UrbanUpdate

Back in high school, Emily Brown began every track practice by doing two important things: lacing up her shoes and downing about a half-dozen sugar packets. Brown's now a registered dietitian at the Mayo Clinic Healthy Living Initiative, retired professional runner and 2009 U.S. cross country champion, so it's not like we can say "Don't eat sugar packets!" because she's done pretty well for herself. But her approach to the shameless consumption of diner sugar has, shall we say, evolved.

Brown's sugar packets have been repurposed as alternative power sources like gels and chews and beans and chomps and packets of something professional runners legitimately call "goo." On some level, they're all the same things: Pac-Man power pellets, space-food mixtures of glucose and fructose designed to normalize your blood sugar and delay the emptying of your glycogen tank.

Is goo for you? The answer is an unequivocal NO unless you are running a long-distance race, cycling up a mountain, or otherwise exercising for more than ninety minutes. If you are for some reason planning to spend the better part of an otherwise lovely summer day exerting yourself, here's what you need to know:

You do need to eat something for energy, and it almost doesn't matter what you eat as long as it contains carbs. "You could have a swig of maple syrup," says Boston sports nutritionist Nancy Clark. "Some people like energy bars, biscotti, cookies. I happen like little Milky Ways myself. You just need calories that digest easily."

Goos are to be taken sporadically. Brown says you need forty to sixty grams of carbohydrates every forty-five minutes to an hour. "But I've been to marathons where I see people with a belt with, sure enough, 26 gels strapped to them." Don't let that be you.

You'll want to wash your gel down with six to eight ounces of water, to dilute the sugar as it pours into your bloodstream (which happens within a few minutes). Not doing so can create or exacerbate GI problems, by which we mean they'll turn your bowels into a Faith No More album by Mile 9.

Note that we said water, not sports drink. You could do Gatorade or a goo, but not both. "That's a double sugar dose," Brown says. "Your body's not gonna like that."

You don't need any fancy extras in your goo. Brown says gels that offer extra vitamins and minerals aren't necessary. One exception: caffeine, which is a nice thing to have in your system (though you already knew that).

From there it's a matter of personal taste and texture. Gels taste like icing, which is festive and delicious, unless you're carcass-dehydrated, in which case they might make you want to die in a Port-a-Potty. "It depends on what you want to be tasting when you finish twenty-six miles," Brown says. Just be sure to try them out in training. As is the case with shoes, drinks, socks or underwear, don't try a new one for a race. Under no circumstances should you stop at Mile 16 just because some company is offering a free product—or even a flavor—you haven't heard before.

Don't sweat this. As Clark says, "People have been athletic for years without gels and goos and performed just fine."

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