Hey @Nate_Pearson and @Jonathan and any others that have been experimenting with extra high carb fuelling.
Quick question, are you going normal bottles plus extra gels etc, extra concentrated bottles, or extra bottles?
For reference, I mainly use High5 energy drink mix plus SIS gels or sometimes others.
I’ve recently been adding in some GU Roctane and beta fuel chomps. I can comfortably do the 90g an hour without stress and have done higher by adding gels. I don’t know whether I want to up the water amount by all that much, but is it too risky to move too far away from the recommended drink mix concentration?
I’ve been using High5 for some years, just recently switched to a homemade mix. My experience with High5 is that going only slightly over the instructed amount of powder makes it very difficult to get everything disolved.
That being said, I have increased my intake by increasing the number of bottles I go through on a ride. That has been working fine for me as long as I’m training inside, but I probably have to try something else for my outdoor workouts next year.
I make my own drink mix, and I add more or less per bottle depending on the length and intensity of my ride.
I did a 2-hour sweet spot workout yesterday. I did 2 bottles with slightly higher strength drink mix, and 1 bottle with just water. But, it was super hot, so I wanted to make sure I was taking in more hydration. On other days, when it’s been really cold in my training space, I’ve made the drink mix more concentrated, to make sure I get the energy in, even when I’m not particularly thirsty.
For high intensity races around an hour long, I’ll run one bottle with super concentrated drink mix, and one smaller bottle with plain water. That means I get the energy, plus I get a clean mouth feel which sometimes is just critical.
I find myself using nothing by drink mix during races, although I’ll take a gel immediately before the start. I actually did a full ironman on nothing but drink mix (save for a gel at the start of the swim and at the start of the bike).
search the forum for Dr Alex Harrison who is an excellent resource on this topic. His RP endurance guide gives detail on fuelling, fluid replacement and salt intake.
But essentially you need to make sure you’re mixing in fructose if going over 60g/hr, especially as lots of gels use only glucose.
I use sucrose, which is 1:1 glucose fructose, and its cheap and can buy it anywhere. I understand they now believe 1:0.8 glucose fructose is optimal, so sucrose is pretty close.
@mailman my approach has been to put some dextrose and a little sodium citrate in a gel flask, pour some warm water in, and mix it up. I mix two of those flasks and stuff them in my jersey pockets.
Then I just put normal water in my water bottle frames. That way if I have gut issues I’ve got some pure hydration to fall back on .
Usually each flask has 105g of carbs. I’ll throw a couple caffeinated maurten gels in my jersey as well. Then I’m good for a three hour race.
Closer to 300ml. That’s what I use most of the time. I also have some of those PlanetX gel flasks which are smaller but great for occasions when I don’t have to carry so much.