One tip my running coach gave us was never eat something "new" the night before a race. I agree with her completely, but when you're visiting a new place, how is that possible?
There's a couple of areas you can (almost) never go wrong with in my opinion, and that's pizza and pasta. Notice I said almost...
For me, I mostly stick with pizza as a pre-race meal. I know that most of the time, it's going to be delicious, it doesn't upset my stomach, and it's a crowd pleaser, so I know those in my travel party will like it too!
When visiting Walt Disney World, we've had dinner the night before the Princess Half at Via Napoli and it was amazing!
No, we didn't consume this GIANT pizza ourselves - we ate here with friends! I also don't recommend over-stuffing yourself the night before a race, especially with something like pizza. Another tip our running coach gave us was to watch for trigger foods (like too much cheese) that might cause a runner to get stuck in the "K-John" aka port-a-potties immediately before a race. Now, it's ok to have to potty before a race, but you definitely don't want to be stuck in there forever, especially if the race is about to start!
Another pre-race favorite at Walt Disney World is the Port Orleans Riverside food court! They have an awesome pasta selection that works great for pre-race carb loading!
While doing research for this blog post, I discovered that pizza is indeed my true pre-race meal. Take New Orleans for example. Every time we run Rock n Roll New Orleans, we stop by this awesome little hole in the wall pizza restaurant and enjoy a delicious pizza.
This place has changed names over the years (I believe it's called Outlaw pizza now), but the taste hasn't changed one bit! It's still delicious and still does the trick as a great pre-race meal!
If you're visiting a new town for a race weekend, I highly recommend finding a restaurant and calling ahead for reservations. In our experience, when thousands and thousands of runners flood a town like New Orleans, all of the restaurants end up with 2 hour long waits by dinner time. We've had very good luck calling ahead of time and booking a reservation which means we've eaten dinner and are in bed at a decent time the night before a race. With a place like Disney World, if you're looking for an Italian type restaurant, I suggest that you're on the computer or phone at 180 days out from your trip, booking your reservations right then and there. Once race weekend approaches, you won't be able to find any sit-down pasta/pizza restaurants at all (this happened to us for Marathon Weekend this past year). If you do run into this instance, the pasta selection in the food court at Riverside or an in-room pizza delivery at your resort would work out perfect for you! (Or you could always have pizza delivered from off-property...but that would mean breaking the "Disney bubble"...and that's no fun!)
So to recap:
- never eat something "new" the night before a race
- don't over-stuff yourself the night before a race
- watch for trigger foods that cause stomach upset - you don't want to spend the entire morning of your race in a port-a-pottie
- if a restaurant needs reservations, book early - especially if it's a race weekend where thousands of runners are coming to town
It's the Tuesdays On The Run Linkup with Erika, Marcia and Patty.
