Cycling and energy gels

Have you tested after using an energy gel(s) at the end of your ride? It should tell you how you are responding to it. Exercise makes your cells take in insulin better. I know my husband who was/is a type 2 does walks but also swims at least 4 times a week. On the days he decides to eat spaghetti he makes sure he is only doing so before or after he swims and he ends up staying in his normal ranges for him. That's somewhere between 5-7.

Gels supply quick glucose and if you are cycling a good distance, your body will want fuel for it. A quick source of fuel for endurance exercise is glucose. Especially needed to help if you are dropping too low. Your liver can dump some glucose from stores for fuel, but that is limited. While you need fuel, it will vary for the length of the ride and how much you are used to that level of exercise. Each individual can vary and what they need can vary with it. Testing or even better a cgm will tell you what your blood sugars are doing.

Here is one link.


There does seem to be a lack of information of type 2's and marathon running or long distance cycling. Maybe someone will be able to supply more information. I just know my husband burns more carbs easier on the days he swims as a type 2. As a type 1 when I swim 2-3 hours I use part or all of a gel when I drop to maintain my BG level.

Have a read of Volek and Phinney The art and science of low carbohydrate performance. It’s about avoiding bonking during endurance athletic performance such as cycling and marathons And complements a low carb approach to type 2.

Kind of the opposite of what you currently do really. You perhaps need to test at various times to see the effects of your existing choices, both with and without cycling, and decide if the outcome in terms of levels and medications is what your goals are or if you want changes.

A couple of weeks should tell you a lot. Fasted, before and 2 hrs after meals and in this situation before and after cycling with or without gels/ carb loading etc. probably the less uncomfortable and possibly cheapest with this much intense testing would be a freestyle libre or two. Not sure if they are still offering one as a free trial but worth checking.

@craneman9 Trying testing after you ride. If you are high, then you have used too much gel. But your body wants fuel to exercise, if you are using the fuel you are taking..... and exercise helps you to use it, you should be okay.

The only caveat to that would be if you are staying really high for a while after taking a gel. So trialing/testing just once or twice about 30 minutes after one, maybe half way through your ride would tell you if you are utilizing that fuel enough efficiently.

The eminent professor Tim Noakes who was one of the inventors of gels to replenish glycogen for running and wrote the Lore of Running, has disowned the section on fueling with carbs.

From what I have observed with Volek and Phinney's (The FASTER study), Noakes and other research, it is possible and desirable to oxidise fat for long distance endeavours.

Sami Inkinen, one of thr founders of virta health, was an elite triathlete, he still became prediabetic by carbing up, this is not unique.