Recovery food for runners
To help you recover from those long runs, here is my top list of recovery foods. These may not suit everyone, but whatever foods you choose for recovery and repair, try and aim for a 3:1 carbohydrate to protein ratio.
1. Jelly sweets
While sweets are often labelled as a ‘bad’ food or a rare treat, slap a ‘sports food’ brand on them and they suddenly become the magic key to recovery, and twice as expensive! The normal sweets you find in the supermarket can be just as useful as an immediate recovery food for runners. As well as having a high sugar (carbohydrate) content, sweets are easily digested, rapidly absorbed and help to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles. They have the added benefit of tasting pleasant, which could help those of you who struggle to eat anything following intense exercise. Try and opt for sweets with as few ingredients as possible and that are higher in glucose (look for glucose, dextrose or glucose-syrup as first ingredients on the label) rather than those containing the majority of their carbohydrate from fructose e.g. glucose-fructose syrup, sucrose. Jelly babies or Haribo sweets are perfect!
2. Milk
Milk is one of the cheapest and most effective recovery foods out there. Milk contains protein, which stimulates muscle protein synthesis, leading to muscle repair following a race. There is also some research showing consuming milk immediately after exercise can help with that post-exercise muscle soreness also called DOMS. It contains a natural source of carbohydrate which to helps to refuel, and contains sodium which helps with rehydration (scientifically proven to be more effective than water to hydrate!). It really is the complete recovery package!
3. Almond butter and bananas
It tastes as good as it sounds! Bananas smothered in almond butter have some excellent recovery benefits. Almonds are high in Vitamin E, which as an antioxidant can help reduce free radical damage and therefore help reduce inflammation after a race and speed up recovery. Bananas contain ~20–30g of carbohydrates to help replenish carbohydrate stores (bear in mind you should be eating approximately 1g/kg body weight of carbohydrates in the immediate post-exercise period) and contain a variety of micronutrients including potassium, a vital mineral involved in muscular contraction and electrolyte regulation. Therefore consuming bananas in the post-exercise period may also be helpful in replacing potassium lost in sweat after an exhaustive race.
4. Cherries
Long known for its anti-inflammatory properties (which have been highly valued by sufferers of arthritis and gout), cherries and cherry juice are now relied on for easing muscle soreness after exercise.
Why? The pain associated with exercise involves muscle damage, inflammation and oxidative stress. Cherries seem to help with all three due to the concentrated amounts of anthocyanins inside. Studies suggest that cherries have the ability to reduce muscle pain and weakness after bouts of intense strength training, as well as after long-distance running.
Happy recovery!