Topic Title

Following on from the Sports Psychology session yesterday the next session will be an introduction to Nutrition.

You R What You Eat

What do you have in your water bottles/back pocket for the Saturday morning training ride 10.00 - 13.00!

This year I will be mostly drinking 1xbottle water 1xbottle of H5 (carbo/protein) and a gel for emergencies or hangovers!

A lasting memory of Erik (the flying dutchman) was seeing him eat a huge jam sandwhich whilst climbing the hill into Malton.

Well, I'm currently absent from the Sat rides, but when I was there it was either a bottle of Adsa's own version of Lucazade Sport (according to the ingredients they're just the same) else water plus a banana.

Clubruns for me are currently water/banana unless I know it's going to be an epic when I'll bring carbo drink as above, but diluted slightly. And I'll have an extra slice of toast with my breakfast.

In a race it was a case of what I could stomach: as above, but also found cherry bakewells, Xmas cake, honey and banana sandwiches, jelly babies, fudge bars, dried fruit and flat cola all positive experiences. I nearly asphyxiated once on some buttered Soreen malt loaf when it gummed my jaws together and once in an emergency tried some Slim-fast (but the least said about that the better). Never a fan of "Powerbars" or the phrase "using food"! Those gels look like they should come with a tube to pass it down your nose!! An old boy I rode with used to swear by liquidised rice pudding with a tablespoon of jam.

In a real endurance event - 12 hours plus - eating something warm (if your helper is amenable) can give a real lift; tomato soup, hot sweet tea...

But for most of the riding we do (less than 3 hours or so) I reckon what we eat before and after is probably more important and more controllable.

Currently I go with diluted cranberry juice and recently been a fan of soreen malt loaf because it doesn't freeze (thanks for the warning though Rob, I'll try and remember to chew). I hear what you say about eating before and after being the most important thing for a medium ride, but I don't seem to have very stable blood sugar and for anything over 2 hours I need to eat solids starting at about 45 minutes and every 45 minutes after that. If I leave it for 2 hours and then start eating it's all over.

Through trial and error I've found that verysimple sugars like most gels and sports drinks make this situation worse and they're full of additives. not to mention £££. Hammer gel has slow release sugars and worked for me but I can't find it here. It's still just as revolting.

So I guess my nutritional question would be what high calorie stuff can I bung in my drink to make me less hungry? And please don't say rice pudding...

Before a long (over 2hrs) ride - granary toast with either peanut butter or eggs because a high-carb breakfast like porridge/fruit/white bread just makes me hungry again after an hour and a half.

Soft cereal bars on the ride like those nutri grain things or an SIS energy gel (not as sweet as some of the others) for emergencies....and you can always spread it on your toast when you get home (joking Rob!).

I don't like energy drinks very much so normally water or cordial, and the worst, most retch-inducing thing that people keep pulling out of their back pockets? Brown Soggy Squashy Bananas - aaagh!

Apparently it is possible to train your body to burn fat over sugar. The trick is to put yourself through a sort of "controlled bonk". If you go out on the bike before breakfast (don't eat or drink anything other than water or black coffee) and ride pretty hard for between 1 and 2 hours. You'll go a bit wobbly, but not so much that you won't get home! The idea is that your body reacts by burning more fat and less sugar next time.

Its quite a good session if you have visitors for the weekend as you'll be home before they get up.... or even if you're away with work.

Don't normally eat anything special before rides; if I'm out in the morning it's just normal breakfast (couple of slices of toast) and if I'm out in the middle of the day I try to skip lunch until I get back - a sort of version of Rob's suggestion for fat burning.

Out on rides I just use SIS Go to try to replace fluids. I've never bonked on a ride but if anything gets me it's cramps. I've tried carrying dates, figs and all manner of stuff during races but either (a) end up forgetting them and finding a squishy mess in me back pocket after the event or (b) nearly die of asphyxiation when they end up finding their way into me respiratory system. So now I don't attempt it!

Back to the original question - on a Saturday morning ride I would take a couple of decent quality cereal bars - I quite like the Alpen bars, a couple of single twix bars and a packet of glucose sweets. I would also take a litre bottle of water. I would expect to drink all the water but probably take the food home maybe with the exception of one of the cereal bars which I would have on the way back.
As already said a ride of this duration is more about your breakfast than what you have on the ride. as you can probably gather I'm not a big fan of energy bars, gels or energy drinks - lets face it they are just mad money and definately overrated.
As a diabetic I'm only carrying this lot as an insurance policy in a worse case scenario sort of way. However that kind of focus's the old mind a bit so I never forget to eat and never forget to take enough food! However I have no problem eating solid food even in a race and I appreciate not everyone is able to do this. I think the golden rule is you have to take stuff you enjoy and can consume easily.
4-5 hour rides I would take a bottle of SIS and a bottle of water and about twice as much food - and expect to eat something every hour or so. Lets face it you don't want to be crawling home on your hands and knees when you have stuff to do when you get home!

