Very cool

Signed up

Thank you

I signed up some time ago (or rather, you had to do it manually), but I haven’t heard anything after that.

Signed up

Some advice - I'd provide an explanation somewhere on the site or here about what makes you different and how that helps the athlete.

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Professional interests in Genomics, Bioinformatics, Hardware/Software interfaces, sports interests are running from 800 to half marathon, sprint tri to half iron, cycling road races

https://brave.com/ - A safer and faster way to browse the web
https://www.strava.com/athletes/3757906

1) what does the app do?
2) what do you expect beta testers to do?

Thanks!

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

I also signed up earlier but did not receive anything. Would love to be a part of the project.

I'll email you next week at the latest.. Thank you for signing up.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Will do! Serious website build-out coming very soon.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

We've been holding out getting the app in folks hands until I could polish it up a bit. Wanted to save some fresh eyes for the new roll-out. Very much appreciate your patience and interest.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Sounds great, thanks Dr. Alex!

The app writes workout and race fueling plans for you.

Sports that it covers:

Triathlon
Cycling
Running
Swimming
Rowing
XC Skiing

It uses the products you like, selected from our hand-curated library. And you can add and save your own too. It also recommends the addition of sugar and/or salt or sodium citrate, which indeed are optimal additions to 90% of folks' mixes.

Use the app. Complain when they don't like it. Try to hurt my feelings with harsh criticism.

I bet we'll share opinions on most things, because I also want it to do what 99.9% of users want it to do. And it will. In the future.

My development team tries hard to keep up with Michelle and my demands.

So far, Michelle and I are winning. If you know a developer interested in hearing about us, send them here.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Thank you. Glad to have you.

To all who signed up,

Thank you. It's truly humbling to see your interest.

If you're doing a tri, or back-to-back workout soon - like a brick - I'd love to have your feedback on the tri &/or brick features pre-launch.

Finally, we may cap at 500 testers. Today put us over 400. If you know someone who would be exceptionally interested, please have them sign up asap.

Thanks again.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

signed up!

willing to try it!

Brilliant! Signed up and hoping to get on the feelings hurting train!

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

Love it.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Tagged in on the Google form. If you haven't already topped off.

Is this separate from the Fuel app project? If so, and if I was apart of that, am I "moved over" to this one automatically, or do I need to re-register. Thank you sir!!!

I intended for this to be a short reply, but, alas...

Old app vs. new app:
Yes, they're the same project, but the new app has been totally revamped, inside and out, and some of it requires us to have everyone go download a totally new app. The old app will be discontinued and unusable. We're pretty sure it will be worth it, but we'll let everyone else be the judge! Thank you for putting up with the inconvenience. It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway, we promise never to do a crazy thing like forcing people to redownload an app, once we're fully live in app stores! This is a one-time thing, and I can't thank you enough for being part of this with us.

When you'll be contacted:

• If you accessed the app but never filled out the beta sign-up form, you'll get an email next week notifying you of how to make the move to the new app.
• If you did sign up through the beta sign-up form, at some point in the past (or do now), then you'll probably get an email today or tomorrow with a detailed update. (and one next week with same "how to move" message as the first bullet, immediately above).

App availability, what to expect:

• For all users, new and old, the new app: Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, is rolling out a final-public-beta-launch next week between Jan 23 and Feb 2. This is the aforementioned one-time "redownload."
• We'll smash bugs and make minor tweaks/fixes from then until full public launch. We hope all our beta users will complain a lot so that we can catch them all before going fully live. :)
• We launch fully to app stores around Valentines day.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

FYI Dr. and anyone waiting on news, the first email went to my junk folder.

Signed up a few weeks ago but did not receive an email. Thx.

Alex and others - also to my spam (gmail). Thanks to the poster above for the heads up.

Lol, fantastic. Great start to our new usage of Klaviyo as a bulk email sender.

If anyone sees an email address ending in @saturdaymorning.fit, that's me trying to contact you. Which I promise to do intensely sparingly because I hate spam.

There will be a welcome email flow during your trial usage of the app after launch, but beyond that, it'll be mostly crickets or occasional information that I think people will REALLY want to hear. I guard my own inbox tightly against spam and expect others like to do the same!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

PS. we just sent the first one out in about 5 months, yesterday. So if it's been silent from us, you haven't missed anything.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Re: bulk mailing

Most email marketing systems (mailchimp, klavyio, constant contact) for their basic subscription use shared IP addresses for their outbound mail. If some of the other thousands of users in that shared IP address get flagged as a spammer, the server doesn't know the difference between Dr. Harrison and Nigerian Prince with $325M to send to your bank account so it blocks the whole address which means Dr. Harrison winds up in the junk folder. If you read the features comparison for different subscription levels, find the one that gives your mail a unique IP address and as long as you don't start scamming people, your emails should go through without a problem (sometimes there is a window early on with a "new" IP that the servers will need to learn to trust you, but it goes away quickly).

Now, Re: Tri fueling strategies with the app...

It currently allows to pick one of the 3 sports and I've used it to fuel with great success (unlimited carb level and max performance setting with sodium citrate) not having any GI issues and decreasing or eliminating the smell of ammonia I was getting post workout from catabolic breakdown due to being a generally low carb/whole 30 type eater.

I have tested alternative fuel tolerance by going very high concentration (275g carbs(250g table sugar, 25g gatorade), 2tsp sodium citrate, 200mg caffeine) per 500ml of water. I consumed approximately 200g of carb worth of that drink during a 40min threshold/race pace without issue.

I did the above because my bike has 500ml Elite crono bottles and I am doing a sprint tri this weekend. 750m swim, 21km bike, 5km run. I am a 210lb, 43yo athlete who isn't in incredible shape. I am unsure of what my swim time will be, my FTP is about 230w on the bike and my 5k run will probably be about 35-39min. Running is not at all easy for me and I have a difficult time fueling during a run from a HR management perspective, I need to come to a walk, drink, make sure I can breathe again then resume running. Add to that I don't know what is being provided on course for the run and don't want to rely on it.

My plan is to make a 1L 500g carb 4tsp sodium citrate, 400mg caffeine bottle, half of that will go into my on-bike bottle for nutrition, the other bottle will have water only to wash down as needed (that concentration was a little...tangy...in the throat). The remainder of the 1L will be used to sip/take a swig prior to wading into the water after donning my wetsuit for the in-water/treading swim start. I am hoping that bit of nutrition will take me through the swim, I will load up on carbs during the ride, then be able to go without nutrition at all (maybe grab a water for a quick sip) during the run.

Thoughts on the approach and perhaps thoughts on how the app will approach or instruct fueling for a race when you can't eat at all during the swim and the ability to intake and uptake are different on the bike vs run?

Thanks for all of the work you're putting into this, it has absolutely improved the quality and enjoyment of my training.

Signed up. Waiting impatiently for email.... I mean it HAS been 34,35,36 seconds.

Thanks for signing up. We finally smashed the major onboarding bug. I'm sending out a big email blast shortly. If you don't get it in the next hour, please email let me know here.

To all helping us in the beta testing, your feedback has been tremendous!

Keep it coming!

I may be torturing our (growing) engineering team, but I think it will be worth it. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Good info re: new IP. Thank you!

Good plan.

We're updating the instructional texts within the app to help the race scenarios. Should be done within the week. The overall message should be: consume all of what's recommended for the swim for before the swim, during warm-up and while waiting for swim-start. Consume the rest for the bike and run, as you normally would, steadily, during both of those legs of the race.

Stay tuned!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Just found this thread and downloaded the app. I went to plan it for my ride today and have the following comments:

- It wasn’t clear to me what “speed nector” was at first. I thought this was an actual product I had to buy from the app or a third party. Eventually I figured out it’s just how much table sugar and salt I would put in water. I suggest renaming this to “make your own” or something

- I usually fuel with Gatorade endurance. I put in the 24 oz bottle and selected one serving only to find this added just 22g of sugar. In an entire bottle (24 oz) of Gatorade endurance there are 44g of sugar/carbs. Gatorade considers one serving to be a 12 oz bottle. I think you need to double your carbs for the 24 oz bottle.

