What do you eat "on the go" on long rides?

[ALawson]

Ride London today,

1420ml sis go energy
710ml electrolyte
3 bananas
4 mini malt loafs
2 sis go gels
1 sis caffine double expressed gel

[GuinnessMK]

On longer rides, I worked out I needed something every 20 minutes to balance the calories I was burning.

On the 120 miles round Lake Geneva, I was having an Aldi Mini Titan Bar (Mars Bar copy), then a Gel, then an Asda Flapjack Bite, then start again on the hour.

Used to use the Sainsbury's Flapjack Bites, but found the Asda ones are worse for you (more sugar)! Wrap them in little squares of tin foil and you can eat them in two bites.

[yellowjack]

Not enough, probably!

106 miles for me today. I took/bought the following...

* 2 x 710ml bottles of plain (no added sugar) squash

* 3 x 500ml bottles of still Lucozade Sport

* 3 x Jordans cereal bars

* 1 x Snickers Duo


...I finished the ride with about 300ml each of the Lucozade and squash still left. Breakfast was toasted wholemeal bread with jam, and lunch was a couple of small ham & mustard sandwiches to finish off the wholemeal loaf.

[Steve vRS]

But where do you carry all this stuff? My pockets are full of tools and tubes etc, Maybe I should invest in a nice little saddle bag!

[NorthDave]

Black can man said:

We had these on today's Pru 100

Bloody good they were too

I did 1000km over a week earlier in the summer and these pretty much got my through it. I find sucking a block to nothing takes 20 minutes, wait 20 minutes and repeat and that is the right level of energy in for me. On the flat at least. If a decent hill approaches then I might chuck a gel or some proper food in at the start.

I think they are great.

[NorthDave]

GuinnessMK said:

On longer rides, I worked out I needed something every 20 minutes to balance the calories I was burning.

On the 120 miles round Lake Geneva, I was having an Aldi Mini Titan Bar (Mars Bar copy), then a Gel, then an Asda Flapjack Bite, then start again on the hour.

Used to use the Sainsbury's Flapjack Bites, but found the Asda ones are worse for you (more sugar)! Wrap them in little squares of tin foil and you can eat them in two bites.

I'm doing this tomorrow! Hoping for good weather.

[Black can man]

E65Ross said:

Just had a look at those.... They're bloody expensive!

They weren't yesterday

Made sure i stocked up, i have 5 packets

[Silver940]

Ride London,


Can of Red Bull ( I hadn't slept a wink all night before )
2litres High 5 Energy Drink
1 banana
2 SIS energy Bars
About a dozen gels of varying makes and flavours. ( Annoyingly I had one left in my pocket at the end, thought I had run out )


Not the best of diets!

[SteveSteveson]

NerveAgent said:

You guys eating chocolate bars, do they not melt?!

Not unless it is very hot out. I put it in with my tools and inner tube and it's fine.

[E65Ross]

Black can man said:

E65Ross said:

Just had a look at those.... They're bloody expensive!

They weren't yesterday

Made sure i stocked up, i have 5 packets

haha, brilliant!

As someone posted above, it works out 1 pack equals 2 gels....but with the current wiggle prices that's still equivalent to around £1 per gel/£2 per pack. Still rather pricey. SIS gels seem to work well for me and you can get 20 of those for £14/70p each, the High5 ISOGELs are less than 50p each at the moment!

I stocked up on gels and energy bars last month as SIS had a big deal on.....buy 3x8 pack of energy bars (5 x mini bars and 3 x normal size - different flavours) for just £15.....so I got 48 of them, and they had 30 gels for £21 so got 60 gels

Mind you, I tend to get through 4-5 gels per week and 3-4 bars...

[yellowjack]

Steve vRS said:

But where do you carry all this stuff? My pockets are full of tools and tubes etc, Maybe I should invest in a nice little saddle bag!

Ah! There's the difference, I think. My tyre levers, tube, CO2, patch kit, multi-tool, chain tool, etc all live (permanently) in a saddle pack. Apart from the chain tool I have specific kit for each bike to save swapping it all over when I ride another bike. (It also avoids going to change a tube only to find that it's a 700 x 28c tube and the tyre is 27.5" x 2.1"... )

Left pocket - pump, windproof/showerproof jacket, Leatherman tool, 1 x 500ml Lucozade Sport
Centre pocket - camera, (another) spare tube (longer rides only), OS map (if I've got the right one)
Right pocket - phone/cards/cash, cereal bars/sweeties

The squash goes into 2 x frame mounted 710ml bottles, the extra Lucozade gets decanted into those bottles when I buy it, along with the original bottle from my pocket. As I chomp through what I'm carrying the pockets get less full, so there's space to top up at a shop if needs be.

[Matt_N]

Quite liking Clif peanut butter bars at present.

I tend to have half at the 1/4 point of my ride, stop at half way for a drink and a cake then the rest at the 3/4 point. I tend to do 60-80 mile rides.

I'll have about 50g of oats in a home made shake about an hour before I ride too.

[GuinnessMK]

NorthDave said:

I'm doing this tomorrow! Hoping for good weather.

Good luck! It's the most intensively scenic ride I've ever done, so take lots of photos.

The Swiss roads are superb, French side not quite so perfect, but generally very good.

[E65Ross]

NorthDave said:

Black can man said:

We had these on today's Pru 100

Bloody good they were too

I did 1000km over a week earlier in the summer and these pretty much got my through it. I find sucking a block to nothing takes 20 minutes, wait 20 minutes and repeat and that is the right level of energy in for me. On the flat at least. If a decent hill approaches then I might chuck a gel or some proper food in at the start.

I think they are great.

Tried these today and whilst they taste lovely and have a nice texture as a "sweet/jelly snack" they have one problem in my opinion....when pushing on hard you simply can't really chew. I was doing a tempo ride earlier and found them a bit of a struggle, yet don't have that issue with the gels.

But....they'll be great for general endurance rides when you're not quite so breathless!

[RemyMartin]

yellowjack said:

Not enough, probably!

106 miles for me today. I took/bought the following...

* 2 x 710ml bottles of plain (no added sugar) squash

* 3 x 500ml bottles of still Lucozade Sport

* 3 x Jordans cereal bars

* 1 x Snickers Duo


...I finished the ride with about 300ml each of the Lucozade and squash still left. Breakfast was toasted wholemeal bread with jam, and lunch was a couple of small ham & mustard sandwiches to finish off the wholemeal loaf.

Eating size I'm OK but I struggle with drinking in so much as that I drink loads!
Where are you storing all those bottles!

[yellowjack]

RemyMartin said:

Eating size I'm OK but I struggle with drinking in so much as that I drink loads!
Where are you storing all those bottles!

2 x 710ml bike bottles are in frame mounted bottle cages. 1 x 500ml Lucozade bottle is in a rear jersey pocket. The other x 2 Lucozades are stored in a garage or corner shop for use later, to be honest. No way I can carry all of it from mile 1 really. I have a 'curly wurly' cable lock that wraps around the bars/stem which I take on long rides for cafe/shop/toilet breaks, etc.