Fuelling for longer rides

3-4 hours I'll manage on a carb drink - e.g. High 5, rather than just gels. Longer then pop in some real food. I find 'bars' to be hard to eat. I've a 10 hour sportive coming up on Sunday, and I'll force myself to stop at the 'feeds' and eat some real food.

Fueling on gels ie glucose is not good for you.  You need a mix of carbs.  4 hour ride I wouldn't eat anything much.  6 hours i would stop and have something that is a mix of carbs ie a sandwich and a flapjack.

You need a decent breakfast as well.  Oats are good for regulating blood sugar.  I bet you are having sugar crashes from overstimulating your insulin response.  ditch the gels, eat real food

This is for leisure rides - racing is differnt

Is it just a practice thing?

In short: Yes, but I also I find it helps massively if I have a good dinner the night before and lay off the booze, and get a really good night's sleep. Have a good breakfast at least 30 mins before you start riding. Have food that you want to eat, and mix it up with savoury and sweet, and build in stops or reminders to eat. A good café to aim for half way round also helps especially with motivation. But yes, its mostly practice. A 4-5 ride should be demanding , especially if there's plenty f climbing, but regular food will help.

BTW, pro riders in the peloton are starting to have diets with 100g-120g/ Kg of body weight now to fuel the sorts of faster riding that they're doing now, so y'know, count yourself lucky

Cafe's are available, stop at cafe's.

Cafe’s are available, stop at cafe’s.

I approve of the plural. If there are no cafes, that's just shit route planning.

It's very trainable, and something you'll have to work on rather than expect passive hunger to sort out. Blood flow to the gut and stomach is significantly reduced during exercise meaning you can struggle to take in anything that's not easy to absorb (i.e. not gels, carb drink etc.). This reduction is proportional to intensity, so if you're pushing hard you'll need simple easy digestible food, if you're bimbling sandwiches will do nicely.

Carb requirements are also related to intensity and to fitness - the higher the power output the higher the energy expenditure. The 120g/hr+ numbers that road pros are hitting these days are required due to them being capable of 6000kJ+ races without blinking, and those intakes tends to be seen in the heavier classics guys. A 60kg climber on an easy endurance training ride would be doing less than half the energy output of Mathieu van der Poel at Flanders.

All this being said, taking in easily digestible carbohydrates on a regular basis is one of the easiest ways to improve performance (or at least avoid catastrophes). Don't get caught up in worrying about health concerns of sugary snacks on the bike (with the exception of dental health) - during exercise is an altogether different situation than at rest.

If you're currently struggling at 30g/hr you'll likely have to try quite hard to push up to more sustainable figures - using carbs in a bottle alongside solid/gel food is a good way to achieve this.
We can take carbohydrates in at an increased rate by including multiple sources of monosaccharide sugars - fructose and glucose (don't worry ab0ut galactose). In short, there are different pathways in the stomach and gut that absorb each of these. If you're making or purchasing sports drink, try to make sure it contains both of these (sucrose (table sugar) contains both in a 1:1 ratio; maltodextrin is effectively 100% glucose in a faster absorbing form; dextrose=glucose).

I make my own carbohydrate drink with a 1:0.8 ratio of maltodextrin:fructose and added electrolytes. It's palatable up to about 150g/litre concentration. I then combine this with gels/bloks/bars/sandwiches etc (dependant on intensity) to total about 70g/hr for training and 110g/hr for racing.
I have an alert set on my garmin every half an hour during training and every 20 minutes during racing to remind me to eat. This is something I'd highly recommend.

Key points from this ramble:

• Train your gut and work up to the higher intakes.
• Tailor food to intensity. The easier the ride the more 'real' food you can manage.
• Eat regularly - little and often.
• Try to use multiple carbohydrate types.
• Use liquid carbohydrate sources to increase intake.

I can only manage about half this, I just don’t want to eat more

Then get a carb drink and drink to fuel yourself as well as eating.

Are you all able to consume what BC are recommending?

God no, but I do regularly scoff gels and Haribo-type sweets on rides of that length. Along with the odd snack bar and maybe a butty if lunch falls during the ride.

Caffeine gel can help for the second half of a longer ride as well, IME.

Are you all able to consume what BC are recommending? How are you doing it? Is it just a practice thing?

Not even close. I don't eat a huge amount on the bike anyway. I think the only time I've ever done rides relying entirely on energy stuff was RideLondon when I could do the whole 100 miles with zero stops in 4 hrs living off gels and a bottle of energy drink. The aim of that ride though was pure speed - get round with the leading group.

Otherwise, I prefer a cafe stop and a mix of energy intake. I often carry a gel for emergencies but prefer to rely on slower release food like flapjack and banana for riding and a cafe stop mid-ride.

To get that amount of energy per hour needs some training - don't just go out on a ride and start necking gels cos it's highly likely that your body will react to the sudden vast intake of sugar quite badly. Also, most people are not riding anywhere near hard enough to justify that amount of calorie intake. Maybe in a race but on a normal road ride, you won't be close to needing that level of carbs.

Brief add on from the above, some example ride fuelling summaries.

Sunday roadie cafe ride: Carb drink in bottles (40g/hr) + bars on the bike. Coffee and sandwich at halfway. Total 60g/hr intake.

Easy MTB ride: bars only and pastry at halfway (low intensity and lots of stops so predominantly fat utilisation). Total 30g/hr.

