jaxgtr

Should still be ok as long as the package has not been opened

Russ Roth

The inside is a gel consistency and they will give you that fast sugar rush, but the crash after downing a 4pack is rough.

From my limited experience, I've only tried three brands and about 8 flavours, the difference for me always came down to taste, they all seemed a similar consistency but the taste determined which were buying again. Gu has a raspberry that I've liked the best of the ones I've had but their plain, unflavoured was also the absolutely more disgusting gel of them all.

jaxgtr

I have a buddy that likes to use gummies...

Eric F 

Brownies, too, or just gummies? 😉

Eric F 

Good traction…but lousy rolling resistance.

Sy Reene

I picked up another just in case.
Note that at thefeed.com you can order individual packets if you want to mix and match.

livedarklions

For non-perishable goods like hermetically sealed packets of syrup, the expiration date is probably meaningless. Expiration dates are at least as likely to be determined by the marketing department as they are anything scientific.

jaxgtr

Well, I've never seen him with brownies, but I wouldn't rule it out

NoWhammies

Have you tried the Cliff Shot Blocks? Once I discovered the shot blocks I have never looked back on the Cliff Shots. The only problem I have with the shot blocks is that in cold weather they turn into little frozen rocks and can take some time to chew through. If I am thinking I will put the shot blocks in my glove to warm them up before hand.

Carbonfiberboy 

I'm another Hammer Gel user. Their 6 oz. squeeze bottle is just the thing. Refill it out of the pint bottle. The only garbage is the pint container, which it takes a while to go through. It's easier to drink from the squeeze bottle than mess with some plastic packaging while trying to ride a bike. I think their gel is decent in the mouth. Normally I use a bottle of homebrew carb on the bike, but sometimes I get behind and need a little boost.

A racer I used to ride with told me how much energy Hammer Gel gave her, so I asked what flavor she like best. "Oh, the Espresso." She didn't realize it wasn't just espresso flavor.

genejockey 

Yes. Sterile is pretty much an absolute - if it wasn't sterile when it went into the packaging, it would have exploded long ago. Expiration dates are put on things because an expiration date is required. They are often meaningless like an expiration date on a sealed bottle of sterile distilled water.

Bobcat Goldthwaite used to have a joke about Twinkies, that they had a shelf life of 20 years. He said, "So if you ate a Twinkie that was 20 years and one day old, would you say, 'Yuck - is there something wrong with this Twinkie?'"

Sy Reene

Yeah.. Heck in that vein I've wondered why the bottle of 99% Rubbing alcohol I have has an expiration date (which has passed quite a while ago now)?

jaxgtr

That is like Honey, the dude I get it from bottles his own from his bees, has to put an best by date, but as long as you don't get water in the container, honey will never go bad.

Koyote

The squeeze bottle is perfect for racing. Much easier than carrying a whole bunch of gels and then getting your hands (and your handlebar and the insides of your jersey pockets) all sticky.

livedarklions

If it gets too old, it might rub you the wrong way.

Nachoman

I love clif shots, but I do hate how messy they are.
I always end up with sticky fingers and sticky jersey pockets.
This thread has me thinking about switching to clif blocks.

Juan Foote

This was one aspect of these I really hated while still doing group rides. So many folks would tear open with teeth, consume, and throw the wrapper to the ground. The whole route was littered with these from YEARS of people doing the same thing. I advocated for people to stick them back in their jersey and often got looked at like I had a cat stapled to my forehead or something. They were more often apt to litter than have some sticky trash in a jersey they had to wash anyway.

Carbonfiberboy 

Very interesting. That must be a cultural thing. Around here . . . I don't think I've ever seen a gel wrapper on the road. Maybe Washington State is a hippie paradise or something. I do see banana peels sometimes though and for sure those are from cyclists. But those are organic, right? Nasty though - they're ugly and slippery. I was on a group snowshoe with my droogs* one time and a guy just threw his banana peel into the woods. My wife made him go get it. We really were hippies back in the day.

*droogs - from A Clockwork Orange, an anglicized version of the Russian word for comrades

jaxgtr

Yea I would agree, I live in Florida, so not a hippy paradise, but I can say, I've never seen a gel package on the ground, cigarette butts and edger blades, completely different story. I don't understand why people have to throw their cig butts out on the ground, and I once counted about 9 edger blades on the side of the road over a 50 mile route.

genejockey 

I don't see a lot of gel or other snack wrappers hereabouts, certainly not enough to suggest that hordes of cyclists are tossing them on ground. BUT I have had the experience of getting home, going through my jersey pockets, and failing to find the gel wrapper I KNOW I put there. I felt really guilty! Thereafter I am careful to jam the wrapper all the way down in the pocket, so now my housekeys are a little sticky, but at least I didn't litter!

late

Gu.

Esp. the Chocolate Outrage. I even wrote a love song to it

It had to be Gu,
Impossible Gu,

I wandered around a finally found a snack that was true

(you get the idea).

They have a ton of new flavors now, but as one of the worlds top chocholics, all I care about is the chocolate.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...DKIKX0DER&th=1

Hiro11

SIS works well and is easy to get down. Maurten is also good but really expensive.

I've mostly given up on gels as you need a ton of them to properly carb up at 60-90g/hour, that's 3-4 gels an hour which is ridiculous. I make my own carb drink mix:
100 parts maltodextrin
80 parts fructose
3 parts salt
1 part sodium alginate

You can find all of the above in bulk easily online. I add one True lime or orange packet per bottle and about 70g of the above. This costs about $0.65/bottle. I make 2kg of it at a time. This stuff will not bother your stomach and absolutely keeps you going. Carbing properly has changed how I train.

Carbonfiberboy 

By weight?

Hiro11

Yes. I use a kitchen scale and a large mixing bowl to measure everything out.

shelbyfv

Tuck the empty gel packet under the leg hem of your bibs. Won't get the other stuff in your pocket sticky.