What to eat on the bike?

Apr 24, 24 10:44

Post #1 of 19 (886 views)

My background is running, and for marathon training and racing, I fueled exclusively with Gu energy gels. I typically take one every 40 minutes or so. This has been very successful for me, and I've never "bonked." I've also never done a run longer than 4 hours.

I'm participating in a bike training series this year, with rides building up to 100 miles. I'm a slow cyclist, so this is going to take me quite a while - well in excess of 4 hours. I'm not sure I want to ingest gels every 40 minutes for hours on end.

In the two group rides I've been on so far, we've had very limited stops - maybe every 90 minutes at most for a planned stop. Based on my running experience, I want to be taking in calories more frequently than that, so it has to be something I can ingest quickly. I don't find I can eat granola bars, for example, rapidly or on the move, though I think that's potentially an option for the few longer stops - but even on those stops, I also need to deal with refilling water bottles and/or using the bathroom. I don't relish the prospect of scarfing down a Kind bar.

I normally just drink 0 cal Nuun or water and rely on Gu for calories, but I'm thinking of switching to some kind of caloric energy drink, maybe Gatorade endurance. But I'd expect to run out of that on longer rides and refill bottles with water, at least on hot days.

What do people do for long training rides? Are you taking Gus mostly? Other designed-for-endurance options like the Gu Stroopwaffle and energy chews? Or something else?

Do you try to take in calories every 40 minutes or so? If so, doesn't the sweetness start to get to you after a while? My training runs normally peaked out at 3 hours, and I could handle it for that duration, but I'm looking at 6 hour cycles.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 24, 24 11:07

Post #2 of 19 (858 views)

I cannot recommend Infinit Nutrition enough to athletes. I am part of the coach affiliate program because I wanted to be able to incentivize my ~30 athletes to use the product and get them a discount because it's not cheap, but I've been amazed at how quickly my athletes have adopted it and use it exclusively now on the bike (and sometimes run). You can set up a free call with an Infinit dietitian to make your custom blend. Then I recommend making 60-90 minutes bottles by concentrating the blend. Ride nutrition becomes very easy when you say "I'm riding for 4.5 hours, and i have 3 places to stow water, and 3 90minute bottles".

Blog: https://davidkoppeltriathlon.blogspot.com/
Coaching: https://dkendurance.com/

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 24, 24 11:22

Post #3 of 19 (833 views)

There's a gentlemen who writes articles on the front page and posts around here fairly often named Dr. Alex Harrison who has developed an app called Saturday. I fuel using table sugar and sodium citrate in the amounts dictated by the app. I flavor with an assortment of gatorade flavors if needed. I do not see any reason to pay inflated prices for someone else to mix sugar and salt together for me.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 24, 24 13:06

Post #4 of 19 (743 views)

One of my favorite parts of long rides is I get to (happily) eat the same garbage food my kids eat

There are ways to really “optimize” - like a perfect mix of different sugar types, drinks vs food, isotonic ratios, etc. And yes, over time you should worry about that

I used to be really anal about drinking the perfect amount of calories when I first got started, and that is probably fine if you want to go that way.

But at the simplest level, especially if you’re just getting started - just fill your jersey pockets with whatever calorie / carb dense food you want to eat. It can be all gu’s if you want ($$$ and kinda gross over time), but I’d go w poptarts, oatmeal crème pies, honeybuns, gummy bears, nutrigrain bars. Whatever you like. I’ve packed sandwiches, sweet potatoes, figs, rice cakes too when I feel like it. At a rest stop, Drink a Coke, eat a payday or a snickers. You’re fueling the engine for more riding with carbs (aka sugar), so you don’t want to skimp

I’d start with a rough guess on # of carbs you need / hour (super variable based on your size and effort …. But maybe start w 60-80?), pack that food and then adjust up or down as you get more experience

Last edited by: mvenneta: Apr 24, 24 13:09

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 24, 24 14:03

Post #5 of 19 (710 views)

Fueling on the bike is a bit different than on a run. You can consume more calories more easily (so solid foods are an option, especially for less intense rides), and you have reasonably sized pockets. Going with gels is always an option; for a moderate intensity ride 2-3/hr is probably a good goal. This works great for some folks (myself included), but other prefer some solid food and/or a less expensive solution. Fig newtons and Clif bars are common go-tos, as are pop tarts and nutagrain bars. You can get energy chews, or use something similar like aussie soft licorice (the trader joes version is three pieces for 100kcal, which makes fueling easy).