XCO race: 1-2 gels per hour + carb drink at high concentration. Total 80g/hr.

Marathon race (6hr): 3-4 gels or one packet of bloks per hour + high conc. carb drink, with additional gels/bloks as needed. Total 110g/hr.

On a ride up to 4h I'd have a sandwich and a couple of bits of fruit. ( Or cake)

On anything much longer I'd eat something every hour. I've got very sad and cross open long rides, when I think about it it's mostly due to not eating every hour. I now set my watch to beep to remind me. It doesn't have to be exactly on the hour but for me it needs to be close.

How do I do this- by being greedy 😃

Riding to my in-laws is 130 miles, the only super long (for me) ride I do each year

5.30Breakfast- toast/ porridge. On the bike at 6ish.
Banana
Banana
Bar
10am first lunch- sandwich cake and coffee
Malt loaf
Malt loaf
Gel or bar
1pm second lunch massssive sandwich
Cake from second lunch
Coffee/ cake and ice cream
Bar
4.30 Gel, 10 min out from in-laws so I can string a sentence together and parent when I arrive instead of being total starving and obsessed with food.

I'm not super training, just aiming to finish. I could cut an hour of my 10h 30 time by not stopping for food, I'm in no rush

Since riding longer distances (60-100km) fuelled by sugary drinks and snickers bars, I now seem to suffer from sugar cravings off the bike day to day - never used to have a sweet tooth. My weight is fortunately stable thanks to a regular commute but I have to work hard to avoid excessive snacking at work.

Anyone else get this?

I've been steadily training myself to eat more on anything over an hour and a half. Typically I start off with bulkier harder to digest stuff i.e. bananas then work through a range of semi normal stuff like mini soreen and those 'Natural' bars which are basically pureed date and cashew. Obviously I mix it up with whatever cafe stops might be en route and maybe a gel or two or Clif Bloks if I need/want something quicker or easier to digest.

If it sounds excessive I STILL don't think I'm managing the BC recommendations, but also even if the actual intensity of the ride doesn't differ I ALWAYS feel better afterwards for eating more, general mood etc. Even on Z2 rides I think I've managed to go hypo-glycemic and ended up in a pissy grumpy mood for the rest of the day.

Edit: in fact pretty much what Tall Martin said!

I’m trying to train myself up to longer distances now that the days are getting longer. I reckon my kj or kc demand is 500 per hour for a lower intensity ride up to 1000 per hour at race pace.

If I underfuel my performance drops later in the ride. I then feel wiped out for the rest of the day and my recovery suffers.

There’s no way you can take in 500kcalories per hour. So I think the recommendations above for a powdered energy drink and bars/gels are good. Recently I have been eating a Naked bar every hour but that’s only 190kcals. I think I’m going to go for a powdered drink and a bar every hour and a cafe stop every four hours. I think it will take a bit of practice to get used to taking in more but the benefits are huge.

British Cycling say I need 0.75 x my weight ( 65kg ) per hour = 49 gms per hour. An average gel is about 22gms so I need 2 gels or the equivalent every hour

Per hour of what exactly?
How much are you working? What are you actually doing for that time?

BC do seem to see the world mostly in competitive road cycling terms, so they think you'll be taking on ~50g of carbohydrate (mostly in various forms of sugar) per hour at "race pace" (I'm guessing Z3-Z4+).

I'm 20kg heavier than you and I know I can ride steadily (in Z2-Z3) for 5-7 hours(ish) on the Road (based on HR); if I have some breakfast before (couple of Weetabix or a bacon roll), chug down maybe 1.5-2L of overpriced sugar water during the riding (High 5 or similar mixed @ circa 75-100g Per-Litre), plus a couple of gels and maybe a flapjack/soreen/fist full of trail mix, basically a mouthful of something solid with calories approximately every 45mins or so (I have a timed reminder on my watch.
I can comfortably do 70-100miles fuelled only by what I have in bottles on the frame and snacks in my jersey pockets, add a stop for a more substantial lunch an I can go further.
I'll finish that sort of ride tired but not super hungry, I think the Carbs diluted in my bottles and the odd gel meet the basic needs in an easily absorbed form and the solid food just tops up energy with stuff that is a bit slower to digest/release and kicks in after about hour 4 of a ride.

But MTB/Gravel bike riding off-road definitely beats you up more than people realise, it places more demand on core muscles and tends to spike HR more (IME), generally with less chance of recovery. As a result I end up either needing to take more calories on more frequently and/or I just can't cover the same distance or ride for as long off-road. I still struggle with this a fair bit TBH.

Essentially The higher the level of effort, the more calories you'll need to take on more often, and effort doesn't equate to speed/distance off-road in the same way as it does on a Road bike. hard and fast rules from BC should be taken as a guide at best I reckon.

Honestly, you need to train it, as in get used to eating more. Steadily increase the amounts with more riding. If you go all in without being used to it, you're likely to get stomach issues.

You want a mix of anything carby, but ideally slightly more glucose than fructose, but really you don’t need to think about it if you’re eating a variety of snacks, drinks (ie High 5), snack bars, cake at a cafe.

Kendle Mint Cake is actually really excellent too. 80g in a bar, you can nibble your way through.

If I do a fastish club ride, I prefer to drink the carbs. If it's a gentler cafe ride, I still drink some carbs, then get very excited dreaming about a massive slice of victoria sponge. Overall probably hitting 50g per hr.