- I didn’t exactly know what effort to put for my ride today. It’s a 2 hr zone 2 ride with about 30 minutes of v02 max intervals. I wasn’t sure where this fell in the how hard is your ride today question. Picking the intervals seems to hard but picking the low aerobic seemed too low

Otherwise great stuff. I look forward to using it more!!

Woah good catch about the Gatorade endurance bottle. Fixing asap.


Great point about Speed Nectar. I’m glad you figured it out. You’re right though, it isn’t immediately clear that we're not trying to sell a product. We’ll make that more clear.


Great points about the intensity too. I'd rate yours as one of the in-between options. I generally recommend just intuitively averaging for the overall "feel" of the intensity and picking based on your first gut feeling. We've written it to align with how you do that. We'll get more quantitative in the future, but there's a chance that intuitive rating is actually better until I create a better proxy for effort and glycogen burn rates than NP or AP alone. We'll test it. Had a chat with Tim Podlogar today. He's got a couple smart friends in machine learning. I'm twisting some arms (politely and with a carrot on a stick). Cross your fingers. It will be for the good of us all.


This intensity rating is something we thought about for a silly number of hours. Side story: we made intensity selection a slider for a few weeks but humans use sliders in funny and unexpected ways. Us included. Psychology of interaction design is fascinating.


You can join our space "What Intensity is my xyz?" if you're interested. There's also the Saturday Feedback space. It's like a Facebook group without the Facebook.


Always feel free to ask questions or provide feedback here too. I'd make a thread for feedback here too, but that seems a little bold on someone else's platform until we're big enough to drive traffic to their site. Wishing I could tag @rrheisler & @slowman. ;)


Does someone want to tell TrainingPeaks that we're cool enough for them to accept our usage of their API?

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I'm happy to tell them.....but, they just now implemented a feature I asked for 6 years ago (weather forecast on the Calendar). So, it might be a while....

Would love that. Yes, their dev team seems to move slower than ours for some reason. I can't imagine why. It's not like they have that many users or are handling that much data. \pink

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I've been a engineering product manager for 30 years. I've met with Gear Fischer in Fort Collins (way back in the day). They don't get that much slack from me. Prioritize.

Done: if you have an account you can vote for the idea here:

https://peaksware.uservoice.com/...te-with-saturday-fit

Excellent. Thanks for the responses. I’m looking forward to your next article here as well

I'll just bump that ^^^ for the folks in the back. :)

Appreciate you making that feature request, Tom.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

You're welcome. Glad you're enjoying the article series too.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

In, and bumping with a unsolicited testimonial.

This app and your Youtube videos last year were the first 'aha' moments I've had in tri in a long time. I think I'm 32 or 33 Ironmans into this game, and was pretty confident that I had covered off any personal blind spots in training and racing that could be covered off. Alacrity/Saturday, and the two-part Youtube vids on restricted eating, precipitated a huge change in my training mindset, beliefs and behaviours. (and you have no idea how surprising it is to a 50+ year old athlete to experience a "huge change" in anything, anywhere) Keep up the great work.

Totally agree with respect to those two vids. All of them really, but there is something immensely valuable about Michelle's open and honest personal sharing in those two. It has really made me (as another 50+ Male, lifelong athlete) stop and think about my own behaviors. Particularly, as I sit here mid-way through trying to lose 30 lbs (15 down, 15 to go).

It was clear to me from the get go what "Speed nectar" was. I mean it was written right there. But I didn't find the idea of having water with sugar and salt that appealing. (Normally I eat grass when I want to puke - Triumph the Insult Comic Dog).

However, I did try it yesterday and it was surprisingly... tasty? Not too much of either in the water (2 tbsp of brown sugar, 1/3 tsp of salt in 0.75 liter), but rest assured I will test my limits :)

I second the comments about intensity. Saturday's big selling point is that you don't need a PhD to use it, it's super quick to set up a session, and and there's virtually no learning curve. But to figure out the intensity of a 7x3' at 110% with zone 1 recoveries and zone 2 filler time to 75 minutes is a bit of a head scratcher. Imperfect as it is, IF could be a guideline. I'd like to see the option to enter IF or TSS so that the app returns the intended intensity level. After a dozen uses we would no longer need to know the IF/TSS to guesstimate average intensity.

However, I understand that you may be reluctant to implement this as the goal is to simply be importing workouts from Trainingpeaks?

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

Yep, you can help us expedite that goal of importing workouts from TrainingPeaks by voting here. https://peaksware.uservoice.com/...te-with-saturday-fit

Okay, I have to share something really important, folks.


We did not expect anyone would actually JUST use Speed Nectar. You all are tougher than nails. Add some flavor please!

We designed the entire app to really strongly encourage people to be willing to use ANY Speed Nectar at all. We didn't think you would! "Try drinking some sugar and salt" is sometimes a hard sell, ya know? We just wanted folks to be open to trying it at least once, for at least a little bit of their fuel.

Looks like our design worked! lol. Really appreciate you all gracing us with your feedback. Means the world.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I may have fist pumped while holding back tears. This is why we're in it.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

See above fist pumping and sobbing. Michelle and I have received countless others from younger men and women on other platforms. I knew the videos needed to be made. I knew they were important. But it really didn't hit home until we started hearing other people's stories.

Hearing how the app has granted some folks a feeling of license to fuel adequately, for the first time in their lives, man that's an amazing thing.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Juat downloaded it. Looks great.

Used the app yesterday for a 4.5 hr ride and it went great. I just used the speed nectar and the tase was fine. One small thing was I used 74 fl oz of water and I have different size water bottles so I had to do a lot of math to figure out how much sugar and salt to put in each. It would be cool if you could plug in how many water bottles and the size you will be using so it automatically calculates this. Maybe there is a better way than the way I did it lol

I agree with your comment! It would also be great to be able to set the small paper cups given at races as containers.

yeah I second this- would be useful to know how much of each to put in each bottle instead of having to find a massive bottle to mix everything in. Otherwise really liking the app- makes it super convinient + have been feeling great after sessions as a reult of fuelling & drinking properly.

For one more data point, for a sprint Tri I did a couple weekends ago, I had a single 1L bottle with water, 250g carb (50g gatorade/200g table sugar), 2tsp sodium citrate, 400mg caffeine. I poured half in my 500ml Elite crono bottle and drank most of the other half in the 15min prior to the swim start. I nearly finished (maybe 50ml remaining) the 500ml bottle by the end of the bike leg and went on to the run with no water or nutrition. Maybe it was the fueling strategy, maybe it was adrenaline, maybe both, but I PR'd that 5k run by 4 minutes.

Also, more proof that you can take 250g of carbs in an hour and survive.

We are going to bump up water bottle distribution and fuel carriage options in our development pipeline. Appreciate all the feedback here! Please keep it coming.

Edit to add: I intended this as a reply to many of the recent posts, not just yours! Awesome to hear your experience and major congrats!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I’m really enjoying testing the app. I find it’s helping me carry only what I need and not what I think I will need, without any decline in performance so far.

That's fantastic. Really glad to hear that.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

If you are an iOS user and you are experiencing any weirdness around trying to subscribe, please let me know.

We're actively working on solving this subscription issue tonight.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Thanks for the awesome app Dr Harrison and Michelle! My partner and I have both been using it to train for ironman/ultra distance tri and so far it's been great! We've only just started, but I can see this is going to be a game changer for those 6+hour workouts!

2 features/fixes that I'd like to suggest, if it helps!

1. Swim: I'm not sure what the speed default is set to to calculate the time, but when I enter distance, it way overestimates the amount of time (ex: for 2500m it says 1:20). Right now I just enter whatever distance gives me an hour, but could we have an option to enter time rather than distance, like for cycling or running?
2. I feel like some sort of reminder to check in after would be useful, as well as additional metrics to track afterwards. Something to enter what you actually did consume vs what was prescribed, maybe a percentage (95% of planned nutrition consumed, showing your totals for water salt and sugar), charting it against the feeling emoji, so we can start to notice patterns (ooh look, the days where I finished my bottles I had more positive emojis, etc.) Maybe this is already in the works, but I would find that very useful!

Our free trial is ending soon and we'll be signing up for sure!

