Runner's Tea

Back in January I started seeing some tweets (there's that Twitter again) about something called Runner's Tea. I was immediately intrigued. I've read before that coffee can be great before a run (provided you're not dumping a bucket or sugar and milk in it which is what I would have to do to drink it) but I don't drink coffee. I've been a tea drinker for a couple of decades now. Ok, maybe a few decades. Anyway, when I saw that someone had come up with a tea specially formulated to help with running, I HAD to try it.

When I say I'm a tea drinker, I mean, I put a tea bag in my mug with a dollop (not a bucket) of sugar & milk. Less and less sugar actually. I'll drink any kind of tea when I'm out, but I usually drink Lipton at home. So I'm not quite the tea connossueuir... The Runner's Tea does not come in tea bags. It's a powder with herbs and spices. It's packed quite full of useful things like lemongrass and cinnamon and cayenne! You can find a list of ingredients and their health benefits on their website. This is not your regular run of the mill tea.

I bought a little ball infuser to use with the tea and it worked horribly. Well, it worked just fine but for me it was horrible. I have super texture issues-- I'm the girl who buys No Pulp orange juice and gags if there's a little bit in there. The infuser let lots of the smaller herbs through and I just couldn't deal. The website has instructions for using the tea both hot and cold and I remembered my iced tea maker that I hadn't used in a while... So I made a pitcher of the tea with that and it was awesome. No little bits floating in my tea and enough tea to last me a few runs! I've used it on a couple of long runs (cold) and I also used it for the pyramid intervals I did a couple of weeks ago. Hot is supposed to be better for speed so I put the iced tea in a mug and heated it up in the microwave. I put it in a travel tea bottle I have & actually drank it before & during my intervals. It worked great. It was a really good treadmill run. Hopefully the microwave is not mutating the organic goodness of the tea because I've done this for both speedwork and my race and it was awesome. I drink it hot while doing treadmill intervals (I know, but it works!) and then I drank it hot in the car on the way to the race. Which turned out pretty well. 

I can't say for sure if the tea is having an actual effect on my running, but it seems to be working out. I've had decent long runs after drinking it, I've had quality speedwork while drinking it, and I had an awesome PR-breaking race after drinking it. I don't want to discredit all the hard work I put into my running this training cycle and say it was the tea. But I think it definitely helped to give me an extra kick. I don't use Gatorade or energy drinks and I haven't had to use Nuun at all. I have the citrus mint flavor now and might try the berry one. There's also a new recovery blend I'd like to look into. I've had NO issues with my stomach while drinking it and it didn't conflict with the Honey Stinger chews I used on a long run. I'll definitely be buying more of this tea. 

I was able to purchase this tea at a discounted price thanks to an ambassador on Twitter. But I did purchase it on my own and I'm reviewing it so I have something to blog about not because they asked me to (they didn't). If you'd like to try some of your own, check out their website: http://runnerstea.myshopify.com