I can eat A LOT of cake!

For normal long rides with mates ( 100km + etc ) - I just take random food.
Some gels, bars, sandwichs, chocolate, bottle mix

And depending on how long (i've done some 20 hour plus stuff ) often peanuts... as i get bored of sweet foods and with the joy of pockets on shorts I can easily get them out for a quick handfull every now and then.

For racing (e.g. glentress 7 ) 1 -2 gels / bars per hour and bottle mix. Which is about 100g + of carbs per hour
I've recently moved to styker stuff which has more carbs per serving.  (50g per gel / bar)

If you're thinking of increasing your gels per hour / in total. Do it on a practice route / turbo.
It takes a while to train your gut to handle that many carbs / processed products.

Finally I often get carried away and forget to eat for periods of time so I have set a reminder every 30 min on my garmin to same EAT.

Assuming a decent breakfast (or lunch if it's an evening ride):

Up to about 90 minutes - nothing, might take an cereal bar/Naked bar/apple

Up to about three/four hours - I'll have sandwiches or similar half way, either bought or brought with me depending on route, plus have a couple of bars/apples with me.

Over four hours - Same as above, but will just have more of it.

I never use gels, I only drink water

I never use gels. I think they're gross. It's only 22g too, way easier to drink that, or eat something real - like foam shrimps and bananas 😂

hard and fast rules from BC should be taken as a guide at best I reckon.

To be fair, a lot of gels have the same info printed on them - take one gel every 20-30 mins of riding...

🤯

Not only would that get very expensive very quickly, it'd make many people very ill.
I've seen it a couple of times on ride-leading jobs where people have got really anxious about it all and they've put the miles in on turbo trainers (so never really needed gels etc) and then it gets to the real event and within 10 minutes of starting they're necking gels back cos they've heard they need to do this and that's what it say on the pack...and then a couple of hours later they're in a hedgerow throwing it all back up.

so I need 2 gels or the equivalent every hour

Ouch, my bank balance is weeping. In the olden days i'd have needed between 30 and 40 gels a week to meet training and racing needs.

Are you all able to consume what BC are recommending? How are you doing it? Is it just a practice thing?

It's getting your guts used to it. I used to do "practise" races with the required carb/sugars/salts/nutrients and (most importantly) effort. Usually in a group, knocking lumps out of each other for 3 or 4 hours. See what happened, and if it worked or not.

And FWIW, i've never consumed what BC (or anyone else) recommends outside of a race. Usually mixed drinks between 1/4 and 1/3rd recommended strength for training, not even 100% for races. Rarely use gels outside of a race. Do sometimes take an energy bar or two out training for "food between cafe stops" or if there is no stop. And have taken a ziplock bag of drink mix on longer/hotter rides. The smallest IKEA ones are a nice size.

A lot of it depends on the intensity of the ride.

2 hours easy and most people can do it on empty, 2 hours on the rivet and you'll need some kind of food.

Personally, I find the right gels (and there is some experimentation needed to find the ones that work for you) are vastly easier on the stomach than real food which just repeats on me as soon as the effort goes up. Again, if you're pootling about then proper food works fine.

It's running not bikes, but when I've gone hard at a marathon (3 hours effort for me) then I will take about 6 gels, so one every 30 mins or so. But doing an ultra where you're going half the pace and 2 or 3 times the distance then proper food (pork pies and doughnuts) work better.

But you do need to get used to them. I've tried the high strength gels (SiS BetaFuel and some of the Maurten stuff) and struggled with it as my stomach can't deal with that volume of carbs.  Normal Sis/High5/whatever is fine.

Like a lot of the advice dished out from the strange BC world, that's not much use for normal human beans.

If you're a genuinely competitive racer, keen on top performing, then get a well educated coach to help you formulate a plan that actually works for you and then practice and work at it.  Many people cannot train their gut to absorb that level of exclusively sugary carbs and will require a much broader spectrum of nutrition in order to be able to ride all day; that's long after your glycogen stores are gone and you're needing support while switching to fat burning.

For the other 99.8% of the cycling community, then you're much like my ultra running people and will also probably benefit from the way I cope on my own, longer and harder bike rides and runs.  Eat real food; eat early, eat often.  Just as TJ and others have said, short chain carbs (sugary stuff) comes with physiological and endocrinological baggage.  If you're eating real food both before and early in a long ride and can keep a lid on your adrenaline pre-, early and mid ride, then you'll keep your guts active and in absorption mode for much longer.  So much better able to take in what is being offered.   And not throw it up again in protest..  Lots of runners at the Highland Fling at the weekend were throwing up as soon as the sun warmed the course, they begin to feel a bit odd in the unaccustomed warmth of a highland spring, their gels become impossible to face and a DNF is inbound.  Just remember, everyone is different.

I've found I've had to train myself to eat on the bike (Garmin reminder, and even then sometimes I'll ignore it). It's definitely something you have to practice at.

Thanks all, lots of great information to experiment with. I'm not really a gel fan, hence the clif bloks and cereal (graze) bars, and I prefer taking sandwiches ( walk around, stretch and eat for 10 mins) than stopping at cafes. I do have an alarm on my Garmin that goes off every 30 mins. I will practice slowly increasing my consumption, more variety and carbs in my drink bottle and I'll stop fretting over the BC recommendations! I think I need more pockets for all this food!

