Hi all , at the beginning of the year I signed up to a 100mile bike ride which is in June and a marathon in October , normal I wouldn't worry about the distance but I've just been diagnosed with T1 , I have read a lot of information and finding it hard to understand if I should take incline after I finish the events , what food I should eat , and do I have to stop halfway round to eat . #confused .
Cycle Sportive Nutrition
- Thread starter FantomPoet
- Start Date
haspden
Member
- Messages
- 9
- Type of diabetes
- Type 1
- Treatment type
- Insulin
Hey Filer11 where about's are you based? I'm trying to get a group of T1s together in a "team" for charity rides...
Food wise I'd start by slightly reducing you insulin for your meal pre ride, I'd start with say a 20% reduction and see how that goes, then try eat constantly throughout the ride without any units for this food. Around 20-60g of carbs an hour.
An energy jel is about 17-23g of carbs so I try take 2 an hour for medium intensity and 3 for high...
Post ride I usually eat a carb and protein heavy meal and reduce my insulin anywhere between 50 and 90% for this.
It's worth baring in mind that every'body' is different And reacts didifferently. These are some starting guides to be worked with.
- If you find your going low shortly after rides, it's the mid-ride intake you need to raise,
- if it's early in the ride, drop your Pre-ride meal insulin intake
- If it's anywhere between a few yours and 48hours after then it's likely to be your iin-ride and post ride intakes (yes it really can be 48hr)
The key to all this is testing, I use an accu-chek mobile meter which is great for taking my with me on rides because of its size.
Also worth noting if your training, then things will change over time as you keto-adapt, becoming my better at using stored fats for energy rather than carbs. If you can become better at this then blood glucose will become so much easier. Unfortunately for me I'm a carb lover and my 8'000kcal a day diet is carb heavy... So that's not gonna happen to me anytime soon I guess haha
One other quick note is about legumes, chickpeas, lentils, Dahl etc. They are a fantast fuel for pre and post ride meals. They are high in protein and high in carbs, and yet they're glycaeimic index is soon high that most doctors/dieticians will tell you that you don't need to inject for them. I don't entirely agree with this as a science minded guy it's simple maths, carb intake must be met with insulin, but I think they worry that as rapid insulins tend to have a working period of around 3-4 hours and a peak at about an hour, if legumes are your only carbs and you inject at the start of your meal your bloods will crash low as they can be a very slow Carb absorbtion fuel of up to 8 hours in cases...
Anyhow the point is, pre and post ride, no insulin for this, especially if your enjoying hypos mid or post ride...
Lastly a note from one cyclist to another, fufuels such as bananas, malt loaf, and flapjacks are all greatest your not a fan of energy jelS. These are all small yet with high carb content.. Little (or a lot) and often is the key to sports nutrition both with performance (stopping the bonk) and blood glucose control I'm mind.
Ooh one more thing, Fluid intak. It's often overlooked but it can have a huge impact on insulin sensitivity and effectiveness. Id recommend some high 5 Zero nutrition tablets, one or two of these in a bottle helps with salt intake which is lost through sweat, which inturn help you absorb more of the water your drinking.
Keeping a good salt balance is also vital to carbohydrate absorbtion (co-transport) in the small intestine.
I try to drink about a bottle of water an hour at least. So on long rides I take 3 out with me, 2 in bottle cages and one in the back pocket of my jersey, or I stop and shops and refill them. I usually have hydration tabs in one of my bottles and Keeping the Zero hydration tabs with me to add to one of the bottles as I refill them too... Cramps are common in diabetics, I've experienced them so many times and in phases however the most common causes are cycling with high bloods, dehydration and salt deficiency. So keep hydrated with zero tabs, your blood in check and you'll be doing your ride no problem...
When your experimenting with different fueling and insulin changes, it's worth logging what you did and what your bloods did so you can look back at it and see what worked what didn't and what combination to try next time as a result...
Sorry for my ridiculously long answer
but I hope it helps, any questions just reply on here or PM me.
