not a lifestyle.

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The Final Night Before the Race and Race Morning Breakfast

I’m pulling these two meals out separately because they’re the ones most often messed up.

The Final Night Before the Race

Remember A-Zhe’s lesson: the last night is not a celebration dinner, not a night to try something new. Three principles:

1. Eat early, not too late: give the gut time to digest, no bloating before bed
2. Easily digestible, high-carb foods: white rice, udon noodles, pasta (sauce not too oily) are all fine; avoid big steaks, fried foods, raw salads, and spicy heavy flavors
3. Don’t try foods you’ve never eaten: the worst thing in race week is “let’s try this place today”—any new food is an unknown variable

Race Morning Breakfast

For the pre-race meal, guidance generally falls in the range of 1 to 4 grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight, e.g., about 2 grams per kilogram eaten 2 hours before the start (see references at the end). For a 65 kg rider, hitting about 130 grams of carbs 2 to 3 hours before the start is a reasonable target.

Here’s a pre-race breakfast schedule that’s actually doable for someone in Taiwan:

Time (counted back from start)	Content	Purpose
3 hours before	2 slices of white toast + banana + honey + a little tea or black coffee	Main energy source, leaving enough digestion time
60 to 90 minutes before	Small sips of sports drink or diluted juice	Hydration + a bit of carbs, without bloating the stomach
15 to 30 minutes before	1 energy gel or half a banana (if you tolerate it)	Top off blood sugar, avoid feeling hungry at the gun

Caffeine does help many people, but the same “no new things on race day” rule applies—if you don’t usually drink coffee, don’t suddenly down a big cup on race day; your stomach and heart rate might give you trouble. Keep your heart rate (bpm) in the range you’re familiar with; don’t let caffeine unnecessarily spike your pre-race resting heart rate.

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Carbohydrate Dosage Reference Table by Body Weight

The hurdle many athletes get stuck on is that “grams per kilogram” sounds abstract, and converting it to their own body is confusing. So I’ve put together a quick-reference table of common body weights matched to daily total carbohydrate amounts at different loading intensities. Just find the row closest to you, and you’ll know roughly how many grams of carbs to aim for that day.

Body Weight	Entry Level 6 g/kg	Amateur Level 8 g/kg	Advanced Level 10 g/kg	Food Reference
50 kg	300 g	400 g	500 g	300 g ≈ 5 bowls of white rice
55 kg	330 g	440 g	550 g	Each bowl of white rice ≈ 60 g carbs
60 kg	360 g	480 g	600 g	1 medium banana ≈ 25 g
65 kg	390 g	520 g	650 g	1 rice ball (onigiri) ≈ 40 g
70 kg	420 g	560 g	700 g	1 sports drink ≈ 30 to 35 g
75 kg	450 g	600 g	750 g	1 slice of white toast ≈ 15 g

Don’t be scared by numbers like 500 or 600 grams. Convert it into “how many bowls of rice, bananas, or sports drinks,” and you’ll find that with small, frequent meals spread across the whole day, it’s actually doable. I usually suggest athletes split the day into 5 to 6 eating points, with 80 to 120 grams of carbs at each, plus small sips of drinks to top up, so the load isn’t concentrated in any single meal.

A practical reminder: during the loading period, you don’t need to calculate to the single gram every day. Pick a target range and get the big picture right. What actually causes problems is eating “whatever” with no concept at all, or conversely, eating too little out of fear of gaining weight.

Race-Day Fueling: Closing the Loop on the Foreshadowing

Earlier, I kept mentioning that for races lasting over 2 to 4 hours, simply loading up on glycogen before the race isn’t enough. Let’s wrap up that thread here, because it’s the second half of the same plan as pre-race nutrition.

Your body’s total glycogen storage has a ceiling. Even if you load up to the max, a high-intensity long-distance race will gradually deplete it. That’s why for races over 2 hours, you need to keep taking in carbs during the race, using external fuel to delay the point where your glycogen runs dry. Going back to A-Zhe’s first failure, not only did he fail to load up beforehand, his mid-race fueling was also sporadic—eating only when he remembered, skipping it when his stomach felt off. By the third hour, he was running on empty both internally and externally.

