Help With Nutrition On First Century
CleeRider
Posts: 304
A friend and I are planning our first 100 mile ride in a couple of months.
I've heard advice to have a drink every 15mins and eat 20g of carbs every 30mins.
I normally drink water with a High 5 Zero tablet (electrolytes) and a Clif Bar half way through a 40-50 mile ride.
I was planning to get into a routine of eating half a Clif Bar (20g carbs) every half an hour as I train up to the longer distances but read that 7 Clif Bars over the 100 miles is a bad idea on the stomach etc.
Can anyone provide advice on what combination of food and drink works for a century ride and how you carry it all as we'll be unsupported. There's a few hills so we're estimating 7 hours.
Thanks!
I've heard advice to have a drink every 15mins and eat 20g of carbs every 30mins.
I normally drink water with a High 5 Zero tablet (electrolytes) and a Clif Bar half way through a 40-50 mile ride.
I was planning to get into a routine of eating half a Clif Bar (20g carbs) every half an hour as I train up to the longer distances but read that 7 Clif Bars over the 100 miles is a bad idea on the stomach etc.
Can anyone provide advice on what combination of food and drink works for a century ride and how you carry it all as we'll be unsupported. There's a few hills so we're estimating 7 hours.
Thanks!
0
Posts
Well that's what I did for my first 100 in May which took me about 7hrs.
Felt much better after 1 pint of OJ & lemonade, 1 pint of water and a burger! Filled up my bottles at the pub and they were gone by the time I got home.
I didn't need to p1ss at any stage of the ride, which makes me think I was still a bit short on liquid intake through the ride. Ate 3 cereal bars before lunch too!
Just eat little and often, I take a cut up Soreen malt loaf in a food bag and a couple of gels with me, stop a couple of times for coffee/flapjack/cake/can of coke and you'll be fine.
Don't get too worked up about what to eat and how often, if you have a good breakfast and eat when you feel like it you should be fine.
I just did a coast to coast averaging 80 miles/day for 5 days. Each day routine was: Ate full english breakfast, went 25 miles, cake/flapjack and coffee, went 25 miles sandwich or similar at pub, went 20 miles cake and coffee, and rode to finish, dinner at pub and repeat the next day. Drank when I wanted (approx 3-4 bottles per day plus OJ and Lemonade at pub lunch) and kept munching on the jelly babies when I remembered to.
Highest mileage close to 90 miles and most days I felt could have done 100. Never felt hungry or lacking in energy. Unless you're planning on not getting off of the bike for the entire time, it's difficult to see the obsession with gels and "energy" bars when the metabolism at that sort of distance gives you the rare opportunity to eat the sort of things you normally try to deny yourself.
I take sips from the energy bottle on a regular basis and drink from the water bottle according to my thirst usually after the solid food and probably at a rate of about 3:1 to the energy bottle. This means I am usually drinking plain water most of the time and don't have that sickly sweet taste from energy drink constantly in my mouth. I also don't use any electrolyte products either. I also carry a couple of gels just in case but haven't needed them on any of my UK century sportives.
I realise that this strategy will not suit the majority of people but it has stood me in good stead for several century sportives over the last couple of years. That includes the Marmotte in July although I did supplement with slightly more solid food there due to the length and severity of the climbs. I have arrived at this strategy after reading tons of nutritional advice on-line and experimenting and honing it on many long training rides.
Assuming that you are going to be increasing your mileage in preparation for the century ride, I would advise you to experiment with your energy and hydration strategy over the coming weeks to see what works for you.
1 drink bottle with just water
sachet of High5 4:1 to use when refilling the first bottle of it mid-ride.
Then eat something solid like a snack bar/flapjack/cake/pie every hour. Have something more substantial at lunchtime - if not a proper meal then at least a sandwich, sausage roll, malt loaf, banana or something of that sort.
If you feel a dip mid-way between the hourly feeds have a gel or some jelly babies maybe - or if you need something extra for the last 20 miles.
thats my formula and it worked well on my century last year and a few Audaxes just short of a century since.
On Sportives or Charity rides, all of this is often available in the price at various feed stations.
That is only partly true. Any source of carbohydrate will illicit an insulin response which is how the body breaks it down into usable energy. The body utilises sugar differently when exercising when your glycogen stores are running down and the energy is shunted directly to the muscles. Jelly babies should be fine providing you don't stuff too many down at one go and overload gastric emptying leading to a stomach ache.
I'm not saying it is a good thing to exist on them solely for energy but is certainly a valid choice as part of an energy strategy and seems to suit a lot of people.
Mark won the National 12 on nothing but gels and carb drink. Good enough for me.
A pie every hour!! That is something I could fully get into!
Results are worth it and I can go for much longer on less fuel as a result. Get up get some caffeine in you and train hard for 1 - 1.5hrs, then eat modestly for the rest of the day. Alternatively (better option) fast all day and train in the evening. Do this a couple of times a week and you will get your endurance ability to a whole new level, unless of course you are under weight. You still need electrolytes, salt and water, but you can get these in the zero cal high5 tabs.
Stretching & Workout Vids
They are supposedly scientifically balanced though.
True, I was talking about the recommendations that seem to suggest just jelly babies with maybe a bit of cake and thinking more of overloading with sugar which my understanding is can lead to reactive hypoglycemia as the insulin over-compensate. A few every now and then should be fine. I bonked massively on a sportive despite eating and drinking plenty throughout and the only reason I can think of for that happening is that I stuffed handfuls of jelly babies into my mouth at the feed stations :oops: (it could have been some other unknown reason of course). By contrast I rode a 12 hour TT a few weeks later and was fine with most of my feeds consisting of rice pudding handed out in an ice cream cone by a roadside volunteer!
I would also say make sure you use food/drink that your body is used to - a long ride is not a good time to experiment with new gels etc, stick with what you know.
Gels / energy bars do my guts in, banana / flap jack / fig rolls etc agree with me much better so that is what I would advise, but obviously we are all different.
Anyway, good luck, my first century I am pretty sure I had net calorie gain
trainerroad - http://www.trainerroad.com/career/joeh
Ritchie runs the best 12hr.
Is that who Sub55 on here is as I think he was the one doing the rice pudding cones.