鈥淵ou are what you eat,鈥� the old adage goes. But what if we are also what we 诲辞苍鈥檛听eat, but just taste?

last November by researchers John A. Hawley of Australian Catholic University and Louise M. Burke of Australian Institute of Sport looked further into the connection between endurance athletes and nutrition strategies鈥攕pecifically the use of carbohydrate mouth rinsing as a performance enhancer.

During the initial stages of the study, they learned that, although athletes were swallowing carbohydrate to fuel activity, their muscles didn鈥檛 actually need it during the 60- to 90-minute time trails they were using. Yet taking in carbs鈥攄rinking a sports drink鈥攊mproved performance.

鈥淭hat didn鈥檛 seem to make sense,鈥� says Hawley. 鈥淏ecause we have enough glycogen stored in the muscle to do that task. So it pointed at things which weren鈥檛 metabolic in origin鈥攊n other words, wasn鈥檛 anything to do with the muscle.鈥�

In fact, the only thing that the carbohydrate drinks actually triggered was a neurological response that said, 鈥淚 feel better now.鈥� But this was enough to help the athletes perform better. 鈥淲e were all surprised by this finding because it pointed to something that wasn鈥檛 in the muscle and wasn鈥檛 metabolic,鈥� says Hawley. 鈥淭he brain drives everything else in the body.鈥�

While mouth rinsing and sensing , what Hawley and Burke鈥檚 newest study suggested is that there are other uses for it as a way to trigger the brain that may be beneficial to athletes.

鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of crosstalk between nutrient receptors, or sensors in the mouth and the brain, which can either warn you that this is not a good thing to do or to encourage you to keep doing it,鈥� says Burke. 鈥淪o we鈥檝e been thinking through what some of these other signals might be and how you could exploit that for sport.鈥�

What they discovered was that, along with carbohydrates, specific mouth rinses and mouth-sensing could be used to potentially help prevent cramps, give you an extra burst of energy the last few meters of a race, or offer a sense of cooling when your body starts to overheat.

Quinine: Fight or Flight Energy Burst

Quinine is a bitter crystalline compound, commonly used in tonic water and formerly used as a way to fight malaria. Neurologically, things that taste very bitter are often associated with poison, so it triggers our flight-or-fight sense. Hawley and Burke wanted to see if athletes could use it to push their bodies harder when needed, such as while sprinting those last few meters of a race or pushing through a particularly hard part of a course.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a very bitter, unpleasant taste and it鈥檚 been used in scenarios of sport where you鈥檙e doing a high-intensity effort,鈥� says Burke. 鈥淏ecause even though you think you might be flat out, we always have some kind of reserve.鈥� Think of it this way: If you鈥檙e trail running and come across a wild animal on mile 15, chances are, you鈥檒l be able to kick it into high gear and get out of danger quickly鈥攏o matter how tired your muscles are.

The researchers found that, unlike carbohydrate rinsing, athletes needed to fully ingest the quinine for it to affect the brain. 鈥淭he quinine tends to need to be swallowed because most of the receptors are down in the back of the throat, so if you鈥檙e just swirling it around in your mouth, you probably haven鈥檛 activated enough of them,鈥� says Burke.

Although it is in the very early stages of testing, they have found that it does in fact benefit athletes in high-intensity situations. But it only helps for about 20鈥�30 seconds, and it has downsides. Because it tricks your brain into going into overdrive, your body has to work harder to achieve that extra effort, and a feeling of high fatigue quickly follows. 鈥淚n the period after you鈥檝e had that extra spurt you鈥檒l have to rest or recover in some way,鈥� says Burke. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not a completely free lunch.鈥�

Caffeine: Feel Better Booster

听While caffeine is one of the few nutrients that starts the process of ingestion as soon as you put it in your mouth, it also creates a neurological response, even from smell鈥攖hink about walking into Starbucks in the morning and how you feel better even before having a drop of your morning brew.