Here’s a rough guideline for mid-race fueling (be sure to test your tolerance during training to nail down the actual numbers):

Race Duration	Mid-Race Carb Recommendation	Fueling Format
1 to 2 hours	About 30 to 60 grams per hour	Sports drinks, energy gels
2 to 3 hours	About 60 grams per hour	Alternating energy gels and sports drinks
Over 3 hours	Can push toward 60 to 90 grams per hour	Mix multiple sugar sources; solid foods can be added too

Key points for mid-race fueling:

• Small amounts, regular intervals, start early: Don’t wait until you’re hungry or your legs are shot—by then it’s too late. Set a timer or go by distance, and take in a little at fixed intervals.
• Pair with enough water: High-concentration sugars like energy gels must be taken with water, otherwise the concentration in your gut can cause discomfort.
• Mix solids, semi-solids, and liquids: The longer the race, the more sickening sweet gels become. Adding easily digestible solids (like bananas or energy bars) can help you last longer.
• Practice all of this: Mid-race fueling is a big challenge for the gut. You must rehearse it repeatedly in your long training rides to train your gut to “digest while exercising.”

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The Taiwan Context: Eating Out, Humid Heat, and Gut Health

This section is what I think most foreign articles don’t cover, but what Taiwanese athletes need the most.

How to Load Glycogen When You Eat Out

It’s hard for Taiwanese people to cook at home every day before a race, but eating out is actually great for carb-loading. The key is choosing the right items and avoiding the landmines:

• Good choices: White rice bento boxes (with less sauce), udon noodles, noodle soups (don’t drink the overly salty broth), onigiri rice balls, white toast, bagels, boiled or steamed sweet potatoes (portion-controlled), plain congee.
• Landmine zone: Fried chicken cutlets, Taiwanese popcorn chicken, large salads, overly greasy braised pork rice, spicy hot pot, large amounts of beans, and high-fiber brown rice (fine normally, but cut back a day or two before the race).
• Drinks: Unsweetened or lightly sweetened sports drinks, diluted juice can provide carbs and hydration; but avoid large full-sugar bubble teas or heavy milk-based drinks the day before the race—sugar and fat together can cause bloating.

A handy tip: convenience stores are the best fueling station for Taiwanese athletes. Onigiri, bananas, Pocari Sweat, white toast, and honey—this combination can cover your entire day of carb intake before a race, whether you’re traveling or racing away from home.

Humid Heat and Electrolytes

Taiwan’s summers are hot and humid. On race day, heavy sweating means losing water and electrolytes like sodium and potassium. Build a regular hydration habit in the week before the race; don’t wait until race day to chug.

• One to two days before the race, slightly increase your salt intake (noodle soup, sports drinks with a pinch of salt) to help your body retain water.
• But don’t overdo it, and don’t suddenly pop a bunch of salt tablets before the race—that’s not a plan, that’s gambling.
• A simple way to check hydration: look at your urine color. Light yellow means you’re roughly fine; dark yellow means you need to drink more.

Healthcare and Medical Advice: When to See a Professional

Taiwan has convenient healthcare, and that’s our advantage—use it:

• If you have chronic gut issues (like long-term diarrhea, IBS, or GERD), consult a doctor or dietitian before adjusting your race-week diet. Don’t experiment with low-fiber or high-carb diets on your own.
• If you have chronic conditions like diabetes, high blood pressure, or heart disease, significant carb fluctuations, caffeine, and electrolyte intake all need individualized assessment and oversight from a medical team. The general advice in this article doesn’t apply to your specific situation.
• Taiwan has sports dietitians and sports medicine clinics you can consult. Before a major race, it’s worth one clinic visit to clarify the personalized details.

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Common Mistakes and Fixes

After coaching students for so many years, I see the same mistakes repeated over and over. I’ve compiled the most common ones into a comparison table—you can find yourself in it directly.

Common Mistake	Why It’s a Problem	Correct Approach
Starting to “binge eat” a week before the race	Eating too much too early ruins your appetite and messes with your weight	Seriously increase carbs only in the final 3 days; focus on recovery before that
Using high-fiber whole grains to carb-load	Too much fiber puts a heavy burden on your gut on race day	Switch to low-fiber starches like white rice and white toast during the loading phase
Panicking and dieting when the scale goes up	Glycogen holds water, so gaining 1 to 2 kg is normal	Accept this as a normal sign of being fully fueled
Eating a big meal or trying new foods the night before	Unknown foods plus high fat and fiber can cause issues the next day	Eat familiar, easily digestible, high-carb meals
Eating too little or too late at breakfast on race day	Starting hungry with unstable blood sugar	Eat about 2 grams of carbs per kg of body weight 3 hours before the start
Only loading glycogen and ignoring mid-race fueling	You’ll definitely run dry in races over 2 to 4 hours	Plan carb intake every hour during the race
Suddenly changing caffeine or electrolyte intake before the race	Heart rate and gut reactions you haven’t trained for	Test all fueling strategies during training first
Never practicing the race-day routine	You discover at the venue that you can’t eat or have diarrhea	Simulate race-day breakfast and timing during training

One point I want to emphasize here: every strategy must be tested during training before race day. Everyone’s gut reacts differently; what works for one person may not work for you. Be sure to rehearse the entire routine a few weeks before a major race—don’t treat race day as an experiment.

