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Fill ‘er Up: Our Pedal-By-Pedal Eating Schedule for a Successful Century
I staggered into the mini-mart, eyes glazed, hallucinating about cookies
and caffeine. I was 75 miles into Colorado’s 100-mile Triple Bypass, a ride
that crosses three high passes, and I had honked big-time.
But it wasn’t until
that night, after I’d had ample couch time to reflect, that I figured out
how it had happened.
My nutrition diary on the day of the event looked something like this:
Skipped breakfast, ate two bagels while driving to the start. At the first
rest stop I grabbed a banana to eat later because it was so crowded. At
the second rest stop I bypassed the sports drink, filled my bottles with plain
water and munched a couple of cookies. The third stop was at the base of
12,000-foot Loveland Pass. that crosses three high passes, and I had honked
big-time.
I don’t like to eat before a big climb, so I carried a couple
of granola bars. Result: At the top I was exhausted, with 25 more miles
and 10,666-foot Vail Pass still ahead.
Suffice it to say: Lesson learned.
THE RULE OF THUMB
Do as I did and engrave this truism on your stem: On long rides, your pace is primarily determined by what you eat and drink, not by how much you’ve trained. Because we have only enough fuel (glycogen) stored in our muscles to ride for a couple of hours, eating carbohydrates is vital. The other crucial element is H Even the slightest dehydration can thicken the blood and take a progressively bigger bite out of your performance.
PRACTICE EATING
Like a good pedal stroke and a well- timed shift, eating right is a skill that needs practice—especially if you’re relying on it to carry you comfortably through 100 miles of riding.
• Start each day with a balanced breakfast to refuel your muscles after your overnight fast. The old favorites are still a cyclist’s best choice: cereal, bagels, muffins, fruit, milk and yogurt.
• To ensure energy for an after-work ride, eat a carbohydrate-rich lunch: A low-fat sandwich, vegetable sticks, fresh fruit or juice, and yogurt.
• At dinner, replenish the fuel you’ve used during the day. Cover your plate with vegetables and a large serving of pasta, rice, or potatoes. Meat (or other protein source) should be about the size of a deck of cards.
•Avoid alcohol, which dehydrates you and slows down the recovery process, making your training the next day less effective. And drink at least eight glasses of water a day.
• Find out what the ride organizers will be serving at the rest stops. Do you like their sports drink and snacks? If not, bring your own.
• Practice eating and drinking during your training rides. Use cues—for in stance, drink at the top of every small hill. Or go by your watch—drink every 10 minutes and eat every hour.
THE WEEK BEFORE
Start filling your tank well in advance.
• Increase the amount of carbohydrates you eat to top off your glycogen stores.
• Don’t eat more food—rather, increase the proportion of carbs. For example, cut down on your meat serving and substitute another roll or more rice.
• Drink a couple more glasses of water each day. Your body stores glycogen along with water, so you need the extra fluid. It’s good to gain a few pounds— it’s merely stored water which you’ll use during the ride.
THE DAY OF THE RIDE
• Eat a good breakfast, just like during training. Get up early enough so you finish eating about two hours before the start. Drink several glasses of water.
• During the ride, down a large (24- ounce) bottle of water plus 300 calories every hour. Regular consumption is the key. An energy bar is about 200 calories and half a bottle of sports drink is 100 calories, just to give you a benchmark.
• Start the ride with two tall bike bottles (24 oz. or so each). Fill one with water and the other with a sports drink—a brand that you’re familiar with from training. If you can’t stomach the rest-stop offerings, or you don’t want to risk trying a new concoction without testing it in the field first, pack your favorite drink powder, pre measured into baggies. A tall bike bottle of sports drink has 150—250 calories, de pending on the brand.
• Every 10 minutes drink either water or sports drink. At the end of the first hour, each bottle should be half full. At the end of the second hour, both bottles should be empty. If you have fluid in your bottles as you approach a rest stop, finish it up before you refill them.
• Take advantage of the freebies by re filling your bottles (one water and one sports drink) and replenishing your snack stash at every rest stop. Another rule of thumb: Always carry 400 calories (two hours’ worth of snacks) in your pocket. Examples of 200-calorie (more or less) snacks include one energy bar, four cookies, two energy gels, a sliced bagel with jam, two bananas or two granola bars.
• One hour into the ride, eat the first snack. (The snack plus that hour’s sports drink provides 300 calories). You’ll probably get to the first rest stop at hour two, where you should eat 200 calories. Keep the second snack just in case it takes longer than planned to reach the next rest stop.
• Keep eating and drinking like clock work and you’ll arrive at the finish pleasantly tired, not bonked—ready to ride again tomorrow. Which brings us to:
POST-RIDE PIG-OUT
• Plan to ride again the next day? Then pay attention to what you eat in the two hours afier the ride. This is the “glycogen window,” the period of time when your body is most receptive to restocking all that fuel you burned up while breaking your personal record. Studies also show that adding protein to the post-ride feed increases the amount of glycogen that gets stored.
KEEP IT HANDY
Don’t stash your food and water away like some paranoid squirrel preparing for winter. Keeping it in easy reach often means the difference between finishing well and simply finishing. Here’s how:
• Tote food in your jersey pockets only, not in a seat bag or backpack.
• Carry two bottles on your bike.
Drink one, and squirt the other at your buddy in celebration as you near the finish. Just keep track of which one is sports drink.
• If a backpack-style hydration system is your thing, you have something of a mental ad vantage—the proximity of the tube to your mouth makes it likely you’ll sip more often. On the other hand, it’s more difficult to toll whether you’ve been drinking enough every hour. Find out before the event how far you’ll travel between rest stops and plan accordingly—carry just enough water to get you through. No need to carry unnecessary weight—20 ounces of water for example, weighs 1.3 pounds. Experience will tell.
• Put your sports drink in a bottle, not a backpack—it’s too hard to clean bladders thoroughly, and you risk attracting mean microscopic wigglies.
Sweating for Science
Think you’re drinking enough on rides? Think again
What does riding on an ergometer in a heat chamber for an hour really do to your body? I had the chance to find out recently, at the Gatorade Sports Sciences Institute in Chicago. Despite drinking 25 ounces of Gatorade I lost a pound of body weight during the ride. (And I thought I was drinking frequently!) I needed a whopping 17 more fluid ounces to replace what I lost. Had I continued with the insufficient fluid intake for a three-hour ride, I would have lost 2% of body-weight, affecting my performance considerably. I also sweated out 1,128 mg of sodium during the hour and replaced only 29 (or 26%) from the Gatorade. Even if I had drunk enough sports drink to retain my weight, I would only have replaced 497 mg.
Lessons? Drink, drink, drink during the ride. I need 10.6 ounces every 15 minutes to stay hydrated—and I’d still be low on sodium. So afterwards? Bring on the salted pretzels.
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