your diet, eating during cycling trips

[Crankin]

I pretty much ate anything I wanted on my tour in Spain... riding just 30-45 miles a day, up categorized climbs in 90 degree heat kind of made me not worry about it. I also drank a lot more wine than usual, too. And we probably walked at least ten miles during the 2 weeks, also.
When I came back, I weighed exactly the same as when I left. It's been a little hard to get back into my normal, healthy eating, when I don't ride that way everyday.

[mirliluck]

Shootingstar, good to hear that you are back and your trip was good! Can't wait to hear more about it. I was in Prague when Germany was playing England and they had it on jumbo screen in the main square. So fun to be part of that energy and excitement!

When I am on a cycling trip or just during the warm months in general when I am cycling a ton (and not skiing ), I do agree with the 'eat whatever you want and not worry about it', but I first try to pay attention to protein intake. Long rides in particular are not terribly friendly to muscle mass. I try to focus on protein like eggs and yogurt for breakfast and fish/tofu/whatever for dinner, cottage cheese for snacks, etc. I usually have most of my carbs mid-day and around riding time to keep me fueled. I have really noticed a difference in how strong I feel during rides and how I feel post ride since upping my protein intake. I also prefer fuel with staying power, so I like full-fat dairy products and other 'good fats' like avocado, olive and coconut oils, nuts & nut butters, etc. I've noticed my skin and hair love the good fats too.

[shootingstar]

Here is the link on our cycling experience in Prague:
http://thirdwavecyclingblog.wordpres...ing-in-prague/
(I'm the blogmaster for dearie's company blog.)

Eating Prague was abit of challenge, especially if one wants to focus on trying Czech food since there is less variety of veggie dishes. Czech wine which is not commonly found in British Columbia and Ontario liquor stores, has some good varieties to try.

The problem with a bike trip, especially a long one across multiple countries, is that it is nearly impossible to buy and safely lug around local wines (which often are not sold in North America). Not worth shipping back in advance, since postage cost would exceed cost of wine. So for Germany and Czech Republic, too bad we planned our trip backwards: we should have ended our trip with those countries!

We did lots of walking too. After all, I'm abit of a museum/gallery freak.

Still, in other long, self-supported bike trips, I lost abit of weight since previous trips I did more sustained, longer cycling time on consecutive days. Such previous cycling trips were in North America (which includes Hawaii).

No I didn't have any sports bars, drinks or gels. But then I never have at home, except for the occasional Cliff or Luna-like bar on cycling trips.

If a person cooks or already eats a variety of dishes across several different cuisines that use good cooking techniques, then it might help assess unfamiliar local dishes and their "healthiness" when travelling overseas. For instance, quality gourmet baking in southern Germany is NOT too sweet. The chain bakeries in southern Germany, feature supersized, overly sweet/fattening pasteries vs. the independent bakeries. It is screamingly obvious to the informed consumer. However if a North American tourist is not attuned to fine gourmet European baking, they may not be able to make intelligent food choices in ie. southern Germany. I only know this because of years of tasting dearie's mother's German gourmet baking.

Then when we got to Czech Rep. and Denmark: no I'm sorry their cuisines really aren't not known for fine, diverse desserts. So I could ease off willingly from eating much baked goods from within those traditional cuisines. Except for Glace, a fine cake-cafe in Copenhagen.

I certainly ate more meat during the whole trip than what I normally eat for 4 weeks at home. We did really want to try local cuisine, though we had to rely on some Italian meals since we couldn't find cost-effective Danish restaurants. Copenhagen was expensive, food-wise.

[oz rider]

Interesting subject shootingstar. And glad it sounds like you had a good time. I've been thinking about food (as always, hehe) with my tour coming up. Some of it is remote and while we'll be able to pack lunch, there's no coffee shops for hundreds of kms so I'm thinking of taking some snacks I know work for me. Love asparagus too.