<p>Yeah. I have no idea what I would eat. I can’t stand the thought of eating when I’m sweating like a pig and panting like a dog. Purely from a nutritional standpoint, it would probably be hard to beat a peanut butter and honey sandwich, but choking it down would be another story. Maybe a can of Pringles and a swig of Gatoraide? :)</p>
<p>Thanks to all the contributors who have made this an extremely interesting thread.</p>
<p>Cycling cross-country (4000 miles over 100 days), my daughter ate a lot of instant oatmeal (preferably made with hot milk), peanut butter, crackers, toast, chocolate bars. She did carry various artificial nutrients, but mostly ate those as emergency food. She found the oatmeal essential.</p>
<p>BunsenBurner, I have a cast-iron stomach. If I start feeling stomach problems, it’s generally because of low blood sugar (the bonk). I’m thinking about three issues:</p>
<p>1) Assuming Lustig’s theories are correct, how can I avoid the detrimental affects of fructose while on bike trips (and at all other times)?</p>
<p>2) What should I eat to assure a good uninterrupted supply of energy so I can ride all day?</p>
<p>3) What should I eat to promote a safe level of weight loss on bike trips?</p>
<p>Like Dmd’s daughter, on long trips I carry artificial energy supplements, but just for emergencies. I think it’s better to eat food. I suppose Almond Snickers Bars and Junior Mints are not much healthier than GU, but at least they’re readily available.</p>
<p>Cardinal:</p>
<p>According to Lustig’s detailed summary of liver metabolism, fructose consumption is not a problem for endurance athletes who truly have depleted their glucogen supplies. In that case, he says that fructose is actually a fast, effective way of replenishing glucogen supplies (stored carb energy). He makes the argument that an elite marathoner would benefit from high fructose sports drinks. The problem is that eliite marathoners aren’t who is drinking the stuff. Fat kids are drinking it.</p>
<p>That being the case (and I have to take Lustig’s word for liver metabolism!), I would probably be inclined to lean on fruit (bananas, apples, grapes, etc.) during a long ride or hike. It would also probably be an appropriate use for the high carb/high protein workout shakes and bars.</p>
<p>[Sugar:</a> The Bitter Truth - YouTube](<a href=“Sugar: THE BITTER TRUTH - YouTube”>Sugar: THE BITTER TRUTH - YouTube)</p>
<p>CF, so you are talking about maintenance nutrition, not energy replenishment while you are cycling. I thought it was the latter that concerned you. When it comes to replenishing glucose during exercise, even a person with an iron stomach cannot basic fight physiology, as coureour and I discovered in the past. :)</p>
<p>This is from his post (he is talking about OJ, but it is true for any form of sugar):</p>
<p>“When you get dehydrated, especially from running or other vigorous cardio, I recommend you rehydrate with Gatorade or other sport drink (or just water). The reason why is that the sugar in orange juice is not absorbed in the stomach as quickly as the simple glucose in Gatorade is. And in its eagerness to get the water into circulation the body rushes it through the gut and into the large intestine where most of the water is absorbed, and the orange juice sugar that would normally already be gone is still present. The result is the bowel bacteria go nuts feasting on the OJ sugar. And the result of that can be gas and the runs.”</p>
<p>Coureur is completely correct; that’s why sports drinks and gels either have carbs as MONO-saccharides that get absorbed quickly without going down the gut OR OLIGO-saccharides of the optimal polymer lenghth (like the ones in GU) that stick around in the stomach (but just long enough so they cause no troubles like long carbs) and/or do not work as food for the bacteria in the gut. And that’s why the makers of the gels say “take with plenty of water”.</p>
<p>I agree with i-dad: bananas, fruit, oatmeal, granola bars, toast, etc. are all good sources of carbs for endurance athletes.</p>
<p>I’m concerned about both maintenance nutrition and energy replenishment. Bonking is horrible and I don’t want to experience it, and I also want to lose weight.</p>
<p>Definitely, cyclists need to drink lots of water. There’s a reason touring bikes have three water bottle cages! I’ve never had the problems you describe when I don’t drink enough, though-- I just feel weak.</p>
<p>I’m not the least bit athletic. I do take 2 or so long walks a week with a walking buddy and swim about once a week. Walks are just that–walks–at a slow speed, but average about an hour and a half. We often stop for five or ten minutes half way through. </p>
<p>I’ve fought the battle of the bulge my entire life. I stay constant for years at a time, but then crisis hits–divorce, herniated disks that limited mobility, etc, and I pack on pounds. Current weight has been stable within a range of about 10 pounds–I’m short–for about eight years. My highest weight ever was at the high end of overweight, but I’ve never made it into obese territory. </p>
<p>I could skip all carbs and it would not bother me. I love dairy–cheese, yogurt, ice cream, etc. I also have a sweet tooth. I often satisfy those cravings with fruit, especially in summer. I eat lots of peaches, dried cranberries–which seem particularly effective in satisfying my sugar urges., 1-2 avocados a week, some berries, oranges, grapefruit. I eat few vegetables, except salads, which I eat 4 or 5 times a week, mostly made from fresh spinach . I also drink some “light” fruit juice, usually cranberry, no sugar added, and love, in summer only, the frozen “fruit” bars. </p>
<p>I also drink wine, which I know is loaded with sugar, and assume tends to be fructose. </p>
<p>Again, at this point my weight is not a problem. BMI is currently in the range of 21.0-21.3, accounting for minor fluctuations in weight. At the high end of my fluctuation zone, which happens mostly in winter when my body seems to think it’s its job to pack on weight, it’s about 22.5. </p>
<p>I thought I was being good eating a lot of fruit. I really don’t drink that much cranberry juice, but do drink more of it in summer. I drink lots of diet soda, but very little sugared soda – maybe two cans of it a year. </p>
<p>Should I be dialing down the fruit? </p>
