Performance & Recovery

This mostly comes down to personal preference and practicality rather than one being definitively better. Gels are the most concentrated and portable option, easy to carry multiple of during a long session, but some people find the texture unpleasant or need water to wash them down. Chews deliver similar carbohydrate content in a more food-like format, often preferred by people who don't like gel texture, though they take slightly longer to eat mid-effort. Carbohydrate or energy drinks spread intake more gradually and handle hydration at the same time, but require carrying a bottle rather than a pocket-sized gel or chew packet. Many endurance athletes actually use a combination — a drink for steady background fuelling, with gels or chews for a quicker top-up later in a longer session. If you're new to fuelling, we'd suggest trying each format during training (never for the first time on event day) to find what your stomach and preference tolerate best under effort.

This depends heavily on session length, intensity, and how much you personally sweat — there's no single answer that applies to everyone. For sessions under about an hour, water alone is often sufficient for most people, since you're unlikely to lose enough electrolytes to meaningfully affect performance. For longer or more intense sessions, particularly in warm conditions, electrolyte replacement becomes more relevant, since sweat contains sodium and other minerals that plain water doesn't replace. A practical sign worth noting: if you finish a long, sweaty session and notice white salt marks on your skin or clothing, you're likely a heavier sweater than average and may benefit more from electrolyte products than someone who sweats less. If you're training for a specific event, practising your hydration strategy in training (not just on event day) helps you work out what your body actually needs rather than guessing.

This relates to how concentrated the product is compared with your body's own fluids, which affects how quickly it's absorbed. Isotonic products have a similar concentration to body fluids, providing a balance of quick fluid absorption and carbohydrate delivery — a reasonably universal choice for most training sessions. Hypotonic products are more dilute, absorbed slightly faster, and are generally preferred when hydration is the priority over carbohydrate delivery, such as in hot conditions where fluid loss is the main concern. Most of the electrolyte tablets and gels in this collection are formulated as isotonic or close to it, since this suits the widest range of training conditions. If you're training in particularly hot weather or know you sweat heavily, a more hypotonic option prioritising fluid replacement may suit you better — checking the specific product description will tell you which category it falls into.

Recovery drinks in this collection are generally formulated to combine carbohydrate (to replace what you've used) with protein (which contributes to the growth and maintenance of muscle mass) in a single post-session product, which is convenient if you don't want to plan a full meal immediately after training. That said, a normal balanced meal with adequate protein and carbohydrate within a reasonable window after training can achieve a similar outcome for most people — a dedicated recovery drink is a convenience option rather than a strict necessity. Where a recovery drink genuinely helps is when you've finished a long session away from home, or without immediate access to a proper meal, and want something practical to start the recovery process before you can eat properly. If you already eat well and consistently after training, you may not need a dedicated recovery product at all — it comes down to convenience and your own routine rather than a hard requirement.

We know stock availability varies across this range, particularly for our most popular gel and hydration formats from brands like High 5 and Torq. Because these are genuinely popular, fast-moving products among regular endurance customers, availability can fluctuate more than in some of our other categories. If a specific product you want is showing as sold out, we'd suggest checking back periodically or getting in touch directly, since restock timing varies by brand and supplier rather than following a fixed schedule. In the meantime, similar alternatives from other brands in this collection (for example, switching between High 5 and Torq gels, which serve a similar purpose) can often cover the same training need while you wait for your preferred product to return.