In their study, Hawley and Burke looked at caffeine鈥檚 performance-enhancing benefits and how it affected the central nervous system versus its metabolic benefits. They found that caffeine mouth-sensing could indeed be used during training as a way to trick yourself into feeling more energized when you鈥檙e burnt out.

鈥淗aving a [caffeine] mouth rinse would be another way of saying, 鈥業 want to feel better when I鈥檓 doing this exercise even though my muscle doesn鈥檛 have fuel and it鈥檚 going to be a pretty low-quality output,鈥欌�� says Burke.

Why would you do this instead of drinking a cup of coffee or grabbing a Coke? For some, drinking that much liquid caffeine may irritate the stomach and cause gastro-intestinal issues. Or, if you鈥檙e training at night, you may not want the full effects of coffee but only the quick, added energy boost on a long run.

Menthol: Keeping You Cool

鈥淢enthol sets off temperature-sensitive receptors in the mouth,鈥� says Burke. 鈥淪o even though menthol doesn鈥檛 have any effect on cooling itself, it sets receptors to think that it鈥檚 cool.鈥� And when you feel cooler, you鈥檙e more likely to perform at an improved level in high-intensity situations.

The researchers鈥� thought was that adding menthol to your liquids, or popping a cough suppressant on race day, could help give you the idea that you鈥檙e not as overheated as you are. That could help you to mentally push through the last couple of miles on race day.

Like quinine, menthol is a bit of a double-edged sword. 鈥淰ery often the reason that you鈥檙e feeling hot and that you should slow down is because you are听hot,鈥� says Burke. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a bit of a fine line between trying to use things like menthol and cool fluids to make people feel like they can go harder, when it鈥檚 a useful sensation that the body鈥檚 given them.鈥�

Excessive sweating is your body鈥檚 attempt to keep you safe, so don鈥檛 use this method without keeping in mind that maybe you are听too hot and need a quick a break. Only consider it when you just need to influence your brain into getting through those last few reps, miles or sprints.

Vinegar, Chili, Cinnamon: Cramp Blockers

You鈥檝e most likely heard of runners swearing by pickle juice for added sodium and electrolyte balance, right? Turns out, the sodium wasn鈥檛 creating the effect, it was acetic acid鈥攁n organic compound that gives vinegar its taste and smell鈥攊n pickle juice that was helping to delay or stop a cramp from occurring.

Burke says that Acetic acid has an effect on the neural message to the muscles to contract or cramp. 鈥淎cetic acid was found to be able to alter the sensation that elicited the cramp,鈥� he says.

As Hawley and Burke continued to investigate their findings, they discovered that other plant-based chemicals could possibly have the same neurological affects as well, including capsaicin (the active ingredient in chili peppers), and cinnamaldehyde (the organic compound that gives cinnamon its flavor and odor). Currently, there are a number of these types of supplements on the market, but none seem to have figured out quite the right formula to prevent or end cramping for everyone. In the lab, they make a small muscles contract until it cramps, which doesn鈥檛 necessarily transfer to large muscle or whole body cramps that occur in sports.

So while this knowledge is still in its early phases, if we are able prove that these plant-based chemicals really do prevent larger pains, and discover a method to use them preventatively, it could be a game changer for cramp-prone athletes.

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People love to hate on Galen Rupp. Although he鈥檚 one of the best American distance runners of his generation, the running world has a hard time rooting for him.

When you talk about athletes such as Kobe Bryant, Floyd Mayweather or Tom Brady, their names alone elicit feelings of excitement and pride, or you immediately begin to think of all the reasons why they are the worst. Oftentimes, when great athletes aren鈥檛 adored by fans, it鈥檚 because their personal lives are messy and disappointing; or, how they act on the court, in the ring or on the field, makes them unlikeable.

Yet with Rupp, you can鈥檛 really say it鈥檚 because his off-screen personality is offensive or that he鈥檚 not a team player; in fact, his teammates seem to really like and respect him.

For his part, the Nike athlete is known for rarely giving interviews and choosing family instead of spending time on social media. It鈥檚 this separation from the running community that may be part of the problem. America loves a good punching bag, and the less access we have to a public figure, the less real they become in our minds, and the easier to鈥�well, punch.

