Tailwind UK Winding Down? How To Switch Your Drink Mix Without Wrecking Race Season

Updated August 2026

Tailwind's UK importer has announced it is ceasing imports after 11 years, citing US tariff-driven price rises of 7–19%. Remaining warehouse stock is being sold off, and while a new UK distributor is expected "in the coming months", nobody has published a date. If Tailwind is your race fuel, that leaves you with a genuinely annoying problem: supply uncertainty in the middle of a training block.

First, credit where it's due — Tailwind is a good product and its UK team served this community well for over a decade. This isn't a hit piece. It's a practical guide to protecting your season.

Your three options right now

1. Stock up on sell-off inventory. Sensible short-term. Check dates — drink mix keeps well, but a season's worth is a big outlay on a product whose UK pricing was already rising before the wind-down.

2. Wait for the new distributor. Possible, but you're betting your autumn marathon on an unannounced timeline and on post-tariff pricing that the outgoing importer described as up to 19% higher.

3. Switch to a UK-stocked equivalent now, while you have time to test it in training. This is the one we'd argue for — not because we sell one, but because the golden rule of race nutrition is nothing new on race day. A switch made eight weeks out, tested on long sessions, is safe. A panic switch in race week is not.

How to switch drink mixes properly

Match your carbohydrate dose, not the scoop. Work out how many grams of carbohydrate per hour you currently take on (most endurance athletes run 60–90g/hr from all sources). Read the new mix's per-serving carbs and scale servings to hit the same hourly number. Scoop sizes differ between brands; grams don't lie.

Check the electrolyte side. All-in-one mixes carry your sodium as well as your carbs. If you sweat heavily, confirm the sodium per serving and top up with electrolyte tablets on hot days rather than over-concentrating your bottle.

Manage caffeine deliberately. If you used a caffeinated mix, decide when you actually want caffeine — key sessions and race day — and go clean the rest of the week. Rotating a caffeine-free and a caffeinated mix is the tidiest way to do this.

Test on long sessions first. Two or three long runs or rides at race-day concentration tells you everything: taste at hour three, gut tolerance, how it mixes in hard water.

Where FTP fits

We make Power Fluids in 900g bulk pouches (30 x 30g servings): a carbohydrate-electrolyte drink mix in Tart Cherry (caffeine-free) and Core Neutral Citrus (50mg caffeine per serving). It's stocked in the UK and shipped from the UK — no import gap, no tariff pass-through. Our pastilles sit alongside it if you prefer chewing part of your carbs on long days.

Two honest ways to try it:

• Power Fluids Taster Pack — a few pounds to find out if you like it before committing to anything.

• Power Fluids Rotation Pack — both 900g flavours plus a black 710ml FTP sports bottle for £42.99 (£59.97 bought separately): the caffeine-free/caffeinated rotation described above, in one box, ready to mix.

Rated 4.8 across nearly 400 customer reviews, and if it doesn't agree with you in training, you've found that out for £5, not mid-race.

The short version

Don't panic-buy, and don't wait until October. Pick your replacement now, match your carbs per hour, test it on your next three long sessions, and lock your race-day plan early. Whatever you switch to — good luck out there this season.