Pre and Mid Ride Food
domcarr
Posts: 85
Can someone give me some basic ideas for pre-ride food and food to have during the ride that will help avoid the dreaded 'bonk' (horrible word). I ususally go out for 2-4 hours.
Thanks
Thanks
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Comments
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If you're bonking (tee-hee) after two hours then you're probably going too energetically or there's something else wrong. Your body should have enough natural stores of glycogen for this long. Beyond this though you will need something else.
I started training for the sportive season earlier in the year and was clocking up 4-5 hours riding, what I used to do was:
About half an hour before I left I'd have a banana and a couple of slices of toast with peanut butter and jam on them. I'd also drink about 500ml of a carb-based energy drink. (To be honest this is probably overkill but hey-ho).
Out on the ride I'd have two 800ml bottles of carb-drink, although usually only finished one, and then would take some gels out with me just in case.
As I went on my learning was this:
Gels are rancid and don't have that much energy in them compared to a bottle of carb drink.
Relying on liquid only is a mistake as it sloshes around inside you and makes you feel uncomfortable.
Some carb drinks can give you a bloated feeling and some have a nasty aftertaste. The best ones, in my own case, are Torq and the Powerbar drinks. The most popular ones are the SIS drinks although they contain aspartame as a sweetener which is a bit of a nasty substance. I found I reacted badly to them and there was a strange aftertaste.
If you're using a camelback rather than bottles then energy drinks are almost impossible to clean out properly.
I now like to balance the drink/solid food intake. The Go energy bars are really good whilst you're out and don't tend to crumble up. Haribos have as much energy in them as some puported 'sports sweets'. There is also a case for something savoury and peperamis are easy to transport and eat whilst on the go.
Still make sure you have something before you go out. It's still bananas and peanut butter for me! Although I don't tend to drink any carbs before I leave.
Beware that some of the carb drinks won't have any rehydration salts in them, Torq and Powerbar do however. You could always take one carb drink and one plain water with some Nuun tablets for rehydration.
Like I said, I'm basing this on my own personal preferences and using bottles rather than a backpack.
All in all just experiment with what you like and good luck!
(Try searching bikeradar for 'nutrition' as there are plenty of articles on this.)0 -
or if you've got a carb drink minus electrolytes, just add the Nunn!0
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Plain ones though! Wouldn't fancy mixing raspberry carb drink with orange and ginger nuuns
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