Originally posted by Lynne
[B Oh! And thanks for the advice on eating and drinking before I feel it. As a woman, I always try to make sure I never eat unless I am truly hungry-it will be a weird thing to reverse that life-long training.
[/B]
If you are doing centuries, you need to eat before you are hungry. If you wait, you may hit the wall (aka bonk, crash).You will need to experiment with how much & when. A rule of thumb is to eat something after one hour of cycling & then every hour thereafter. It needs to be a high carb, moderate protein, low fat snack. Clif bars, power bars, etc., are often used, as well as bananas, cookies, etc. We recently had a discussion about this on another thread and everybody had their favorite food.

If you ever bonk, you'll know the reason why you need to eat. Your body won't necessarily tell you it is hungry. You'll get light headed, disoriented and extremely weak. You will not be able to pedal. A severe bonk can take a couple of days to recover from.

Again, you won't necessarily get a signal that you're hungry until it is too late. After you've been cycling for awhile, you will recognize the subtle cues. Even then, it is too late for a complete recovery. If you start to bonk at mile 50 in a century, you're going to be miserable for the next 50.