luddite_68

I took some advice from this thread & did the same ride today. Pretty much the same weather conditions. I ate a banana 1/2hr before I started & had two cups of coffee. I mixed 2 water bottles with water & 1/2 low calorie Gatorade. I ate a 120 cal dried berry & nut bar 1hr into my 2hr ride. I felt much better & active for the rest of the day after the ride.

gregf83 

There are a number of incorrect assumptions in the above statements. First of all it's unlikely you're burning anywhere close to 1000 to 1100 Cals/hr (280 to 305W).
Secondly, it's not clear where the 200 Cals from storage comes from. Reasonably fit riders can extract 250-300 Cals/hr from fat alone with the rest supplied by stored Glycogen.

For reference, I just finished 146km in 4:40 and burned about 3,300 Cals (Energy expended 3283kJ from powermenter). I ate a clif bar and a latte at the halfway point along with a bottle and a half of water. The rest of the energy came from fat and stored glycogen. The last hour of the ride was the most intense so no dropoff in power or energy. I'm about 165 lbs so not a lightweight.

To be fair, I did have a decent sized breakfast with 3 pieces of french toast before leaving so that likely contributed 500-700 Cals during the ride.

rgconner

I am 215, so there is a huge difference in calories burned.

About 225 more per hour, or about 20% more per hour at 14-16 miles per hour, based on "typical" fitness. (That calls 14-16 "brisk" but not "fast". I would bet you call that "slow" and I call it "average".

I am also not nearly as fit as you are I assume. I do benchmark rides, and as you get more efficient, you burn less calories, at least based on heart rate. Same ride 2 weeks ago, 148bpm average, this week, 140. Only 2 or 3 pounds lighter (I average a little over pound a week, or about 5lbs per month weight loss)

I'll accept 300 calories per hour from fat storage, but even then that is only 400 more calories, or about 2 nutrition bars difference for me.

And that is the most important thing, everyone is different in how their body deals with nutrition, and you have to do what works for you.

rgconner

Keep doing what works for you.

You might want to try mixing it up, see if other things work better, but at least you have a benchmark now.

gregf83 

It's still way too high. For that distance and pace I would burn about 2200 Cals so maybe you're at 2700 Cal's or 675/hr for 4 hrs.

As you get more fit you don't become more efficient and burn fewer calories. You become faster and burn more calories/hr. HR monitor based estimates of power or energy output are notoriously inaccurate.

rgconner

Research disagrees with your calorie counts:

Bicycling Calorie Calculator - High accuracy calculation


Based on:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&p...OTg5M2JjODE5Yg

extensive research.

nycphotography

Your high accuracy calculation is utter and complete crap. garbage. Not just flat out lies, but lying about being a liar.

49yo/male/183cm/72kg/16-20mph/210min

Says BMR = 1650. It's more like 1800-2000.

Says calories burned over 63 miles is 2900. Power meter says 2100.

But how do I know it's FOS? Because 20mph burns way more calories per hour than 16mph Wayyy more. Wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more. Like 50% more!!!

Like 16mph = 145 watts for 3:30 = 56 miles and 1765kj and 1950calories.

20mph = 250 watts for 3:30 = 69 miles and 3159kj and 3450 calories.

Thats a big whomping range for one bucket in the "estimate".

If you want to play with estimates, at least learn to use one based on actually physics.

Bicycle Speed (Velocity) And Power Calculator (I have compared it to my power files for many rides and it's always pretty close, particularly when I have some notion of what the wind was and when not pacelining.)

rgconner

What is so interesting is this line on the bottom of the page:
(assumed efficiency: 22 percent) will be calculated.

so clearly there are more and less efficient riders.

Aka Gross Metabolic Efficiency.

The longer you have been training on a bike, the better your GME. With the low end being 15% and the high end being 25 that means that an inefficient rider spends up to 50% more calories getting power to the pedals.

That efficiency is based on training and of course, genetics.

gregf83 

Genetics yes, but there is no evidence that training improves efficiency. Some are mire efficient than others but it's not due to their level of fitness or training.

rgconner

The evidence is quite easy to find, there are plenty of arctics on it.

The easiest way is increasing VO2 Max, are you suggesting that is impossible?

https://kar.kent.ac.uk/43673/1/Jobso...erformance.pdf

https://www.academia.edu/698881/The_e...cling_A_review

gregf83 

The differences noted above are small and I would say the research is equivocal.
Here's a study which found no difference: https://d3epuodzu3wuis.cloudfront.net/R060.pdf

Chuck Naill

Fast acting carbs. Hardly the best fuel unless you are riding a mile or less.

gregf83 

The only fuel you want on a bike is fast acting whether you're riding a 1 hr time trial or a longer race. But that's not why I ate french toast with maple syrup

rgconner

Which is prior to the research I reference which specifically said previous research was flawed and resulted inaccurate results:


"It now appears that insufficient methods (e. g. small sample sizes and inappropriate exercise intensities) may have resulted in type II errors in many of these studies."

gregf83 

So two different studies, both with small sample sizes, found different results. That's the definition of equivocal. In any case, the differences found by Hopker were small 1.6% +/- 1.4%. Those are large error bars indicating some riders observed a substantial difference and some had no improvement.

