are energy drinks needed during HM?

i'm going to run my second half marathon on sept 1st, with a view to obliterating my PB. everything's going ok, and i've been using an energy drink to replace lost fliud after long runs. on the run i use a small water bottle, the smallest size, and drink more when i get home.
however, i was wondering, do you need to take in carbohydrates etc in a HM? would it be beneficial to carry my bottle with a drink in? i ran last time taking a few sips at the drink stations.
i have no problems on the long runs, but i was wondering what more experienced runners might be able to tell me...

Hi Severa Superba,
thats a mouth full! I persoanally only take a small drinks bottle with an isotonic drink if the weather is very warm. Otherwise I just take sips of water at the drinks stations.

I will then have a carbohydrate drink after as I find it's easier to replace my fuel stores this way than eating, which I don't normally fancy straight after a race. High5 is my favoured replacement drink, but there are plenty of others to try. Hope this helps. Happy running!

thanks for your advice, since the race is only 2 weeks away i dont have much time to experiment, so i'll probably stick to the water stations!

I usually take the mid sized drink bottle of PSP on 1/2m races. I start sipping from about 2 miles onwards, but always take the water offered - 2 gulps of water then throw the rest over my head. Seems to work for me! Which 1/2M are you doing? Good luck anyway.

Dangly Spice, I'm doing the Liverpool HM, I'm not sure about running with a bottle but I might give it a go in one of the 10k races I have planned later in the year, I know I probably wont need the drink then, but I think I need to get used to carrying it when racing, and the 10k's are just training runs under pressure. If it all goes horribly wrong I'm going to enter the Garstang HM (near Preston) at the end of September...