3 weeks in to my Road Cycling adventure ...

hostman

Hi,

So I decided to buy a Road Bike in September, to celebrate the cold weather (!). After umming and arring about which bike to buy since June, test riding a couple of bikes at my nearest Evans Cycles, I ended up with a Boardman Road Team (http://www.boardmanbikes.com/road/road_team.html) from Halfords, who I found more helpful than my nearest Evans Cycles (and they had stock, unlike Evans Cycles!).

Started off with a loop of my local area of 6.7 miles, did that a couple of times. Then upped it to 13 miles a ride, two weeks ago doing one ride of 18 mile then last weekend two 18 mile rides, Saturday and Sunday. The first 18 mile ride was good but by Sunday morning I felt beat, there was no way I could have done it again that weekend. But a friend (who recently completed his first triathlon and is a cycling nut) recommended this stuff: http://www.myprotein.com/uk/products/tri_carb - This seemed to do the trick, because last weekend I did two 18 mile cycles, one after the other and felt pretty good during and after each ride, the after fatigue was definitely greatly reduced.

Put it down to the tricarb or to generally improving fitness (most likely both), but I now feel ready to increase from 18 miles and will attempt a 27 mile ride this Saturday. Depending on how I feel after that, will attempt it again on Sunday.

Am I pushing for too much too soon? I feel like it's a distance I can do, but it will certainly be a challenge, which is what I like to have when exercising!

I'm using MapMyRide to log maps and workouts, my profile is here: http://www.mapmyride.com/profile/23223555/

I'm interested in joining up with a cycling club if anyone knows of any in Greater Manchester, in the Atherton / Wigan / Bolton area.

g00se

To be brutally honest - the carb supplement is unnecessary at 20 miles. You can fuel up before 1-2 hour ride with a decent meal which would last you. Search for discussions on gels and sports drinks for pages of alternative views though . I would think you're improvement could just have easily been down to better hydration through drinking something religiously - and having the carbs in your system to help recover afterwards.

The best thing to do would be to make sure you're recovering properly after a ride. When you get back in, stretch (important) have someting with carbs and protein to eat (beans on toast or milk shake) within 20 minutes of getting back - and rest. When you've put muscles through it, they need to rebuild and recover.

Sports drinks and carb gels are good if you're putting yourself through it for hours on end and can't get off the bike to consume something.

jezzpalmer

Ground oats from MyProtien are my favourite, a scoop or two in a shaker either with some honey or flavoured protein powder and some milk is a set up for a ride.
It's a super easy way to get bags of decent carbs inside you.

Mixing your own tricarb is a lot cheaper, MP sell all the constituents by the KG.

king_jeffers

jezzpalmer wrote:

Ground oats from MyProtien are my favourite, a scoop or two in a shaker either with some honey or flavoured protein powder and some milk is a set up for a ride.
It's a super easy way to get bags of decent carbs inside you.

Mixing your own tricarb is a lot cheaper, MP sell all the constituents by the KG.

+1 also use this combo before and after gym, stops me getting hungry!

I usually find I'm okay to about 30 miles then need some fuel, typically before a big ride (60 mile). Normally go out in the morning and find a bowl of (oaty) cereal and a bagel keep me going for ages.

Cereal bars are good for re-fuel and cheap.