Your previous implication that efficiency could improve from 15 to 25% is unsubstantiated.

Chuck Naill

Fast acting better for sprinting because they are metabolized quickly.


Oatmeal would be a better option for long distances.

gregf83 

Sprints are under 30 Seconds and rely on energy already available in your muscles. No need to digest or metabolize carbs.

I usually eat oatmeal but like a treat once in a while. I don't think it matters much what kind of carbs you eat before or while riding. It's all going to get used up during the ride and not converted to fat. While riding it's easier to control intake with fast acting carbs. There is no benefit to slowing the rate of ingestion while riding.

Chuck Naill

Below is something I found that provided a straightforward explanation why it matter what carbs you choose.



I discovered the difference between simple and complex carbohydrates when I was involved in diabetes management years ago. The book https://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&ke...l_9cjan21pvk_p changed how I thought about carbohydrates. It may be something you would consider.

elcruxio

Again with this Livestrong BS! This website is not reliable in delivering any info on health, nutrition or anything!
May I remind you that this website implicated that a person may die if they bonk during an exercise.

Anyways, the fact of the matter is that during exercise the insulin reaction is altered thus that one does not experience the high / crash cycle of fast carbs. How this exactly works is not completely clear to me, but one reason at least is the massively increased insulin sensitivity a person experiences during exercise. You cannot ingest enough fast carbs to spike blood glucose during exercise and as secondary effect you also do not experience a that crash some people get. Actually the secretion of insulin is greatly reduced during exercise and it does not increase nearly as readily during as it would at rest.
If there would be a high / crash cycle during exercise, people could not do long distance, at all. Eating even a little would render you useless very quickly, so it makes a certain amount of sense that the body has adapted it's sugar metabolism to correspond to heightened exertion levels.
And also as a quick extra comment.
Had to refresh my memory a little and there is actually a very good reason why insulin secretion is reduced while glucose uptake is increased. The reason is that if insulin secretion would increase, the glucose that was fed into the system would be then taken up by the apidose tissue and other tissues which are not involved in moving you forward. So during exercise the body is trying to limit the storage of glucose and rather push it in where it is most needed.

So while it doesn't matter that much what you eat during a ride, if you want it to have a quick effect, gels or glucose tablets are the way to go and if you want something to also keep hunger at bay some real food is a better option. The difference in effect time is however in the digestion / glucose conversion phase and not in the insulin stage.

And the reason why I know so much about the human sugar metabolism is that after I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, there was a period of around two years where I did very little other than study these exact issues in part to understand how to control my disease and in part trying to find a loophole someone had missed and would lead me to a cure or at least some halfway point at least. Needless to say, such halfway point was never found, quite unsurprisingly.

Chuck Naill

I would not want to depend on French toast and sugary syrup as a meal before any long distance exercise (running, hiking, cyclng) for the reasons I posted. There are plenty of other options. Instead of posting another source you would just dismiss, you might consider the diets of racing cyclists. If you see French toast and syrup as a staple then I will concede I am wrong. I think you are going to find they eat complex carbs from fruits and vegetables.

memebag

This is what you have to eat to compete in the Tour de France - Cycling Weekly

They eat stuff that can be digested quickly. French toast with syrup may not be on the menu but it is similar to what they eat.

gregf83 

Good advice if you're sitting around. Not applicable when exercising. If you're not diabetic blood sugar levels don't rise significantly when you ingest sugar while exercising. There is no 'crash' felt.

edit: Here's what happens when you take glucose during a long ride:

from - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20479485

gregf83 

I'm not a pro. I just do this for fun. Try some French toast before your next 4 hr ride. You might be pleasantly surprised!

Zoroman

The following make sNO SENSE to me whatso ever---


“One thing all riders avoid is eating heavy food,” says Judith Haudum, sports nutritionist to the BMC Racing team.

“They have to resist the enticing pastries from the hotel breakfast bar because this type of food isn’t fully digested in time for the start, making riders’ stomachs feel uncomfortably heavy.”


Pastries are light and are almost all sugar and simply carbs!! Everyone knows this. How are they cuddenly complex and heavy foods???


This is crazy-ness.

memebag

Yeah, that part of the article seemed contradictory to me, too.

But the rest seems pretty clear. They don't try to digest fat and protein during a ride. They go for simple carbs, electrolytes and caffeine. Protein is good after a ride, along with more carbs and electrolytes. Mostly they have to take in a whole lot of calories without upsetting their GI tract.

French toast and syrup seem to be in line with the kind of nutrition Tour de France riders consume before a stage. Maybe skip the egg and have normal toast with syrup.