In the amateur ranks, passion is the driving force of dedication. It’s unlimited. Time and resources, however, are not. Life is a complex and unpredictable interplay of family and work and the unforeseen that makes structure a challenge. We train and race around an unreliable routine. When we can, not always when we want. Nevertheless, we still aspire to be better. We still try. It’s not simply a devotion — it’s an addiction. Of the good sort. Every amateur watches the professional and, at some stage, wonders — what if? Maurten can’t give the gift of time or streamline the day in, day out by stripping away the layers of life. But we can offer the support of nutritional expertise and an ecosystem of specifically designed fueling products.

If you never try, you never fail. But it will not diminish the sense of regret. “I'll just try a triathlon. And I liked it a lot. I thought it was super cool that I can continue swimming, but then at the same time start something new. So I kept doing it and this year I did my first 70.3.” — Melissa Carloni.

LOG 1 — introducing Melissa

LOG 2 – Building momentum

LOG 3 – Melissa x Lucy Charles-Barclay

Typically, it’s the discipline that people struggle most with. Maybe are even fearful of. But Melissa is in the enviable position of coming into triathlon as a strong swimmer already. Years of synchronized swimming and life-saving events have equipped her with a good feel for the water. “To get better at swimming, I would need to train every day because I'm already, I think, at a level where it's hard to see large improvements. It's also the shortest part of the race, so that’s a bit sad for me.”

For Melissa, the challenges start after, as the race develops. As the body position moves through lying in the water, to sitting on the bike, and then upright for the run. Consuming the right fuel at the right time for three disciplines is hard. It puts a lot of strain on the gut and takes a lot of practice.

“I think I had this idea in mind that you should — and I now know this is the wrong idea — train your body and make it used to performing, even in hot conditions, with no food or with no nutrition. Because then when you get food on race day you are much stronger or much faster. That's the perception I had.”

It’s an honest admission of not knowing how to prepare. But we’ve probably all been there at some point — influenced by outdated protocol. The old school methods that die hard.

The reality, supported by science, is that training our guts with certain amounts of sports nutrition decreases the likelihood of gastrointestinal distress on race day. GI discomfort is a significant inhibitor to performance. By fueling training with the right amount of carbohydrates per hour, our bodies can adapt and get used to it.  It’s a well-trodden route into fueling. A rite of passage, almost.

“The first mistake I made was already in the preparation phase because I was not getting used to enough gels or carbs. I think in my mind I didn’t associate training with a need to fuel.”

It’s a well-trodden route into fueling. A rite of passage, almost.

You reap what you sow and inevitably Melissa’s first attempt at an IRONMAN 70.3 in Mallorca was a harsh reckoning. Her body providing acute feedback on the avoidance of fueling during training. “I was so excited because I’d spent so much time training for it. But my nutrition was so bad, The cycling part was great, but then I was completely sick. I had so much cramps, nausea, and all this kind of stuff. When my body left the sitting position (off the bike), I started feeling all these mixed stomach issues. I just thought I had to finish, no matter what. I will stop eating because it might get worse and I will just continue. But then I had a lot of pain everywhere. The run was not really a run. Overall, not the greatest experience.”

In the clarity of hindsight, it’s easy for Melissa to see where mistakes were made. But they are perfectly human mistakes. Errors everyone makes because racing can be intense. It clouds judgment and muddles rational thought. “On the bike I kind of deprioritized nutrition in a sense. I wasn’t drinking so much because even taking bottles every 5 minutes, I didn’t feel like I had time or I was too stressed for that. And of course, then I paid for it. I think that's also something I would need to practice.” The hyper-focused atmosphere of a race, when the mind and body are amped with adrenaline, is not something easily recreated in training. We give ourselves mindless instructions — I'll eat at the top of the climb, I'll eat when I stop next, or I'll eat when I catch the person ahead. Always fuel without delay. 

Despite full-time work commitments that consume her diary from 9am until 6pm, Melissa is already learning from her experience in Mallorca. “I’ve already improved a lot. I did a half marathon in Copenhagen recently and it went well — much better than it was last year. So I think there is a big space for improvement, especially in cycling and running. I am not yet as fast as I could get.”

The year ahead will be a great opportunity for Melissa to master her own fueling strategy.

“I guess everybody is different. Maybe I tolerate better some other kind of carbs but not solids. Or maybe it's better for me to drink a lot and not get so many gels. I have no idea — I'm completely new on that.”

It’s a position familiar to many. Melissa has listened to the noise and has been influenced by fueling advice that ultimately didn’t work. Fueled for a Year is a chance to learn what’s right on her terms.