It's a long day out there. Find something high carb that you like. Training is a lot more flexible than racing (where your carb ingestion is higher [400kcal] and solids are more difficult to deal with).

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Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Re: What to eat on the bike? [Lagoon] [ In reply to ]

Apr 24, 24 15:16

Post #6 of 19 (683 views)

Lagoon wrote:

There's a gentlemen who writes articles on the front page and posts around here fairly often named Dr. Alex Harrison who has developed an app called Saturday. I fuel using table sugar and sodium citrate in the amounts dictated by the app. I flavor with an assortment of gatorade flavors if needed. I do not see any reason to pay inflated prices for someone else to mix sugar and salt together for me.

I'm also on the speed nectar. I'm at around 100g an hour from sugar water. I've adapted to the sweet flavor so it's not too bad to get down even after drinking nothing but sugar for 3+ hours.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 6:23

Post #7 of 19 (587 views)

Please don't eat a Kind bar while riding. :)

Consider adding a carb source to your drinks or purchasing a higher carb beverage mix. Sugar is what we use in our house. We flavor with the various products on the market because it's now our job to have experience with everything. Fluid based fueling is absolutely the easiest and most reliable way to get what you need. It doesn't have to be what you do though. If your gut can handle it and you don't mind chewing and swallowing while riding, then you can get glucose & fructose any number of other ways.

Key point: carb intake rates should be higher per hour, the longer the session. Duration of the training session is the primary determining factor of carb intake rate needed.

These might also be helpful :)

Slowtwitch 1: Intro to Sport Nutrition Series
Slowtwitch 2: Necessity of Carbs
Slowtwitch 3: The History of Fueling Endurance
Slowtwitch 4: Factions in the Fueling Camps
Slowtwitch 5: How High is High-Carb Fueling?
Slowtwitch 6: High-Carb Fueling All The Time?
Slowtwitch 7: Should You Scale Down Carbs On Easy Days?
Slowtwitch 8: Crash Course On Fueling for the Dazzlingly Incompetent
Slowtwitch 9: Deciphering Carb Nutrition Facts
Slowtwitch 10: Wrapping up the sport nutrition series, my intro to endurance nutrition

Dr. Alex Harrison | Founder & CEO | Sport Physiology & Performance PhD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
📱 Check out our app → Saturday: Pro Fuel & Hydration, a performance nutrition coach in your pocket.
Join us on YouTube → Saturday Morning | Ride & Run Faster and our growing Saturday User Hub

Re: What to eat on the bike? [DKMNTRI] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 6:53

Post #8 of 19 (574 views)

DKMNTRI wrote:

I cannot recommend Infinit Nutrition enough to athletes. I am part of the coach affiliate program because I wanted to be able to incentivize my ~30 athletes to use the product and get them a discount because it's not cheap, but I've been amazed at how quickly my athletes have adopted it and use it exclusively now on the bike (and sometimes run). You can set up a free call with an Infinit dietitian to make your custom blend. Then I recommend making 60-90 minutes bottles by concentrating the blend. Ride nutrition becomes very easy when you say "I'm riding for 4.5 hours, and i have 3 places to stow water, and 3 90minute bottles".

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll check it out. The idea of not dealing with solids and just drinking is definitely appealing, though in cool weather I do struggle to drink much fluid. But I'm sure I'd get better at it with practice.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [Lagoon] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 6:57

Post #9 of 19 (569 views)

Lagoon wrote:

There's a gentlemen who writes articles on the front page and posts around here fairly often named Dr. Alex Harrison who has developed an app called Saturday. I fuel using table sugar and sodium citrate in the amounts dictated by the app. I flavor with an assortment of gatorade flavors if needed. I do not see any reason to pay inflated prices for someone else to mix sugar and salt together for me.

