CYCLINGFORUM.COM - Where Cyclists Talk Tech --- Return To Home

 

    Register FAQ'sSearchProfileLog In / Log Out

 

****

cyclingforum.com ****

HOMECLUBS | SPONSORS | FEATURESPHOTO GALLERYTTF DONORS | SHOP FOR GEAR

Return to CyclingForum Home Page CYCLING TECH TALK FORUM
          View posts since last visit

Nutrition
 

Author Thread Post new topic Reply to topic
dan emery
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 6884
Location: Maine

6/18/22 1:45 PM

Nutrition

Through Rene Herse, I became aware of Untapped, a Vermont company started by Ted King and a few other Vermont athletes. Makes sports nutrition products from mostly maple sugar, and a few other natural ingredients (e.g., lemon, sea salt, tea, ginger, etc.). I’ve gotten the waffles (replace sports bars in your jersey pocket), and a powdered drink mix and liquid concentrate drink. The powdered mix with tea is good enough I can use it for a normal lunch, and I just got the ginger mapleade concentrate which is delicious in the water bottle!

Analyzing nutrition is above my pay grade, but if Ted uses it in his gravel marathons, it’s probably good enough for me.

Good stuff!

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

6/18/22 2:11 PM

Which flavors of the waffles you get so far, and comment on those flavors, etc?

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

dan emery
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 6884
Location: Maine

6/18/22 2:44 PM

I got a combo box with maple, cocoa, raspberry and lemon. Tried all but lemon, they’re all good. Much easier to chew than bars.

 Reply to topic    

Brian Nystrom
Joined: 26 Jan 2004
Posts: 5096
Location: Nashua, NH

6/18/22 4:13 PM

I've had a few of the maple waffles and the "gels" (maple syrup in a gel pack) at various gravel events. They're good, but I typically buy whatever I can get at a good price at our local Sierra Trading Post store, which is usually Honey Stinger stuff. Their cracker bars are really good and a nice departure from waffles.

 Reply to topic    

RCoapman
Joined: 09 Feb 2005
Posts: 5137
Location: Back in the snowy homeland

6/19/22 6:04 AM

Thread hijack warning- proceed with caution or, best advice as usual, just ignore me

Nutrition has been constantly on my mind since I started training. In January I made some serious life changes, all of which I think have been very positive.

1- I quit drinking regularly. This has made me incredibly more productive, improved sleep drastically, and been an overall boon to every aspect of my existence. Added to this is that I have expensive taste in whisky and my wallet is a happier, too.

2- I started training which has been amazing.

3- I went back to a keto diet. I was keto for about 18mos at a previous time until my last parter convinced me I was crazy...turns out it wasn't the diet that was crazy but that's another story.

Not only am I full-on keto, I'm doing carnivore...meaning a fully animal-based diet. Lots of science has come out in the past decade that has supported this diet and is also completely upending and reanalysing all the studies of the past that said fat is bad, etc, when the actual evidence points to all forms of sugar being the real culprit.

Now, cycling without carbs is blatant heresy and had gotten me a lot of strange looks and some rather shocking insults online as I've searched for resources/information on being in an endurance sport without maintaining high-carb intake.

While I'm certainly not a doctor I know how I feel. In 5 mo I'm down 40lbs, I feel amazing, my blood pressure has dropped to normal/healthy levels from low-end stage 1 hypertension in early March, and I don't get the metabolic crashes and doldrums I used to when eating sugars. RHR has dropped from ~58 (a welcome holdover from my intense training 20 years ago) to ~50. I've not had a chance to check my cholesterol, but positive changes there from this diet are reported to take somewhat longer than I've been doing this.

There is a lot of evidence that we evolved to eat an animal-based diet and that plants have been a "starvation food" for when critters would not readily jump into the stew pot. Obviously the agricultural revolution changed that but that is a rather recent change in evolutionary terms.

So I'm eating this diet as I've been sufficiently convinced that it's our natural way of eating. And then, because I've always liked to complicate things, I then get back into an activity that is completely unnatural. The intensity and duration of effort required for cycling training is far outside what we evolved for. We appear designed either for bursty, anaerobic efforts, i.e. run away from the thing with teeth and claws, or sustained, low to somewhat moderate efforts such as found in persistence hunting.

Smashing out a multi-hour effort at a large percentage of one's aerobic threshold is not really something our ancestors ever needed to do and a fat-based energy system can't keep up. It takes more oxygen to produce ATP from fat than it does any form of sugar, which is heavy in O, and refueling on the bike is very challenging to impossible, at least as far as I've found. Fats require much more effort and time to digest and divert so much blood to the stomach if I have any of it in me when I'm on the bike I very quickly want to empty myself out. Really not fun indoors.

