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USING ACTIVE ROOT
Learn how our drinks and gels can help keep you balanced, fuelled and hydrated during all forms of training and racing.
PRODUCT RANGE
There are four different types of Active Root product - Sports Drinks, Gel Mix, Energy Chews & ElectroLite - all help to keep the stomach behaving normally, but with varying amounts of fuel and hydration. Below you will find the details of what each of our product ranges contains and example nutrition plans.
SPORTS DRINK (500ml)
| BALANCE | FUEL | HYDRATE |
|---|---|---|
| Ginger | Carbs | Salt |
| 204mg | 32g | 400mg |
GEL MIX (1 Gel)
| BALANCE | FUEL | HYDRATE |
|---|---|---|
| Ginger | Carbs | Salt |
| 102mg | 24g | 80mg |
ENERGY CHEWS (1 Chew)
| BALANCE | FUEL | HYDRATE |
|---|---|---|
| Ginger | Carbs | Salt |
| 140mg | 6g | 50mg |
ELECTROLITE (500ml)
| BALANCE | FUEL | HYDRATE |
|---|---|---|
| Ginger | Carbs | Salt |
| 204mg | 8g | 400mg |
HOW MUCH DO I NEED?
Understanding how much fuel and hydration you need can be tricky. It depends on how strenuous the exercise is, how long you are exercising for, how much you weigh and the temperature of your environment.
The best place to start is the actual functionality of each product i.e. what it's going to do to help you perform and keep you going. The functionality of sports nutrition is usually divided into 'Fuel' and 'Hydration' and with Active Root we also have 'Balance' i.e. how much is the product going to settle your stomach.
Below are also a set of example activities which demonstrate how to use Active Root.
Stomach Settling - Ginger
It's simple, all our products contain ginger. By taking our drinks, gels or chews the ginger will help promote normal stomach behaviour and digestion. Ginger can help reduce nausea and alleivate issues with the stomach. The levels of ginger in each product are within the optimal tolerances of daily ginger intake and are configured to benefit your digestive system as much as possible.
Fuel - Cane Sugar
When working at a steady intensity, you need about 60g of carbohydrate per hour to keep fuelled. Both our Sports Drink and Gel Mix contain about 50% of this per serving, whereas Active Root ElectroLite only contains about 1/8. A lot of athletes work backwards from the 60g of carbs p/hour mark to work out what they should be taking in. In the case of Active Root that would mean: 1) 1x Gel Mix serving & 1x Sports Drink serving; 2) 2x Gel Mix servings and 1x ElectroLite serving or 3) 2x Sports Drinks servings, to get you to the 60g p/hour mark.
Hydrate - Sea Salt
Hydration is probably the most difficult element to measure as there's very little evidence as to 'how much' you need per hour. Both our Sports Drink and ElectroLite have 400mg of sea salt p/serving, in line with industry standard for rehydration products. Without any reliable evidence it's hard to be exact, but we'd provide two bits of advice. Even if it's not hot, you're going to sweat so make sure some form of hydration is part of your plan (take more than you expect to need), especially if you're going to be out for a long time. And, like fueling, try to drink little and often.
How To Use Active Root During Your Training Or Racing
After working out what you need, the next thing is to think about how and whether it's possible to take it with you. For instance, if you're running a marathon, you won't be able to rely upon 6x 500ml Active Root bottles. You'd probably take one bottle and a couple of 150ml gel soft flasks and a packet of chews. If you're riding a sportive however, you'll probably have 2x bottle cages and a couple of pockets for soft flasks or chews in your cycle jersey.
The golden rule when it comes to nutrition is 'try before race day', multiple times if you can. All Active Root products are light tasting and easy to digest The last thing you want is to hate the taste of the fuel that you're going to be using for the next 3 hours, or not be able to get your soft flask out of your waist belt without stopping and taking it off! We hope this goes some way in explaining how you could create an Active Root nutrition plan. Below are some recent examples from our own racing/training below as well as a guide to using Before/During or After. As always, if you have any questions please get in touch here at enquiries@activeroot.co.uk
2.5hr Trail Run
Before
- 1x 500ml bottle of Sports Drink
During
- 3x Gel Mix servings in 150ml soft flask OR 12 chews
- 1x 750ml bottle of sports drink
Post Run
- 1x 750ml bottle of Sports Drink (Green Tea)
35min Morning jog followed by 25min Gym session
During
- 1x 500ml bottle of Sports Drink (Original)
Post session
- 1x 500ml bottle of Lemonbalm ElectroLite+
4hr HILLY CYCLE
Before
- 1x 750ml bottle of Sports Drink
During
- 2x 750ml bottles of Sports Drink (Original and Peppermint)
- Additional x2 drink sachets to be filled at a water station
- 3x Gel Mix servings (1 flask) OR 4 chews
- 3x caffeinated Gel Mix servings (1 flask)
Post Ride
- 2x 750ml bottle of Sports Drink (Green Tea)
10K ROAD RACE
Before
- 1x 50ml Gel Mix Caffeine gel. OR 4 chews
During
- 1x 500ml bottle of Sports Drink (Original)
Post session
- 1x 500ml bottle of ElectroLite