**Note: I've talked about percentage insulin adjustments however in reality this only works if like me your post ride meals tend to be fairly fixed in terms of carb content. In reality it's a carb deficit your trying to plug, so there will be a foxed ratio (specific to yourself and your fitness level) between your energy expenditure and carb requirements. If you can find this out then you will be able to say "right I've done 2000kcal of cycling so I need to not inject for 40 or carbs and inject normally for anything over an above this. Hope that makes some sence
Food wise I'd start by slightly reducing you insulin for your meal pre ride, I'd start with say a 20% reduction and see how that goes, then try eat constantly throughout the ride without any units for this food. Around 20-60g of carbs an hour.
An energy jel is about 17-23g of carbs so I try take 2 an hour for medium intensity and 3 for high...
Post ride I usually eat a carb and protein heavy meal and reduce my insulin anywhere between 50 and 90% for this.
It's worth baring in mind that every'body' is different And reacts didifferently. These are some starting guides to be worked with.
- If you find your going low shortly after rides, it's the mid-ride intake you need to raise,
- if it's early in the ride, drop your Pre-ride meal insulin intake
- If it's anywhere between a few yours and 48hours after then it's likely to be your iin-ride and post ride intakes (yes it really can be 48hr)
The key to all this is testing, I use an accu-chek mobile meter which is great for taking my with me on rides because of its size.
Also worth noting if your training, then things will change over time as you keto-adapt, becoming my better at using stored fats for energy rather than carbs. If you can become better at this then blood glucose will become so much easier. Unfortunately for me I'm a carb lover and my 8'000kcal a day diet is carb heavy... So that's not gonna happen to me anytime soon I guess haha
One other quick note is about legumes, chickpeas, lentils, Dahl etc. They are a fantast fuel for pre and post ride meals. They are high in protein and high in carbs, and yet they're glycaeimic index is soon high that most doctors/dieticians will tell you that you don't need to inject for them. I don't entirely agree with this as a science minded guy it's simple maths, carb intake must be met with insulin, but I think they worry that as rapid insulins tend to have a working period of around 3-4 hours and a peak at about an hour, if legumes are your only carbs and you inject at the start of your meal your bloods will crash low as they can be a very slow Carb absorbtion fuel of up to 8 hours in cases...
Anyhow the point is, pre and post ride, no insulin for this, especially if your enjoying hypos mid or post ride...
Lastly a note from one cyclist to another, fufuels such as bananas, malt loaf, and flapjacks are all greatest your not a fan of energy jelS. These are all small yet with high carb content.. Little (or a lot) and often is the key to sports nutrition both with performance (stopping the bonk) and blood glucose control I'm mind.
Ooh one more thing, Fluid intak. It's often overlooked but it can have a huge impact on insulin sensitivity and effectiveness. Id recommend some high 5 Zero nutrition tablets, one or two of these in a bottle helps with salt intake which is lost through sweat, which inturn help you absorb more of the water your drinking.
Keeping a good salt balance is also vital to carbohydrate absorbtion (co-transport) in the small intestine.
I try to drink about a bottle of water an hour at least. So on long rides I take 3 out with me, 2 in bottle cages and one in the back pocket of my jersey, or I stop and shops and refill them. I usually have hydration tabs in one of my bottles and Keeping the Zero hydration tabs with me to add to one of the bottles as I refill them too... Cramps are common in diabetics, I've experienced them so many times and in phases however the most common causes are cycling with high bloods, dehydration and salt deficiency. So keep hydrated with zero tabs, your blood in check and you'll be doing your ride no problem...
When your experimenting with different fueling and insulin changes, it's worth logging what you did and what your bloods did so you can look back at it and see what worked what didn't and what combination to try next time as a result...
Sorry for my ridiculously long answer
but I hope it helps, any questions just reply on here or PM me.**Note: I've talked about percentage insulin adjustments however in reality this only works if like me your post ride meals tend to be fairly fixed in terms of carb content. In reality it's a carb deficit your trying to plug, so there will be a foxed ratio (specific to yourself and your fitness level) between your energy expenditure and carb requirements. If you can find this out then you will be able to say "right I've done 2000kcal of cycling so I need to not inject for 40 or carbs and inject normally for anything over an above this. Hope that makes some sence
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