I was on the Alacrity FUEL build on testflight and the build has been removed. Is there a new signup to be pushed the latest version?

Your wish is my command.
Your wish is my command, again!

Yep both of these are in the works. I so appreciate your patience while we work on it. Please keep the ideas coming.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Thank you for speaking up, here. I think there are more folks in your position.

"Saturday" is the new app name. Download it below.

Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration is the full app name but most people (us too!) just call it Saturday. Saturday Morning LLC replaced Alacrity Endurance LLC. We just found that the other business and app names we were using were too hard to really "get behind" and certainly too hard to design and brand together. So we though [really] hard about long-term company vision and what our users wanted to experience, and how we wanted to serve them. Saturday (the app) and Saturday Morning (the company name), pretty much sum it up. Nothing like the opportunity and energy of going long on Saturday, or prepping for a Sunday race on Saturday.

iOS app download page:
https://apps.apple.com/...dration/id6444738746

Android Saturday app download page:
https://play.google.com/...ay.hydration.gx.fuel

(ps. if you were formerly a "FUEL" user or "Alacrity FUEL" beta tester, you will need to download Saturday. We incorporated a bunch more personalization and new features and we think you'll think it's worth it once you see it. I am really sorry for the inconvenience to some of our earliest beta testers and if you feel like that wasn't the best route to go once you get it downloaded, I hope that you'll share that with us. We always want the most frank opinions.)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

It'd be great if you highlighted assumptions being made and values that are calculated:
It would also be useful if you had optional inputs for assumptions. Many people know their FTP, Sweat Rate(s), etc. The app could also "learn" with a retro-spective analysis by helping athletes determine sweat rate for their ride.

E.g.
1. App has my weight, rough fitness (although, I don't know what "Advanced" truly means), etc.
2. App asks how long I'm riding
3. App asks ride intensity (sometimes this is hard to judge)
4. App checks the weather

Out of this multiple assumptions occur:
1. Workload
2. Caloric Expenditure
3. Substrate Utilization
4. Sweat Rate
5. Sweat composition

---

I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

Fantastic feedback. We are planning retrospective feedback-based analysis and future nutrition output adjustments.

We will definitely incorporate more advanced data usage and analytics in the future. The algorithms are already ready for that. We took a slightly different route than most tech because I think it's somewhat needed in this space. Most sport tech caters to super users first, and sometimes gets stuck never leaving the super user. We wanted to bring solid science to my mother in law (who runs, sometimes. but who does not "do" apps) Our first goal was to make an app that ANYONE could get professional recommendations from.

Our second goal (of course, because Michelle and I have been elite athletes in some form or another) is to allow super users and elite athletes (and everyone in between) to enter loads of specific quantitative details. We'll soon have it just sync it from their various platforms they already use.

I'm glad to hear that you're desires are in line with where we're planning to go. That kind of feedback has been very humbling and gratifying to receive. Of course, please continue to hit us with all the thoughts!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Make the leap from Fuel to Saturday and my account came across with no issues.

For the personal best page, is 100yd swim the only option? The numerical entry field keypad never goes away if there is supposed to be a next button at the bottom of the page. Related, does the performance data change anything or just a nice to have tracking metric?

Hmmm..... we may actually need to troubleshoot here because that should not happen. There is a newer more detailed onboarding that helps us set up your initial user settings better than the old version.

For now the performance-data (if you mean the notes and activity ratings after-the-fact) is a nice-to-have but will probably help modify fueling recommendations in the future, if that's what you mean.

Yep, for now the 100yd swim is the only PR entry and just helps estimate swim workout duration. Soon you'll be able to input either/or (duration or distance and we'll predict duration for you).

Hmm... go back to your app store on your phone and check for updates. That issue was part of an earlier version. Let me know what version you're on. For more reliable/faster help, and up-to-date info, we can also chat on Saturday Member Hub if you want. It does require another account but login is pretty easy.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Holy cow I was thinking kind of along these lines this morning! If we have a prescribed workout, we know what the intensity factor target should be (or what the average power target is), as well as the duration. With these we can calculate the kJ output for the whole ride and maybe even changing conditions along the way to get prompted to eat/drink more or less often. I'm pretty good with the workload part of this calculation but it seems to get messy for the other side (fueling)...the Saturday app is helping me along though.

Rich

I know product development well and I think Alex trying to keep this "simple" is a noble quest!

For some, they'll want real-time updates based on intensity, etc.

But for most, the general recommendation gets them what they need at the level they need it.

I can see product development occurring where more advanced features are accessible by more advanced users, but to be honest, that should be a future development.

(sorry for the tangent, I really like thinking about how to make things).

---

I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

 I am with you! But I also like that there is refinement possible for future versions and maybe my ramblings will trigger a good idea in someone else

Just thought I'd add my experiences thus far. I've been using the App since early February for all of my run in excess of an hour (8 - 12 miles generally). These are my harder runs that involve: mile repeats, extended tempo, fartleks, hill repeats, etc. During that time, the weather here in Dallas has ranged from 17F/20%rh to 87F/65%rh.

Saturday allows you to select "fasted" or not-fasted...and alters the fuel/hydration accordingly. I've used it in both situations, across these runs. I always weigh pre/post run and have taken the time to ensure that my pre-weigh starts before consuming any hydration (and in just my skivvies to minimize errors---sorry for any mental images that may induce).

Two observations:

1. Every run has ended between 0.9 - 1.1 lbs below starting weight, regardless of duration, intensity, temperature, or humidity. I have zero issues with consuming the volume, nor any GI issues. Historically, I've been an under-drinker. But, I've finished every run, so far, sucking an dry straw from my vest.

2. I've found that following the fueling recommendations allows me to complete the prescribed workout without the same feeling of "exhaustion". By that I mean I get to the point where I can feel the workload in my legs, and can tell if I keep going I'm going to dig a deep hole before my brain says "I'm done...time to stop". Mostly, because the first few times, I keep going to the same normal "done" mental state, only to be cooked for 3-4 days before I could get back to it. So, I've had to adjust my cues for when to stop, so that I can still do tomorrow's workout and the next day....I need to be able to tell when "one-more" will be too many...rather than feeling like "no more" is just right.

Interesting food for thought.

There's a strong testimonial here somewhere.

"Warning: Saturday may cause euglycemia. Before using Saturday consult with a trained professional to learn new cues to stop training, because your hypoglycmia-induced mental weakness won't be there for you anymore."

"Saturday. Train so hard you injure yourself."

I don't think those are going to fly with our branding & marketing department (wife).

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Please keep them coming! It's really good to hear what folks are thinking / wishing for. Or especially what folks are frustrated by. We probably share your pain points and want to hear about them.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I might put a slightly different spin on it. But, it is specifically branding and marketing's job to take engineering speak, and make it sound enticing---even if by the time they are done with it, its patently false. If (as the product manager) I don't read it and cringe, they aren't trying hard enough.

Just a quick update that the latest update should solve any folks subscription issues. The rest of the app has been working great. But it's been blocking us from taking your money, in some cases. And in other cases it's taken your money and then pretended like you weren't subscribed. (not cool!!) If that's you, please reach out and I can fix it immediately with a VIP override I can grant you. This recent update prevents that from ever happening again for new subscribers. (v1.0.44, rolled out today.)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Feature request

For the speed nectar recommendation, it'd be great if you could prescribe by bottle or by oz/ml.

The leap from 4.7L of water and 3.125cups of sugar into how much to pour into a each bottle is tough.

Perhaps it could be
Bottle 1: ask size,
Ask if bottle 2 -> ask size
Etc.

Then sum volume as a check and amounts per bottle.

---

I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

This is coming asap. Hotly requested for sure and has been in the pipeline since inception in 2021. It is now up next on our dev schedule of major features.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Despite being budget focused, I broke down and bought some maltodextrin to see if I felt different with the gatorade/sugar/sodium citrate concoction.

Now my question: can the maltodextrin be a substitute for sugar in your recipe? I.e, can I swap out the 150 grams of sugar I would otherwise use with 150 grams of maltodextrin (paired with a serving of gatorade powder for taste)? Or do I need to add fructose?

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

I'm not Alex, but I think I know this answer from reading his posts =P.

