Fuel your training like a pro
When you get on the bike the day after a tough or long session, even if you have feelings of fatigue and feel like you have nothing in your legs I can GUARANTEE this one thing. It's not your fitness that's the problem it's how and what you are eating and drinking that's the issue.
Low energy availability (LEA) and dehydration will slow you down and make training RPE (Rate of perceived energy) feel a lot harder than it should.
What and when you eat and drink before training matters for performance IN training
What and when you eat and drink IN training matters for performance in training and AFTER for recovery
What and when you eat and drink after training matters for RECOVERY and PERFORMANCE in your NEXT training sessions
We’ve all done a ride, under-fuelled, and then felt depleted for the rest of the day. It didn’t feel good right?
So, what’s the SOLID standard practice so that you get good energy in training and for long rides and ensure better training and recovery?
The evening before:
Eat a normal whole food meal that's carbohydrate-rich, with 30g of protein and veggies or salad foods for health.
60 mins pre-training:
If you are heading into training feeling a little bit hungry but don’t want to eat a big meal aim for a bagel, sourdough toast with banana and jam, cereal or Styrkr energy bars. These are high-carb and high-energy, low-volume foods that digest fast and give you instant available energy.
In training :
If your session is an hour you shouldn’t need anything other than water and electrolytes. That’s because your nutrition should be on point throughout the day, and night before to support an hour’s worth of training no matter how tough the session. However, having said that in some tough training sessions drinking 60g of carbs could be the intervention that clinches a PB effort.
My top tips to always power through LONG rides:
The standard carbohydrate recommendation is between 60g and 90g of carbohydrates an hour.
I like to fuel by eating a small chunk of an energy bar of about 257 calories with 50g of carbohydrates 20 mins into the ride and aim to finish it within an hour, every hour I also add 1 x energy chew with 120 calories and 30g of carbohydrates. (sometimes I eat 2 chews)
It's super simple to follow every hour and super effective at keeping me strong on the bike over 100-mile rides and longer.
Post training:
Eat a normal whole food meal that's carbohydrate-rich, with 30g of protein and veggies or salad foods for health.
If you are training again that day or have tough or long training sessions fairly close to each other or the next day aim to consume a whey protein shake with water with 0.8g up to 1.2g per kg of body weight of carbohydrates to replenish glycogen stores fast. Then eat a normal whole food meal that's carbohydrate rich, with 30g of protein and veggies or salad foods for health.
Hydration is key to making sure you perform and recover optimally. Being dehydrated gives the same feelings of low carbohydrate availability and bonking and can make you feel a bit sick.
The VPCC standard practice on hydration is 550-750mls of water and electrolytes per hour. (1000ml right up to 1500mlg of sodium per ltr of water). Keep in mind everyone has different sweat rates. Some sweat more, some sweat less.
I can not say this enough
You should NOT see your longer rides with lower calorie or low carbohydrate consumption as a chance to drive greater, faster fat loss. This is NOT how fat loss works. Fat loss happens over a week, a month a year from a consistent calorie deficit.
Did you know that increasing energy expenditure through exercise naturally increases hunger hormones? The more we train and the less we eat the more we raise hunger, it's a normal hormonal process that our body is driving to maintain energy balance.
This is why it's key to fuel and hydrate like a pro before, during, and after training. Want to train effectively, recover at your best, and look leaner fuel like a pro.
Thanks for reading.
All my best, Simon.
Written By Simon de Burgh
Founder, Performance and Nutrition Director
www.veloperformance.club
Thanks for reading, Simon
2 X Winner of Gym Based PT, and founder of VPCC