This book is your friend:  https://www.skratchlabs.com/products/feed-zone-portables great recipes plus also goes into the science of what your body needs/can digest, avoiding gut rot, etc.

I'm a big fan of their rice cakes, plus rice and eggs for breakfast is my go to for fuelling any big ride. Buying a rice cooker is a good shout!

A lot of it depends on the intensity of the ride.

This.

I've managed steady 8-hour+ rides on keto grub - walnuts/jerky/bit of bacon and eggs at halfway etc . Admittedly there is the small matter of adapting your body to reach for fats rather than mainly carbs, but the idea that you need to be piling just sugars into yourself non-stop on a 'normal' longer ride is not entirely true.

The closer you get to your max intensity, the more 'easy access' energy you'll need, but if you're just spinning along, you won't need anything like as much, and pumping yourself full of gels creates the possibility of bonking on the other side of the sugar spike.

I'm just gobsnacked by the number of you that can go 4 hours between cafe stops😄

I do have an alarm on my Garmin that goes off every 30 mins.

FWIW, I absolutely hate those. Guaranteed to start going off as you're negotiating a busy junction or a steep descent and on group rides it's massively annoying - it gets about 20-30 minutes in and suddenly everyone's Garmins are tweeting and warbling away.

Maybe that's one for the [url= https://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/stuff-that-makes-you-disproportionately-cross/ ]Stuff that makes you disproportionately cross[/url] thread. Group rides where Garmins are constantly bleeping away. Text message! Off route! Eat now! Climb coming! Segment complete!

Did a 3 hour ride at the weekend. A hard ride for me, flat and fast, I prefer slow with hills😄. It was pretty much a 3 up TT until one guy blew and sat on then a two up tt. I ate a banana and had a homemade gel (about 5 scoops of maltodextrin, pinch of salt and some blackcurrant squash). I was on the verge of bonking by the end. Had it been my more usual tootle along and smash it up.a.few climbs type of ride that would have been fine as it was I could have done with double....point is it depends how hard you ride. I avoid energy drinks in bottle and just drink plain water, makes my teeth ache just thinking about it. Gels are useful but I dislike the packaging waste so find I avoid eating them till it's too late.

On longer slower rides I would probably take two bananas to eat early on, some cereal bars and two homemade gels. Then if I stop at a cafe I would have something savoury or a pasty or something from a shop with make a full fat coke and put some sweets in pockets to graze on. If you ride enough you will work out what's good, basically just eat what you fancy.

I’ve been mixing a fancy squash (no sweetners) with maltodextrin with electrolyte powders. Very cheap and taste less artificial than hi5 type stuff. You can also adjust the amount of salt depending on the temperature and how sweaty you are.

The intensity thing is entirely logical because it all comes down to how you're fuelling efforts on a physiological level. Basically slow and steady is more biased towards fat burning, lots of hard efforts above threshold and you're eating into your glycogen reserves and need to supplement them more aggressively. You know about this if you're doing hard intervals indoors.

A lot of the advice on massive carbo intake is based on elite-level riders going at race pace for hours. On top of that, everyone's different. A mate of mine who was a very good 24-hour soloist fuelled solely with gels because it was the only thing his gut could tolerate, other people seem to be a lot more tolerant.

Anyway, this being STW, I'm disappointed that no-one has yet suggested fuelling sociable group rides with exogenous ketones... I guess it's only a matter of time 🙂

a full fat coke

A your concerned what an energy drink will do to your teeth?  The Maltodextrin is sugar AA, in context the same as the Glucose you’ll find in an energy drink, plus of course your adding the various nasty acids from the  Coke, ouch.

If you want to fuel properly listen to Paddy.  It’s not just about “eating what you like” it’s in context of effort and energy requirements and how / how quickly your body can break down what you shove in your mouth, and how it reacts to excreting the excess chemicals it doesnt need.    Stuffing a pasty in your face and expecting it to support the next hour (at peak performance anyway) is an illusion, it’s full of crap you don’t need and hard to digest what you do need which causes gastric stress which in turn lowers performance.  That’s is why Gels exist - they are a purer faster form of ingestible carbohydrate - with some being cleaner e.g. Torq - to support your energy systems as your glycogen is exhausted.   Some are also “dual” sugars - Glucose and Fructose - providing a dual absorption pathway allowing a greater carbohydrate absorption rate.

Eat what you like, but the best thing the OP could do is take a few minutes to understand the basis of exercise effort and related fat and glycogen usage and the basics of good quality nutrition albeit sports supplements or not.   By all means eat whole foods it’s of course very good for you, but if you want to properly support a ride take the best quality food you can.

A your concerned what an energy drink will do to your teeth? The Maltodextrin is sugar AA, in context the same as the Glucose you’ll find in an energy drink, plus of course your adding the various nasty acids from the Coke, ouch.

When I take the maltodextrin as a homebrew gel it doesn't stay in the mouth like when it's in a bottle and you are constantly sipping. I much prefer it that way, it's washed down with water and doesn't stay around teeth.

The odd full fat coke on a hot day with some water after isn't going to kill me.

Stuffing a pasty in your face and expecting it to support the next hour (at peak performance anyway)

Long rides are not done at peak performance. All these energy drinks and gels are very useful if racing or pushing on, not so useful if doing a long ride or multi day bike packing etc.

You should ask yourself who does all the research on gels and carbo drinks and what there interests are? Then have a think about why they are pushed at leisure cyclists?

 but if you want to properly support a ride take the best quality food you can.

