On the Go Fuel - goodbye gels

What I love the most about our home made ‘Nutritious Gel‘ recipe is that you are not only utilising two products you’d use on a race or during training but you’re also recycling the sachets… Ok, this isn’t the only thing I love, on par is that you can kiss goodbye to the sugar fix, gut-wrenching highs and lows of gels that also require, despite what is claimed considerable amounts of water… and then, when you’ve finished, that drained, I’ve got nothing left in my system feeling. Gels do work in moderation for some people but for most of the people we talk to they don’t, which is why our Mountain Fuellers kept asking us for an alternative.

I’ve based the recipe on making around 3 to 4 sachets and it will depend on your duration / use that will dictate whether you make more or less. You can store them in the fridge for use later in the week too. Remember we are all individual so there is no hard and fast rule as to how long the energy provision will last etc as this very much depends on type of activity, effort etc so play around and see what works for you. With that, tweak the measures of ingredients too but be careful on the volume of figs and dates and be conscious that you need fibre so the skins are essential.

Enough of the waffle this is how you make them.

Place the following into a blender (this mix will make four sachets and will keep well in the fridge so you can half or double the recipe depending on use for the day / week);

1/2 teaspoon of Morning Fuel
1 1/2 teaspoon of Xtreme Energy (Tropical or Blackcurrant)
1/2 banana
1 soft dried fig (chop it up a bit first)
1 desert spoon of chopped dates
50 to 150 ml of water (depending on consistency required)

Whizz up all the ingredients until thoroughly blended.Using scissors cut neatly across the tear line where you opened the sachets and then spoon around five or six spoonfuls into each sachet until evenly distributed.Using thumb and forefinger and or side of fingers push the mix into bottom of pouch and also clean up any excess that may have come over top edge.Fold over in roughly 1cm widths until you have a pouch and then use sellotape to seal the edges.With scissors cut a couple of nicks into the side of the foil so that you can easily open when ‘on the go’.

There you have it, you’ve now got an extra secret weapon in your Sports Nutrition bag that will not only help you perform better, feel better but also save you buying extra gels!

As a guide, in recent weeks we’ve tested our home made ‘Nutritious Gels’ in various different scenarios – this is not to say you would need the following for these activities as it does depend on your aims, effort etc;

5k Park Run – sipped a bottle of Xtreme Energy (500ml) made up from 1/2 sachet (ex teaspoon for ‘On the Go Fuel) two hours in advance and then consumed one ‘home made gel’ roughly 30 mins before.

10k hilly Trail Run – sipped a bottle of Xtreme Energy (500ml) made up from sachet (excluding a teaspoon for home made gel) two hours in advance and then consumed ‘home made gel’ roughly 30 mins before.

18 mile Fell Run with ~2000m of ascent – sipped a bottle of Xtreme Energy (500ml) made up from sachet (ex teaspoon for ‘home made gel’) two hours in advance and then sipped one more bottle full during the the run (4 hours). I also had small quantities of the ‘home made gel’ as I approached the big hills during the second half of the run and nibbled on around four or five power pancakes while fast walking up the steeper sections of the hills. I alternated between Xtreme Energy and sipping from my water bottle (500ml) during the run which at times was pretty hot.

50k Trail Run. Running on a combination of sipping energy fuel and home made gel throughout meant no other food or liquid was required. However this was running at a competitive pace (race win), you could also supplement this with easy to digest and carry food like the power pancakes.

Olympic distance Triathlon – sipped a bottle of Xtreme Energy (750ml) made up from sachet (ex teaspoon for ‘On the Go Fuel) two hours in advance and then alternated between Energy Fuel and water on the bike leg. Took the ‘home made gel’ in transition to run leg.