Absolutlely every pro team use them at this point... At different points in time the UCI has said the both EPO and testosterone provided no benefit as well... LMAO...

As I eluded to the early studies that tested performance based on 1hr TT showed no effect or even impairment... recent studies that pair ketone ester with bicarbonate and mimic actual race situation do show significant performance benefit. When the performance was tested after 3hrs of moderate exercise and ketones paired with bicarbonate there was significant performance benefit.

I will find you links to the research.. UCI WAY behind as usual...

Exogenous Ketosis Impairs 30-min Time-Trial Performance Independent of Bicarbonate Supplementation Chiel Poffé 1 , Felix Wyns 2 , Monique Ramaekers 1 , Peter Hespel

Same team a few months later...

Bicarbonate Unlocks the Ergogenic Action of Ketone Monoester Intake in Endurance Exercise

This is the end of a long back and forth with Gemini presenting the rebuttals by critics to "Bicarbonate Unlocks the Ergogenic Action of Ketone Monoester Intake in Endurance Exercise" and essentially the critiques are completely irrelevant to success in practical real world application resulting in actual performance gains.. bottom line.. cyclist just want to know... will it make me faster.. and the answer is YES!

So the claim now is that ketones are improving performance outcomes in 3-hour events. Question: Are ketones really improving outcomes, even in long-duration efforts? Let's look at published results (not coached AI output).

I found one that fits:

"Exogenous ketosis produced by oral ketone ester ingestion during the early phase of prolonged endurance exercise and against the background of adequate carbohydrate intake neither causes muscle glycogen sparing nor improves performance in the final stage of the event." (Poffé et al, 2020)

If you want to perform well on a long-duration ride, be sure to eat plenty of carbs. They are proven to be effective. Ketones? The results are meh, at best.

OMG… I gave you links to a study that the SAME scientist did a few months after saying your QUOTE THAT YOU PROVIDED…said the opposite in 2021 in a follow up study…

Scroll up about an inch… The link is right there. It’s the second Study… Again, it’s the same research researcher that that YOU quote 🤦🏽‍♂️🙄

I see that study entitled "Exogenous Ketosis Impairs 30-min Time-Trial Performance Independent of Bicarbonate Supplementation". It does not negate their earlier study.

Here's what the new study concluded: ketone ingestion impairs performance, and that taking bicarbonate along with ketones does not fix the problem.

Seriously, if you want to perform better on long efforts, skip the ketones and eat more carbs.

Also, I can find no evidence that "all the pros" are downing ketones. Several teams have experimented with them, but most of them have abandoned their use, citing lack of results. On the other hand, every pro team is downing massive quantities of carbs.

Edit: This ketones/bicarbonate/carbs discussion is off topic. Maybe we can keep this thread about training for efficiency, thanks.

Bicarbonate Unlocks the Ergogenic Action of Ketone Monoester Intake in Endurance Exercise Chiel Poffé et al. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2021.

Wrong link to second 2021 study

The power for the 15min ITT after the 3hrs was 5% higher for Ketone + Bicarbonate group! That’s an EPO level increase in performance!

”Results: KE ingestion transiently elevated blood D-ß-hydroxybutyrate to ~2-3 mM during the initial 2 h of RACE (P < 0.001 vs CON). In KE, blood pH concomitantly dropped from 7.43 to 7.36 whereas bicarbonate decreased from 25.5 to 20.5 mM (both P < 0.001 vs CON). Additional BIC resulted in 0.5 to 0.8 mM higher blood D-ß-hydroxybutyrate during the first half of IMT180' (P < 0.05 vs KE) and increased blood bicarbonate to 31.1 ± 1.8 mM and blood pH to 7.51 ± 0.03 by the end of IMT180' (P < 0.001 vs KE). Mean power output during TT15' was similar between KE, BIC, and CON at ~255 W but was 5% higher in KE + BIC (P = 0.02 vs CON). Time to exhaustion in the sprint was similar between all conditions at ~60 s (P = 0.88). Gastrointestinal symptoms were similar between groups.”

https://ketone.com/blogs/blog/announ...efficiency.%22

True. My main point was that the guy was 70 years old and crazy fit, he just happened to also be tiny : P

We cannot control a lot of things in our lives, but diet, consistency, and discipline are some of the things we can.

Yes pro athletes have been experimenting with ketones. However the results certainly are far from conclusive and even many negative. Most indicating no performance improvement during the ride. There is a little more to suggest a benefit for recovery after the ride. But only a little.

The ad from Ketone-IQ is just that. A ad. In which little context is given so that imaginations can run wild by the readers of the ad. They are a sponsor of Visma Lease a Bike. But then again so many other companies producing things I wouldn't care to use also sponsor Visma Lease a Bike and many other sports teams. With money being more essential to be a winning team, all teams are more than willing to take sponsor money or free product.

While increasing the bodies ability to burn fat will help a individual performance. That individuals increase in performance is still not going to be a benefit when others are also getting energy from their blood glucose during those long periods of maintaining a fast pace between the times they have to really work hard and sprint or climb.

For any that aren't competing and just ride for themselves, then it matters not where they get their energy if they are meeting the goals they wish.

Think you've missed the point here.. the benefit is not a direct benefit from using ketons vs using carbs... the benefit is using BOTH strategically at different points in a race... that when you're burning exogeneous ketones for time when typically demands in pro race demand is for lower to moderate intensity.. i.e. fist few hours.. so you are not burining glycogen and sparing it and have full glycogen load for busness end of race... this would be a strategic way to use this protocol.. that strategy, like others may or may not work given some parcours.. and how race actually unfolds... but this seems to work.. there is really no critique that I have found that that 5% increase is there given this protocol.. and note this is [NOT] useful at all for shorter events and TTs likely to hurt performance!