This is sensible advice, but most of us aren't riding for performance, most of us are riding for funz, and if you've set out on a long slow ride on a Sunday morning, I don't want to have to be measuring stuff out on weigh scales the night before, or bothering with reading the ingredients on a package, For some of us (like the OP I suspect) just remembering to eat, or even being bothered to stop, before you realise you're going cross eyed and you have a headache is a small win (well, it is for me at least).

Some good advice from Nickc there.

last year I went in a longer gravel ride with some friends. I decided to cycle to the start which was20 miles or so  from home. Everyone else drove. I knew there was a planned lunch stop so didn’t worry about fuelling too much. I had 4 bars in my back pocket. Anyway met the bunch and set off. I tried to eat a bar every hour. Four hours in for me, around midday, I had eaten all my bars. We were still a few hours from the cafe. I was feeling low. Finally got to the cafe at 3. I ordered a big lunch burger and chips, sugary drink then had a cake and a coffee. Alas it was too late. I reckon I had already burnt 3000kc and only consumed 600 at most . Luckily I only had 2 hours riding to get back to the cars and get a lift home. Felt weak throughout the last few hours still able to ride but not able to match accelerations. As they say no matches left I had burnt them all.

So for me the learning is don’t dig yourself a huge calorie deficit you can’t get out of quickly.

You should ask yourself who does all the research on gels and carbo drinks and what there interests are? Then have a think about why they are pushed at leisure cyclists?

For the same reasons that bikes (and wheels, clothing etc) are still marketed to leisure cyclists as 9 seconds quicker over 100km or 3W less effort at 40kph.
For the same reasons cars are advertised on the basis of their 0-60mph time rather than anything remotely useful in the real world.

People want to believe they've bought performance, they're being like the pros.

I mean gels have their place for leisure cycling, absolutely. They've got me out of a nutrition hole more times than I can remember! But marketing them with all the science around carbs per hour is total nonsense to 90% of "enthusiast cyclists". I actually think  they'd be better marketed in the way that Red Bull is - Red Bull gives you wings. Basically, if you're feeling a bit tired and crap, have a Red Bull. Same with gels. The cycling equivalent of giving Popeye some spinach. Market them that way, it'd be absolutely true!

I eat something every 30 min. I rotate; banana (they go off quickly), SIS gel, Nature bar or flapjack, gel, small malt loaf, gel,... I take bloks ad libitum, but a whole packet is just one gel. Every fourth gel is a caffeinated double espresso. Of course you need some carb loading, and for me this will be porridge with sugar (double dose, i.e. two scoops not one). The night before I also eat rice. One of those pouches, microwaved with a little soya sauce is 400 cal.

When racing (12h TT), I can't swallow solid food at all, so the Nature bar and malt load are swapped for liquidised sticky rice and tuna loaded into freezer bags, and semolina. 500 calories an hour minimum, sometimes up to 750 depending on race. I don't stop.

I try to alternate gels/energy bars with 'real' food like bananas, flapjack etc. Lots of good advice above. It is definitely about training your gut but another point is that you need to be confident eating on the move. I've seen less experienced cyclists struggle because they only eat when they stop and in a group ride of faster paced ride, that might not be often at all. Some energy food manufacturers really do need to look at making this easier with some products, albeit most are trying to ensure that the tear-off strips on gels remain intact with the rest of the packaging now.

 Finally got to the cafe at 3. I ordered a big lunch burger and chips, sugary drink then had a cake and a coffee.

If you need your glycogen stores replenishing in a hurry, avoid fats i.e. lose the cheese etc.  They slow the rate of carb absorbsion down.

most are trying to ensure that the tear-off strips on gels remain intact

You can fit four SIS gels under your cycling short grippers for easy access, I always have one for finishing short circuit races. No need for back pocket antics! I've never ripped the tab fully off one yet either. All rubbish goes into a back pocket or down the skinsuit (if racing). You don't litter.

Practice taking bottle without looking down, and taking food if in a back pocket. Riding one-handed comfortably is an essential skill. Often not practiced until too late.

It's a bit harder with 3/4 bibs or longs! I've worn shorts once so far this year. I'm the same with gels, it's the SIS Beta gel wrappers that are the biggest pain.

It's also worth bearing in mind that people's metabolisms differ - the same food is absorbed at different speeds, causes sugar spikes quickly or not etc - also the point at which individuals start burning predominately glycogen also varies, or at least that's how I understand it.

So coming up with hard and fast rules about what and when to eat based on individual experience is only a very rough guide. If you're someone who starts burning glycogen at quite a low level you may need to fuel differently from someone else who burns fat for longer even at the same intensities.

Apparently you can shift how your metabolism works - see also ketogenic diets, GCN did a fascinating video on that a while back - but initially at least, you are where you are. I'm no expert but that's the gist of stuff I've listened to / read from people who should know what they're talking about.

As far as gels go, for me they're pretty much an emergency measure given that I'm not racing. I'm also quite dubious about some of the additives used, particularly artificial sweeteners, by the likes of SIS. I'll maybe pop a couple in extremis, but for normal rides I tend to avoid. Ditto sports drinks.

TLDR: there's quite significant variation in how different people need to fuel. One rider's fuelling regime might well not work for someone else.

Practice taking bottle without looking down, and taking food if in a back pocket. Riding one-handed comfortably is an essential skill.

