assuming you ate a decent breakfast about 2-3hr prior…
do you ingest any last minute carbs or caffine prior to heading to the line for a 3-4hr race or is that an invitation for stomach issues with a fast-paced start? Gels, flat soda, rich mix like maurten 360 etc? Otherwise, lll be trying to get to 80g carbs/hr during the event.
Yes, caffeine 30 prior and 25-40g carb gel 15 prior.
This is a personal question - everyone will react differently. The easiest way to find your answer is to try it in training - slam a gel 15 minutes before doing some VO2 intervals and see how your stomach feels
ETA: 30 minutes is generally considered too far from the start for carbs - for a starting point I’d suggest 10 minutes prior - try that and adjust accordingly
For a 4 hours race, I’ll do a big dose of caffeine ~10 minutes before the start. Maybe a gel or 2, but the caffeine is the main thing. Agree with the other comments that 30 minutes is a bit too long for carbs. And caffeine as well for me.
A caffeine gel around hour 3 helps keep the levels up
Caffeine pills upset my stomach. I down a Maurten caffeine gel 20 min before the start. For some reason by body relaxes as the caffeine starts to take effect. That takes about 10 minutes for me. In 20 minutes I’m over the relaxation effect and hoppin ready to roll.
If you’re going to be using gels to help you reach 80g/hour, it might be helpful to take that first gel just before the start of the race to get it out of the way, especially if it’s going to be a fast-paced start.