How to Choose Energy Foods
Nutrition science has provided a lot of performance food options in recent
years. If you're an outdoor athlete who needs a quick, easy energy infusion,
you'll find many convenient choices to fuel your ambitions.
Before, During and Recovery
Bars
Gels
Chews
Beverages
Snacks
Before, During and Recovery
The most significant trend in the performance-food category is its sophistication.
Now you can fine-tune your nutrition intake with food choices engineered to
enhance every stage of a workout or outdoor excursion—before, during and after
(the recovery phase).
The online product page for each performance food product offered at REI includes
a best-use designation (as selected by a team of REI experts). They
are:
Before Workout
These foods or beverages are formulated to provide an elevated, consistent energy
level over an extended period of time. They typically include a balanced mix of
complex carbohydrates, proteins and fiber. Some are suitable for eating minutes
before activity begins, though a longer lead time (1 to 2 hours) is often
recommended.
During Workout
These are designed for easy digestion and absorption into your bloodstream. The
goal is to provide sustained energy through a gradual rise (not a spike) in
energy followed by a similarly gradual decline. Chews, gels and beverages are
favorites due to their simplicity and agreeable taste.
Recovery Phase
These are fortified with proteins, amino acids and other muscle-restoring
elements to help hasten the repair and restoration of cells in your body.
Many products can serve more than one of these functions. But these general
designations can help guide you to choices best suited to your needs.
How many of these items do you need? It depends on the intensity of your activity
or workout. For a light training run, for example, you may not need any. A more
moderate run, a half-day hike or a standard training ride may call for just
a single item from one of these categories. The more demanding (and prolonged)
your activity, the more options your body may likely need to sustain peak
performance.
What do these products offer that traditional foods cannot?
- Easy portability. Bananas, as great as they are as energy boosters,
quickly get beat up when transported in an adventurer's pack.
- Long shelf life. No refrigeration (or similar food-handling
precautions) needed.
- Convenience. What you need (concentrated, specialized nutrients),
when you need it (any time you choose) and where you need it (any place you
choose).
Which items are best suited for you? We suggest you experiment with various
products. Stick with the ones that:
- deliver the best results for you
- feel most comfortable in your stomach
- offer the most appealing flavor and texture for your tastes.
The most popular options are noted below.
Energy Bars
These are a good choice when preparing yourself for endurance activities
(generally, any moderately intense aerobic endeavor lasting at least 90
minutes). In most cases, they are recommended for before-workout and
recovery-phase use.
Bars are commonly high in carbohydrates, low in protein and fat—a good
combination to consume just before starting an extended activity (or during an
extended rest break). Bars with slightly higher fat and protein content are a
good to eat an hour or more before a workout or anytime after it. The high-grade
carbs in bars provide an endurance boost during a workout; afterwards, they help
replenish glycogen (energy reserves) in muscles.
With varying quantities of fat included (up to 15 or 20 grams in some items),
energy bars are the only performance-food option that serves to quell hunger
pangs, though they do so only modestly and briefly.
Energy bars are not the same as meal-replacement bars or snack bars. Still,
hikers often use an energy bar as an on-the-go midday snack during a rest stop.
This allows them to save time while addressing hunger and energy issues at the
same time.
Drink water when eating an energy bar. Bars are usually dense and chewy and are
easier to digest with generous water intake. Avoid washing them down with a
performance beverage. Consuming too many carbohydrates at once can slow your
body's ability to absorb them.
Organic Bars
Many performance food choices now offer a high percentage of organic ingredients
in their products. REI offers a wide variety of organic options.
Raw Foods
While most performance foods are not excessively processed, a new subcategory of energy bars features minimal processing-or no processing at all. These bars include whole, uncooked, energy-inducing foods (nuts, seeds, fruits) that are chopped, pressed and compacted into a single-serve package. For on-the-go food purists, this is a great convenience.
Gels
Gels are very popular among hikers, cyclists, paddlers and runners for on-the-go
(during-workout) use. They are syrupy, semi-liquid products--usually high
concentrations of carbohydrates--that come in small, squeezable packages that
bring to mind squeeze food tubes used by astronauts in the 1960s.
Their chief benefit? They swiftly deliver a very-easy-to-digest energy
boost—offering perhaps the quickest energy input of any performance food
option. Some gel-makers create specialized gels by add varying doses of caffeine
(a potent fatigue-fighter) or sodium (for people sweating excessively due to
high temperatures or humid conditions). Caffeine-enhanced products are usually
clearly marked. If you prefer to avoid caffeine, take note when selecting gels.
Gel packets are small, very light (1 or 2 oz.) and easy to stash just about
anywhere.
Chews
Some people find the gooey texture of gels less than appealing. Electrolyte chews
were created for them. Chews are offered in varying consistencies. Some are like
gumdrops, or gummy bears, and others are more like jelly beans.
They provide essentially the same function as a gel—infusing the body with
carbohydrates (to delay fatigue) and electrolytes (to replenish stores of
salts). Because their soft-yet-solid texture requires slightly more digestive
work than a gel, their benefits may be slightly slower to impact your body.
Chews are designed exclusively for the during-working stage of activity.
Beverages
The beverage category, which launched the modern energy-food movement with the
introduction of Gatorade in 1965, includes items that cover all the phases of
activity—before, during and recovery.
Better known as "sports drinks," performance beverages brought the term
"electrolytes" into the mainstream lexicon decades ago. Electrolytes are
minerals, primarily salts, which exist in your blood and carry electrical
impulses (such as muscle contractions) between cells. They are important to
bodily processes that involve your heart, nerves and muscles.
Major electrolytes in your body include sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium.
During hard or prolonged exercise, perspiration drains you body of electrolytes,
particularly sodium and potassium. The typical result: fatigue and diminished
performance. Performance beverages help prepare and sustain an athlete's body in
sweaty conditions.
Beverages with high protein content (and thus higher caloric content) are
designed more for recovery, although some beverage-makers assert that protein
boosts endurance as well. Nutrients are rushed in liquid form to fatigued and
depleted muscles, speeding their ability to rebound and provide a high level of
performance the next day or later that same day.
Effervescent and Low-Calorie Beverages
These are a couple of relatively new twists on the performance beverage front.
Effervescent beverages come in tablet form and offer two benefits:
1) electrolyte replacement in a lower-calorie liquid and 2) a more
reservoir-friendly concoction for people who enjoy sipping a flavored beverage
through their hydration system. Effervescent tabs do not create the potential
for gunking-up a reservoir the same way a high-carb powdered energy drink mix
might. Most effervescent beverages also contain fewer calories than typical
sports drinks.
Many trainers and nutritionists advise exercisers training at no more than a
moderate level of intensity to drink diluted performance beverages or drinking
water at the same time when drinking a full-strength performance beverage. A
low-cal beverage can accomplish the same goal. Plus, by consuming fewer calories
in their beverages, athletes can obtain rely on more on solid food for their
caloric intake. Low-cal beverages also succeed at minimizing residue left inside
a hydration reservoir.
Snacks
Since most performance foods offer sweet or fruity flavors, the snack bar (with a
saltier flavor emphasis) now fills the salt-craving void for hikers and other
outdoor athletes. These foods offer the convenience of a single-serving snack
package that provides a healthier combination of ingredients than can be found
on grocery-store shelves.
Note: REI offers a volume discount on performance foods, but not snack foods.
Contributors: T.D. Wood, REI's far-hiking editor; Doug Peterson, REI product manager
Last Updated: October 2007.
