Food and drink

To avoid March’s fuelling failure, for my December swim I embarked on a regime of intensive research (lasting approximately 100 minutes) to ensure that I would have enough food that was calorie-packed, and easy and enjoyable to eat. All my drinks would be warm. I practised this feeding plan – more or less – during the six-hour swim on 27 November (not knowing, of course, that I'd be swimming the Strait in less than a fortnight) but because it was a very hot day the idea of drinking anything warm was repellent and I stuck with cold drinks. I'd also neglected to get some fruit juice to mask the taste of the 'Naked' Tailwind, so added a tiny bit of Pure to the Tailwind bottle to improve the flavour experience.

I also read through some of the extremely long feeding threads on the Marathon Swimming Federation discussion board. As in the past, these left me none the wiser: some dogmatic people said ‘LIQUIDS ONLY! Anything else is a waste of time!’ while others advocated various scientific preparations that were either expensive or unavailable in New Zealand. A third group of people recommended a mixture of high-energy ‘real’ food and carb drinks, pointing out that there’s bound to be some time on a long swim when you’re really miserable, so why not have a few nice morsels to look forward to. This mode of thinking appealed to me:  if it's OK for Sarah Thomas to eat a cookie or two during her swims, it would be OK for me to have some normal food as well. 

 The next logical step in the feed plan process: make a spreadsheet. I investigated the calorie/carb content in an array of squishy foodstuffs in 100g or 100ml servings. Banana, tinned peaches, kumara, and creamed rice/rice pudding came out on top if you need just over 100 calories with around 20g of carbs per half hour. Maple syrup packs an epic punch as well, so incorporating that into my pouches seemed a fine plan. I decided that the kumara would be better in lumps rather than mash. Almond butter and peanut butter are good for calories, less good for carbohydrates, but of course, provide some protein. Regarding commercial preparations, I ascertained that two Natural Confectionery Company jelly snakes constituted a ‘serving’ of sufficient power, and at least two Tasti snackballs would provide a hefty whack of energy. Both these items, while delicious, would, however, prove hazardous – more on that later. I also secreted a Snickers bar in the bottom in the container of snakes for emergencies, as well as a selection of Pure gels. 

My primary drink was Tailwind (the ‘Naked’ one with no added flavour). I decided to mix it as a concentrate (1 scoop to 100ml water) in a large bottle, with a dash of Just Juice ('tropical')  to mask the metallic taste of the Tailwind. The plan was to drink about 100ml in a cup, topped up with warm water each 30 minutes. I also took a couple of bottles of electrolyte drink (Pure, raspberry flavoured). This was in mixed to a fairly robust strength so that I could have it in cold water, or diluted with the warm water from the thermos, and in either event would get some electrolytes. On the morning of my Strait swim, II made a thermos of very stewed English Breakfast Tea and laced that with some more Tailwind, and a scraping of honey. Finally, I included in the crate that well-known lifesaving medicine, flat Coke, again for physical or spiritual emergencies.

 Recipes
On Rebecca’s recommendation, I sought these Kai Carriers. They’re for small children really, but also work well for adults who do weird stuff in the water. I bought the 140ml pouches, mainly because that was all the local Warehouse had. I was worried they’d be too small but figured that if I could squish in 100ml+ of calorie/carb-laden nourishment, it should work out well. I made three different concoctions, to create variety. In each case, the lemon juice  served to prevent discoloration (which worked!)

 Mushed banana, almond butter, maple syrup, dash of lemon juice.

Creamed rice, tiny bit of ginger powder, maple syrup, dash of lemon juice 

Creamed rice, some banana, some maple syrup, dash of lemon juice

Filling the pouches was a bit messy: I learned later that putting the pouches in a jug of very hot water makes the pouches more flexible and easier to fill. A lesson for the future, and for other converts to the Kai Carrier lifestyle. 

I meant to take a picture of my ‘lunchbox’ because it looked impressive and weighed a tonne (some comment was made that its vast weight would sink the IRB) but I forgot. Here’s a less impressive picture of two pouches of mush instead.

 

Did it work?
Yes. The whole eating/drinking process worked very well. After the first hour I just had a drink of the Tailwind/Just Juice in hot water mixture, and that was fine for the next 30 minutes. After that, we cycled through pouches, snack balls, snakes, etc.

Although two snakes (as opposed to four dinosaurs) constitute a ‘serving’ they were a bit harder to masticate. I chewed one, swallowed it, and then kept the other snake in my mouth when I started to swim again. Unfortunately, it was very unwieldy and after nearly inhaling it, I just had to swallow it whole, along with a hefty gulp of seawater.

The snackball scenario (the first time) was the same. I chewed/swallowed one, and most of the second one, but some sharp bits were stuck in my mouth. I didn’t fancy another gulp of saltwater, so spat out most of the second snackball. However, because I had the Tailwind concentrate, not ingesting all the snackball didn’t matter. Although I don't really like the Tasti ones, they tend to be softer than the Tom and Luke versions, and thus easier to deal with.

 The squashy kumara, being both sweet and savoury, was delicious. I can recommend this highly and thank Tom for his recommendation here. This kumara was steamed, and had a tiny bit of salt/pepper added, which proved very tasty.

The pouches also worked well. I squeezed the first one a bit vigorously, and so some of the mush escaped through the ziplock. However, it was still a perfect-sized snack. The banana/almond butter/maple syrup/lemon juice combination was tasty and refreshing: it was easy to swallow, but had some substance. The creamed rice mixture tasted great but left a horrible-tasting coating on the roof of my mouth and tongue. Possibly the milky element? Disappointing, anyway.

 I think I had two beakers of tea (nice, but definitely less energising, as less concentrated), a couple of beakers of Pure (can’t really remember), and on the last two feeds, a mighty treat in the form of flat Coke. I don’t think I made any specific requests for what to eat/drink, enjoying being surprised instead. My segment of Snickers on the last feed was great, although a stray peanut again caused a hazard.

Throughout the swim I stayed warm and nourished, remained coherent (well, kind of), and looked forward to whichever morsels would be handed to me. Everything was very digestible. 

Overall, I'd packed at least enough nourishment for 15 hours of swimming, so there was some left over afterwards.. While I donated the remaining creamed rice snacks to the hens, I turned the leftover banana pouches into a delicious banana bread loaf a couple of days after the swim.