Fuelling for longer rides

daniel_b

Greetings all,

I've taken Friday off as the weather looks reasonable, to ride a 200k route with my brother who is over for a bit from Italy.

He's a long distance bike packer, so it will be a steady pace, and we'll likely stop at around 140k for a good lunch, and to meet my partner and daughter there too as it happens.

I'll be on my gravel bike with rack and top bag, so have some space for provisions - last time I rode a ~160k solo on good friday, I took the same bike, didn't stop for any food or drink, and took a load of sandwiches, some small pork pies (Which were really really good) and some muffin type things - with the vibrations, one of these disintegrated and reformed itself into a very dense form

*I tend to take, and will take some clif bloks and bars, but my bro doesn't tend to go in for those types of things.

I'm also likely to take part in a 200k audax in November, so some good tips here would be useful for that too :-)

The ride with my bro will be more relaxed I suspect, probably going to average a moving speed of maybe 24km/h, and we are leaving at 06:00, crack out something in the region of 90-100k, then stop for a mid morning feed of food bought with us, then onto the cafe for lunch 40k, then the 60k back should be pretty straightforward - that bit is on roads that I know well.

My bro will be on one of my bikes, which has no luggage carrying capacity (Though I could give him a handlebar bag I suppose) so the food will need to be carried by me.

I don't just want a ton of sweet stuff, I'm thinking pork pies again could be a good one, I could even put some in my top tube bag, and eat whilst riding.
I've heard peanut butter pitta breads mentioned as a good on the road food stuff as well, I guess roomwise they are pretty efficient as well.
Starting at 6 as well, we'll be looking to pack probably a couple of rain jackets to counter the cold first thing, but will then want to stash them later.

Anyone have any personal good/bad experiences with what food they have packed for longer rides?

mrb123

New potatoes, cooked and then dressed with some olive oil,salt and pepper. Take in a little ziploc plastic bag.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

White bread; peanut butter; cheese; banana; jam; marmite.

~200g bag of jelly babies for quick fix.

webboo

If you are stopping for lunch do you need anything more than an energy bar or gel before and after lunch.
I did 125 miles the other week. I had 3 quarters of a bar before lunch (70 miles) lunch was a large cheese salad roll and a piece of millionaire short bread. That was all other than sugar free apple squash.
Given the training you do and the pace you are planning to ride. You aren’t going to be depleting your glycogen supplies that much.

daniel_b

Thanks for those replies.

We are both likely to start the day at around 5am with a 60g bowl of (overnight) porridge oats, probably with some fruit and stuff in it, and a cup of strong coffee.

I have bonked before and it was a particularly nasty experience, so I guess I like to try and over compensate perhaps and ensure that does not happen, and riding with my brother who doesn't eat bars of have any energy stuff in his bottles, I want to guard against that I suppose.

You could well be right though @webboo and if I was riding solo I wouldn't think about taking so much, especially with the lunch stop at pretty much the exact same point as yours.

I have lost my mojo in recent months though, and have not had anything like as much saddle time, road or turbo as I have had in the preceding ~3 years, so will be interested to see how it goes......

@mrb123 I like new potatoes, olive oil, salt and pepper - that sounds like a very good snack on the go if a little messy - oily fingers?
Do you cook them up exactly the same as if you were going to eat them at home?

@N0bodyOfTheGoat those bread filling ideas sound good - and I have them all in the cupboard.
Any reason for the white bread as opposed to seeded/wholemeal/granary or some such, or just personal preference?

mrb123

Yes Dan, just fully cooked through as normal so soft but not falling to bits. If you're worried about getting the oil on your fingers you can just squeeze the bag to move one up to the opening and straight into your mouth.

daniel_b

mrb123 said:

Yes Dan, just fully cooked through as normal so soft but not falling to bits. If you're worried about getting the oil on your fingers you can just squeeze the bag to move one up to the opening and straight into your mouth.

That's what I do with Clif bloks

Is that your go to ride snack, or do you keep it for longer rides?

Would you tend to have a piece of tato every 20 minutes or something, and you find that keeps you fairly energised, or do you supplement it with other food stuffs?

mrb123

daniel_b said:

mrb123 said:

Yes Dan, just fully cooked through as normal so soft but not falling to bits. If you're worried about getting the oil on your fingers you can just squeeze the bag to move one up to the opening and straight into your mouth.

That's what I do with Clif bloks

Is that your go to ride snack, or do you keep it for longer rides?

Would you tend to have a piece of tato every 20 minutes or something, and you find that keeps you fairly energised, or do you supplement it with other food stuffs?

Use them more for ultra distance fell running stuff TBH but would work well too on long rides when you want something savoury and easy to eat. The texture works really well at times when other stuff is becoming difficult to get down.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

daniel_b said:

Any reason for the white bread as opposed to seeded/wholemeal/granary or some such, or just personal preference?

Easier for body to digest I thought, plus I find white bread is usually more fluffy and easier to chew.

Oh, those fillings I mentioned, sometimes I do sandwiches containing them all.

joeyhalloran

Potatos are good but most of the other foods mentioned (pork pies) are pretty fatty with not many carbs.

I did a long ride yesterday and found peanut butter and jam sandwiches (with white bread) good before I moved on to the 3 bags of haribo. I have a massive sweet tooth and use riding as an excuse to eat sweets, which works for me.

