36,500km in 365 days - Cycling Against Living Miserably

I've never got unwell on a long ride - usually feel great. Apart from being knackered, everything hurting, that is!

Pretty similar to @hippy

Some people do take vitamins. I think I might have read @skinny saying something about it (apols if not you - was someone at the top end of ultra world!) but I also only take vitamin D in normal life, and don't bother with it if I am going to be out on a bike in the sun all day.

Showers are great when you can find them but I prefer them to be warm!

I try and eat the best food I can. When racing it tends to be pretty poor, but the quantities are high so bound to get some vitamins if you eat enough of it. I eat a lot of cereal bars on the bike as good trade off between ease of carrying / eating on bike, carb-dense, reasonably nutritious esp if bits of fruit in them, ok flavour, etc. I always grab a sandwich if available when I stop. Byrek is great if in London or the Balkans but hard to find in between. Sometimes it has to be croissants, cakes chocolate bars and other junk as nothing else available. I don't think I've ever eaten a 7-days while stationary, though!

I use electrolyte powder if it's hot (>25). Carry a tiny bag of it with me and put a small pinch in each bottle.

The big risk I take is hand hygiene. Don't wear gloves unless cold which helps a bit as easier to wash / sanitise hands. But everything gets smeared on my bar tape.

Chocolate milk

I love chocolate milk when riding. Sometimes do a litre of that in place of a bottle of water.
On IndyPac I got to one of the roadhouses one evening and found that there was no chocolate milk left. I realised I was too far down the field and the people in front had taken it all. So I said I'm not letting that happen again, rode an all-nighter, made up 10 places and always found chocolate milk every time I stopped after that.

Other drink I use a bit, but only at the end of rides if stomach a bit iffy is Lucozade. A litre of that in my bottle leaving the final control is an effective way to close out an audax - don't need to eat again if I have that.

I've never put it in a bottle or a bladder but I will neck a bottle at a garage or a supermarket (1L cartons in the USA finished before I'd even got to the checkout ftw!)

Haha that's awesome re: indypac I'd fuck people up if they were taking my Iced Coffees - that's the main reason I go back to Oz! (sorry fam, it's about the iced coffee...)

Lucozade and Lucozade Sport featured heavily in UK because they tended to be cheapest big bottles that weren't Coke, Sprite, etc. Lucozade Orange is the best but being fizzy it'd often fizz over the bike, so I moved towards the Sport versions. It's still shitty plastic but I will try to use the bigger bottles to somewhat reduce plastic amount. It's not like I can't drink it after all. In Europe there's more places to get drinking water (hey UK they're called taps ffs, install some!) so that's less of an issue.

Going into an ALDI or similar if they're available mean you can get even bigger bottles but they tend not to be cold which may or may not be an issue.

Oh I did try fish oil caps a while back. Something to do with heart health but it's like "so, I spend £1000 on these over a few years, what actual impact will it have?" and I stopped

I'll be honest (sorry) that photo is the summation of everything wrong with modern life.

Eat healthy and then worry about vitamins. Taking vitamins will not undo the damage of eating shit food.

I do take soke vitamins, occasionally. But mostly I just eat very well and a lot of fruit and vegetables.

Thabks Frank for brining this to my attention.

Joel, big respect for your honesty, cause and mission. A good challange. Nice one.

I was waiting for someone to bite at that photo.

Granted my snacks are bad in order to have some body fat... But I do eat a very good diet, I had shingles a few years ago when trying to trial with rowing so started taking vitamins since then and I don't eat meat or dairy so eat a huge amount of veg and grains, well that's pretty much all I eat.

I was just interested in knowing how you guys manage your health while doing a large amount of volume with racing etc.

Thanks, it's definitely a challenge but I'm enjoying it. Well at the moment I am...

And you make the good point, we are all individual so you must concentrate on what you do and need. Ie. I eat a good bit of red meat and fish. So what I do or take isnt applicable.

Though I disagree with your snacks needing to be as bad as those croissant things. Peanut butter or other butters and jam sandwich or bananas. Avocado sandwich. Oat bars. Nuts. There are many healthier options.

That's interesting about the hand hygiene, I've been carrying a little sanitiser bottle in my saddle bag since covid. I'll keep that then, I never thought about that but if you're eating on the go and stopping at various places then the risk of picking up any germs is very high.

Also love that story below about gaining 10 places just to get some chocolate milk!

Well done you! Hope it goes to plan.

It's massively individual, I meant to say I don't eat cheese not dairy fully as I do eat chocolate. There seems to be a lot of nonsense on the internet/socials/netflix about how a diet suits all and why everyone should eat one way or another but in reality it's individual trial and error.

Those croissants were a just to try ... My GF bakes each weekend so I get either peanut butter cookies or flapjacks, these normally last the working week. My 'bad' snacks are soreen loaf, chocolate fruit and nut mix, occasionally peanut butter and nutella sandwiches

There are many healthier options.

... that aren't in packets.

I've got into brioche bread or mini-brioches or briochettes or something with jam and PB in them.

I think Wilko said he was on the white bread with PB and honey when he smashed his own 24hr record a few years ago. I tried that as well but prefer jam.

I've never used hand sanitiser in races. I'm pretty gross so I don't know where else might be worse that other people are putting their hands in to get them sick! Haha

Pretty good gut here though, in beer retention size and ability to kill germs I guess.