He鈥檚 also coached by Alberto Salazar, the infamous name behind the Nike Oregon Project, a training group that has been in the news since 2015 when and the BBC stated that its athletes were being investigated for illegal performance-enhancing drugs. Again, in 2017, furthered those doping allegations and called out Salazar as violating drug protocols with his elite runners. So far, Rupp has never tested positive for PEDs.

If you鈥檙e reading this article though, you likely already knew all of this.

Over the weekend, during all the press events at the , I saw a side of Rupp that differed from not only what has been written about him but also how he came off in Boston last April. What was clear over the course of those three days was that the pro runner just wants to do what he loves and all we want to do is fault him for it.

This past spring, Rupp was favored to win the Boston Marathon thanks to his first-place finish in Chicago only six months earlier and his second-place finish in the event in 2017. But four days before the elites crossed the finish line on Boylston Street, published another piece on Salazar. The article pointed fingers at both Rupp and his teammate Jordan Hasay, questioning whether their performances were due to illegal supplements and whether their choice to continue to train under Salazar was telling.

During the elite press conference, when asked about the investigations into his coach, the athlete seemed bothered but answered by saying, 鈥淲e all addressed those allegations several years ago and we moved on after that.鈥� Within seconds he was turned back around to take questions from other reporters. He went on to DNF on Marathon Monday due to brutal weather conditions that led to symptoms of hypothermia.

Fast forward to October and Rupp had a new win under his belt following the Prague Marathon in which he finished in 2:06.07 and was ready to tackle the Chicago course as the defending champion. Relaxed and amicable, the 22-year-old 32-year-old sat amongst a sea of reporters and politely answered questions with a very boy-next-door charm throughout the weekend.

In every situation, he was visibly more at ease than in Boston and in higher spirits鈥攐ften joking with former teammate Mo Farah and playfully sharing quips with the press. The juxtaposition of how he鈥檚 been portrayed in the media and the person standing before me seemed to be two totally different people. It鈥檚 hard to look at a person who is smiling and positive as the jerk neighbor kid who doorbell ditches you every Friday night. Rupp is likeable, and easily so.

Following the race, he and pro triathlete turned pro runner spoke to the media again, this time as the , respectively, in their divisions. Jorgensen, a newcomer to the marathon who already seems to have gained more support from the running community than Rupp has, came down hard on herself, noticeably agitated by her performance.

鈥淔or me personally, I let myself have 24 hours of kind of being pissed off and you guys are sort of seeing that because it鈥檚 within 24 hours. And then I go back and evaluate the positives,鈥� said Jorgensen. 鈥淭here鈥檚 definitely positives that came out of this race but I really feel like my training was indicative of faster racing and on the day it didn鈥檛 happen.鈥�

On the other side of the fence, Rupp, a seasoned veteran in the event, spoke optimistically about his time and seemed to better understand that you can鈥檛 win every race. 鈥淚 ran as well as I could today, and I gotta give credit to Mo and all the other guys that beat me,鈥� said Rupp. 鈥淭hey were better today and they ran well. I鈥檓 real happy for Mo, I think he ran a great race. Thrilled for Suguru [Osako] to get the Japanese record, I know he鈥檚 been working real hard.鈥�

Maybe Rupp is just growing up and we鈥檙e seeing a side of him that is more peppered and gracious, or maybe the media has gotten it wrong all along. He鈥檚 always had the choice to leave Salazar鈥檚 side and I鈥檓 guessing until he does, there鈥檚 going to be an inherent distrust in him. You are the company you keep, right?

If you take a closer look though, you may start to realize that this runner is exactly who he shows himself to be: a personable and very talented athlete who is just trying to do his job. “It鈥檚 really a never-quit mentality, you have to just keep fighting, not get discouraged, not get down on yourself … and keep pushing as much as you can,” says Rupp. “You never want to just throw in the towel and give up.”

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