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Actionable Advice for Readers at Different Levels

Finally, here’s a version you can act on immediately, based on your level. Find the one closest to you.

Beginners and General Exercisers

• Don’t be intimidated by “10 to 12 grams per kg”—that’s the elite ceiling, not your assignment.
• You only need to focus on three things: eat a bit more easily digestible white starch 2 to 3 days before the race, don’t eat anything crazy the night before, and eat a proper breakfast on race day.
• Just cut back slightly on fiber the day before the race; no need to overcomplicate it.
• Remember: for activities under 1 hour, you don’t need special glycogen loading at all—just eat normally.

Amateur Athletes with Some Training Base

• Seriously execute the three-phase timeline from this article once. A loading target of 7 to 8 grams of carbs per kg is plenty.
• Start logging your carb intake and gut reactions to identify your personal tolerance landmines.
• Plan mid-race fueling together with pre-race glycogen loading. For races over 2 hours, schedule carb intake every hour.
• During your long training rides before the race, fully rehearse your race-day breakfast and fueling routine.

Advanced and Competition-Oriented Athletes

• You can try higher loading targets (8 to 10 grams per kg, or even more), but be sure to pair this with tapering, gradually reducing fiber, and eating smaller, more frequent meals.
• Manage hydration and electrolytes precisely, especially for summer races in Taiwan’s humid heat.
• Build a personalized race-week SOP: write down every meal, every time point, and every fuel product as a checklist. Validate it repeatedly and fine-tune it year after year.
• If you’re chasing the ultimate edge, consider consulting a sports dietitian for individualized design, and collect data feedback across multiple races.

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Rehearsing in Training: Run Through Your Race Week First

This is the section I want you to remember most out of everything here. Your race-week nutrition plan is not something you execute for the first time on race day—it must be rehearsed during training. Everyone’s gut reacts differently—some people take energy gels as smoothly as water, while others get diarrhea from one gel; some can pack away three slices of toast before a race, while others can’t swallow a bite when nervous. These differences can only be identified through prior testing.

I usually ask my athletes to run through the entire protocol during one of their long training sessions (simulating race intensity and duration) before a race:

1. The night before: Follow the same principles as the final night before a race (white rice and lean meat, low fiber, eat early), and record your sleep quality and morning gut sensations
2. Breakfast on session day: Eat according to your race-day breakfast schedule, and note any bloating or bathroom urges between eating and starting exercise
3. During exercise: Follow your in-race fueling plan, and record gut reactions, nausea, or side stitches after each fueling
4. After the session: Review the entire process and identify which steps caused discomfort and which fuel products don’t agree with you

Write all of this into a personal race nutrition log. Accumulate it year after year, and you’ll understand your body better and better. The value of this log far exceeds any generic advice, because it’s your own data.

Let me emphasize the golden rule once more: never try anything new on race day. New fuel brands, new restaurants, new caffeine doses, new salt tablets—all of these must be validated during training first. On race day, you only execute what has already been confirmed to work.

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

These are the questions I get asked most often when coaching athletes. Here they are, answered all at once.

Q1: Will carbohydrate loading make me heavier and fatter, affecting my climbing?

Your weight will indeed rise by 1 to 2 kg in the short term, but that is almost entirely water stored alongside glycogen, not fat. This water gets released during the race as glycogen is utilized, which actually helps you maintain body temperature and fluid balance. Rather than worrying about that 1 to 2 kg, worry about running out of fuel and fading in the latter half—that cost is far greater. For climbing-oriented athletes, my advice is: don’t take loading to the extreme (aim for 7 to 8 g/kg), but absolutely never race hungry just to be lighter.

Q2: Do I need carbohydrate loading for short races (under 1 hour)?

No. For races under 1 hour, your body’s normal glycogen stores are more than sufficient. You just need to eat carbs normally, have a solid pre-race meal, and never start on an empty stomach. Save the loading effort for the long-distance events that truly need it.

Q3: I have a sensitive stomach and need the bathroom when nervous. What should I do?

This is very common—pre-race stress makes the gut more sensitive. A few approaches: seriously follow a low-fiber, low-fat diet for 1 to 3 days before the race to reduce gut contents; avoid foods you know are triggers (dairy, fried foods, spicy foods, large amounts of beans); and choose the breakfast combination you know best and that causes you the least trouble. If the condition is severe enough to affect your daily life or racing, please see a doctor to evaluate whether you have issues like IBS—don’t just tough it out on your own.