Sugar = 1:1 glucose:fructose.

Maltodextrin is just glucose, so you need to add fructose as well. 75g of each in your example.

It depends on what ratio of glucose to fructose you want.

Old-school is 2:1. New school is 1:0.8. I use 1:1. Lots of folks are doing it. The scientific literature will soon agree.

Acceptable options according to the literature reviews are: 2:1, 1:0.8. If you really look hard at what's not being said in the literature reviews, 1:1 is being left out of major reviews and meta-analyses.

Sidebar:
My wife is applying to be on some of the committees that help decide what gets published by major journals and nutrition governing bodies, now that she's board certified as a sport dietitian. The literature has been behind the times and she feels pretty strongly about moving it forward. Meanwhile, I play on internet forums. :)

Here's how to get each ratio, from sugar & maltodextrin:

• Old school: 2:1 glucose:fructose ratio → 1 part maltodextrin to 2 parts sugar. In your case: 50g maltodextrin plus 100g sugar.
• New school: 1:.8 glucose:fructose ratio → 1 part maltodextrin to 8 parts sugar. In your case: ~17g maltodextrin plus 133g sugar.
• My school: 1:1 glucose:fructose ratio → Pure sugar. In your case: 150g sugar.

Here's how to get each ratio from fructose & maltodextrin, if that's more your style. Not as cheap. Just as effective.

• Old school: 2:1 glucose:fructose ratio → 2 parts maltodextrin to 1 part fructose. In your case: 100g maltodextrin plus 50g fructose.
• New school: 1:.8 glucose:fructose ratio → 5 parts maltodextrin to 4 parts fructose. In your case: ~83g maltodextrin plus 67g fructose.
• My school: 1:1 glucose:fructose ratio → 1 part maltodextrin to 1 part fructose. In your case: 150g sugar...errr... sorry: 75g maltodextrin plus 75g fructose.

If you're using a relatively small contribution from gatorade, it won't matter if the gatorade is 2:1, 1:1, or something else. Ratios are clean and pretty. Physiology is anything but clean and pretty.

Hope that helps!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Hello!

Same here with the "PBs page". I only have the option to set my fastest 100m swim, but nothing else.

Also, when I tried to check previews triathlon recipes, It only let me check the swim recipe, not the other ones.

Everything else works like a charm!

Just wanted to put it out there that I've been using the app for about a week and it is phenomenal. I have always done my swims first thing in the morning and never had any sort of fuel aside from water just assuming that it would make me feel like crap. Turns out, just by drinking some nectar on my way to the pool and in between reps I finish my swims with times that are just about as good as how I start. I've used it for other workouts too but the swim has shown huge improvements, especially in the last 1/3 of the swim with just this tiny adjustment.

Suggestions that I think would help, some of which I think you've gotten:

• Post workout review especially including -- what % of the fuel did I ingest
• Calibrating the amounts to typical water bottle sizes--if it's more than one or 1 1/2 fine, but a thought
• For the run...I get that fueling consistently is great but...carrying 2 full water bottles for a long run is tough so suggestions/hacks for this would be fabulous!

Thanks for this app. It's great!

We totally created a point of confusion here! The swim personal best input is just to help us help you predict your swim activity duration because early-on in testing lots of users found it cumbersome to have to know exactly how long their swim would be because they "thought" in yards or meters, rather than duration. (We will soon include the option to input duration or distance, just so you've got the choice).

We will add more personal bests soon too, especially once we're synced with other platforms. If you happen to use TrainingPeaks, you can poke them to let them know you'd like us to get to sync up with them, by voting here.

Oh! You, my friend, are a winner. You found a design flaw that we were unaware of. I'll rectify this ASAP, and let you know when I've fixed it and pushed out an update with the fix.

If it is currently mission-critical for you to view those recipes now, you can work around this in the meantime by going to your "Past" activities tab, then long-pressing on the triathlon activity and moving it to today. Once it's moved to today, you'll be able to view all the recipes within it. We're fixing this ASAP because this is totally a 'hack' workaround that nobody should have to do. Are you trying to edit the activity details by tapping "edit" in the activity detail view?

Everything else works like a charm![/quote]Really glad to hear it!! Seriously appreciate you taking the time to share any issues you're having here.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I looked but couldn’t find the answer

What is the cost of the app after the 14 day free trial please?

Q2 (starts tomorrow) is a team all-in on making the "how do I actually make and carry this fuel" a better user experience. Bottle sizes, prescriptions, app memory/automation/prediction, hydration pack considerations, etc.

I would love to hear how you'd optimize your run-fueling experience, personally. (other folks' input is more than welcome here too.)

Do you ever use a hydration pack? I'd love to hear any and all details of how you do it, or what your magical, seemingly impossible, ideal scenario might look like. Sometimes I can work a bit of magic nutritionally/strategically, and I just need to know what folks prefer. I know there are a lot of folks (myself included) that, for running, the mindset is: "can I finish this run without dying? Okay I won't carry anything."

We are planning to add a feature like "minimalist - balanced - nutrition optimal at all costs" where you can note how much you'd like us to help you modify your workout fuel or shift some of the fueling and hydration beforehand. I suspect the "minimalist" is going to be a really popular option. :)

And, yes, those other requests are hotly requested too. Please keep it coming. Feedback from people using the app is what drives us forward. Especially if your opinion is, "it's got serious problems!"

To any lurkers here reading this: If the app isn't your cup of tea, or if you have any manner of negative opinion of it, please let us know here (or email me at alex @ saturdaymorning.fit if that's easier) and I would love to learn from you. You are a wealth of important knowledge and I'd be happy to chat about anything nutritionally you're interested in, as a trade for your time. We can talk shop or I can answer questions unrelated to the app, or we can just chat about whatever you like, if you're also willing to tell me why the app doesn't work for you. I would love to hear from you, truly.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I wish that I had a 'magical ideal situation' but I don't. I do not use a hydration pack, though I used to for long hikes etc, but it just feels like dead weight on my back and feels like it slows me down. Probably more feel than fact there, but so it goes.
I do have a belt that I wear to carry my nutrition (maple syrup and salt usually--and my phone for long runs) which I sometimes do pop a water bottle in but only a small bottle really fits. For my longer runs (I'm marathon training right now) I have done a few things including dropping bottles off on the road ahead of time and/or just running by my pool and running in to grab a drink real quick. I've often subscribed to 'can i survive with nothing?' approach which doesn't seem great. I am not able (or just don't) consistently do any of these things though and, having done it last saturday for my 20 miler, found it super helpful. I'm just honest enough with myself to know that I won't do this all the time cause often I don't know when in a weekend day I'll be running, having 2 small kids and all, thus the question.
thanks

Gotcha. Very much appreciate the introspective response. Sounds like there is a fair amount of uncertainty in approach, and like any method we implement is going to need to be flexible and easy to navigate. That's really helpful.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

2.99 a month, which comes with lifetime grandfathered-in pricing.


I know folks had concerns around Strava's tactics for rate increases. Ray's piece that contrasted TR to Strava was eye-opening. We hope to obviate that concern completely for our early adopters. We're calling that the first 5000 subscribers.


Humongous thank you to you all who have joined us, and another thank you to those of you who have shared us with someone. Could not be more grateful over here.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

That is an insanely my low price

I’m joining now

I honestly wasn’t going to do the free trial because I figured it would cost much more thank that

I was going to post the question here but was a little embarrassed to

If I were you I would have that be the first thing you see in the website

Thank you for the a reply!!

I may just take your advice. That's a good point. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Just joined

I am honestly completely blown away

For anyone who is on the fence about trying it

Do it!

Less than 5 minutes and I now have an exact recipe for tomorrow 3500 yard swim session and 3 hour bike workout

This is crazy good

I was a full on doubter about this app

WOW!!!

😃

NO payment method needed for the 14 day free trial!


This is not the usual

Thinking you would require a credit card for the free trial and then having to chase after to cancel it was another reason I didn’t do the trial

But for sure I am onboard and will set up payments when the free trial ends

We prioritize user experience over everything because we are coaches first. I'm glad it feels that way. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Because I'm wicked smaht I realized I could mix everything in the biggest mixing bowl we have - heating slightly on the stove to encourage the sugar to dissolve in the cold tap water - THEN pour the drink into bottles AFTER the mixture was made.