Or just remembering to stop at the memorial bench and taking in the view, we're not all eating for gains.

Siri, describe a poorly-planned bike ride:

"4 hours between cafe stops"

Siri, describe a poorly-planned bike ride:

“4 hours between cafe stops”

"Needing 8 gels between cafe stops..."

Or just remembering to stop at the memorial bench

Given how often I drink or eat, I'd need to be riding around the Donkey Sanctuary 😉

GCN did an interesting video on this, and the ex pro rider said that he probably under fuelled during his racing career which detrimentally affected his performance. I think that level of carb intake is unsustainable in the real world, maybe for a specific race but imagine consuming that amount of food on a ride, makes me feel sick.

https://www.globalcyclingnetwork.com/lifestyle/challenge/does-fuelling-like-a-pro-rider-let-you-ride-faster

Personally, I don't do anything specific for longer rides (I don't race though), as they're longer they should be mostly in zone 2 so I will be mostly be burning fat and I've plenty of that. I'll take food if I'm not going to be passing an open shop or cafe.

I once was asked why I ate cake if I was a keen cyclist, I said that "I cycle so I can eat cake" I even have a cap to remind me just in case I forget.

https://fatladattheback.com/products/mens-womens-will-ride-for-cake-cycling-cap

"the ex pro rider said that he probably under fuelled during his racing career"

Keeping in mind, if you have big watts, you consume a lot more calories per hour. Professional cyclists zone 2 equates to our zone 4!

Bigger guys, Ganna for instance, are at a disadvantage. He's a bigger guy at 82kg, benfitting from a bigger FTP (450w maybe?). But he then needs to be able to consume more to fuel that engine.

I said that “I cycle so I can eat cake”

+1

I set off yesterday afternoon with two slightly out of date SIS gels in my jersey pocket, without a real route plan. I had a banana a while before I headed out, having had oats late morning, with a small sweet potato and tin of mackeral in curry sauce for lunch.

The sun was wonderful, nicest day so far this year, knowing we had rain forecast for the rest of the week pushed me to go much further at very low Watts than I expected and was out for ~3.75 hours.

Yep, I was and still am a bit sore plus physically knackered. But I don't think I bonked through lack of fuel, I was in z1 for a vast majority of the ride, with very short spells around high z2 up hills in easiest gear.

~2+ years ago, when I used to regular 30+ mile loops including several hills I'd usually climb at z4+, I'd often have a banana before leaving with some water and take a bag of Tesco's jelly babies... Roughly one every 5mins or so from near the first hour of riding.

Yep, I was and still am a bit sore plus physically knackered. But I don’t think I bonked through lack of fuel

I know that feeling, it might not be bonking but I still prefer to avoid it, you can feel amazingly fresh after long rides (and I swear, but can't prove, even more pain free) if you eat!

I think the only drawbacks are the faff of trying to carry as much food as poss, and the conscious effort to keep packing it in 😂

I also agree tfat a mix is good, tailoring the sugariness/short chain-iness of the snack to taste or upcoming effort.

What  are you calling longer rides? 4-6 hours might be 50% looking at the view or coasting down hill or it might be completely on the rivet. For me a morning, say 50 hours/60 miles on the road with several stops for slashes and jumper stops, means a normal cereal breakfast a nasty, they all are, cereal bar at 30 to 40 miles and that's it. Might get home knackered if with faster mates but that is the whole point of the ride.

100 milers mean a trip to a cake shop 2/3 of the way round or maybe a butchers for a nice pie. Summer may see this replaced with a pint in a pub.

Way too much fuss being made over food and drink. Pro road riders may need to worry, most of us don't.

Eat real food; eat early, eat often

This. If doing a long road ride, I'll usually start with overnight oats and have a second breakfast at a cafe stop. I did 1200km last year (PBP) on real food all the way, including pastries, pizza, sausage gallettes, plus a couple of Paris Brest pastries. I did lay off the booze until the finish.

Forgive me, I've only " scan-read " the thread this far...
Don't get around here much, anymore.
kinda at the plateau of the D-K curve on the topic of nutrition, I hope Alan or matilda doesn't see this....

Anyway, seen a lot of comments about carbs, carbs, carbs.
If you're participating in a tour, then unfortunatey, you're going to need to consume refined and easily digestible carbohydrates.

However, for every muther-luving " cyclist " one of us proles-on-wheels, out for a weekend six hour ride, to blow away the stress or the cob webs from the week?
A diet of species specific, species appropriate food, will surfice, ie, the muscle meat of large ruminant animals and associated fats.
Leave the carbs alone, they'll only upset the randle cycle or/and create advanced glycation end products.
Glycation in cells is seriously not what you want to cause and certainly not as a matter of habit!

S

Gels are fine - there's nothing in them that isn't in normal sweeties and they're a bit more convenient to eat sometimes. Just like normal sweeties, I'd struggle to palate them if it was all I took on a ride.

I'm definitely in the 'eat a bit more than you might instinctively think camp' for anything that's challenging. So if I'm out doing intervals or anything a bit longer I'll aim for something every half hour, mixing things up as much as possible. I personally find I finish the ride much stronger, and more importantly don't get as much fatigue afterwards. It's the difference between being able to play with my kids later on or not so for me it's worth the effort.

Way too much fuss being made over food and drink. Pro road riders may need to worry, most of us don’t.

I disagree, although on the spectrum from 3gels an hour to not worrying, I am firmly in the middle.