Q4: Can I use “healthy starches” like sweet potatoes and brown rice to load glycogen?

Of course you can in daily life—they’re great. But in the latter phase of the loading period (1 to 2 days before the race), I actually recommend switching to low-fiber “white starches” like white rice and white toast. The reason is that sweet potatoes and brown rice are high in fiber, and eating too much of them at this point increases your gut burden on race day. This is the one scenario where “refined carbs beat whole grains”—it’s short-term and purpose-specific, and you switch back afterward.

Q5: The loading phase requires 5 to 6 meals a day, and I can’t do that at work. What should I do?

This is exactly where convenience stores come in. Liquidize and snack-ify your carbs: grab a small sports drink during a work break, eat an onigiri, a banana, or a few slices of white toast with honey—all of these take just seconds to consume. You don’t need to sit down for big meals. Spreading out small, easy, on-the-go fueling actually fits the principle of eating small, frequent meals better.

Q6: Should I deliberately dehydrate and then rehydrate, or take salt tablets before a race?

I don’t recommend messing around with this on your own. Deliberate dehydration carries high risk and does more harm than good for most amateur athletes. Electrolyte intake should be moderate and regular, especially in Taiwan’s hot, humid environment where you sweat a lot. Suddenly swallowing a bunch of salt tablets isn’t a strategy—it’s gambling. If you’re doing an especially long or hot event, consult a professional for an individualized electrolyte plan.

Q7: I have diabetes/high blood pressure. Is this carbohydrate loading approach suitable for me?

These general recommendations do not apply to your specific condition. Dramatically increasing carbohydrate intake will significantly affect blood sugar, and caffeine and electrolytes can also affect blood pressure and the heart. Your race-week nutrition must be individually designed and monitored by your physician or dietitian, taking your medications, blood sugar, and blood pressure into account. Exercise is a good thing, but please do it under the supervision of your medical team—don’t treat this article as a prescription.

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Conclusion: Races Are Half Won at the Dinner Table

Back to A-Zhe. A season later, we redesigned his race-week nutrition—fixing what needed fixing during recovery, loading glycogen seriously when it was time, switching to his familiar white rice and lean meat the night before, and following the race-day breakfast schedule to the letter. With the same training base, he didn’t fade at all during that race, and on the final climb he still had the power to stand up and overtake riders. The first thing he said to me afterward was: “So it wasn’t my legs that were the problem—I just never filled the tank properly before.”

Training matters, of course, but training determines how strong your engine is; your race-week nutrition plan determines whether you can unleash that engine’s full potential on race day. A good car that isn’t filled with fuel and breaks down halfway will obviously be slow.

Treat this article as your race-week checklist. Prepare early, rehearse early, and don’t let all your hard training be undone by what’s on your plate in that final week. Wishing you strong legs, a settled stomach, and a full tank on race day.

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This article is educational content and does not replace individual diagnosis and treatment advice from a physician, physical therapist, or dietitian. If you have diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, or any chronic gastrointestinal condition, please discuss any major dietary changes with your medical team first for an individualized assessment.

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References

• Science for Sport — Carbohydrate loading for endurance, still a good practice? https://www.scienceforsport.com/carbohydrate-loading-for-endurance-still-a-good-practice/
• Gatorade Sports Science Institute — Dietary Carbohydrate and the Endurance Athlete: Contemporary Perspectives https://www.gssiweb.org/sports-science-exchange/article/dietary-carbohydrate-and-the-endurance-athlete-contemporary-perspectives
• Precision Hydration — How to carb load before your next race https://www.precisionhydration.com/performance-advice/nutrition/how-to-carb-load-before-a-race/
• PMC — Dietary restrictions in endurance runners to mitigate exercise-induced gastrointestinal symptoms https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7288429/
• Athlete Training and Health — Carbohydrate Loading: Fuel Yourself https://athletetrainingandhealth.com/carbohydrate-loading-fuel-yourself/

Related Reading

• Pre-Race Nutrition Strategies: A Complete Guide to Glycogen Loading and Gut Management from One Week Out to the Starting Line
• Athlete Nutrition Periodization: Aligning with Training Phases for a Win-Win in Performance, Body Weight, and Recovery
• Travel Nutrition for Athletes: How to Eat When Competing Abroad Without Falling Short Away from Home
• A Sample Weekly Meal Plan for Athletes: A Complete Practical Guide from Weekly Structure to Training-Day Adjustments