What are the most important lessons you learned or tips you can give to a first time beer miler? Beer selection, chugging, pacing, how to burp, etc?
What are the most important lessons you learned or tips you can give to a first time beer miler? Beer selection, chugging, pacing, how to burp, etc?
[3.1]Miles Davis wrote:
What are the most important lessons you learned or tips you can give to a first time beer miler? Beer selection, chugging, pacing, how to burp, etc?
Don't Puke
I work with a lot of the world's best beer milers, and I have a very modest PR compared to them. My tips are more for mere mortals, and will hopefully be helpful to you.
If you are coming from a running background and aren't great at chugging, you may try to run harder to make up for your poor drinking. This can be problematic. If you get really out of breath, it will be increasingly harder to drink you beer. A good rule of thumb for beginning beer miles is to run you 5k pace. You will be a little out of breath, but not enough to effect your chugging.
The easiest you can do to help your odds as a begining beer miler is to have a fast first chug and a fast last lap.
Save your fastest running for the last lap, as you won't have to worry about drinking another beer.
As for chugging/beer selection:
- Bottles are generally faster than cans. Lagers like Budweiser are popular options.
- You will need to burp. I am usually burping through the back stretch. I have no tips on how to burp, just burp.
- The really good guys never stop the beer from flowing. If you can keep chugging, more power to you. Every time you bring the beer off your lips, you are adding 3-4 seconds. You really have to force yourself to keep drinking, even when you are out of breath. This is hard. Quite frankly, I have never gotten the hang of it.
In my experience, that third and fourth beer will feel really hard to get down. You gotta just push through it even though it feels impossible. If you wait for it to be easy, you'll easily take 40 seconds to drink that beer. A novice should shoot for 15 second a beer even though it feels impossible.
Likewise, that third and fourth lap, you'll feel like jogging the turn and backstretch. If you do, you'll still have a bunch of foam in your stomach but will have wasted a lot of time. Hit the gas harder than you think you can on the first turn. It should get the burping going and give you some relief to finish hard. It's the only race I think gets slightly easier at the very end, because all that beer is starting to be less painful in your stomach.
You need flat beer