Nutrition

skyblueamateur

I'm doing my first 80 mile ride on saturday and was after some advise on nutrition.

The furthest I've ridden before is 67 miles. I only brought a couple of bannana's with me and felt like I was hitting the wall at 40 miles in. One of the lads I was with, kindly gave me an energy gel and that worked wonders. Had no problems from there on in.

For saturday I was looking at bringing water, a couple of energy drinks, an energy gel and a Malt loaf. There are a couple of cafe stops on the way as well if I need to stock up. Should this be sufficient? Any other tips would be greatly appreciated as well. thanks.

velvetytoast

Everyone is different but I'd go more for the malt loaf and bananas with 1 water and 1 energy bottle. Make sure you eat before you think you need it, so start after about 45mins with half a banana and top up about every half an hour after that. The gels are good if you have got too low and need a quick hit or if the pace is too hard and your burning up but you'd be better off eating and drinking regularly - fwiw I normally end up with most of the energy drink left and all the water gone because I'd had enough sweet stuff with the food.

Hope that helps...

skyblueamateur

Fantastic. Thanks very much. I struggle with energy drinks as well. Always seem to make me phlegm-y :oops:

EV!lution

Energy gels are good but for them to work properly you need to take them before you run out of energy, a energy gel is no good, you really need to be taking 1 every hour and keep your eanergy supplys up, rather then letting them run out and trying to replace them after.
That and water will keep you going, but a halfway break at a cafe and some realy food would help alot as well

rich@mailorderbikes

We use High5 products, if you private message me your postal address i will send you a 'race faster' leaflet free of charge, we just got a ton of them delivered from High5 UK. You could also consider getting a 'race faster pack' which has all you need for 4 hours of racing. http://www.mailorderbikes.com/m2b0s275p ... ster_Pack_

rich@mailorderbikes

Just thought, if you don't like energy gels/bars etc... you could always go for banana flapjacks. They taste amazing! http://mailorderbikescyclingfitnessheal ... -ride.html

CiB

80 miles is 5 hours give or take. It's as much about prep before the the ride as what you do on it, so have a decent breakfast - porridge, weetabix etc and plenty of it in the morning, and start off well hydrated - drink enough water / squash before setting off. Eat enough to keep energy up, but there's no reason why you shouldn't eat normal foods that you know you enjoy - banana sandwiches are good, or plain old jam sandwiches. Marathon bars if you can put them where they won't melt before you use them are ok, or a pocketful of jelly babies type of sweets that you can keep dipping into is always handy.

Start off well stacked with food & drink, and take enough to stay on the right side of intake. 5 hours though won't require 10000 calories & 20 litres of energy drink.

skyblueamateur

Thanks for all the advise.

Nutirtion wise wasn't a problem. Got away with banana's and malt bread until the last 10 where I needed to use an energy gel as a pick me up.

Was the longest I'd ridden and the conditions were against us (strong head-wind and rain). Really struggled to be honest and my fitness level wasn't what I thought it was. Got through it though I suppose so onwards and upwards.

Silly Old Hector

rich@mailorderbikes wrote:

Just thought, if you don't like energy gels/bars etc... you could always go for banana flapjacks. They taste amazing! http://mailorderbikescyclingfitnessheal ... -ride.html

I'm looking for similar advice - would you send me a leaflet ? Have PM'd you. Taa.

rich@mailorderbikes

No probs, will see if I have any other goodies too.