Now that my rides are getting to +2hrs, I've been really drained at the end of the workout. Like, completely and totally drained- the tank is empty. So I've been experimenting with adding some sugar only whilst on the bike. I've only done this a few times, using Skratch Labs energy chews, and I think there's been positive results but I have to do a lot more testing to fine-tune how much and when to take them.

The chews are like the soft, gel candies I used to love as a kid but never really learned the proper name of. They sit in the stomach with no problem. The only real issue is the packaging, literally the worst possible packaging for a product of this type. That being said, I really have no idea how best to package them for use on the bike.

I like the chews because I can, more precisely than bars or other foods, determine how much I intake over time. The goal is to use just enough to get me through the workout without completely bolloxing up my metabolism off the bike and sending it into a hysteria of confusion switching back and forth.

I do know that I will have to make a choice at some point, maybe sooner than I had hoped, between ultimate performance and diet/health. I've been thinking that I might want to get back into racing but I'm not sure (and by not sure I mean pretty damn sure I can't) I can maintain my diet and do so. While there is not a lot of science on keto diets and endurance sports what evidence there is suggests that it can be fine, even beneficial esp as regards weight loss, in early "base-building" stages (where I'm at) but that it is a, not surprisingly, limiting factor when it comes to high-end performance.

But I have to say, getting off the bike and stopping for a heavy cream latte at the coffee shop is not something I want to give up.

 Reply to topic    

Brian Nystrom
Joined: 26 Jan 2004
Posts: 5096
Location: Nashua, NH

6/19/22 8:50 AM

I'm glad you've found something that works for you, at least in some ways, which in the end is what really matters.

That said, my philosophy is to avoid dietary extremes - like carnivore or vegan - and all the fad diets that come and go like the seasons. It seems like every time you turn around, the foods that were sure to kill you last month are the absolute best thing for you this month. Proponents always cite studies and theories to support their beliefs, but it all seems to have much more in common with religion than science. Well, that and marketing.

I also suspect that there's a heaping helping of placebo effect in the results people report about how a given diet "changed my life". Plus it almost always seems that a major dietary change is accompanied by other lifestyle changes like increased exercise, less drinking, less smoking, etc. Consequently, attributing everything to a change is diet is just BS.

We didn't evolve the molars we have for a strictly meat diet, nor our incisors and canines for strictly eating plants. Our digestive tract is not well suited to digesting meat and is really best at digesting fruit. Our nearest relatives in the animal kingdom are omnivores and it seems pretty clear that we are too, biologically speaking. One can argue that grains we now cultivate are not a large part of our natural diet, but they aren't completely foreign to it, either.

I try to eat a healthy balance of foods and ignore all the external noise. I know I eat too much sugar and I'm working on that. I've added more protein now, as it's apparently more important as we age, but I stopped eating red meat over 45 years ago (back when I started racing). My alcohol consumption amounts to 4-5 beers or glasses of wine total per week and that works for me. I don't drink coffee and typically have 5 or so cups of tea per week. Variety and moderation are the keys, as far as I'm concerned.

I don't mean to disparage anyone else's choices. Whatever works for you is fine by me.

 Reply to topic    

RCoapman
Joined: 09 Feb 2005
Posts: 5137
Location: Back in the snowy homeland

6/19/22 9:02 AM


quote:
It seems like every time you turn around, the foods that were sure to kill you last month are the absolute best thing for you this month.


Yeah, I'm highly aware of that. I'm paying very close attention to my body and what it's telling. So far this diet is very easy to maintain, I feel fantastic, and I overall feel much healthier than I did before. Of course, I have to account for the 3 major confounding variables I listed above in all that.

Not the best application of the scientific method to start 3 major changes in the same week. ;)

No doubt we are omnivores. I haven't looked specifically at fruit as a primary food source re: how our digestive tract is designed but I do know it's better at digesting meat than it is anything green/leafy. If you look at our closest cousin, the chimpanzee, their digestive tracts make use of a massive "fermentation area" to extract every little bit of nutrition out of their primary food source- green/leafy stuff. This is why chimps and gorillas have ribcages that flare out at the bottom- to make room for the added part of the GI system.


quote:
I try to eat a healthy balance of foods and ignore all the external noise.

Yes, that's the trick isn't it....figuring out what that balance is. I've read some convincing science and analysis that brought me to my current diet and if that's shown to be wrong I'll move away from it just as easily.

I think the only thing we can say for sure is cooking at home is always healthier than eating out and only eating whole foods is vastly superior to anything processed. I honestly think eating whole foods is about 90% of the battle in the modern world, whether or not those foods come from the plant, fungus, or animal kingdom.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/2/22 1:37 PM

Ordered up some Untapped waffle packs to sample.


'Welcome15' code worked for me...

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

dan emery
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 6884
Location: Maine

7/2/22 2:28 PM

Timing

I just read the post and then got an email with the code, so I bought some gels. Today I’ve had 2 glasses of lemon tea mapleade, one after a short ride and one at lunch.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/10/22 1:03 PM

Dan, are you aware of how the waffles might handle hot car storage, if only by accident??