LOG 2 – Building momentum

LOG 1 — introducing Melissa

LOG 3 – Melissa x Lucy Charles-Barclay

Throughout winter, Melissa reduced the pressure on racing and allowed herself to focus on the simplicity of building a strong base of fitness. With a new bike setup and new knowledge, she is looking to develop her training focus over the next four months.

Like many athletes across Europe, Melissa has been impacted by the weather.

“I don't like treadmills so much because, for me, running is my one hour of free time. It's the one hour when I can just shut my mind and go out. I don't really care if it's in the dark or in the rain. I just go out anyway. It's nice in Frankfurt because I can go along the river and it's always full of runners, so I'm not too afraid of that. Actually, I've been more troubled by the ice and the snow because in the last weeks it was very hard to find a day where you don't fall on the ice. Cycling I have to do inside on the turbo trainer because it's too cold to go out yet.”

Despite the challenging conditions, she remains positive and excited to start training with discipline and structure. And a half marathon in March will be a good test of how well she is already progressing towards the Ironman 70.3.

Previously Melissa found it hard to eat the right things when training at awkward times around her long work hours. It’s something that the Maurten Nutrition Team have provided guidance on.

“Now I'm really structured and paying a lot of attention to what I'm eating — how much, and when. I'm also trying to note down how many grams per hour of carbohydrates I am having. I’m kind of starting from scratch.”

It was shortly into the run when Melissa’s race really unfolded last time, so she was keen to understand how to fuel the three disciplines of a triathlon while minimising stress in the stomach. “I think the part where I am more stressed in eating is running. So far I haven't done so many long runs to test, but I know I can support one or two gels easily, which I want to slowly improve. And especially I want to see how it goes with the new TT bars, because I now know that it can be a bit different to eat or drink with the body leaning further over on the bike.”

“I think some things have really opened my mind. For instance, I never thought about how to structure eating during the whole race. I always think I should take X grams per hour and it doesn't matter when. But now I will practice eating more in the first part of the race and maybe start decreasing during the end of the cycle because then my stomach and my gut can be ready to run. If I keep eating and eating at the end of the bike I have more risk of getting sick.”

Melissa appreciates that practicing with her race day fuel over the next few months will be an important part of training. Each session is an experience that provides a little more knowledge to benefit race day.

“I am already starting like comfortably with 30 or 40 grams of carbohydrates, so I can hopefully easily go to 60 grams. But the Nutrition Team made an important point, that we don't have to have a goal in mind — it’s not that I need to necessarily reach 90 grams per hour.”

Again reinforcing the importance of a personalized approach to fueling. What works for another athlete may not work for Melissa. Ben Vriends, Maurten’s Global Education Manager, adds that, “working with ambitious amateurs is about helping them listen to their body and build confidence in fueling step-by-step. Introducing one small logical next step every time often makes the biggest difference over a long time."

Coming next:

In log 3 we will get a race report from Melissa’s first event of 2026 — a half marathon in Frankfurt — that will serve as an important test for how she is able to fuel on the run.

LOG 3 — Melissa x Lucy Charles-Barclay

LOG 1 — introducing Melissa

LOG 2 – Building momentum

Our Fueled for a Year athletes have told their story, they’ve spoken with the Maurten Nutrition Team, and now it’s a chance to get real insights from the elite athletes. Melissa chatted with Ironman World Champion Lucy Charles-Barclay about how to balance three disciplines. Also a swimmer first, before discovering triathlon, Lucy was able to explain how having a superpower in the water enables her to be a stronger runner and cyclist too.

Melissa:
Being a swimmer my whole life, my lower body was not used to the impact of running. So I was always curious about your story and how it was for you to move from swimming to do also running and cycling?

Lucy:
My experience sounds very similar to you to be honest, making that jump. I had an incredible engine from being a swimmer that was almost a blessing and a curse. It allowed me to be able to be very cardiovascularly fit in cycling, which is fine. In cycling, you're pretty safe — if you push it a little bit too much, there's not really much that's going to happen. But in running, if you push that a little bit too far — and I was able to do that because of my engine — it would always lead to injuries. I’ve always found that the mindset in swimming is ‘more is better’. So, more and more and more training and you're going to get better. But you can't apply that to running. You have to be a lot smarter with run training and gradually build it up. You have to listen to your body. If it feels tired, then you probably should either change the run to an easy run or maybe substitute it for a different session — perhaps a bike ride instead, or an elliptical trainer or cross trainer. Something to get a similar stimulus, but not the impact of running. As swimmers, we're not used to the impact of running. It's non weight-bearing.  
 
That said, I felt like the progress comes quite quickly because you're already really good at dedicating yourself to something and are very disciplined. You have this engine and you have this work ethic and triathlon rewards all of those things.