Eat stuff something carb based every half hour on rides over say 2.5hours unless you are simply on a solo pootle (or zone two as people call it nowadays)

Gels are fine – there’s nothing in them that isn’t in normal sweeties

Ingredients:

Water, Maltodextrin (From Maize), Natural Flavour, Salt, Gelling Agents (Gellan Gum, Xanthan Gum), Acidity Regulators (Citric Acid, Sodium Citrate, Malic Acid), Sweeteners (Acesulfame K, Sucralose), Preservatives (Potassium Sorbate, Sodium Benzoate), Potassium Chloride, Magnesium Citrate

YUM!!!

That's an SIS gel. I'm not saying it'll kill you, but why would you choose to eat that stuff when you don't need to? 'Normal sweeties seems like a bit of a low bar tbh, but arguably slightly less UPF-ish. And actually, there does seem to be quite a lot of stuff in an SIS gel anyway, that isn't 'in normal sweeties':

Jelly Babies

Sugar,
Glucose Syrup,
Water,
Gelatine,
Concentrated Fruit Juices** (1 %) (Apple, Lime, Orange, Strawberry, Blackcurrant, Lemon, Raspberry),
Acid (Citric Acid),
Colours (Anthocyanins, Paprika Extract, Vegetable Carbon, Lutein, Curcumin),
Flavourings,
**Equivalent to 5.5 % Fruit Juice

Mars Bar

Sugar,
Glucose Syrup,
Skimmed Milk Powder,
Cocoa Butter,
Cocoa Mass,
Sunflower Oil,
Milk Fat,
Lactose and Protein from Whey (from Milk),
Whey Powder (from Milk),
Palm Fat,
Fat Reduced Cocoa,
Barley Mat Extract,
Emulsifier (Soy Lecithin),
Salt,
Egg White Powder,
Milk Protein,
Natural Vanilla Extract,
Milk Chocolate contains Milk Solids 14% minimum,
Milk Chocolate contains Vegetable Fats in addition to Cocoa Butter

Thanks for the detail BWD.

Palm Fat  🤒

😆

I have always been guilty of underfuelling on long rides ,try to stick to mileage/distance reminders now ,so eat/drink even when I don't feel like anything.

Thanks for the detail BWD.

It's all very delicious, tbf, Torq for one, seems less additive laden. I started making my own flapjack-type bars  and using them for ride fuel - at least I know what's in them and with an air frier, you can cook a batch in 15 minutes.

I'm not saying gels (or sweeties) are inherently terrible things btw -  I get that there are plenty worse out there -  and they have a place in race nutrition particularly - I had a mate who won 24-hour rsolo aces and he ended up fuelling exclusively with gels (yuk) because it's the only thing his guts would tolerate, but for normal riding it feels like overkill. Also, so many discarded gel wrappers on the roads round here 🙁

Jelly Babies have sugar and glucose syrup on the ingrediants list there. I wonder what ratios... Sugar is 1:1 glucose:fructose, then adding more glucose as per the ingredients list, you MIGHT end up being a similar ratio as the sports drink mixes 2:1 glucose:fructose!

Available everywhere for cheap - Jelly Babies FTW 😂

I started making my own flapjack-type bars  and using them for ride fuel – at least I know what’s in them and with an air frier, you can cook a batch in 15 minutes.

This sounds interesting... do you follow a specific recipe or should I just Google "air frier flapjacks"?

My  local Aldis now stocks big bags of dates (500g) for £2.49 . So if I'm going on a longer ride I just take a small bag of these.Just one natural ingredient moist,tasty,easy to eat and digest and  57% carb by weight and cheap too.

For long races I like a carb drink then savoury snacks.

Don't need to eat much when pootling.

For an ultra marathon I made up some rice cakes with pancetta. They were fabulous as a lovely change from the sweetness associated with most energy foods. I'd left them to be picked up at the halfway food station, so found I was really looking forward to them and got a nice boost. A bit of faff for "everyday" use though.

Way too much fuss being made over food and drink.

I think if you've been riding for a while; 10-20 years, sort of gig, you can do the sorts of rides you're talking about and your body will just cope with it, becasue you're just so used to doing it every weekend. It takes a while to get to that stage though, and not everyone will have had that time adaption.

That’s an SIS gel. I’m not saying it’ll kill you, but why would you choose to eat that stuff when you don’t need to?

Quite. I keep gels for emergencies, they're helpful if I get the dozies at 4am, but I don't see the need for them routinely.

gels are gross.

I put 50g table sugar and a pinch of salt in a standard 550ml water bottle. I take a swig every 10 minutes and hey presto 50g/hr done. There's a limit to how many bottle I can carry, so I either take containers of pre-weighed sugar and salt to refil my bottles or take a mix of solid food like bananas, rice cakes, flap jacks/porridge bars. The key for me is to avoid high fat/protein foods, because they  take longer and are more demanding to digest while exercising.

gels are gross.

I really don't mind them (Torq) it's just that I'm too much of a skinflint to use them regularly 😂

Pro road riders may need to worry, most of us don’t.

You don't need to 'worry' as such,  but having the right food to eat on rides will make you ride further for longer and feel better doing it, which is a good thing isn't it?