For those who want to know; I used a full sized whisk for thorough integration - not the Binging with Babish Tiny Whisk (tm).

---

I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

Yes, fair amount of uncertainty...AND...now that I'm seeing the benefits I want to mend my ways. Again yesterday did a hard run directly after masters swim fueled according to the apps plan and my goodness does it make a difference. (I feel like I'm a paid pr guy for you right now).

So, my point/question was, yes I haven't had a great plan for carrying fuel, but I want one. As you guys ramp up I'd love to see/hear any suggestions for how to do it better.

Would love to have anyone's feedback on what we build next.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

sorry if this is a stupid question, but does sodium citrate taste less "salty" than mortens salt when added to a drink mix/nectar?

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the world's still turning? >>>>>>> the world's still turning

Yep. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Been reading as many of your fueling threads as possible and have used the app a couple times now. Just signed up as a paid subscriber. One question I have - do the ratios of the sodium citrate/sugar/water stay the same across time and effort level - with just an increase of decrease in total mix per hour based on intensity and duration?

I guess what I'm really asking is if there is a way to create my personal "mix" of speed nectar based on my stats and my added Gatorade flavor to mix dry in bulk then use the app to tell me how much of my mix to measure out.

So for example - if my speed nectar is always X grams of Sodium Nitrate and X grams of sugar with X grams of gatorade powder - could I build that as a preset then the app tell me X total grams of my mix for today's workout?


Awesome app - awesome information you share here. Thankful for your time and energy.

Glad to have you as a subscriber! Welcome to the Saturday family!

Good question. You're onto something with your line of questioning here, by the way. This is actually the reason why companies who sell nutrition products can never land on just one mix, and why after half a decade of me trying to sort out how to determine "what's best" for a person, or what the optimal mix was for all people, I decided: "this is a human problem that can only be solved, and solved well at scale, using software engineering, rather than chemical engineering."

The ratio of sodium / carbs / water recommended does change based on your inputs. Intensity, duration, and estimated "sweatiness" for the upcoming activity, all change the ratio.

The choice for the "sweatiness" for each activity is the thing that will change the ratio of the sodium & water to the carbs, the most.

I wish there were this easy option where it tells you "every day you need 500mg sodium per 50g of carbs" but some days when you're sweating heavily and riding easier, or conversely riding harder but sweating less because it's cooler, the ratios must change, or you'll feel all sorts of 'off.' The truth is, sometimes it doesn't matter. But when it does matter, it can matter a lot. This conundrum was actually the entire impetus for the app.

There is no one optimal ratio of ingredients for a person. Conditions change. Intensity changes. Duration changes. Attire changes. All of which affect the interplay between calorie-burning, sodium loss, and water loss.

Separately, we are also working on a "close enough for this ride" type of feature that will allow faster prep with less scooping. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

So helpful! That makes perfect sense - thank you for the thoughtful and detailed response. I don’t mind all the mixing - especially knowing the logic behind it.

One more question - is there an optimal way to distribute the speed nectar across the water? Can I make the bottle as concentrated as dilution will allow? Or is best to spread it evenly across the total volume of water needed? I understand the preference for having regular water to chase - but is it necessary other than preference?

Another great question. And soon that question will be answered by a feature in the app. Answer: it's your preference. Your dentist will prefer that you chase with water.

As long as you consume it all relatively evenly, how it's mixed won't matter to your gut or your performance.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Incredibly insightful

The amount of carbs needed to ride the same 56 miles is approximately the same if it is 70 degrees VS 90. But the amount of liquid needed is completely different

With the Saturday app it takes that into consideration, fantastic

Let us know what features you'd like next. One respondent gets lifetime VIP Saturday app use for free. Feature Planning Feedback
(winner announced next week via our newsletter)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Hi Dr Alex, thanks for all your work on this. I just joined the app and am playing around. I love the carb calculations as those make sense to me. I struggle with the sweatiness factor and don’t really know what that means in real world application. Is there a quick and dirty way to figure out fluid loss at a certain exercise intensity and time that I can apply to various situations? Is it that being in the ballpark is good enough for sodium replacement? Should I just consider myself a medium sweater and move on? Thanks for your help.

Great question. The sweatiness associated with each training session is designed to be an intuitive rating of how much you perceive you'll sweat during the session. The separate user setting related to how heavy of a sweater you are, is more related to how much you think you sweat in general compared to your peers.

Turns out, folks tend to have pretty reasonable intuition as to how much they sweat relative to others, and how much they'll be sweating for a given activity, compared to their lowest-ever, and highest-ever sweat rates.

The fluid and sodium recommendations the app makes are adjusted by a dozen or more things for any given activity, but the biggest driver is your intuitive rating of how much you'll sweat for that activity on the sliding scale. Think of the highest rating (the red sweaty face icon on the right) as like top 5% of heavily-sweating activities you've ever done. Think of the cool-looking face on the far left side of the slider as something like the bottom 5%. Use your intuition between, for each activity you do. Consider the weather, what you'll be wearing, etc etc. It can usually just be a snap judgement in less than two seconds with a peak at the weather panel below the sweat slider, and folks end up pretty pleased with the hydration/electrolyte component of the plan.

But! If you end up using your intuition, and doing what the plan says, and feeling bad, I want to hear about it!

The more post-activity feedback we can get, especially from newer users like you, the better I can design the post-workout chat & coaching feature to help folks adjust their user settings, or automatically fine-tune their fuel & hydration recommendations for them for the future.

Direct answer to your second question: yes, for sodium, being in the ballpark is good enough for sodium replacement. Fluid is a little more particular. Carbs are a slightly narrower window of optimality yet. The longer the training session, and the more physiologically challenging the training session, the smaller the acceptable percent-error is for each of them. For easier and shorter sessions, there's lots of wiggle room.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Having some good success following the recipes in the app. Couple of notes/questions:

1. I went with Sodium Citrate and you're right, it does not taste as "salty", but how much sodium is too much? For example, if I am mixing three bottles and the app calls for 3/8 tsp in each, I usually round up to the nearest 1/4 tsp for each bottle. Any danger is adding much more? Note that I am between an 8-10 on the sweat scale.
2. Related to the above, I have noticed after my last 3 long runs (10-13 miles each), the day after my legs are not nearly as sore. Could be due to increased fitness and a million other things, but my run/bike volume has not changed significantly. Is this a sign that I'm fueling my muscles better? Previously I would only take water, maybe some gels and flat coke.

Thanks,

Colin

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the world's still turning? >>>>>>> the world's still turning

1. Awesome. Yeah, probably no risk in increasing sodium by 25% during most training sessions, especially if you're using sodium citrate.

2. Reduced soreness can absolutely be fueling related. Here's how: lower fatigue accumulation during training means muscles are farther from their current max ability. You're asking less of the muscles relative to what they're currently capable of. That can be tremendously meaningful from a soreness perspective when training sessions are 2+ hours, and even more out near 4-5 hours. "I'm not as wrecked after training" is one of the most common reports when folks dial in their fueling.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Great, that is good to know.

I've also changed my fueling timing habits, which I'm sure is helping too. For the bike I usually wait until the first aid station (in a race) or about 30 mins (indoors) before really drinking anything. Now I'm getting half of a bottle into my system in in the first 15-20 mins. For my running I'm drinking some mix (400 mL) before I start, instead of waiting until I find a fountain or get back to my car, which is usually a 3-4 mile loop.

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the world's still turning? >>>>>>> the world's still turning

Just wanted to say thanks a million for the easy to digest information! I had the Saturday app in beta and plugged in a 5 hour bike race. Took those numbers and made it my Ironman bike leg nutrition plan. Practiced with it on three longer rides and had no issues. Raced IM Tulsa this past week and had zero gut issues. Only thing I grabbed at aid stations were water bottles. Biked faster than I anticipated. And most importantly, didn’t blow up in the run. Managed to negative split each leg. So thanks for not only helping me to race fast successfully, but doing so on a budget - with nothing more than sugar, sodium citrate, and Gatorade powder.

