tmayder

How long after you eat do you wait to get on the bike? Is everybody different or is there a standard?

I try to eat healthy meals, but I do not ride as well on a full stomach as I do if I wait at least 30 minutes to an hour. My husband is totally different. He can fill himself up and go. I have to eat light or I ain't goin' nowhere very fast.

twclements

You are right, everybody is different, but as for when you are on your bike, drink berfore you are thirsty, and eat some kind of snack before you feel hunger pangs (power bar [yuk!] banana, or do as my wife does, and try those preformed peeled baby carrots)
Save for the end of the day

RWTD

It depends on the size of the meal as well as the individual.For large heavy meals(lots of fats or complex carbs )more digestion time is smart.Therefore while touring smaller frequent meal and snacks are smarter saving a larger meal for post ride gyclogen restoring.

tallcliff

If you eat a full meal, or even a full breakfast, wait at least an hour or two before serious biking.

Your body is using energy for digestion during that time, which means there's less energy for your biking.

Smaller snacks during your ride just help to keep your energy level up and won't hinder you.

Good Riding!

alexeicharkham

I read recently in the CTC (uk cycle touring club - good magazine) magazine that you must eat within 15 mins of stopping for your muscles to recharge on lost glycogen. if you wait longer than that I understand they won't recover as quickly.

interesting stat (close to this but might be a few % out due to my memory) - yr body uses up 80% of carb stores in an hour of exercise, but only 1% of fat stores. as fat is much much harder to digest than carbs, and you hardly use it anyway, you should snack and meal off carbs, and stay off fat

a banana baguette with good soft bananas is quite good I find

RWTD

I agree with the "window of opportunity "concept immediately post workout where simple carbs can be ingested and preferentially shuttled to muscles to be stored as fuel(glycogen)however that is not to say glycogen stores can't be refilled at other times with complex carbs after normal digestion.In fact if fat burning is the goal and you are not totally depleted of glycogen then you will continue to burn fat postworkout if you don't immediately reload the carbs.It all depends on your objectve and I mention this because you previously stated weightloss as a goal.I disagree with the second part of alex's statement again if weight loss is the goal which wasn't mentioned in this thread.My understanding is for aerobic exercise the body first uses blood sugar for energy and when this is depleted (maybe 1/2 hour to 45 min.max if full to begin with)the body switches to a combination of glycogen(muscle sugar) and stored fat.This is the first hitting the wall I referred to in the other thread that you can train through and should if you want to burn fat .My understanding is the percentages of each used varies with the intensity of the exercise with low intensity favoring fat and high favoring glycogen.You have maybe 1 1/2 hours of fuel stored as glycogen(again if full to start)and if all glycogen gets depleted the body goes into a crisis mode(second hitting the wall which most refer to as the "bonk")and cuts off fat burning and starts cannabalizing muscle to get protein for fuel.You can even train through this but if you want to retain muscle and burn fat not train to win a marathon you don't want to.The point to all this is if you don't keep topping your blood sugar with simple carbs you will burn a large % fat with long slow to moderate paced rides.However if fat loss is not the goal topping up the blood sugar is the most efficient way to go because it is the bodys oreferred fuel and most efficiently burned.

alexeicharkham

thats really helpful r, didnt know that. will bear it in mind on my next longun then...

if you can be bothered, what r your thoughts on fat burning and short rides (eg half hr medium paced commute, 7 miles). would you advise NOT eating both before and after the daily ride?

RWTD

My thoughts(and let me say I am by no means a expert on this just follow this for my own purposes)are that you probably want to make sure the glycogen is topped off the night before and then not eat anything right before ,during or immediately after(water of course).For a short ride You may want to try to pick up the pace as much as possible and even try some intervals where you alternate periods of sprinting with slow paced recovery.This burns a larger percentage of carbs but much more calorie altogether so you may actually burn as much if not more fuel from fat this way and plus with the high intensity your metabolism remains elavated after training continuing to burn fat particularly if you avoid the post ride simple carb fest.My thoughts on your question to vlad on the snacking thread are that during and immediately after exercise (particularly intense )it is OK to injest simple carbs as snacks as long as it is immediately being used for fuel and not overwhelming bloodsugar levels which causes the spikes in energy.In my opinion while touring you still want to injest more balanced small meals at longer rest stops at regular intervals and I have no problem myself on bike while touring combining small amounts of fat (such as nuts)with simple carbs such as fruit as long as my pace at the time is slow and I don't speed up too much right after but I have a naturally high metabolism so my experience may or may not be useful to you.