<p>Or is eating a lot of fruit okay as long as my weight is under control ? </p>
<p>I’m totally confused by the stuff I’ve read. It seems to “talk” mostly about people who are obese and take in 20% of their calories from drinks–which I definitely don’t do–or endurance athletes. What about the rest of us?</p>
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<p>I don’t know about marathoners, but endurance cyclists definitely drink sports drinks. The thing is, kids drink sports drinks (fat kids and thin kids alike), and there are more kids than endurance cyclists.</p>
<p>I watched the Lustig video idad cited. Lustig recommends the following four lifestyle changes to his obese pediatric patients, and they’re probably valid for everyone else too:</p>
<p>Do not drink sweetened drinks. Don’t drink soda, fruit juice, sports drinks, chocolate milk, or any other drink sweetened with sugar or high-fructose corn syrup.</p>
<p>Get exercise, not because the exercise will itself burn significant amounts of calories, but because exercise reduces stress and promotes numerous healthy changes in your metabolism.</p>
<p>Eat carbohydrates (including sugars) in their natural form, with fiber. That means, eat whole grains, and eat a piece of fruit rather than drinking juice.</p>
<p>Balance screen time with exercise. Every hour spent in front of a TV or computer screen should be balanced with an hour of exercise.</p>
<p>jonri:</p>
<p>Except for endurance athletes (marathoners, cross-country cyclists, professional athletes training hours per day), I can’t think of a single reason that any of us should ever drink a sugar sweetened beverage. Ever. No soda. No fruit juice. No sweet coffee. No sports drinks. It’s the absolute first step in good nutrition, IMO. For many people, that one step would be enough to get control of the waistline.</p>
<p>What would be the best alternative to fruit drinks - especially for kids who are used to a glass of apple or grape juice a day (they do not drink much soda.)</p>
<p>Also, I have a 14 year old who is a vegetarian - but seems to eat mostly pasta, cheese, bagels and other carbs. I am sure this is contributing to her being overweight but I don’t know how to help her change her diet. I keep fruits and veggies available (including spinach for salads) - and she does eat them to a certain extent…but she still seems to be too heavy into the carbs.</p>
<p>She is not a vegetarian for the health benefits (or for her love of veggies) but for the animal rights stance. I am at a loss. I think her health is being negatively impacted.</p>
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<p>Water. Sorry, but that’s the right answer. Definitely not artificially sweetened drinks, which cause sugar cravings. </p>
<p>For a vegetarian who is eating a lot of white flour products, the answer (not, alas, one I’ve been good at adopting) is to try to move toward whole grains.</p>
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<p>If you need to lose weight despite your heavy load of distance cycling, that’s a bit of a different issue and you probably have to separate it from your immediate need for carb fuel while on a ride.</p>
<p>There’s some kind of non-intuitive adpatation that occurs with high-mileage cardio where the higher mileage produces less and less fat loss benefit. In fact, it seems that it’s sometimes necessary to cut mileage to lose weight. Here’s fitness author Rachel Cosgrove’s story of getting fat from Ironman training:</p>
<p>[The</a> Final Nail in the Cardio Coffin](<a href=“http://members.rachelcosgrove.com/public/The_Final_Nail_in_the_Cardio_Coffin.cfm]The”>http://members.rachelcosgrove.com/public/The_Final_Nail_in_the_Cardio_Coffin.cfm)</p>
<p>That’s why I mentioned that the bigger overall challenge for a high mileage enthusiast (running, biking, swimming) will be keeping protein consumption high (overall, not necessarily during the rides) because there is the real risk of burning away lean muscle from the high mileage.</p>
<p>For reasons that are not well understood, the optimum exercise for fat loss seems to be shorter high intensity workouts combined with resistance strength training. So, weight lifting a few times a week plus short sessions of sprint training or hill sprints on the bike would be fantastic. Long distance cardio works at first, but becomes less and less effective as your body adapts and becomes more efficient. And, the weight that it lost on a 500 mile bike trip may not be the weight that you most want to lose, if that makes any sense.</p>
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<p>That’s a real problem and one made worse with the pervasive anti-fat jihad we are bombarded with. For one thing, eating nothing but carbs is going to produce weight gain for many (but not all) of us. It is also going to make it very difficult to get adequate protein and without adequate protein, maintaing healthy lean muscle mass is impossible. Among other things, lack of lean muscle makes it much easier to store fat.</p>
<p>I feel bad that we had so much carbohydrate in our diets while my daughter was growing up. If I had it to do over, I would not have had them in the house.</p>
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<p>It makes sense, but it’s not, in my experience, true. That is, in the 500 mile bike trip I plan to take next month, any weight loss will be exactly where I want it. Moreover, the fat loss will be greater than the weight loss-- I will gain muscle and lose fat. Or, at least, that’s what has happened in all my previous bike trips, and I have no reason to believe this one will be any different.</p>
<p>Speaking of glucose vs fructose:</p>
<p>[Fructose</a> Consumption Increases Risk Factors for Heart Disease](<a href=“Fructose Consumption Increases Risk Factors for Heart Disease”>Fructose Consumption Increases Risk Factors for Heart Disease)
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<p>I’d like to see a bigger study.</p>
<p>Interesting. Fine with me if the nutrition-nazis want to make sugar the new bogeyman. Villifying fat in every imaginable form hasn’t worked out that great, so it probably is time to aim the guns elsewhere.</p>
<p>I love how these articles just assume an ironclad linkage between all these cholesterol numbers and heart disease, when the picture is hardly that cut n’ dried!</p>