newjunior

I am bored to **** with Clif bars and gels. What do you guys eat pre/during/after your races?

furiousferret

On the ride I'm a big fan of the Honey Stinger Waffles, Clif Shot Blocks, Bananas, and Fig Newtons. I hate gels because you get them on your fingers the stickyness bothers me.

Before I usually have eggs and a banana, after I have a whey protein / banana smoothie.

newjunior

Are the Honey Stinger waffles just....honey waffles?

aaronmcd

I can't freaking chew clif bars while riding. PITA. During rides and races I drink Infinit nutrition mix. 300 cal per bottle for my mix. It's all custom mix - carbs, protein, caffeine, electrolytes. Everything in the quantities and ratios you choose.

Pre race I take a caffeine pill, or coffee. Or both. I have caffeine in my drink mix so I don't come down during a long ride or race.

I eat some low fiber cereal for breakfast, and have one of those fruit shake things from CVS and a coffee and water on the drive if it's long. Sign the waiver, pick up number, pin it on, warm up a bit, take a piss, warm up some more, take caffeine, line up, race. Afterwards I either have another shake ready or just buy some food nearby.

newjunior

Heard from a nutritionists presentation at Team Specialized's info session that you shouldn't drink your calories? something about sucking water from your gut and dehydrating

aaronmcd

Hmm, I drink calories based on trial and error. No need to take a dump, and very easy and convenient during the ride/race. I won't eat enough during a race if I only have shot blocks and such.

waterrockets 

Gels, Powerade, and either a PB&J or Ham Sandwich.

revchuck 

The search feature is your friend.

They come in different flavors, and are actually pretty good. They're easier to chew than Clif bars. For ease of use, you need to cut the top off the wrapper and make sure the waffle isn't stuck to the wrapper before you ride. This also applies to Clif bars.

This is true if you use a concentrated liquid and don't drink enough water. For something like Gatorade it's a non-issue. I go through a bottle of something per hour, either water or Gatorade.

There are a gazillion or so books out there on sports nutrition. Hit the library and/or book store!

Wesley36

Seriously, real food rules. Some of the recipes in the book are crazy easy too (like the oat-rice-dark-chocolate bites), and there is a little guide to wrapping food to make it easy to eat on the bike. My best way to ride is to get up early, and to make the most of my time in the morning, I have started grabbing 3-5 bites to throw in my pocket, and I eat as I warmup on the rollers.

Also, the book is worth buying for the analysis of water/ calorie ratios and gastrointestinal distress that fills the first part of the book. Very important stuff on fueling well for performance.

kindablue

I usually have a bottle of mix, bottle of water. Having supplemental calories/electrolytes to drink seems to really help me out, however I make sure not to dehydrate myself (e.g. drink enough water before the ride, keep the mix a good consistency so its not too "dense"). Skratch labs is a really good mix. Something like gatorade is a bit too sweet for me.
@newjunior, I'm pretty sure that the "Team Specialized" presentation was encouraging proper hydration by keeping the electrolyte balance in check. Drink too much or too saturated mix and you're body will be deprived of water. Drink the right amount and the sodium will actually help you retain and use the right amount of water. I doubt anyone would really discourage a good drink mix to help with hydration.
That being said, I'm assuming that what you eat and drink go hand in hand. If you're eating frequently and eating nutrition with a lot of sodium in it, the drink mix is probably unnecessary. However if you're like me and hate eating when the RPE is high, drink mix is a savior.
Personally I've taken to drinking a bottle of mix + some water to taste pre races (in the car and while warming up). I can't really quantify it, but I feel like I race better this way. I'm not as thirsty, I don't have to pee like a madman, and body just feels better while making efforts.

I like to eat fig newtons, bananas, pancakes, clif bars, sweet potato burritos for long adventures, gels one in a blue moon (more so when I race).

Creatre

Oatmeal Cremepie's.

/thread

thechemist

Reposting from nutrition thread:

Did you happen to attend the "Nutrient Timing, Timing is Everything" webinar put on by Peaks Coaching Group? I was expecting a very sales pitch filled presentation since the presenter, Dr Ivey, was from Neogenis Labs, the company that makes BeetElite. I was wrong, there were only a few references to it and felt like I took a lot of valuable information away from it. The recorded webinar is available on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnCmTTNx_Jo

rankin116

Low Fat Fig Newmans. PB&J. Fruit. I like to eat real food, but I do usually carry a clif bar too. Homemade energy gel as well: honey, agave nectar, molasses, pinch of salt.

misterwaterfall

Roast beef, pb and j, rice cakes, oatmeal protein bars, bananas. That sums up everything I've had on the bike.in the last 6 months and more hours/miles than I can count

mattm

Who cares what everyone eats.