I've been with this from the Fuel app and it's been better than I've been. I say that as, I have this awesome fueling resource in my pocket that I forget to use as often as I should (can you say "take for granted?"). I want to believe that I'm not performing or recovering as well as I could because of my lack of fueling. Starting today, I'm making a dedicated effort to fuel-up via this app for every workout in the hope of reducing recovery time first & performing at my best second.

A couple of little usability improvements I thought I'd mention as "nice to haves"...

• The "Unit Swap" feature on the "Prep My Fuel" page is great! The app remembers this setting, on this page, from use to use, which is also perfect. Is there a way for this setting to be *remembered* and applied/shown to the "Consume this" pages? Currently, it's locked on mL only for Hydration. Again, its a detail thing, but would reduce the number of clicks for those of us that mix our fuel from the "Consume" page rather than having to dive into the "Recipe" page.
• Speaking of the "Recipe" page, I use the same products over and over. Given others are probably similar, would there be a way of remembering & listing those *favorite* products on each of the new recipe pages, rather than requiring to "+ Add product" (the same products) over & over again on each new recipe (work out, event, etc.)?

I will say, I've learned so much from you Dr. Alex in that, this morning, I put my fuel together from memory of your writings and checked my work via the app afterwards... because that's what *men* do right: read the directions afterwards! ha ha. Anyway, I'm glad to say, per the app, I got it right with the exception of adding a 1/4tsp extra citrate. win-win; I got my fueling right and I'm still learnable. :)

THANK YOU FOR THIS RESOURCE!
MD

I have used your app today for my first workout, a swim. Had my best swim in weeks!

In talking to a friend, who is taking medication for high blood pressure, the question was asked “how do I increase my salt intake on my rides, when I’m already on a diuretic.” I’m interested in your response. I was stumped.

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I'm closer to the feathered end of the spear than the point.

Huge!

Seriously appreciate your feedback here! We need this!

Could you try tapping the "Lock" icon. That should save and automate the process for you. :) If it doesn't do what you're asking for, let me know. It should set those products as "presets" for you and apply them automatically to all your workouts.

You can choose different products to apply to runs versus rides versus swims, etc. Or just apply the product to all types of activities. Once you tap the lock icon it should offer checkbox options for you to tell it how you want it to work.

Yep, unit swapping should apply across the board. You're right. I'll make sure that's in our pipeline. I'll reach out here when it's complete. This is why we do what we do. Appreciate you sharing that with us. Even little comments like this go a long way for team morale in early startup land.

He should chat with his MD, but increasing sodium during training is often totally acceptable and optimal for folks with higher BP, especially older athletes who tend to have a higher sweat sodium loss than others. Always chat with a smart physician though.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Hey Dr. Alex, I am prepping some fuel for a 70.3 and since I f'd this up royally in the past I want to make sure I get this right for my next race. With regards to adding a supplemental bottle or 2 of Gatorade Endurance on the bike leg I want to add that to my plan in the app and want to confirm what I should use for number of servings. I know the app says 24 oz bottle and Gatorade considers 12 oz 1 serving so should I use 2 servings in the app if I am consuming a full bottle or does the app consider a bottle 1 serving? I think it is 2 servings based on the numbers I see when I play with it in the app but would like to confirm.

Btw, I love this app. This has simplified things significantly for me!

Dave

Each bottle is 2 servings. Correct. We're working on a feature that allows users to select "bottles" "scoops" "servings" etc.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Yesterday, I took a 2:14 marathoner out to dinner who I'd consulted before, and told him to download the app and let me video him using it for the first time. A few earlier feedbacks called out that they still weren't sure what the app did based on our website and our original post. Turns out, my 2:14 marathoner also didn't know what the app was for, even after getting through onboarding. Once I explained it'll plan his fuel & hydration for his next long run, and he punched it in, I think his exact words were "holy &*%$ this app is amazing."

I think an issue we're running into is that it's hard to conceptualize that an app can so intuitively "get" a person and actually provide sound nutrition advice for something as specialized as marathon training or a triathlon, because it's never really existed before. Certainly not in an easy-to-use manner.

Marketing is clearly not my strong suit. :)

So, I just wanted to call out that I'd clarified the original post with an update, and updated the links in the original post. Copy-pasted the last sentence here, but would love to have your feedback on the app, or how the original post conveys what the app does, or anything else you think I could do better. Roast me.

Your feedback and presence here with us is huge. Thank you for your support. It truly means the world to Michelle and I, and our growing team.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Dr. Harrison - just wanted to say thank you again. I used the Saturday app and your recipe for the bike leg of a 70.3 in Tulsa a few weeks ago (and all training leading up to it as well) AND HOLY SMOKES. It was perfect. Felt strong the entire ride - no cramps, no GI issues, no under-fueled fatigue feeling. It was great.

I've got a group of guys I train with and we have affectionately dubbed our nutrition with your mix "Super Bottle".

I'm relatively new to the endurance sport world, and even newer to triathlon, but for anyone not on the Saturday train yet - hop on. It's so simple and so effective.

HUGE! you should totally go leave us an app review. I can't buy that kind of marketing!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Just wanted to let you know that this feature is now live.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

For the units, I think it would be great to include the whole bottle or package as an option.

For example, the gatorade endurance bottles that you get on the IM course are available to select in the app, but you have to remember that each full bottle is two servings. That has thrown me off in the past, as I would rather select two bottles as opposed to 4 servings.

Same for the cliff blocks, I'd rather be able to select a single package than remember that 6 blocks are 2 servings.

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the world's still turning? >>>>>>> the world's still turning

Thank you Dr. & DM on the way. :)

Me too! This feature is in development. Will be huge for eliminating mental math.

PSA to all: we're going to end entry into our launch deal of "price locked at $2.99 forever" by the end of this month. For folks who subscribe after we end it, pricing will probably be $5.99/mo with an annual option coming soon.

If you've got friends who might be interested, now would be a good time to let them know. They'll have maybe until July 4 to test it before they'd need to subscribe to get that lower price point. At least until June 30 though, but depending on what the marketing team (wife) says, maybe July 4 or 5. :)

Appreciate all the support slowtwitchers have shown us (and me) over the years. It's a pleasure being here with you all.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Highly recommend the app

Definitely am able to complete the same workouts easier and with quicker recovery using the recommended fueling

And this from someone who always tries to put the calories.

I have found I am able to use more calories and no stomach upset or other negatives

Great job doctor!

Been down the Dr. Alex post rabbit hole this week on the recommendation of my coach (who's also a contributor here). Thank you for sharing so much here on Slowtwitch Dr. Alex!

I downloaded the app a couple days ago and used it for the first time yesterday!

Also, I used the Speed Nectar for the first time ever with a couple servings (it took me a bit to realize that a scoop was actually 3 servings) of regular Gatorade (Cool Blue flavor) as a flavor enhancer. Looking forward to the serving>scoop toggle! ;-)

I did a 4 hour ride carrying all of it with me. I ended up mixing the Nectar in 2 950ml bottles and carrying my water in a 500ml bottle and a 1.5l camelback.

I admit to waiting about 20-30 min to start drinking the Nectar as I'd had meal replacement shake, a banana, and some almond butter about an hour before taking off.

I tried to keep the ride steady Z2/Z3 and gave it some gas when I felt good. So not a rigid interval session.

I started to get some gut discomfort at about 3:15-3:20 in so I checked the camelback and realized I had quite a bit of the water left. I immediately began taking extra swigs of it, but still ended up with about 14oz left at the end. Turns out it's harder to monitor how much is left when it's on your back! I'm sure that will get easier with some practice.

Anyway, the legs felt great all the way through the ride. I got 98g/hr in which is likely the most I've ever consumed (not sure having never really kept track). I'll bump it up a bit and keep practicing the next couple weeks as I'm ramping the miles for a big gravel event at the end of July.

Huge thank you to Dr. Alex, Michelle, and the whole community here!

Cheers!

Dr. Harrison,

Before I start my complaint, I truly appreciate the Saturday app and have been using it with success for the past couple of months. It's awesome to be able to mix and match all of the different products along with sugar to get an accurate feeding plan.

