Nutrition plays an active role in how you feel during runs, how well you recover afterward, and how you feel outside of running. It can be easy to focus heavily on what you eat right before and immediately after a run, and overlook how your choices across the entire day or week influence your performance and recovery.
Your body is not a clock that resets every 24 hours. The energy you have for today’s run is shaped by what you ate yesterday, and even the days before. Viewing nutrition as part of your training plan can help support consistency, recovery, and your ability to hit goal paces as mileage and intensity increase. Here's our advice on how to flex your nutrition across your training week.
Matching Fuel to the Type of Run
Your personalized training plan includes a mix of harder workouts, easy runs, long runs, and rest days. Each type of run places different demands on the body, and nutrition should support both the specific run and your energy for everyday life.
Fueling is not about eating more or less based solely on how hard a run feels. Instead, it involves adjusting carbohydrate intake, meal and snack timing, and recovery nutrition so your body has the resources it needs to adapt to training.
Do I Need to Fuel Differently For Easy vs Hard Runs?
Fueling needs are influenced by both the intensity and duration of your session. As either increases, carbohydrate needs rise to support performance and recovery.
Easy, short runs may require less focused fueling before the run itself, but how well they go still depends on adequate intake throughout the day.
Fueling Hard Sessions & Long Runs
Hard workouts and long runs increase your body’s reliance on carbohydrates. This is because carbohydrates are the primary fuel source for higher-intensity running and longer durations, and starting these sessions with adequate carbohydrate availability can improve how the run feels and how well you recover afterward.
Why do harder sessions require higher carbohydrate availability?
Speed workouts, tempo runs, and long runs deplete muscle glycogen more quickly than easy runs. If carbohydrate intake is consistently too low leading into these sessions, runners may notice early fatigue, heavier legs, or a difficulty hitting paces.
Adequate carbohydrate intake in the meals and snacks leading up to these runs helps support training quality and reduces the overall stress of the session on your body.
When are electrolytes useful during harder sessions?
Electrolytes can be helpful during longer runs, high-intensity workouts, or sessions performed in warmer conditions. Sodium losses increase with sweat, and replacing electrolytes during these runs can support hydration and reduce the risk of cramping or excessive fatigue.
Are there any foods to avoid before harder sessions or long runs?
Before harder efforts, foods that are high in fat, fiber, or unfamiliar ingredients may increase the risk of gastro-intestinal discomfort. If running early in the morning, consider what you are eating the night before. Keeping pre-run meals relatively simple and familiar helps minimize issues during the workout.
What should my post-run recovery nutrition involve after harder sessions?
Recovery nutrition after hard runs supports muscle repair and replenishes glycogen stores. Including both carbohydrates and protein immediately after these sessions helps prepare your body for the next training day. Research shows that a 3-4:1 ratio of carbohydrates to protein is ideal to support recovery.
Fueling Easy Runs
Easy runs place less immediate stress on the body and generally don’t require fueling during the run itself if under an hour in duration. That said, just because you're doing an easy, it does not mean that fueling doesn’t matter and it is still recommended to fuel before easy runs.
Consider a snack that is high in carbohydrates such as a banana, stroopwafel, or English muffin.
Rest Days
Rest days are a critical part of training, and nutrition still plays an important role even when you are not running. You may even notice that you feel just as hungry or sometimes more hungry on a rest day.
A common misconception is that rest days require less fuel. Your body is still repairing tissue, adapting to training, and preparing for upcoming sessions. Skipping meals or drastically cutting intake on rest days can interfere with these processes and often impacts your next run in a negative way.
Protein intake remains especially important on rest days to support muscle repair, as do carbohydrates. Rest days are a good time to focus on complex carbohydrate sources such as whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and beans. These foods provide steady energy along with fiber and micronutrients that support recovery.
Rather than viewing rest days as a time to restrict food, it is more helpful to see them as an extension of recovery. Eating enough on these days still supports your training.
The Bigger Picture: Fuel the Week, Not Just the Run
Training adaptation happens across the entire week, not in a single session. One well-fueled workout cannot compensate for multiple days of under-fueling.
When intake is too low, runners may notice that sessions feel harder than expected, even if those runs are shorter or easier on paper. Fatigue accumulates when energy availability is consistently inadequate, and this can affect pacing, motivation, and overall training quality.
Recovery nutrition doesn’t just “fix” the last run. It sets the stage for the next one. Each meal and snack contributes to how prepared your body is for future training. Thinking about fueling as a continuous process helps reduce the pressure to get everything perfect around one run.
Consistent fueling across the week helps to:
Maintain adequate energy availability
Improve training quality and consistency
Reduce cumulative fatigue across the week
When nutrition aligns with training demands, you'll be better able to show up for each training session.