What to Eat Before The Race: I’ll get more into this in Part #9: Pre-Race, to follow. For the moment note that, because of the intensity of the start of a mountain bike race, its important not to over-eat before the race. My rule of thumb is to eat a satisfying but not large breakfast finishing no less than 3 hours before the race.
Plan to drink 1 liter per hour. If its hot and you’re sweating a lot or if you’re pushing yourself harder, you will need to drink more. Some people just naturally need more water than others. Honestly, a liter is too much for most folks in most cases, but until you start to get a feel for how your body reacts to different race-day conditions, its better to have a little too much than not enough.
Drink Early, Drink Often: Again, at race pace you will need more water than you thirst might indicate, and your mind will be on many other things, so you need to remind yourself to drink regularly, right from the first few minutes of the race.
Use a Hydration Pack: Its difficult to get a bottle off the bike frequency and safely during a XC race. So use a hydration pack instead, carry only as much water as you need. With that said, on a less technical course with a lot of double-track or road, a water bottle will be lighter.
Electrolyte are really important to keeping your brain and nervous system firing correctly. For shorter events, you probably have enough reserves in your body to make it to the end, but if you’re racing more than an hour, topping up can help keep you sharp to the finish. I like electrolyte tables since they are easy to ingest independent of calorie intake but a secure place to keep them while racing takes some forethought. Some people like products that can be dissolved in your water like Nuun tablets.
Have a little fuel on-hand: Depending on your fitness level and how well you ate before the race, you may be able to make it through the whole race without eating. Then again, you might not, and bonking in the last few miles of a race can make for a rough finish. Eating while racing is difficult. An energy gel pack is just enough calories for 15-30 minutes of racing and for most folks is relatively easy to digest. Pro tip: Rather than carrying them in your jersey pocket, instead tape one or two to your bike by the rip-off tab, someplace like the top tube or stem. These can then just be ripped off with one hand and squeezed into the mouth as needed. Don’t litter.
An energy bar, granola bar, or energy chew with the package already opened will be fairly easy to eat with one hand while riding, if you’re not into gels.
How to know when to eat?: If you find yourself feeling GREAT, its probably time to eat. I usually have a surge of energy and good feelings right before I bonk. If you start feeling even a little bit tired or hungry eat immediately, do not wait until it gets worse.
Sports Drinks have water, calories and electrolytes, so why not just drink those? First off, most sports drinks will provide the nutrients for bacteria and fungi to start growing in your hydration pack. If you use sports drink in a hydration pack, you will need to carefully wash ever nook and cranny of the bladder, hose and bite valve after every use, which is a PIA. Second, sports drink is often ‘syrupy’ and not as thirst quenching as water. Third, sometimes you want a mix of water, calories, and electrolytes that is different than what is formulated in your sports drink.
One combo that might work is a hydration pack with just 1 L in it, and a small bottle of sports drink mixed at a higher than standard concentration. On of our sponsors, Scratch Labs’ drink would be ideal for this. You can drink from the bottle on the open stretches of the course when its safe to take a hand off the bars for a few seconds, to get your calories and electrolytes. It’s a little heavier than the gel pack, but you might find it easier to digest and handle.
Another option is to use sports drink diluted to about 50% of the recommended mix rate (or if you’re buying it in liquid form, mixed 1:1 with water. You’ll still need to clean out your bladder, but the trickle of calories and electrolytes you get in this mix should be enough to get you through an XC length event.
You’ll just have to try things out to see what works for you. But never eating or drinking something new on race day.
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