That said, I just noticed while working on my workout for tomorrow: The reccomendation is 7000mg sodium and 500g carb for a 4.5 hr ride tomorrow, this seems reasonable and is consistent with what I've been doing. When I go to "prep my fuel" it reccomends 18g salt or 26g sodium citrate (and 500g carbs, that number seems correct). Working through 5000mg of sodium per HOUR seems exceptionally high and doesn't seem to follow what the app has been telling me historically, not to mention that will be some rather unpleasant liquid to get down.

I'm guessing this is just a bug, but if I suddenly forgot how the app works maybe you can point me in the right direction?

Thank you!

Appreciate you reaching out! Hoping to clarify here!

Sounds like it's recommending about 7000mg sodium for the whole activity, right?

The mass of salt will be roughly 2.5 times the mass of the sodium needed because table salt is 60% chlorine. Does that help? Feel free to post screenshots and elaborate more if I'm missing the mark here too. Totally possible I've misinterpreted!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

That makes sense, sounds like I'm just going crazy over here, another good reason to trust the app. The 2.5x number also helps explain the variation in salt offset from the label to the salt offset in your app. Thanks for the clarification!

One last comment, it would be very convenient to be able to see the nutrition content of the various supplements within the "prep your fuel" part of the app. It is a bit iterative to supplement with various products and try to get everything to zero out. In the same vein, it would be awesome to be go back after the activity and confirm what actually got consumed to determine any over/under fueling.

Your wishes are my command. Both of these things are coming! (Slower than I’d like, of course)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Dr Alex,

First of all, I have really enjoyed the Saturday app. The simplicity is great but even better is the improvement in the fueling for me. I'd say one of the biggest revelations to me is the fact that I have historically been woefully under hydrating especially on the run which led to under fueling which led to less than optimal performance. Thank you so much for developing the Saturday app.

My question is related to the ideal glucose:fructose ratio and the Saturday app.

It's my understanding that the ideal glucose:fructose ratio is 1:0.8, although there could be some slight individual variation. One of the reasons that you suggest using table sugar is that the ratio is 1:1 and sugar is cheap. I have tried using maltodextrin as a substitute for table sugar to reduce the sweetness. I noticed on the app that I can substitute maltodextrin until it reduces the amount of sugar in the Speed Nectar recipe to zero. My question is two-fold:

1) Doesn't this effectively reduce the ratio to 1:0 and essentially what I have is pure glucose? If this is the case, then will all of the glucose receptors in my gut will be occupied and the fructose receptors will be unused decreasing the total amount of carbohydrates that are transported? Therefore, with all glucose receptors occupied, there would be excess glucose in the gut which could lead to gut distress?

2) Is there a way on the app to show what the actual glucose:fructose ratio is based on the ingredients of one's Speed Nectar recipe so that athletes can know what the ratio is for their designed drink recipe?

I appreciate your hard work on this! One happy Saturday app user here!

Thank you very much for taking the time to share your positive experience with Saturday. Truly means the world to me and my team.


Your understanding about the 1:0.8 ratio is right, but I'll clarify that the jury is still WAY out on what is an optimal ratio, and when, and for whom. These are things we hope to solve with data from our app, and then, yes, relay to users. Research moves too slowly. If we have to wait for the scientific consensus using mostly college-age men as guinea pigs, we're going to wait another 20-30 years before any nuanced and applicable information is truly robust, and it'll still mostly apply best to the narrow population(s) studied.


Direct answers to your questions:
1) Yes, you're right on most everything here. We grant folks the freedom to do what they want with glucose:fructose ratios for now, but yes, maxing out fuel intake with just maltodextrin is likely to be problematic. There is probably more variation between and within people, and across various use cases, conditions etc, as to what is an optimal ratio than 'slight' but I'm way down in the weeds here. And most importantly, nobody knows left from right yet as to which ratio is optimal when, and for whom. We hope to solve this with data, and relay those findings in an easily actionable way to users. :)

2) Yes, that's in design and is a feature I can't wait to get live. Important! Hard to tackle though because of proprietary recipes that companies are tight-lipped about, because they don't want to lose customers over the details. Some are opening up. And some can be deduced from nutrition facts and ingredients lists. We're working putting it all together for easy usability.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Starting using the app this weekend and have a few questions:

- is there an ideal frequency to drink? Is it better to drink small more frequently or space them out and take in larger volume less frequently.

- my 1:45 run today called for almost 2 liters how do those logistics work for a race? I can’t imagine being able to consume that from aid stations or can you without stopping for an extended stop.

- for sugar and salt requirements is it possible to carry those as a concentrate on the bike or do they need to be diluted across the full volume of water

- can the salt and sugar be taken as pills/chewables to avoid risk of losing a concentrate bottle and to increase flexibility and ability to use on course hydration

- are calories not important just sugar, salt and water?

More tightly spaced consumption is probably better. It's more important, the more you're consuming per hour.

On well-supported courses, yes, aid stations can provide that much per hour, and if you're fit enough to run hard in heat, consuming that much is a great idea. But listen to your gut, and trial it in hot training sessions before the race. If it feels like too much fluid, there is a chance that you should just bump your sweat slider down a notch or two and the app will calibrate everything accordingly. It always affects sodium amounts. And it sometimes affects carb intake recommendations too (for about a dozen reasons).

Yes, definitely carry the fuel as a concentrate on the bike. That's our preferred strategy and we're building an app feature that allows you to do that.

Yes, the sodium and carbs can be taken as chewables. It's more challenging to manage logistically, and requires more interrupted breathing to do this, but it is possible. One problem you'll run into is that you have less control over the ingredients and you'll be marginally more likely to run into gut issues as a result.

If you'll allow me to analogize for about 1000 words, this article explains the reason that I don't recommend concerning yourself with calories during training. Instead, focus on grams of carbs. TLDR: not all calories are effective fuel, so "calories" are an obfuscating measure of energy consumed during training. They just confuse the discussion about what really matters.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

I did that before it was fashionable. Took 2 bottles of the speed nectar (75 grams of sugar per bottle - about my limit) and a bottle of a 2x concentrate (150 grams). Stopped at a grocery store to buy water, split the concentrate into two bottles, diluted - done.

Another time I was truly a grade-A moron and took the entire sodium planned for the ride in two bottles, thinking I could have these bottles first and then live on plain water and no-sodium chews for the rest of the workout. It doesn’t work that way, as my stomach kept reminding me for 2 hours.

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

hah. Oops, yes, stomachs are good at stating their personal boundaries. lol! I've done the same.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Hi Dr. Harrison,

I have a few more ultra-endurance fueling questions for you, if you don't mind. First, is there a limit to how many calories per hour the body can digest from real foods (maple syrup, Clif bars, pb&j, dried fruits, etc.) while biking? I posted the other day about a 7hr ride I did where I took in 435 calories/hour, and some quick calculations show me that I'm burning around 520cal/hr at the effort I'm riding. Is it possible to eat enough to break even and not be in a calorie deficit? In an ultra-long race (I'm training for a triple Ironman in June), would that be preferable/possible for the entire 40+ hours?

Similarly, before a regular Ironman I'd normally eat a big breakfast a few hours before racing - oatmeal, peanut butter, banana, Gatorade. For the triple I'm training for, would you also recommend having a breakfast a few hours before the start? Or since I'll be fueling so much and so continuously throughout the race, could I start the swim "fasted" after waking up and just start eating from there?

I hope you don't mind the questions - you're such an amazing and responsive source of information here, and your DIY carb drink has been a game-changer for my training for the past 14 months. I'm feeling better-fueled and healthier than ever. Thank you in advance!

Zack

Hi Zack,
Thanks for the generously kind words. Glad to hear your fueling game is a strength now. :)

There is no fixed limit to the rate at which you can consume kcal while exercising. Chrissie Wellington famously did 500+ kcal per hour on the bike leg of her final win at world champs almost 20 years ago, under the tutelage of Dr. Asker Jeukendrup. And a fair bit of that was not carbs. Most was carbs, of course. But it's here in the forum somewhere. And IIRC there were close to 100kcal from fat and protein. I'm not sure if this was intentional, tbh.

