My Bad Experience with Hammer Perpetuem

Perpetuem "The world's finest endurance fuel"- or is it?
In my search for optimal ultramarathon nutrition strategies I came across a product made by Hammer Nutrition called Perpetuem. On face value it seemed like the perfect supplement for ultra endurance events and could even be used as the primary fuel source. Here is some info from the website about the different ways it can be mixed up.

• The One-Hour Bottle - Mix the suggested amount of Perpetuem for your bodyweight in a 21-24 ounce (approx 520-710 ml) water bottle. Consume one bottle hourly.

• The Multi-Hour Bottle - Let's say you've determined through testing that 2 scoops of Perpetuem per hour is your ideal caloric intake. For a 4-hour workout, you'll need 8 scoops in a bottle, then filled with water and shaken well. You then nurse this bottle, taking small sips every 15-20 minutes. At this concentration, the water in the mixed bottle does not contribute much at all to your hourly fluid intake needs. To meet your fluid requirements, you carry a second and possibly even a third bottle of plain water, or use a hydration system, or know where you can refill along your route.

• Gel or Paste - Perpetuem can be made into a super-concentrated, near paste-like consistency and dispensed from a Hammer Gel flask. Using a blender or bowl and spoon, mix scoops of powder with a small amount of water, gradually adding water as necessary to create the consistency desired. Depending on how many scoops per hour you require, and how concentrated the mix is, each flask of Perpetuem can supply you with 2-4 hours of fuel. As with the multi-hour bottle, you must carry additional bottles of plain water or use a hydration system to meet your fluid requirements.

Suggested Doses by Body Weight (135 calories per scoop):

• 0 – 120 lbs (approx 54.5 kg) – up to 3/4 scoop/hr. This provides approximately 101 calories.
• 120–155 lbs (approx 54.5–70 kg) – 1 scoop/hr. This provides 135 calories.
• 155–190 lbs (approx 70–86 kg) – 1.25 to 1.5 scoops/hr. This provides approx 169 to 202.5 calories.
• 190+ lbs (86+ kg) – up to 2 scoops/hr. This provides 270 calories.

My thoughts on the different methods
I don't like any hydration strategy that stipulates we need to drink a certain volume of fluid per hour, as given what is known about hyponotremia these days it is simply bad advice. Besides that, I don't like a nutrition plan that is dependent on drinking a certain amount per hour because this would mean my energy intake would vary considerably depending on the weather conditions. If I had a race/ training run on a cold day where I don't need to drink much, then I'm going to miss out on calories unless I over drink. Out of the 3 methods I liked the idea of either the multi bottle or the gel/ paste option.

The Road Test
The night before my training run I mixed up one gel/ paste mix in a gel flask and also one multi hour bottle and refrigerated both of them over night. By following the suggested dosages I should have had enough energy requirements for over 4 hours.

To try the two different methods I was going to first consume the paste mix which would last for the first half of my run, and then the multi hour bottle which would last for the second half of the run.

I thought that the paste mix actually tasted quite good, although it did somewhat remind me of eating cake mix. It was thick but went down very easily with a splash of water. My general nutrition strategy is to take on calories every 30 min so that I have a nice steady stream of energy entering my system. At a bit over the half way mark of my run I had finished the paste mix and all seemed to be going well.

Next it was time to start using the mutli hour bottle. The mix pretty much tasted like a milk shake which is not really what I'd consider to be ideal during a run. After my first drink I realised that I had probably taken on about a third of the bottle instead of a quarter. I didn't think would be a big deal as long as I waited a bit long until I had my next drink of the mix.

It was about now when the wheels started to fall off. I was starting to feel bloated and even after 45 min I still didn't feel like taking on any more Perpetuem. I was starting to feel a bit nauseas but was still running well. 

After about 60 minutes I finally took on some more perpetuem but it wasn't sitting well in the stomach. By the time I got to the final descent of my run after 4 hours I was starting to feel quite bad. Not only did I feel like I was hitting the wall but the nauseas feeling in my stomach was getting to the point where I felt like vomiting.  I actually think this was the closest I have ever come in a training run or race to vomiting. The Perpetuem was obviously sitting in my stomach and as I hadn't absorbed many calories in the last couple of hours due to the issues I was having I was really struggling to run.

I finally got to the end of my run (4.5 hours) and had to sit down for about 20 minutes until stomach started to settle down.

Summary
The only thing that I consumed in this training run was water and Perpetuem so my problems seems to be linked to the Perpertuem. I've never felt this bad before during a run so perhaps there is something in Perpetuem that doesn't agree with me. There are lots of folks out there using Perpetuem in long ultras so I thought that I'd be onto a winner. I guess this is why we experiment during training. Maybe I might try it again on another run, but at the moment I simply can't stomach the though of drinking the stuff again.