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600km, on road, 40hr limit, hilly and potentially 28-30 degrees. I want to do 24 hrs before thinking about a wee kip if necessary, that would be cool.
I think the thing I'm worst at is fuelling and hydration. Now obviously we are all different but I struggle to take the time to eat properly on rides of any length tbh.
Stoo61-
Well, stop struggling to eat properly and you'll find it a lot easier.
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I struggled to eat properly (and still do sometimes but am much better now).
Having benchmarks helped me. Doing 40 miles? Have a snack at 20 miles, something with 20-40 grams of carbs. One bottle should be done halfway, the other by the end of the ride. Anything longer than 60 miles eat something at least every hour. Whatever time you first eat something (9:45am) make sure you've eaten something by 10:45, earlier if your moving fast / working hard.
For audax length do the above plus stop at mealtimes and have actual food, sandwich / burger etc etc. Use hydration tablets if you suck at drinking, will give you some leeway. That's all I've learned tbh. If I follow that I feel fine all the way round. What fellow good audaxes slammed into me was being disciplined about eating and drinking was at least as important as the legs.
Tldr do what hippy said and get good at eating and the distance will follow way easier
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Are you aiming for 40 hours or as fast as possible?
After 24 hours is very late to sleep on a 600. Most people would split it something like 325/275km and so sleep would depend on speed, but if you were doing 20km/h that would mean sleeping after 16-17 hours. If you leave it for 24 hours you will (a) be pretty wrecked and (b) almost finished so hardly worth it.
What time of day do you start? If evening then 24 hours before sleeping might make sense, but not so much if its a morning start.
Eat and drink lots - but you know that. How? It's very personal but this is what I would do.
Carry loads of bars and eat the first one within the first hour. Then keep having them at around 45 minute intervals, unless something better, like a proper meal, comes along.
If I ever struggle to eat than I will go liquid, with either juice (apple, grape, whatever is going), chocolate milk or lucozade.
I generally carry at least two litres of water and just keep sipping. I used to sometimes set an alarm for every 20 minutes and drink on each alarm.
It's always amazing how much less you need to drink at night. It can be quite funny having to piss five times in an hour if you keep drinking at the same rate as during the day.
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Is it an audax? I'm guessing not in the UK if 28-30c.
hippy
youramericanlover
frank9755
jakemcree
Could be, this or the ultra thread.
What type of riding, fast or slow, sleeping or not, on our off road, what climate /weather?
What do you want to know?