Brown or white bread on rides?

secretsam

up until recently I've been eating brown bread PB and Jam sarnies out on the rides, but am wondering if this is actually making rides harder 'cos the brown bread is hard to digest - anyone got any suggestions? Would something like flapjack be better??

Penfold06

flapjack would be better. Not many people bother to stop for a sandwich when out on a ride but I guess it depends how long you're out for.

Most people just eat bars/gels/malt loaf/banana that sort of thing.

Leeuw

I used to follow the Team Motorola diet - white roll/panini with ham and cheese, cut into small almost bite size chunks. Bread for carbs, ham for protein and mustard to help fight indegestion - and they taste pretty darn good too!

But as Penfold06 says, flapjack is good as is malt loaf (but it sticks to your teeth!) and bars/gels/bananas.

I wouldn't recommend something like Jelly Babies though - I was riding with a mate once who just ate JB's for 2 hours - and suffered a major sugar low when he ran out!!!

Leeuw

:oops: But to answer your question...

I wouldn't think brown bread is any harder/slower to digest than white bread or flapjack. But I stand ready to be corrected

giropaul

Leeuw wrote:

I used to follow the Team Motorola diet - white roll/panini with ham and cheese, cut into small almost bite size chunks. Bread for carbs, ham for protein and mustard to help fight indegestion - and they taste pretty darn good too!

But as Penfold06 says, flapjack is good as is malt loaf (but it sticks to your teeth!) and bars/gels/bananas.

I wouldn't recommend something like Jelly Babies though - I was riding with a mate once who just ate JB's for 2 hours - and suffered a major sugar low when he ran out!!!

Team Motorola were riding 150+km stages at the time of course.

Small rolls etc are used in the first feed, whilst the peloton is fairly quiet. The main point, to be honest, is to relieve the boredom of "energy" products. Jam and cheese is another favourite Belgian combination.
What the pro soigneurs do/did is to use the crust of a small roll, but pull out most of the doughy centre.

Penfold06

If you really want to stick with eating a sandwich, it makes sense that the more complex carbs in brown will take longer to digest but tbh I don't think you will notice a great deal of difference if you were to change to white. Try it and let us know

Pross

White bread tends to be more doughy so I would have said it is probably harder to digest but this is just a guess. I would say whichever you use just cut them into small pieces so that you aren't eating much in any one go but there are better food sources on the bike as people have mentioned above.

Slack

White bread higher GI.

Do you mean 'wholemeal' or 'brown' bread? My body certainly complains when I eat Wholemeal bread, it also takes more water I reckon to help digest.

Why not make a sandwich with a slice of wholemeal one side and white the other...

team47b

Slack wrote:

White bread higher GI. Why not make a sandwich with a slice of wholemeal one side and white the other...

+1

White bread is fast acting carbs, same as sugar, so is jam, brown bread is slow release carbs so a brown bread and white bread sandwich and jam is a great combination.

Leeuw

giropaul wrote:

Leeuw wrote:

I used to follow the Team Motorola diet - white roll/panini with ham and cheese, cut into small almost bite size chunks. Bread for carbs, ham for protein and mustard to help fight indegestion - and they taste pretty darn good too!

But as Penfold06 says, flapjack is good as is malt loaf (but it sticks to your teeth!) and bars/gels/bananas.

I wouldn't recommend something like Jelly Babies though - I was riding with a mate once who just ate JB's for 2 hours - and suffered a major sugar low when he ran out!!!

Team Motorola were riding 150+km stages at the time

Fair point

Leeuw

team47b wrote:

Slack wrote:

White bread higher GI. Why not make a sandwich with a slice of wholemeal one side and white the other...

+1

White bread is fast acting carbs, same as sugar, so is jam, brown bread is slow release carbs so a brown bread and white bread sandwich and jam is a great combination.

Never thought a jam sandwich could be so technical

wiganwarriors

Hi. White bread has got a high Gi but it shouldn't be stored it will be used as energy, only when doing activities though.I usually take fig rolls and a couple of gels for the homeward bound journey plus plenty of fluids.

monkeydan

I think some people may be talking about glycaemic index (how quickly the energy from carbohydrates is released) rather than how quickly the food is digested.

White bread has a marginally higher GI than wholemeal bread but in any case fat and protein (i.e peanut butter) lowers the GI so in reality I don't think you will see any difference whatsoever between white bread and brown bread sandwiches.

With regard to the actual digestion of the aforementioned sandwiches, again this shouldn't differ greatly between white and brown bread. All solid food takes energy to digest but not so much that it should make rides 'harder'. Try some liquid carbs (mixture of fruit juice and water, lucozade, whatever) and see how you feel in comparison with having a sarnie or two.

secretsam

OK, ta all, sounds like I'd be better off eating something else - anyone know a good recipe for a flapjack type deal???? I flippin' love flapjack (says he, patting his huge collection of spare tyres... )

d4evr

On a long ride (for me anyway) of 60+ miles I usually take a small cheese sandwich made with white bread, only to give me something savoury instead of the constant sweetness of gels, flapjack etc etc.
In fact I use the 'non crust' stuff my kids use for their school lunch, it makes it a bit smaller and neater to fit in the rear pocket. I read somewhere that it was better to use white bread (something I don't normally eat) during exercise etc. How accurate this is I have no idea.

apreading

Sausage sandwich with brown sauce tastes soo flippin good on a long ride too. mmmmmm....

SBezza

To be honest, it isn't going to matter a jot whilst actually out riding, the body can only process around 60gms of carbs an hour, and I would have thought the carb level for each would be fairly similar and the speed of the body digesting it not too dis similar. Depending on how hard you are actually cycling you might want to get stuff inside you that releases it's energy quicker, you are unlikely to actually store any energy released from food as fat whilst exercising. Obviously if you are just pottering around at a low effort you wouldn't actually need any food.

Flapjack's are more energy dense, and even 1 flapjack an hour is unlikely to provide enough calories to cover what is expended during that hour, a sandwich is going to be way below that. Flapjack will be digested slower though due to the protein and fat in them, again this might be more preferable depending on the intensity of the ride.

apreading

I find eating real food is more for the psychological boost and to make your stomach feel fuller, with high 5 gels and snackbars providing the energy.

Leeuw

SecretSam wrote:

OK, ta all, sounds like I'd be better off eating something else - anyone know a good recipe for a flapjack type deal???? I flippin' love flapjack (says he, patting his huge collection of spare tyres... )

From memory, it's something quite calorific like equal parts oats/butter/syrup - and then add whatever else you like, sultanas, choc chips, apple chunks + cinnamon etc. Big stir, bosh it into a baking tray and 30-ish minutes in the oven.

Remove from oven, score with a knife so it breaks into chunks - but leave until cool before touching. Syrup gets mighty hot and stays hot for a long time!

I've not made them for a while, so you might want to Google the recipe!! I know my ex-boss almost passed out when he found out what his "low fat lunch" included