Gerda Steyn shares her top three carbo-loading tips for long-distance runners, emphasising the importance of personal experimentation and practice to find the optimal energy intake strategy. Picture: Gerda Steyn/Facebook
Image: Gerda Steyn/Facebook
While Gerda Steyn has been busy getting back into the routine of her demanding training schedule for the Comrades Marathon, the Smiling Assassin also made time to give some timely tips for average runners.
One of the most common questions posed to any kind of elite marathon runner normally focusses on fuelling. This has been the case for Steyn again after her Two Oceans Marathon win earlier this month.
While someone like Steyn would complete a standard marathon in under or around the two-hour 30-minute mark, the average runner will spend close to double that on the road in the same race.
It’s for that reason that fuelling is always a hot topic. How exactly does a normal person run for over four hours without their energy and blood glucose levels inevitably dropping?
That is the question indeed, and Steyn sought to answer those burning questions in a typically cheeky post that she is becoming known for on social media.
“A few years back, carb intake was mostly explained in gels every xx minutes or xx kilometres. Nowadays, we talk xx carbs per hour,” said Steyn on Facebook.
“I used to calculate my race day (marathon and up) energy intake as approx. 1x Gel plus energy drink every 5km.
“In 2026 terms, that is approx. 80-100g carbohydrates per hour. Some athletes aim for much higher and some can barely stomach any, but the punchline is: YOU NEED ENERGY when you run for a long time.”
Steyn, though, drove home the point that runners need to find out in training runs what works best for them.
“There is a lot of information out there and it can be confusing at times, so when that happens, strip it down to the basics and build from there.
Rule 1: You need carbs.
Rule 2: You probably need more than you think.
Rule 3: Not all bodies are equal, so practice, practice, practice.
Rule 4: Do your own studying before following every influencer’s clever 4 Rules.”