The recovery piece is actually still not fully established.. the exogenous ketones absolutley do seem to allow riders to "recover" faster.. i.e. work harder after back to back rides than they would otherwise... the question outstanding is.. is this actually allowing the rider to "recover" or is it simply masking 'strain' from their workouts and you will eventually pay the piper by over training at some later time...

Sure...

See above... it's a strategy ot use exogenous ketones when typically they will be sufficient and use glycogen when typically they will be needed... most pro race follow this pattern though...

Don't want to put words in his mouth, but the OP appears to interested in competative cycling... certainly greater absolute performance by his question...

I think you've missed the point. Certainly burning fat at a higher rate will produce more energy for the muscles to use. However the muscles don't know or care what the source is. And the higher fat burning rate is not going to be enough to produce the energy muscles have the potential to use.. Carbohydrate consumption during that time to maintain serum glucose will still provide energy for the muscles to draw energy from when in zone 2, 3, 4 or 5. And with that carbohydrate they can better meet their full potential since they'll have more available energy.

Even the professional athletes using ketones are not using exclusively ketones. And perhaps it's your suggestion that we buy both. But it seems a even more marginal gain than carb's.

As for your 5%, that needs some context behind it.

So why is it that riders are ingesting greater and greater amounts of carbs? 120g per hour.. and they would take more.. as much as they can tolerate given GI distress.. correct? What if you can add as much carbs is is tollerable AND... add IN PARALLELL add... IN ADDITION... EVEN MORE energy substrate, that doesn't reduce the amount of carbs you can pack in and doesn't cause increased GI distress as adding even more carbs would? There is a finite energy limit to packing in carbs given GI distress. Exogenous ketones allows riders to effectively break trough that limit by packing in more energy per hr.. ON TOP of carbs that you can max out on.. do you get it now? It's not an either, or... it's a plus, and!

Request: If you want to discuss nutrition, please start a new thread with an appropriate title.

Thanks.

That’s fair… you seemed to pull on the thread.. well… what else can I (maybe we.. I feel like I’m in same boat) stretch out our performance a little more.. I mentioned using smarts, positioning and tactics as my go to… then I thought about exogenous ketones.. something I haven’t actually tried as another way to tackle this DAMN aging thing 😩

But point taken, cheers! 🍻

I think that the answer is in the original post: "only short indoor climbs at high zone 2 / low zone 3 pace" (I replaced long with short because it was mentioned later that rides are less than 3 hours).

So, basically, controlled cooling (cool room, mid-60s F, with a good fan was mentioned), steady power with no variability (e.g., no wind gusts to spike your HR, no coasting, no cornering, or no sudden accelerations to mix the pace), reduced sympathetic nervous system activation (e.g., no cars to cause stress, no wind to unbalance you, no real danger to react to or just think about), probably better hydration, and certainly better overall comfort -> lower HR -> "improved efficiency".

Based on my experience, just a steady climb alone makes a huge difference in HR efficiency, I'd imagine that this is generally the case?

Smart… Yep… my indoor FTP was 20 W less before I got a proper fan 🧠 💡

I actually use a 24 inch industrial fan so I can hit my outdoor numbers inside… Don’t know why I didn’t think of that!

as well, if more of your ride is done at higher intensity, you probably have a higher core temperature at the lower intensity as well… Which would mean that even lower intensity you’d be having higher heart rate 🤔

Not having a power meter or an HR monitor or anything like that, and knowing that Strava estimates can be way off, I got an estimate of 210+ Watts for climbing the Plateau de Beille in endurance pace, and I get less than 160 Watts for equally short rides on mixed terrain where I actually push myself.

It kind of makes sense, like, on mixed terrain I will attack a punchy climb, my HR spikes, then I go down some switchbacks, my power is close to zero but my HR is still up.

I wrote "long" because I'm doing single constant climbs of 1.5-3 hours (def. an HC climb). Steady climbing stress, as opposed to short climb-recover-repeat sessions (which I was doing last year).

Maybe that doesn't meet someone's definition of a long ride.

I guess to know if this is really an apples to apples comparison… given heart rate drift when doing harder intensity with lower intensity after… Are these rides you’re comparing of the same type, just in the different periods? To be apples to apples comparison I think you need to compare rides like you’re doing now, that you were doing before to eliminate that you’re just seeing more heart rate drift from the previous period when you were doing higher intensity with interspersed lower intensity.

There are no HC climbs indoors, HC climbs come with change of altitude, temperature, wind, different posture on the bike (unless you tilt the bike or sth), and at times very bad road surface, among other things.

While you're doing the research, please post a link to a reliable source for "the UCI has said the both EPO and testosterone provided no benefit as well."

By the way, it's "alluded to," not "eluded to." Thought you'd want to know.

Splitting hairs weakens your argument. Why draw the line at indoor riding? --- "I still feel that variable gears are only for people over forty-five. Isn't it better to triumph by the strength of your muscles than by the artifice of a derailleur? We are getting soft...As for me, give me a fixed gear!"-- Henri Desgrange (31 January 1865 - 16 August 1940)

Elevated heart rate, elevated respiration rate, elevated power output. Amateur and pro racers everywhere have relied on indoor trainers for years to meet their workout goals.

That's rather a "Captain Obvious" statement. No indoor ride will ever be the same as its matching outdoor ride.

But in my experience, an indoor ride is significantly harder than its outdoor counterpart, due to: uninterrupted resistance, more static position, higher sweat rate, less cooling.

yup.. got this wrong… it’s independent researchers that have claimed this!

Pro tip… if you’re going to try to correct my grammar and spelling… you’re going to have very little tlme left over for making arguments… my spelling & grammar SUCKS!! 😂