I think the priorities are:
1) something you will actually eat
2) high carb
3) low in everything else (fat and fibre in particular)

This is more relevant the harder you are pedalling as you have less bodily resources to divert to digestion and will be burning more carbs compared to fat.

shirley_basso

The amount daniel_b spends on cycling kit, talking about his bikes and mentioning his turbo training and yet doesn't know what to eat to cycle 100 miles is alarming.

wallace_and_gromit

mrb123 said:

...squeeze the bag to move one up to the opening and straight into your mouth.

Rice pudding via a bag is surprisingly agreeable and practical.

daniel_b

shirley_basso said:

The amount daniel_b spends on cycling kit, talking about his bikes and mentioning his turbo training and yet doesn't know what to eat to cycle 100 miles is alarming.

Apologies for alarming you, I hope it passes soon

As I mentioned up the thread, I rode ~160k solo, just a few months back with no cafe stop, but this will be riding with my brother who doesn't eat the kind of things that I do (by choice) so thought it would be silly not to tap into the collective knowledge of the forum to see what 'real foods' they recommended and may have personal experience of.

Back in the day I used to take fig rolls out on a ride, and I know my bro likes them, so will get some of them in, as they are very easy to eat, and not messy, though they are quite sweet, so I recall there being a limit for how many I could eat before they were no longer palatable!

I'll be taking clif bars and clif bloks with me as well, but they are all sweet.
Some savoury stuff sounds good, so curenntly thinking about some white bread sandwiches, or cut up into bite size pieces with some kind of savoury filling, peanut butter probably makes the most sense for practical and fuelling purposes - and maybe a couple of bananas too.

joeyhalloran

If you're feeling extravagant you can make some bacon and egg rice cakes. The recipe was given by some pro team a while ago, can't remember where though.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

I have never been a big eater on the bike. I tend to do 3 x 100km+ rides a week but find 3 cereal bars and lucozade sport plus water is fine for me.

I usually just consume sweet stuff but when I did the Raid Pyrenean, slices of quiche lorraine were particularly good on long days.

The bacon egg rice cake recipe is Allan Lim's, who was the doctor/physio with Garmin Slipstream and Phonak I think.

pep.fermi

I've always found the fitter I am, the less I need to refuel.
Is it just me?

webboo

pep.fermi said:

I've always found the fitter I am, the less I need to refuel.
Is it just me?

No.

joeyhalloran

Depends on the riding; the fitter I am the more calories I can burn when riding hard but at lower intensities, I am working less hard so using more of my insulation layer.

shirley_basso

When I am tired is it because my muscles are tired or because I am hungry?

Nowadays I don't ride much more than 50k which I do flat out (30kph) on a just bowl of cereal but then I'm generally in pieces for the rest of the day.

webboo

shirley_basso said:

When I am tired is it because my muscles are tired or because I am hungry?

Nowadays I don't ride much more than 50k which I do flat out (30kph) on a just bowl of cereal but then I'm generally in pieces for the rest of the day.

I would suspect it’s because you are under trained for the effort you are doing. It’s like you are just doing a 50k race every time you ride.

joeyhalloran

I can do very similar rides and have very different responses depending on what I eat. I know I can go out with the club on Sunday morning without eating much and perform well. But I have also learned that if I eat on the ride I am in a much better position to look after our toddler in the afternoon. Even if I have a good breakfast and meal as soon as I get in I still feel better if I have eaten along the way too. These aren't long rides either, maybe 4 hours. I am curious to know if this also affect performance.

super_davo

There are two different energy systems in play; glycogen burning and fat burning. The former can give you lots of power until you've exhausted the fuel tank, the latter can give much less but you've essentially got an unlimited supply.

You're always using both systems in different proportions.

Ride hard, you're going to be depleting glycogen stores, and you'll need to add fuel, and if you don't, if the ride is short enough you may not bonk on the ride, but you will feel tired to do "normal" stuff after.

If you're really fit then for a given intensity then chances are you're using more of your fat burning system, and you won't need to fuel so much on ride and you won't feel so drained afterwards (course this doesn't work if the intensity just goes up!)

imposter2.0

Stop saying 'fat burning' - there's no such thing.

super_davo

It's a (deliberately) dumbed answer so it's easier to understand the principle.

Your body has a set amount of ATP in it's stores and compounds that it can synthesize to create ATP, such as carbohydrates, protein and fat. It's easier to synthesize carbohydrates than fat or protein so you can top up your ATP faster that way.

If you are working hard, then to replenish your ATP fast enough you need to top up from carbs. If you are not, then your body can keep up the generation required just from fat stores. If you have carbohydrates to use up, it would do that first.

Hence you are correct there is no magic "fat burning" form of exercise but also quite pedantic...

imposter2.0

super_davo said:

It's a (deliberately) dumbed answer so it's easier to understand the principle.
>>>
Hence you are correct there is no magic "fat burning" form of exercise but also quite pedantic...

You can call it pedantic if you like - but the simple fact is that 'fat burning' does not exist in any meaningful way. So I don't see how referring to something non-existent is in anyway helpful. There's nothing wrong with clarity.

Generally speaking, you burn glycogen and fat in equal measure, at a combined rate according to exercise intensity and duration. You may burn fractionally more fat at lower intensity/longer duration rides, but the difference is minimal.

orraloon

TCR #9 is on now, Belgium to Greece via control point deviations various. Those are looong rides so worth poking about on the feeds, website et al for info on their feeding.

orraloon

700km in 24h, no sleep. Serious. Check out Strasser's feeding if you want to survive.... 😳