For some reason it never occurred to me that I could make my own Gatorade equivalent. I guess Gatorade had done a good enough job with promoting the mystique of their special formula. In fairness, though, with running most races I've done are providing zero-cal drinks, so I felt like Gu was really the only option. But I had just bought some Gatorade endurance mix for biking and the price was surprisingly high.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [mvenneta] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 7:07

Post #10 of 19 (557 views)

mvenneta wrote:

One of my favorite parts of long rides is I get to (happily) eat the same garbage food my kids eat

There are ways to really “optimize” - like a perfect mix of different sugar types, drinks vs food, isotonic ratios, etc. And yes, over time you should worry about that

I used to be really anal about drinking the perfect amount of calories when I first got started, and that is probably fine if you want to go that way.

But at the simplest level, especially if you’re just getting started - just fill your jersey pockets with whatever calorie / carb dense food you want to eat. It can be all gu’s if you want ($$$ and kinda gross over time), but I’d go w poptarts, oatmeal crème pies, honeybuns, gummy bears, nutrigrain bars. Whatever you like. I’ve packed sandwiches, sweet potatoes, figs, rice cakes too when I feel like it. At a rest stop, Drink a Coke, eat a payday or a snickers. You’re fueling the engine for more riding with carbs (aka sugar), so you don’t want to skimp

I’d start with a rough guess on # of carbs you need / hour (super variable based on your size and effort …. But maybe start w 60-80?), pack that food and then adjust up or down as you get more experience

Thank you for the suggestions. Gus are certainly expensive and after a while start to get kind of gross. But it is a tradeoff with bulk and chewing. I have been doing a little under 2 Gus / hour, equal to about 40 g of carbs. I'm under 140 lb, but still, I probably need to up that a bit. If I switch out one of the Gus for something tastier and add carbs to my drink I'd probably be in decent shape.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 7:24

Post #11 of 19 (544 views)

This : Nothing beats that for long bike sets

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 12:26

Post #12 of 19 (483 views)

Calorie intake while riding is highly individual. I personally cannot digest anything beyond a certain level of effort. I pretty much stopped attempting anything that lasted longer than two hours of racing.

When I started gravel racing in longer climbing events, I started to experiment again, but with little success. Someone suggested rice and rice crispy squares, and later the round, crunchy rice cakes, so I gave it a go. With a very careful, precisely timed approach, I can get through long events most of the time.

I'm not saying try rice crispy squares, but just know that digestion during exercise is highly individual. I suspect most Ironman winners have a very tolerant stomach because you just can't go all day one the energy your body stores.

If you like the gels but don't want to have to open them during a ride, just buy the non-1 serving bottles, squeeze it into your water bottle and shake it up. When I was still trying to race half-IM distance, I would use a clear bottle and mark two-ounce lines on the outside so I could keep my intake regular. One bottle for calories and a front refillable bottle for water.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [mvenneta] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 13:36

Post #13 of 19 (459 views)

mvenneta wrote:

One of my favorite parts of long rides is I get to (happily) eat the same garbage food my kids eat

But at the simplest level, especially if you’re just getting started - just fill your jersey pockets with whatever calorie / carb dense food you want to eat. It can be all gu’s if you want ($$$ and kinda gross over time), but I’d go w poptarts, oatmeal crème pies, honeybuns, gummy bears, nutrigrain bars. Whatever you like. I’ve packed sandwiches, sweet potatoes, figs, rice cakes too when I feel like it. At a rest stop, Drink a Coke, eat a payday or a snickers. You’re fueling the engine for more riding with carbs (aka sugar), so you don’t want to skimp

Some years ago--never mind how long precisely-- D'Wife and I were on our annual bike tour for MS. D'Wife is not very good at working her jersey pockets, so it is usually my job to schelp the snacks around for the both of us. This entails stocking up pretty well at the rest stops along the way, and stuffing my back pockets more than they were probably meant to carry: snack bars, cookies, chips, pretzels, Tastykakes --- you get the idea

At some point on the road, she asked me to hand a protein bar or something over to her. I sat up, reached back, fumbled around until I found what she wanted and handed it over.

Some dude riding up behind me said "Looks like you got a whole Wawa back there"

"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 15:44

Post #14 of 19 (423 views)

Stroopwafels....easy and tasty!