I use plain maltodextrin powder and squash for flavour, with a pinch of electrolyte powder as it stops me having irregular heartbeats.  Plain maltodextrin from bulk.com is extremely cheap, much cheaper than jelly babies.  I used to put it in bottles and whilst it's effective it resulted in me drinking too much of my fluids and needing to carry more. Now I put 4-6 scoops as needed in a 150ml 'soft flask' with hot water to help it dissolve and a bit of squash, then I can snack on that as I feel the need.

100 milers mean a trip to a cake shop 2/3 of the way round or maybe a butchers for a nice pie. Summer may see this replaced with a pint in a pub.

You might want to ride like that but I can't imagine eating a pie half way round a 100 mile ride. Blurgh.

British Cycling say I need 0.75 x my weight ( 65kg ) per hour = 49 gms per hour.

I think that's the typical maximum people can absorb.

Fueling on gels ie glucose is not good for you.  You need a mix of carbs.

Gels aren't glucose, they are generally maltodextrin.  These days they do sometimes contain a mix.

I bet you are having sugar crashes from overstimulating your insulin response.

The sugar spike/crash thing applies at rest, not when you are actually riding.  If you take small amounts of carbs regularly, it enters your bloodstream but it then gets used up by your muscles, so it doesn't cause insulin spikes.

You can't beat a Tunnocks Caramel Wafer in the low weight/high carbs/taste equation.

You might want to ride like that but I can’t imagine eating a pie half way round a 100 mile ride. Blurgh.

You do need to build up to these things and train your body to adapt. Start with a pie halfway round a 10 mile ride and build up gradually from there.

This sounds interesting… do you follow a specific recipe or should I just Google “air frier flapjacks”?

I just mess around with recipes and ingredients. It's easy to make them very sweet, but there are plenty of variations and you can add whatever dried fruit, nuts, seeds, bananas or whatever. The main issue, if you reduce sugar, butter, syrup too much, is binding. It's quite easy to make something that's tasty and not overly sweet, but crumbles very easily - eggs get used quite often, but don't work as well as the classic oats/butter/sugar/syrup gig. I only make them to eat on the bike anyway, so I'm not too fussed about a bit of sugar. I figure there are enough slow burn oats in there to give a decent balance and I know exactly what's in them.

But yeah, basically use google and take it from there. I tend to find 15 minutes on air fry @ 160˚C works pretty well as starting point. Oh, and silicone bar trays are brilliant. I got some on amazon that slot pretty well into a Ninja and make it easy to produce 'pro' shaped flapjacks 🙂

As above, insulin and exercise are opposing. During exercise insulin is suppressed! Insulin does come into play post exercise, and fit individuals who exercise reguarly benefit from increased insulin sensitivity (at rest).

Also completely agree with molgrips "but having the right food to eat on rides will make you ride further for longer and feel better doing it". Even if you're stuffing loads of carbs in, you're still highly likely to be in a calorie deficit.

But being carbed up will make the ride more enjoyable (well that’s what I’ve found). Even longer rides, 75miles+ if I really try and think about eating well, I still feel fine and strong at the tail end.

Pies and pints are a wonderful thing, but your body will struggle to turn that into useful energy mid ride. Stick to easily digestable carbs, not too much fat or fibre. And have a lovely pie afterwards.

The sugar spike/crash thing applies at rest, not when you are actually riding. If you take small amounts of carbs regularly, it enters your bloodstream but it then gets used up by your muscles, so it doesn’t cause insulin spikes.

Yeah, I've never felt anything like a 'crash' after using gels, typically if I've been fuelling well already, something like a caffeine gel before a big effort and/or near the end of a ride has a genuine rocket fuel effect, it's great fun! (and the Torq ones seem to taste absolutely fine to me).

Also completely agree with molgrips “but having the right food to eat on rides will make you ride further for longer and feel better doing it”. Even if you’re stuffing loads of carbs in, you’re still highly likely to be in a calorie deficit.

Equally agree, I admire those who can do long rides on little or no fuel, although saying that, I can too, I just don't enjoy it as much and feel worse (even if just mentally) afterwards. Little or no gain to riding under-fuelled other than trying to stoke some sort of hard-man image which I couldn't carry off even if I wanted to! 😂

The main issue, if you reduce sugar, butter, syrup too much, is binding

I use blackcurrant squash. (diluted with water) If you use the 'no added sugar' ones and there's considerably less sugar than say; golden syrup, you do have to press the ingredients together quite firmly to bind it all, so you won't get nice fat plump flapjacks, you get a harder biscuit type thing, but I've found them robust enough to survive being in a pack for a few hours.

use these quite a lot, on there own or with butter and jam or peanut butter.

fueling on longer rides for me is not about performance more about not wanting to eat everything in the house 5 mins after getting home.

Equally agree, I admire those who can do long rides on little or no fuel

I think it's genetic tbh.

I find I really struggle to eat gluten based cakey bready things on long rides - I get indigestion quite badly, despite being highly adept at digesting them at rest.  If I'm going to have anything besides maltodextrin it is going to be granola bars, chocolate bars or - somewhat bizarrely - meat, particularly when spicy.  I wish I liked Pepperami.  Also nuts go down well despite being very fatty.

I did take a carton of milk and some granola on my Ridgeway attempt and ate it after an hour of riding.  It was a right game, I had to drink half the pint of milk and cut the top of the carton off to make a bowl to dump the granola in.

I find I really struggle to eat gluten based cakey bready things on long rides

agreed, there's no way I could eat those brioche buns. No problem at breakfast with a cup of coffee, on a ride? No chance.