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

dan emery
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 6884
Location: Maine

7/10/22 1:22 PM

No, but they don’t look like something that would melt to me.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/10/22 4:27 PM

I thought maybe the maple might hang in your mouth, but it didn't. And unlike a cliff bar, you can get more manageable mouthfuls I thought.

25 miles on the CRL, it wants to be pedaled hard. Me riding a 10s 39/53 with a 12-27 was like having a 6-7 speed, with a single front ring. 53t ring, nope..


Last edited by Sparky on 7/11/22 12:39 PM; edited 1 time in total

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

Brian Nystrom
Joined: 26 Jan 2004
Posts: 5096
Location: Nashua, NH

7/11/22 10:14 AM

"Me riding a 10s 39/53 with a 12-27 was like having a 6-7 speed, with a single front ring. 53t ring, nope.."

I hear ya...

 Reply to topic    

dan emery
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 6884
Location: Maine

7/11/22 2:06 PM

I think I have the same gears on mine, except probably a 12-24 or 25. Skinny tires.

It's a racing bike.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/11/22 3:02 PM

Yeah, mine has a climbing cassette, 12-27t. ;)

Boy that used to be my fav...

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

Kramer
Joined: 12 Jan 2004
Posts: 121
Location: Richmond, VA

7/11/22 4:34 PM

42 T Front Chainring

On older bikes, I always found a 42T "small" ring was almost always perfect. I replaced my 39 with a 42 and loved it. I did swap it out if I was going somewhere hilly.

Now my do it all bike has GRX with a 30/46 and I seem to spend most rides in the 46.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/11/22 4:39 PM

Are you young? ;)

Actually, when I did a 30/46 I liked the 30 for hills but was nearly always cross chained on the 46. Until a steep hill or late in the ride on a small hill. ;)

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

Kramer
Joined: 12 Jan 2004
Posts: 121
Location: Richmond, VA

7/12/22 4:54 PM

No young but it's flat and....

Not young nor old at 50.5 but I leave in central Virginia and its rather rolling to flat.

I cross chain all the time but whatever. I run a 11-28 for regular riding but pull out the 11-34 or 11-40 if I head to the Mtns.

 Reply to topic    

lrzipris
Joined: 04 Mar 2004
Posts: 532
Location: Doylestown, PA

7/19/22 10:24 AM

For you Untapped aficionados, be prepared for a supply chain shortage. I just got the August/September issue of ACA's Adventure Cyclist, and there is a short piece on Untapped Mapleaid in the "Geared Up" section.

 Reply to topic    

KerryIrons
Joined: 12 Jan 2004
Posts: 3234
Location: Midland, MI

7/19/22 2:48 PM

Ethanol poisoning


quote:
I quit drinking regularly. This has made me incredibly more productive, improved sleep drastically, and been an overall boon to every aspect of my existence.


I always remember the warning issued by my Chemistry 101 professor: ethanol is the least poisonous of all alcohols. This after a student nearly froze to death after passing out drunk in a snowbank.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/19/22 4:54 PM

I quit drinking completely.

Wish I'd had the sense/temerity to have done it sooner.

Jan 14th 2008, hard to think how long ago it is now.

But the plan was 1/1/08 resolution to not drink during the week at all, just on Friday eve into weekend. By the second weekend I broke the pattern and just said done.

Don't have to imagine how that and always riding has improved quality of things @ 65 and going forward..

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail

dddd
Joined: 11 Jan 2004
Posts: 3345
Location: NorCal

7/19/22 7:18 PM

Full-on cold-turkey is just simpler, eliminates need for decision-making, justification and excuses.

Our livers have by now lost a lot of their mission-critical performance levels, so eliminating drinking makes things easier for that organ and for digestion.
Anything that makes the liver's life easier also makes the pancreas' life easier imo.

 Reply to topic    

Sparky
Joined: 08 Dec 2003
Posts: 19068
Location: PDX

7/19/22 10:11 PM

"Full-on cold-turkey is just simpler"

Sure, if your goal is to quit drinking completely. ;)

I just wanted to stop having beer every day. That was the goal.

 Reply to topic     Send e-mail


Return to CyclingForum Home Page CYCLING TECH TALK FORUM
           View New Threads Since My Last Visit VIEW THREADS SINCE MY LAST VISIT
           Start a New Thread

 Display posts from previous:   


  
Last Thread | Next Thread  >  

  
  

 


If you enjoy this site, please consider pledging your support

cyclingforum.com - where cyclists talk tech
Cycling TTF Rides Throughout The World

Cyclingforum is powered by SYNCRONICITY.NET in Denver, Colorado -

Powered by phpBB: Copyright 2006 phpBB Group | Custom phpCF Template by Syncronicity