It's a Good life if you don't Weaken!
My Mom 1922-2004

Re: What to eat on the bike? [ohanapecosh] [ In reply to ]

Apr 25, 24 16:12

Post #15 of 19 (389 views)

Similar to Dr. Alexharrison's recs/app:

You can start with:

1/3C of sugar (brown sugar can be used for slightly different flavor) + 1/4 tsp salt per bottle. If you're riding decently hard, you'll probably need 1 bottle per hour roughly.

As you train up and ride longer, you can gradually increase the sugar and salt in the bottles a bit.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [DrAlexHarrison] [ In reply to ]

Apr 26, 24 9:31

Post #16 of 19 (273 views)

DrAlexHarrison wrote:

Please don't eat a Kind bar while riding. :)

Consider adding a carb source to your drinks or purchasing a higher carb beverage mix. Sugar is what we use in our house. We flavor with the various products on the market because it's now our job to have experience with everything. Fluid based fueling is absolutely the easiest and most reliable way to get what you need. It doesn't have to be what you do though. If your gut can handle it and you don't mind chewing and swallowing while riding, then you can get glucose & fructose any number of other ways.

Key point: carb intake rates should be higher per hour, the longer the session. Duration of the training session is the primary determining factor of carb intake rate needed.

These might also be helpful :)

Slowtwitch 1: Intro to Sport Nutrition Series
Slowtwitch 2: Necessity of Carbs
Slowtwitch 3: The History of Fueling Endurance
Slowtwitch 4: Factions in the Fueling Camps
Slowtwitch 5: How High is High-Carb Fueling?
Slowtwitch 6: High-Carb Fueling All The Time?
Slowtwitch 7: Should You Scale Down Carbs On Easy Days?
Slowtwitch 8: Crash Course On Fueling for the Dazzlingly Incompetent
Slowtwitch 9: Deciphering Carb Nutrition Facts
Slowtwitch 10: Wrapping up the sport nutrition series, my intro to endurance nutrition

My most frequent biking partner has diabetes, and I think he got me started on the Kind bars. I had gestational diabetes and am still a bit paranoid about sugar consumption, but that is probably nonsensical for long bike rides. I will definitely try adding calories to my drink for the next ride.

Thank you for the links! I'll have a look through them.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [Mulen] [ In reply to ]

Apr 26, 24 9:33

Post #17 of 19 (268 views)

Mulen wrote:

This : Nothing beats that for long bike sets

My kids are Nutella addict, but I have to say that looks gross and messy to me. To each their own!

Re: What to eat on the bike? [cdw] [ In reply to ]

Apr 26, 24 9:35

Post #18 of 19 (264 views)

cdw wrote:

Calorie intake while riding is highly individual. I personally cannot digest anything beyond a certain level of effort. I pretty much stopped attempting anything that lasted longer than two hours of racing.

When I started gravel racing in longer climbing events, I started to experiment again, but with little success. Someone suggested rice and rice crispy squares, and later the round, crunchy rice cakes, so I gave it a go. With a very careful, precisely timed approach, I can get through long events most of the time.

I'm not saying try rice crispy squares, but just know that digestion during exercise is highly individual. I suspect most Ironman winners have a very tolerant stomach because you just can't go all day one the energy your body stores.

If you like the gels but don't want to have to open them during a ride, just buy the non-1 serving bottles, squeeze it into your water bottle and shake it up. When I was still trying to race half-IM distance, I would use a clear bottle and mark two-ounce lines on the outside so I could keep my intake regular. One bottle for calories and a front refillable bottle for water.

"I suspect most Ironman winners have a very tolerant stomach because you just can't go all day one the energy your body stores." - I think in general success in endurance events is related to the ability to absorb calories and tolerate taking them in without getting an upset stomach. So far, I'm lucky that my stomach seems to handle things decently well, but I've never done an event longer than four hours. I stick to sprint tris. We'll see how things go on these longer rides.

Thanks for the suggestion regarding the gels.

Re: What to eat on the bike? [IAGLIYDW] [ In reply to ]

Apr 26, 24 9:37

Post #19 of 19 (262 views)

IAGLIYDW wrote:

Stroopwafels....easy and tasty!

I have actually been eating these a bit. The crumbs are kind of annoying, but overall I'm a fan.

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