Back to your question, yes, there is a balance of consumption and exercise rate where you can begin to out-consume your kcal burn. It sounds like you're already within 100kcal of that crossover, which is absolutely an advantage in a 40-hour continuous exercise feat. To maximize the kcal you can consume, minimize fiber for sure, and keep protein and fats near zero, too. Aim for just glucose and fructose sources.

For breakfast, yep, absolutely slam high-carb, high-palatability everything that you've consumed pre-training before race day.

In both cases - breakfast, and intra-race - hydration is a critical component of your gut tolerance and ability to digest large quantities of carbs quickly. A hydrated gut is a happy gut. This means it needs to be hydrated inside and out. The 'inside' hydration just means drinking fluid with carbs, always on race day. The "outside" aspect of gut hydration is just a reflection of your overall body hydration status. Get dehydrated and gut function is going to collapse substantially. It will hard to regain gut function once it's gone due to dehydration. It requires slowing down for a while, and pushing fluid and electrolytes sufficiently to regain hydration already lost on the trek. Not a good scenario.

If you find that you can get your fueling with 50kcal of race kcal burn rate, yeah you probably could perform almost identically with or without breakfast. I totally made that number up, and don't quote me. That said, here's an alternate strategy:

• Wake up to the softest alarm possible & no lights on, 2.5-3 hours pre-race. Eat a couple hundred grams of tasty carbs with 16oz water & 500-1000mg sodium.
• Go back to sleep immediately. Do not turn any lights on.
• Wake up to a second alarm much closer to race time. As close as possible if you're trying to maximize pre-race sleep.
• When your alarm goes off this second time, again consume carbs, water, and sodium, but this time, flip all the lights on immediately and don't stop consuming carbs, sodium, and water until you finish the race 40.5 hours later. :) Keep on sipping and consuming! Maybe an extra-big glug right before you dive in for your first real arm stroke in the swim leg. Goal: sustain your blood sugar, sodium and hydration as long through the swim as possible. :)

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Thank you for the reply! I just looked back at the nutrition I ate during my simulation ride last week, and in just those few hours I had around 80g of fat and 30g of fiber, and that's coming from what I'd traditionally consider (or at least what are marketed as) "workout" foods - pretzels, stroopwafels, Clif Bars, peanut butter, cereal treat bars, etc. You mention trying to keep protein and fat near zero, but how do you recommend doing that? I just can't see my body (or taste buds honestly) accepting 40 hours of sugar water, Sour Patch Kids, and Gatorade. Like I said, I love your DIY carb drink and I've used it alone for 100+ mile rides, but 336 miles is a different beast and I just don't see how it's possible to force myself to eat enough straight-carb foods, if that makes sense.

We need a few more TrainingPeaks-Saturday sync beta testers. Shoot me an email at support at saturdaymorning dot fit with "TrainingPeaks please" in it somewhere and I'll get you added.

We launch TrainingPeaks syncing publicly soon!

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Can you update the Efs pro nutrition information to the new high carb mixture?

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blog

This one? https://firstendurance.com/products/efspro

Do you know if the old EFS Pro still exists?

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Yes. I don’t believe the old Efs pro mixture is being sold anymore.

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blog

for those with a 2-bottle strategy in something like a 70.3 training, is it normal for the mix to have a really hard time dissolving? I pre-mix my bottles at night and even after giving them a good shake and leaving them overnight, there is still sediment in the bottom of the bottle in the morning. for reference this would be about 4 servings of gatorade OR two servings plus 3/8 cup of sugar

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the world's still turning? >>>>>>> the world's still turning

Do you have a thread for questions, or should I just wait for approval to the member hub?

I tried the app this week and am cautiously optimistic after several very good days including a very good long ride.

If you’re prepping the night before, use hot tap water and shake vigorously before putting in fridge. More will dissolve and stay dissolved that way. Upper limit practically appears to be about 250-350g in a 1L bottle depending on temperature of water used during dissolving.

Alternatively, I’ll often just plan to top up that condensate bottle with more fresh water once I’ve consumed at least half of it, so that it’ll all go into solution.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Here is great, or the member hub. You’ve been admitted now and either works great. I’m not sure what that user experience is like TBH. Did you get an email? Are you being bombarded with email notifications from Mighty now that you’ve joined hub there where we host it with them? I’m curious to any feedback you have there too.

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Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
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📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Doc - I had to take a break from the app for a bit, but I'm curious about the TrainingPeaks integration. Is the app able analyze the duration/intensity of the upcoming workouts and generate a customized nutrition plan for them?

E.g., it sees I have a short recovery ride and recommends 1 bottle with a small amount of nutrition. Then it sees I've got a 3 hour workout coming up with threshold intervals and recommends 4 bottles and a lot of nutrition.

Is that how it works?

I think I received one email saying I was admitted. I opted out of the other ones. I'm in week two of using the speed nectar every day and so far there have been no downsides. I was mostly interested in hard, race paced efforts and very long days. My first experiment was a four and half hour ride with a lot of climbing. I was recommended 112 oz with the corresponding amounts of sugar/salt and I mixed it up the night before. I was substituting at a location in the middle of all the climbs so I just stayed after school and staged from there. I think I came back twice for more drink.

On the negative side, I could just not keep downing the speed nectar by itself for 4.5 hours so I drank 20 oz of diet Mountain Dew when I stopped to fill up. On the positive side, I'm pretty sure I have never got that much drink down before in that short a period of time without feeling sick and sloshy in my belly. I managed close to 100 oz in 4.5 hours which is probably equal to what I got down in a couple of 7-9 hour rides I did preparing for and riding up Mauna Kea. I also managed about 1000 calories in that time which is also near the max of what I can eat in a seven hour ride with any other previous method. I had a very good threshold run workout on Tues, a significant PR on a 30+ min climb on Wednesday and then the aforementioned 4.5 hour ride on Friday. I was trying to see how long I could climb at 200 watts and I hit 180 minutes ride near the 4.5 hour mark and still felt lIke I could have kept going. This morning I mixed the recipe into a slightly watered down diet Mountain Dew and had my best run workout to date this year.

All that is to say that I am moving from cautiously optimistic to just plain optimistic. I've never done well at long events despite trying most everything. My recent use of rice cakes and rice crispy squares has been more effective than anything, but the speed nectar seems to work even better. I'm super curious if it helps at all in shorter stuff where I never take in calories or drink at all because I wanted to avoid stomach distress. I also noticed I was not as ravenous after the long ride as usual.

I think I already answered my own question by diving into the FAQs on the website and reading some labels. Flavoring this week has yielded some more palatable results, though usually it is not an issue for just one bottle before runs. I also ordered a couple of clear bottles I can mark to make the intake regular and some sodium nitrate. Once you have mixed a few bottles it is not that hard to figure out the concentration necessary, but I feel like I need to sign up to pay for a while simply because it has been so helpful.

Honestly, the biggest benefit has been experimenting with absolutely zero cost risk. I have sugar, I have salt and I'm training hard. This is my second week of the free trial and so far I've yet to have a bad workout. The day after the long ride, I got through my long run while chugging the speed nectar and though I did not feel awesome, I did not feel awful considering the previous day's ride and I did not experience any stomach distress either.
I'm super curious to see how it goes this weekend for my six-hour run/bike training. I'm going to try and pound the recommended amount and see if I can do it.

Thanks for the free two-week trial. One week could just be where I am in my training cycle. Two really good weeks and I may be convinced.

Good comment.

By the way. If you got through 7-9 hour rides on 1000 kcal (ca. 200 grams of carbs), that’s amazing. I couldn’t do a 4.5-hour one on this amount.

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

Years of adaptation, I'm sure. My fat burning is probably off the charts, but it does not mean that I feel great after 4-5 hours, only that I don't keel over. I managed about 1200 calories up the Mauna Kea volcano for 7:15 of riding, but that was at an average of 145 watts. Being able to consume more calories than that at near-threshold pace is what is blowing my mind. The last three miles of Mauna Kea felt really tough since most of those calories were in the first five hours. Of course, it is hard to say if the problem at the end was calorie deficit or the fact that you are climbing a 14 percent grade above 13,000 feet with a 10 mph headwind. :(