Melissa:
For me, it's always the same — as soon as I push a bit more with running, I run a bit more, or I increase the load, then I get like some slight injury here and there.

Lucy:
Strength training makes a massive difference — it really does. Not only are you helping to reduce the risk if injury, but you're making your running more efficient, which is going to make you a faster runner as well. It has huge benefits in terms of making you a better athlete, but also making you more robust as well.

Melissa:
How do you prioritize which discipline to focus on, when you’re already very strong in one of them?

Lucy:
In the beginning, I obviously was so fresh out of swimming that I was already confident that I could do that part. So I really did focus on the cycling and the running. But I was exactly the same as you. I remember my first Ironman where I basically lined up at the front — because I knew I'd be great in the swim — and I was one of the first athletes out of the water. Then it was the entire day of just being overtaken on the bike, overtaken on the run. I feel like over the years when I have focused on swimming, the amount of fitness I have gained there has helped the other two disciplines. Of course, you don't want to neglect your weaknesses because that's probably where you can make the most gains. But if you have the time, I think you can really lean into the swim. And it's probably the perfect thing to do when you are struggling with an injury on the other disciplines.  

I guess that's the balancing act of triathlon, isn't it? It's trying to work out that whole schedule and what's going to work best. I think you don't want to neglect your strength when it's swimming, because you can get so much from it.

Melissa:
Sometimes I'm like, ‘OK, considering I don't have so much time, what do I do?’ I have to choose in a sense. And yeah, probably at the beginning at least I was confident that I could easily do the swim distance. So I just keep swimming maybe once a week, you know, to maintain the feeling. Then everything else will be mostly cycling and running. But then it's also true that I get a bit frustrated when I go back to the water, because I'm not as fast as I was. 

I was inspired when I heard you say that there is still so much potential that you can unlock with the bike and that you don't feel like you’ve quite reached the top yet. I was very surprised because to me I couldn’t see what more you could do. I mean, you’re already world champion everywhere. I was very motivated by that.

Lucy:
I think the amazing thing since I came into triathlon, which is probably about 10 years now, is all the developments in technology, in nutrition, in training methods that I've seen in that time and the progress that has been made. I used to do a lot of indoor training and just use water. I didn't even know about carbohydrate fueling and that by actually fueling my sessions how much more I can get out of them, and then the impact that has on performance over time by seeing the numbers continually improving.

Melissa:
Yeah, I think that's what still motivates me or like athletes in general, right? That you still know that you can do much better the next time. Even though it's not, of course in my case, it's not winning titles, but even doing a race and doing a PB or doing better than what I did last year — just knowing that there is a chance that I'm not done yet. That keeps me going.  

I think most of your racing is abroad. For instance, when I do my Ironman 70.3 is going to be in Denmark. I need to go there a few days in advance and maybe explore a bit, and travel with my bike. So it's like a lot of little stress things. I wanted to know, how do you deal with that? Do you have a routine or something that makes you feel a bit less stressed?

Lucy:
Even if it's not a super long travel, my body doesn't really like sitting in a chair for that long. I feel my hip flexors and my back tighten up and when I get there initially, the first day, I like to do a bit of mobility, and find a local pool to swim at. You can also hire a car or use google streetview to review the course. The more you can look at before definitely helps to make me feel less nerves — you know how it's all going to come together.

Melissa:
I always had struggles with the food during the races. When I did the Half Ironman Mallorca, which is a very nice and amazing course, I think at the time I made the mistake of eating too much for what I was used to. Towards the end of the bike and the run I was feeling a lot of stomach cramps and I was not dealing very well with it. This program has kind of forced and motivated me to also eat during the trainings and I think this makes a huge difference. Before, if I was doing a two hour indoor ride, I wouldn’t drink or eat anything because I'm inside anyway, so I can just get off the bike and eat something afterwards. Instead now, I'm finally learning how to drink and consume carbohydrates when training.

Lucy:
I think it definitely comes from the swimmer background. When I used to swim for two hours in the pool, I'd just have water or juice. Now that I have a carb drink I wonder how much better would I have been swimming back-to-back sessions if I was fueling properly. I know now that I shouldn’t be depleted at the end of a session and have to start the next one already down on my carbohydrates.  

As a triathlete, when we're back-to-back training, you never want to be in that depleted state where your body hasn't got enough carbs to function and it's already relying on its resources. Especially if you've got to train multiple times a day. It’s really important that you’re training your gut with fueling so that your body is used to the carbohydrates. Without that it’s inevitable that your body will find it harder to tolerate fuel when racing — it won’t be used to it. By using it in training you will really notice that your recovery is better and your energy level in each workout should be better as well.