NeverSecond C30 & C30+
Rock-solid on the stomach, held back only by flavour fatigue over a long day.
gel
The scorecard
Eighteen long runs in, zero GI issues. A thin, watery texture that goes down without a water chaser.
30g of carbs that delivers reliably, and the C30+ adds a real, noticeable 75mg caffeine hit.
Pleasant to start, but a medicinal, syrupy sweetness that wears on you gel after gel.
The 60ml pouches are bulky and do not sit neatly in smaller vest pockets.
A slightly medicinal, syrupy sweetness that wears on you gel after gel, and bulky pouches that do not fit every vest.
Runners with sensitive stomachs who want dependable high-carb fuelling, and anyone after a real caffeine option (the C30+) for the hard efforts.
Flavour-sensitive runners who tire of sweet gels over a long day, or anyone whose vest pockets will not take a bulky 60ml pouch.
The long run
My whole approach to gels is simple: calories are calories. Find the one your stomach tolerates and train with it until it is automatic. The C30 range passes the tolerance test with room to spare, which is the most important thing a gel can do. It is the flavour that has kept it from becoming my only gel.
Where these genuinely shine is on the stomach. Eighteen long runs in and I have had zero gastrointestinal issues from them, which for a gel doing serious carbohydrate delivery is exactly what you want. That is a personal result, and gels are individual: what settles perfectly for me might not for you, so this is not a promise so much as my own experience. But mine has been genuinely trouble-free. The texture helps here too. It is a thinner, more watery consistency than a traditional gel, closer to a heavy liquid, and it goes down without needing a water chaser to force it through.
The C30+ with its 75mg of caffeine has earned a specific place in my kit for the harder efforts. That caffeine hit is real and noticeable, and it has become the one I reach for deep into a long day when I need an actual lift rather than just more fuel.
The flavour is the honest catch, and it is the reason these are not my everything gel. The taste is pleasant enough to start, but there is a slightly medicinal edge to it, which I suspect comes from the high sodium content, and it is a syrupy sweetness that wears on you. On paper I prefer this texture to Maurten’s jelly-like hydrogel, but there is a real irony here: deep into a long run, gel after gel, I have found myself actually missing Maurten’s blandness, because I was so over the medicinal, syrupy flavour of the C30. What starts as pleasant becomes a chore in a way a more neutral gel does not.
The other practical issue is the packaging. To get that thinner consistency the pouches are physically bigger, 60ml is a lot of liquid, and they do not fit neatly into every vest. I run an Ultimate Direction Hardrock vest, and the C30 pouches do not sit properly in the pockets, so I have had to fold and shove them in. They did not burst, thankfully, but it is a genuine annoyance worth knowing if your vest pockets run small. One tip if you do use them: 60ml is a lot to take all at once, so be patient. Open it, take a sip, hold it, keep running, then come back for more over a minute or two rather than gulping it down.
None of that changes the core verdict. These fuel me reliably and they have never once upset my stomach, which is the hard part. I just cannot quite live on them alone: the flavour fatigue means they share rotation with a blander option rather than owning my kit outright.