Endurance nutrition

Last weekend’s 100K race at Snowbasin proved to be a nice testing ground for this weekends 81 miler, also known as the Park City Point 2 Point. I had put in a pretty intense week of riding and wanted to continue it through the weekend as well as try out a few nutrition options that I’ve been thinking about for P2P. Here are the results.First and foremost, HYDRATION is the most important factor. During the pre-race meeting there was a Dr. who spoke about general bike safety in hopes of preventing any injuries. He mentioned one thing that I thought was rather odd. He cautioned everyone to be careful about over hydrating. With that I know what he means and yes, it is very possible. I think personally I take it to the limit nearly every race. I drink a lot. But to shout it to the masses right before the race starts. Not the best idea. I assume there were a few folks already stressed about what to drink, when to drink it and now they were told to not hydrate too much. Thankfully the temperatures were pretty cool for an August afternoon and there were a lot of feed stations along the course.My issues came when I ran out of juice in my bottles. After hearing about how many feed stations there were on course I decided not to wear the Ausprey, and stick with bottles. Not a bad idea, but I should have known better and gone with the usual. All bottles Carbo Rocket. Instead I did one Carb Rocket and the other water. It’s always nice to have the option of water on board because it helps cleanse the palate from the gu’s, blocks, and other calories you consume. For me though, I was craving more Rocket and less H20.As far as gels go, I brought along with me some GU Roctane. I’m a firm believer of gels, but caution you to use them wisely. You can easily over eat with gels and the result will crash the system before you can do much to fix it. I like sucking back a Roctane maybe once every hour, give or take 15 min. In an endurance event though, it’s nice to mix it up with some blocks instead of gels.For the 100K I tried the smoothie flavored Honey Stingers. These are by far the best tasting blocks ever. They’re amazingly easy to eat while riding and did I mention how yummy they are? This was the first time I’ve used them in a race situation and to tell you the truth, I don’t think I noticed much of an energy source from them. I think though it was so mild compared to other blocks I’ve used in the past that I thought they didn’t work. When in reality, I think they just have a very slow release on the system. Not sure if I’m convinced with them yet.Food is also something that needs to take a major consideration. For me, I tried out the classic peanut butter/banana sandwich. I used one slice of bread with some Skippy all natural, crunchy PB, with some sliced bananas. Folded it over once and cut it in half. This made my day. It was actually pretty easy to eat and helped settle an empty stomach. The key here is eating when the riding is fairly mild. You’ll waste more energy trying to chomp down a sandwich or even swallowing a drink if you’re in tough spot on the course. Pick the spots on the trail that don’t require a lot of physical demand to pedal the bike to eat. You’ll save a lot of energy and enjoy the food much more.The legs felt pretty good considering the time spent on the bike earlier that week. I’m getting really excited for the P2P this weekend. It’s by far the best single day mountain bike race I’ve ever raced and I can’t wait to see how much stronger the competition is this year. Just need a little assistance in the feed zone. S-DAY and Forrest (my dad) will all be in Bear Lake on the family vacation.

I'll miss this little one at the finish line this weekend.