Bicarb for the
800m, 1500m
& mile.

If there's one sport category where sodium bicarbonate has the most to offer, it's middle-distance running. The 800m, 1500m, and mile are almost entirely anaerobic — efforts of 90 seconds to 5 minutes that push blood pH to its lowest recorded levels in sport.

The burn you feel in the third lap of the 1500m isn't a fitness problem. It's a chemistry problem. And bicarb is the closest thing to a chemical solution that sports science has found.

Why middle distance is the sweet spot

The strongest research on bicarb clusters around efforts of 45 seconds to 8 minutes — exactly the range of the 800m through 3000m. In these events, anaerobic glycolysis contributes 40–70% of total energy, making H⁺ accumulation the primary performance limiter in the final stages of the race.

The 2021 umbrella review (PMID 34794476) specifically cites improved performance in endurance events lasting 45 seconds to 8 minutes. The ISSN position stand reaches the same conclusion. For middle-distance runners, the evidence is clearer than for almost any other event.

Race-day protocol for track athletes

What about the 5K and 10K?

The evidence gets murkier for longer distances. A 2025 meta-analysis (PMID 41416636) found negligible benefit for continuous steady-state running — defined primarily as events at or below marathon pace. The 5K sits in a grey zone: the first 2–3 minutes are clearly anaerobic, and there's some evidence of benefit, but the effect size shrinks compared to the 800m and mile.

For 10K and longer, current evidence doesn't support bicarb as a performance tool. It's not built for aerobic, steady-state efforts.

Training use: interval sessions

Beyond race day, bicarb is valuable for hard track sessions — particularly 400m, 600m, and 800m repeat workouts where each rep pushes deep into anaerobic territory. Using bicarb in training means higher quality reps, which means a higher training stimulus, which means more adaptation over time.

That's the compounding effect: not just a boost on race day, but better training across the season that leads to fitness gains beyond what the supplement alone provides.

A real-world example

Jacob Guhr, a sophomore at Palo Alto High, ran a 5:00 mile before trying BICARB.NET in a practice session. Two days later: 4:35. A 25-second PR. His legs didn't die in the third lap the way they usually do.

That's not a guaranteed outcome — individual responses vary and pre-race conditions matter. But it illustrates what's possible when the chemistry stops getting in the way of the fitness.