How many calories do you need to replace on a long ride?

[kajero]

LOL . . . it took me a long time! I won't say how long. I only average 10-12 mph. Then getting lost is so frustrating that I tend to take a lot of looonnnnggg breaks!
It's a really hilly, curvy ride and there are couple of hills I don't even bother to try to ride up. I will just get too tired for the rest of the ride. But I do love the ride. I ride out to my Dad's grave at Ft. Snelling. I am going to ride it one more time this summer on the anniversary of his passing. I know I won't get lost so it will be interesting if my time improves.

Also, on a few of the trails there are quite a few stop signs. And believe me if you go through them it's very possible you can get a $150 ticket. The cops will ticket a clipped rider that doesn't put one foot on the ground to stop.

BTW . . . I didn't do much better on the MS150. It took me nearly 6 hours to ride the 75 miles.

We did ride the Dakota Trail one day which is almost completely flat. Even on a trail like that I only averaged 13 mph and it seems I was going so fast. Ugh.

I have been thinking about going clip less, but right now I don't have an income and it seems really expensive to go that way. I am also very scare of another crash.

Sometimes I think I am tired before I even start out. I don't seem to be able to get to sleep very well nor sleep through the night. I get up at 5:00 a.m. two or three days a week to take care of my grandson. I am done at 4:00 and get home around 4:30 and then it seems I can't fall asleep until almost midnight. . Believe me, at 63 years old, I get tired, but I love being with him.

[ny biker]

For eating and drinking, I highly recommend Nancy Clark's Sports Nutrition Guide Book. She covers it all in a fast-to-read format.

http://www.nancyclarkrd.com/books/sportsnutrition.asp

I generally aim for 200-300 calories per hour during a ride, with a bigger-than-usual breakfast and dinner before a long ride. Lately I find that a snack (130-calorie cereal bar) is helpful about 15 minutes before I start to ride. I drink 1 20-oz. bottle per hour, alternating between Gatorade and water. During the summer I include one or two packets of high-sodium gel (Power Gel) as part of my food during the ride. Many regular sports gels and chews, and some drinks like Gatorade, actually do not have very much sodium in them. I'm not able to tolerate much real food during a ride, just cereal bars (Nutri-Grain bars), crackers and occasionally a tomato sandwich. However real foods take longer to digest and get into your blood stream, wheareas the gels and chews take effect more quickly so I feel less hungry.

[Grits]

I second the Nancy Clark's Sports Nutrition book. It is excellent and will provide you with some good guidelines.

[shootingstar]

Kajero, I probably ride just as slow on such a distance with hills. Not clear how much breakfast you had, but for 60 miles (100 km., tell yourself that instead. ), I tend to have a bigger breakfast and finish brekkie at least 1.5 hrs. before I start cycling.

I have never been able nor wanted to eat / drink while riding. And I have been cycling for last 23 consecutive years. I need to stop, even if only for 15 min. to eat and drink. Not worry about whether or not I'm going to fall or swallow something correctly while cycling. I need to completely relax to eat and digest properly.

So it would be at least stopping 1-2 times before lunch like meal. And that meal needs to be for me, 1 hr. stop. Thereafter might be 1-2 more stops with eating/ washroom. No, I don't eat every hr. during such distance of a ride. That's just me.

I would have had a sandwich equivalent or hey small veggie sushi roll, 1 fruit and drink for the largest meal. Snacks would be other small fruit, a granola bar, a handful of nuts, natural fruit juice, etc. I don't eat gels, drink sports drinks, etc.

Maybe next time bring the same amount food but make it different, but don't feel obligated to eat it all. Better to have some handy (lighter?) food instead of underestimating by not enough food. I've been on rides where we rode for long stretches in rural areas and no stores. Pretty scary.

[roo4]

Well, just to underline the "everyone is different" theme, I generally have a peanut butter and honey sandwich with coffee as my pre-ride meal. Then I take two water bottles with Heed if it is under 3 hours and Perpetuum if the ride is longer. I limit on the bike snacking--it tends to make me feel sluggish. I'll take a gel along for emergencies and sometimes the club stops at a bakery that is too good to pass up--that's not really a nutritional requirement, but yum.

[kajero]

Oh dear, it looks like I can add my poor eating habits to my getting lost adventures. That way I can be really frustrated!

[OakLeaf]

Yeah, intensity is really key to how much you need to eat during a ride. I might eat that much on a hilly century. Are you sure you bonked, or was it something else? What were your symptoms? I always suspect hyponatremia since I'm so very prone to it myself, and since it doesn't sound like you got much sodium outside of your sandwich. Remember you need to replace at least 500 mg sodium per liter of water, and along the lines of "everyone's different," that's a minimum, some people lose much more, especially if they're not heat acclimated.