Just keep swimming: The Fourth Discipline

It's almost like the sixth sense where if you fail to execute it properly on race, you will see dead people and in the end could end up like Bruce Willis and be the walking dead. Race day nutrition.

You really have to figure out what you can stomach for the 10+ hours of exercise. It's pretty daunting to think about. If I started the Ironman at the same time you arrive at work, I'm still exercising by the time you go home for the day. Constant movement and you need to figure out what you can stomach during the bike and run. During the swim, you're basically dry for 65 or so minutes except for the mouthfuls of lake water.

The bike is the easy part of the whole thing when it comes to nutrition. You can easily carry all sorts of stuff and since you're stomach is pretty much in the same position you can eat anything. There are all kinds of stories of people eating hamburgers, pb&js, cookies, muffins, bagels, and the obvious stuff.

For me, I use Infinit Nutrition. I built a custom formula in 2008 and it worked great so I'll be using that again. The website lets you dial in everything and basically become a mad scientist.

The run is totally different story. I'm very picky when it comes to the run. It's taken a long time to really find the perfect nutrition plan for the run. I do a 25mg caffeine strawberry banana Powergel every 4 miles. Caffeine on the run is awesome. Of course in order to make it feel like an illegal PED, you have to abstain from caffeine leading up to the race. For you hardcore coffee drinkers out there, it may be tough to do but man you can really feel awesome if you do.

Speaking of abstaining from caffeine, let's talk the daily diet. I'm a total junk food junkie with my biggest vice being chips. I absolutely love chips especially Doritos. I can easily down a whole bag of Doritos post dinner. Chips are complete empty calories so I cut all chips leading up to the Ironman. I still down lots of calories but no chips. In addition to no chips, I cut all alcohol. So no beer. Sure it sounds like the diet is no fun but it works for me. Of course, post Ironman all this goes out the window.

Here's my current list of food I'll be gorging on November 21st: