Feedstation savouries

Sportive Challenge

You are 70 miles into a 100 mile sportive and you are getting fed up with sweet sticky food and drink.

I personally would eat a whole packet of Cheddars, but what you would you like, or what has gone down well at any event you have done?

I'm asking as I'm running three events next year and would like to offer more food choices.

Stay Upright

Ian

gsk82

i've done the whitehaven to newcastle coast to coast in a day the last 2 years, the highlight of which has been a bag of salt and vinegar crisps at the top of hartside pass. i shall be packing some in my marmotte food pack for the veloventoux feed station

bikeav8or

Peperami

hugo15

Couple of small sandwiches, ham, tuna or cheese.

I'm not sure about the nutritional benefits but the sausage rolls and mini cheese pasties offered on the Richmond sportive always go down well

lemon63

Mini Cheddars - pretty good nutritionally I think & they make a nice change from the sweet stuff.

twotyred

Had a sausage roll at the final feed stop of the last sportive I did. Tasted fine at the time but not sure it contributed to my performance.

polocini

TUNNOCK TEACAKES. I love them but they are a pain to carry. Not really cost effective for a sportive but awesome all the same.

AL

LittleB0b

oatcakes.

strangely good dry - but you could add spread (hummus would be my choice)

Also depending on time of year - a small mug of soup

markyone

cheese and cheddars followed up with ice cold stella

coopster_the_1st

Shortbread.

Or a bacon sandwich. :oops:

Rodrego Hernandez

Ham and cheese sarnie. No need to stop with 30 to go though, can of coke is all that is needed,

Lucky Douglas

Cheese, pickle and salad buttie
Tuna pate and salad wrap

Ron Stuart

This is an topic that can either make the previous training pay or ruin it. The essence is that it is more to do with what you have ingested prior to 70% into a 100 mile sportive than what you take from that point onwards. The only reason your digestive system is fed up with sugary food/drink is that you have been taking in too much of it prior to that point. Do what the pros do (not what the sports fuel industry wants to sell you), there will be personal difference but they should have been experimented on in training. Basically I use this as a rough guide.....
I would not be taking gels (no matter what the sales pitch tells you) so soon into this type of event, better to take on solids some of which may have slow release sugars (dried fruit eg) fig biscuits work well pop a few in the pocket to munch as you go, savory stuff works well as a base for gels later in the ride. Stay away from anything too sugary in the first half of the event as this just gives a spike that burns the carbos and is likely to accelerate the depletion of stored reserves. You should be looking to as far as possible spread your energy expenditure equally throughout the event. Take the gels later with plain water plus a nuun tablet or similar on a hot day.
Hope this helps and remember nearly all pros these days take savory solids in the early feeds along with a mixture of alternate bidons of plain water then energy drink, the solids will vary from individual to individual. It's all about conservation, too much sugar early on gives the impression of feeling strong but as they say what goes up must come down and the trick is to make sure it's not before the end of the event.

polocini

Post edited. I would have been steering this topic away from the original post.

AL

Ron Stuart

Polocini wrote:

I don't want to hijack this thread but at the Polocini sportives we will have two food options. We have a pro option which is a complete nutrition package from start to finish that has been developed with Cnp professional. And then we have the standard fruit, Soreen,flapjacks, cake at the end etc for people who don't want energy products. Entrants get a choice between the two.

Ron- I have to say I am very taken with 'what the sports nutrition industry' says. I have been working with Cnp for a couple of months and their commitment to nutrition science is first class. They wouldn't supply my events unless the products were used properly.

Sportive- sorry for the hijack, I'll delete this if needed.

Cheers
AL

I fully understand why and where your coming from, I based my reply on firstly 'the pro peloton' and years of personal experience.
I once acquired a free DVD in my Cycling+ magazine called 'A Rider's Guide To The Ultimate Sportive' it was a Recce come advertising pitch for the coming L'Etape. Well the stuff relating to the route was useful but the sports nutrition aspect would have had me throwing up 50% into the ride, the amount of energy gels and bars that were supposedly being consumed and so early in the ride, I even think they were having them for breakfast!
Seriously, the pro peloton endorses these products and use them in moderation along with decades of tried and tested experience, a pro rider is just a better naturally blessed athlete than us amateurs, they are basically made of the same stuff.
If you were as we have done at a major tour studied the contents of a musete that was discarded less the drink cans,bidons there were small ham sandwiches in foil, currant cake, energy bar (for pocket) eat later if needed and also small cheese sandwiches (salt) this was the first feed, I have seen gels used towards the back end of a ride and indeed Magnus Backstedt during a Eurosport commentary when asked about gels by David Harman said that they were used mainly towards the end of a ride and they were a great 'get out jail card'.
I am also a neighbor of Torg Fuels who supply me with fuel... bars, gels and powder. On visiting them and trying some products I was specifically advised not to take on gels till I was around 70% into an endurance ride and I was to stock up on carbs (pre-fuel) before the day of the event and maintain levels of feed and hydration during the event.

So, who do we follow? The pros?, Torq Fuels? or your so called industry?
and by the way ' The Industry' does not all say the same thing on this subject either. :?

ps. How many times is the word Pro co-opted as meaning something superior in the sports industry and in this case the real professionals don't consume gels the way my free DVD would suggest :shock:

Buckled_Rims

twotyred wrote:

Had a sausage roll at the final feed stop of the last sportive I did. Tasted fine at the time but not sure it contributed to my performance.

+1 for the good Sausage roll.

I don't like Tuna sandwiches because I find them fairly dry and require water to swallow while riding the bike. It's the same with Oat and Nut based bars, too dry and some energy bars are sickly.

polocini

First up Ron, How did you get my deleted message! I re-read it and thought it was bad form to post up on someones thread about myself so I deleted it.

I have that exact dvd. At the end they did a run down of how many gels etc they had. Someone had done about twelve!!!!! Some sissys were crying at the end.......

As for the nutrition industry, I was just repeating your description. I really mean CNP. They have completely won me over. And they haven't given me free products either. I have a trade account but I still have to pay the same as anyone else(well a bit less!).

As for the ProOption at Polocini events it was a working title that stuck. And yes I do believe its SUPERIOR! People will not be filling up on gels, the package is based around each route. In the new year when my site gets updated I will forward you the link.

Many apologies again to sportive. Your thread has been HI-JACKED.

Cheers
AL

Gazzaputt

Love the Downland Sportives for their supply of cheese and ham rolls at the final food stop.

Oh the endless supply of cake at the end is a bonus.

Cipodog

As an experienced Sportive organiser (10 yrs/17 events) & active rider this topic is of great interest to me. From a riders viewpoint yes, you do get overloaded with cakes & other sweetstuff but from an organisers side you've got to be very careful about what you offer the riders. Health & safety issues are never far away & making up sandwiches & any self made foodstuff can be a dangerous route to take. Our food & drinks are always sealed up pre-packaged & bought from a big Supermarket--Friutcake/ Flapjacks/Muisli bars etc. We had one claim from a riders wife (7days after the event) that her husband had been admitted to Hospital with food poisoning & the local Health Officer wanted the full details of "where the sausage rolls the rider had eaten at the feeds had come from" We were able to proove conclusively that we had not supplied any sausage rolls or indeed any food that hadn't been in a sealed package. In these days of claiming culture & litigation organisers should be very aware of the serious trouble they can be faced with by trying to give riders the food they want. When riding an event if there's something specific you like to eat, make it up yourself & carry it with you & top up with the food supplied at the feeds.

fungus_the_muffin_man

They'd be hard to do for a sportive by the organiser - due to keeping them at an optimum temp, but I love making my own Dr lam style rice cakes. One of the guys I did L2P with first introduced me to them and I've made my own since then. I find them to be a really good alternative to all the sweet stuff normally shuffed down my gob. They've easily made, cut to size, wrapped and then eaten. Nice and soft, minimal effort to swallow and full of complex carbs to give you those long burners needed on the longer rides. I normally freeze mine after wrapping them and find that when taken out for a ride by the time I need them they are defrosted and good to go.

Sportive Challenge

Thanks for all of your replies. I take both Ron and Polocini's points about nutrition. For me, on long rides solid food is by far the best option. Many riders have way too much gel and especially sports drink. I've given up completely with sports drink on my own long distance TTs.

On my event last year I was manning a feedstation and saw people loading half a dozen spoonfuls of powder into one bottle. As they had paid their money I didn't want to look like a tightwad and tell them to use less but they were seriously compromising their hydration and therefore performance. I think I'll send out some guidance with the starting instructions this year.

Brian B

Sportive Challenge wrote:

Thanks for all of your replies. I take both Ron and Polocini's points about nutrition. For me, on long rides solid food is by far the best option. Many riders have way too much gel and especially sports drink. I've given up completely with sports drink on my own long distance TTs. .

My experiences with long distance and sportives is that I tend to use gels towards the end rather than the start. For solid food I use energy bars but also use soreen as its moist not to sweet, low fat and high calories but use solid food first and drift towards gels in the latter 30-40 miles of a ride.

I carry with me a roll of wine gums which I keep towards the end as a sort of treat.