What do winners eat?

revchuck 

Whatever their sponsors tell them to?

waterrockets 

Interestingly, a ham sandwich is an idea I got from a guy who always seems to ride away from breaks.

aaronmcd

"The rate at which an energy sports drink is absorbed is dependent on osmolality and caloric
concentration. Osmolality refers to the
concentration of particles in a given amount of
fluid. Normal body fluids have an osmolality of
275 to 298 mOsm/Kg. Solutions consumed with
an osmolality greater than this are hyperosmolar
and cause water to be drawn from the body into
the stomach or gut in order to dilute and balance
the osmolality. The resulting effect to the
athlete is a delay in nutrient absorption and
gastric emptying."

From a series published by the Huntington College of Health Sciences.

The one I use is 276 mosm/kg and 300 kcal per serving, so 2 bottles is good for 2 hours unless it is super cold, in which case I can't drink more than a few sips/hour or I have to pee.

ovoleg

PB&J with milk, banana and/or coffee. or Some McDonalds McMuffin if I am out of food or in a massive hurry.

During the race, I don't eat. I normally dont eat unless the ride is HARD or over 1.5 hours. IF I know it's going to be a long day in the saddle, I'll eat about once an hour, otherwise no food. Most 3-4 hour rides I do, 4 bananas. Bananas ftw.

Post race I usually have 2 scoops of whey protein with water and maybe a banana. Then when I get home its food time!

FOOD!

Tyrell

I'll second this. Buy this book. Great recipes and info. I make a couple different portables on Sunday night and eat them throughout the week. I also have "The Feed Zone Cookbook" but it seems more geared towards meals than on-the-bike food. Still a great one, IMO.

aaronmcd

Holy smokes, I would have some serious GI issues on that diet.

ovoleg

every morning I eat PB&J with milk and 1 banana. In about 2 hours I eat another banana. After lunch I eat another banana.

If I'm riding hard that day, I'll eat another one during the ride.

Lol I haven't had any issues but I think it affects my weight loss. I don't seem to lose weight as fast as I did before my banana craze.

aaronmcd

grolby

I'm going to be honest with you guys: I'm a huge fan of gels for race nutrition. After several years of experimentation, I still have yet to find a better solution, for me, than stuffing vanilla or unflavored Gu packets into my pockets, with plain old H2O in my bottles (I do sometimes take Gatorade in one of the bottles).

To explain, briefly, how I came to this conclusion: what works best for me in races is a fairly limited subset of what I can eat in training. If I'm going to be in Z2 for hours and hours, I can and do eat just about anything, Clif bars, shot bloks, sandwiches, whatever. And it's not a big deal if something requires some unwrapping. Interval work also means the big efforts come at very predictable points, so scheduling eating is really easy. But if I'm really racing and making efforts closer to or exceeding threshold at just about any point in a race, my ability to digest a lot of stuff becomes a lot more limited. I'm totally unable to extract anything of value out of Clif products at all. I can still eat PowerBars, but unwrapping bars in a pack sucks, and they take time to chew. On the other hand, I'm able to absorb maltodextrin pretty readily and don't develop GI distress from eating lots of it. So malto-based gels (I can't handle brown rice syrup AT ALL) hit the sweet spot for me: they're extremely fast to open and eat, I'm able to get the calories I need from them, I can get vanilla or unflavored ones down without gagging every single time, they're easy to schedule and they're not that expensive.

I have the Feed Zone Cookbook, and I've tried the recipes. They're fine, but the work involved in making the portables is kind of annoying and doesn't save much money over the pre-packaged stuff. I understand the reasoning behind giving real food to the pro riders in 4-6 hour races, but my longest race ever was a little under three hours, and most are more like two or two and a half. I've been able to avoid problems with monotony by saving the gels for race day and eating real/solid food during training, when I can handle pretty much anything. That way, my gels are, well, not exactly a treat, but they're not the same thing I eat every day on the bike.

So that's what I do. It works for me, but YMMV as always.

Maybe not the best choice from a nutritional profile standpoint, but you can't beat these for price:calorie ratio. And they go down pretty easily. I don't necessarily endorse oatmeal creme pies as race-day nutrition, but if you have a tight budget it's at least worth looking into.

revchuck 

I have to agree with grolby on the convenience of gels during race efforts. Honey Stinger waffles are the only things that come close in terms of being easy to eat (assuming you've opened them first), but they have the downside of having no electrolytes. I just get burned out on gels pretty quickly.

Something I need to try after Rouge-Roubaix is the waffles with water with electrolyte tablets. That'd work for any race shorter than three bottles, and give me ~300 calories/hour with a waffle each half hour or so.

ETA: On a long endurance ride, a Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Cookie and a bottle of sweet tea will set you right!