Steph - your piece makes interesting reading. I did a course a few years back about how glycemic index of foods effects blood sugar due to the release of insulin and about how mixing different food types effect the glycemic index of what you eat. Read what Cath has written and try it and let me know how you get on. If you don't like peanut butter try cheese. Theres a lot of crap written about GI foods in Cycling Weekly especially. Basically I would say avoid eating high GI foods like cereals, porridge, rice (unless basmati), white, brown or wholmeal bread before a ride unless you combine with low GI foods. Granary bread is the way forward.

as you can probably gather I'm not a big fan of energy bars, gels or energy drinks - lets face it they are just mad money and definately overrated.

Amen brother. I think people use energy drinks too much (and then wonder why they don't lose weight). Most of them are also full of crap and rot your teeth.

For a 2 - 2 1/2 hour Saturday ride I'd take:

Two 750ml bottles. I'd only drink one in winter maybe, but both in summer.

Two geobars and maybe a banana. My rule of thumb is one 'bit' of solid food per hour. Eat on the hour, every hour

I really rate geobars: fair trade, healthy, and cheaper than 'energy bars'. Bananas are also good as they include various trace minerals which need replacing.

For very long or very intense rides I'll use a sports drink, though at a lower concentration than recommended. Currently I like the PowerBar ones, mainly as they are pretty much the only one I can find that doesn't have aspartane in.

Currently I like the PowerBar ones, mainly as they are pretty much the only one I can find that doesn't have aspartane in.

It's mad isn't it why energy drink manufacturers put artificial sweetners in a drink that is supposed to be about getting maximum sugar?! I guess that's the marketing strategy made by companies trying to cater for the calorie conscious masses in the same product they are marketing to athletes.

When I had money to spend on such things I used Accelerade drink that has 1:4 protein / carb ratio, some mineral salts and a good way of getting some extra calories in. Revolting stuff tho; lime flavoured grit.

Quite a few of you use SIS drinks, is there a particular kind that you recommend?

Paul, yes, good point about GI index. I've been eating low GI foods for a while now and it's made quite a big difference. If I have a high GI breakfast I'm out of it before the first hour cycling is up. My favoured breakfast for cycling is whole buckwheat grains cooked with egg, with full-fat yoghurt, almond butter on oat cakes containing other grains, or very slow cook oats.

The sweetner is needed to disguse the taste of the other ingredients

Steph - Wow! - and I thought people stared in disbelief at the breakfasts I construct - which generally revolve around cereals, toast and fruit juice.

"Quite a few of you use SIS drinks, is there a particular kind that you recommend?"

I tend to have a bottle of SIS Rego after long rides or hard training sessions. I've never found a way of doing a back-to-back test to see if it really helps but I've read plenty about the benefits of pouring in carbs/protein immediately after exercise. It's a quick way of doing this and I quite like the choc or vanilla flavours (though I know plenty of others who think they're disgusting!).

"For very long or very intense rides I'll use a sports drink, though at a lower concentration than recommended. Currently I like the PowerBar ones, mainly as they are pretty much the only one I can find that doesn't have aspartane in"

I'm giving Torq drink a try - they claim to be free of artificial sweeteners / preservatives / flavourings and amazingly seems to be a UK company; you can mail-order direct from them. Will see what it tastes like and if it does the trick!

"Quite a few of you use SIS drinks, is there a particular kind that you recommend?"

Aaaarrrrhhhh! Surely "use" is the wrong verb! How about "drink", "consume", "swig", "imbibe"..... I do worry about our relationship with food you know!

"Quite a few of you use SIS drinks, is there a particular kind that you recommend?"

Aaaarrrrhhhh! Surely "use" is the wrong verb! How about "drink", "consume", "swig", "imbibe"..... I do worry about our relationship with food you know!

"use" is exactly the rigth verb for Rego. Added to which it makes you fart like a trooper (or maybe that's just me!).

I prefer solid food when I get back from a ride now - a plate of pasta doesn't take time to make and is better for you IMO.

"Added to which it makes you fart like a trooper.."

No more than anything else! See, I told you someone would say it was disgusting..