Most of the big fads are all about some extreme elimination or extreme inclusion. They're nonsense, rarely evidence-led and certainly may have done wonders for a small number of people but equally fucked up a bunch of others.

One of my cousins is coealiac (sp?) and there was concern that the rest of us might have the genes that can cause it and I was like "are you kidding me?! with the amount of pizza and bread and pasta and beer and god knows else I smash through, I think I'd have noticed!"

I'm always trying different things. Tastes change, events change, ability to find favourite products changes, prices change. Variety is good and a little bit of experimentation can be fun. I'd probably not be experimenting mid-race or big ride though (ultras are a bit of an exception because you simply have to eat what you can find or carry).

Politics is another food changer - I stopped eating Soreen coz they were owned by some pro-Brexit mob. Not sure if that's still the case.

DIY trail mix - salted nuts, m&ms, dried fruits, etc

I don't do Nutella because it's full of palm oil (and I'd eat the whole jar each time).

fish oil caps

I take those too but they are prescription so I didn't count them. Supposed to lower triglycerides and some other types of fat. Might keept that heart attack at bay but, then, loads of other things might and you can't do everything.

I'd eat the whole jar each time

Sure - too dangerous to have in the house

Yeah, it was almost certainly a heart health study I saw that prompted me to try. My blood is already sicky thicky so maybe I should consider them again. I'd rather spend money on things I can feel working though, like beer.

You should try the GU chocolate/nutella mix, it's Palm Oil free and it's like crack. Not sure on the political issues of it though as I just buy it when it's on offer. I always check for PO when buying peanut butter not never looked at Nutella, I'll swap that out for the above permanently now. For a long time i thought rapeseed oil was palm oil so was avoiding that too. Well until I mentioned this to a colleague and he pointed to all of the fields we can see from the office and said what do you think that is.... Embarrassing

I have the same with one of my cousins too, most of my side of the family went and had a allergy/intolerance test and it all came back negativity. They still limit their gluten content though because of it.

I want to say thank you to all the recent donations, it really means a lot and you guys have been incredibly generous.

I'm currently on the turbo drinking a monster and vibing out to disco tunes, having done 55km with my commute today. So I'm pushing for 115km today

Great effort - have donated to CALM through my CAF account but can forward you the confirmation email. Best of luck

So, I feel like it's one step forward and 10 steps back at the moment....

The issue with my right knee has seemed to have gone/improved but with over compensating with my left leg for 3/4weeks this has now meant I developed some issues in my left knee... I'm managing staying healthy and keeping fueled really well but the injury prevention is becoming difficult.

With the weather improving, I'm really looking forward to joining random group rides and cycling with my mates. But with an injury this means it's pretty hard to sustain any pace and I've had it flair up on a ride with my GF which meant I had to stop and limp home. This isn't ideal if I'm 50km+ away from home.

I knew and accepted that this challenge will be tough but constantly battling with injuries is very upsetting/frustration.

I think you have to stick to your own pace. Can you not get your group to ride at your pace, at least for a while and then ditch them and go solo?

My questions in races is always - is this getting better? Can I still move forward without doing long-term damage? Last TCR I had some big knee drama (patella pain - probably from doing Transpyrenees a couple of weeks before) and I just had to slow down. I could still move forward but I was very touch and go between bailing. I took early hotel breaks, longer sleeps, tried saddle height adjustments and ensured I pedaled extremely lightly (I was a day slower than previous editions). I removed anything putting pressure on the knee and massage quads a lot. I did a lot of stopping to rest it and IIRC used a bit of that Iboprofen cream (I refuse to use the pills).

Where is the pain happening? Which body part and at what point in the pedal stroke?

Good advice ^

Just to add my twopence worth:

You don't want to do yourself a long-term injury so there will be a point where you might have to say that you have to give up. But you also don't want to do it too early when you could still continue.

I remember before my first TCR 5 years ago I was seeing a physio for a knee issue that I had had most of the year. She said I should do the TCR and that I wouldn't do long term damage. But if it changed and started to really hurt, then I should stop as that would be doing damage. It actually went away after a couple of days - the 18+ hour days of pretty light pedalling fixed it.

Also - with most of these types of injuries, there is often a position adjustment that you can do that will help. But it might cause other issues (sounds like you have made such an adjustment maybe just by changing your pedal stroke rather than position). The goal is finding a compromise between them. You might not find a solution to the equation that gives zero pain, but if you find one that means none of them are getting worse, that might be enough.

The other thing is, when you have a niggle, recognise it and take early action. It can be tempting to just leave things and hope they sort out but, generally, if you keep doing the same thing, you'll get the same result. Expect to have to change your position a few times over the months you are riding. That is because your body will change as a result of what you are doing - some muscles will get stronger / weaker, some tendons longer /shorter, etc.

That's true, I've had a few mates come out with me and stick to the pace but I guess I need to be realistic, as I do enjoy the faster rides but with this being an endurance challenge, they might have to wait a year.

It's in the side of my knees, lateral position. It feels the same as what was happening to my right which was the IT band rubbing over the femur but it's hard to gauge as it only happened last night while on the turbo. It was fine on the road, I can almost say I was feeling pretty strong on the ride back from work yesterday. I've rested it this morning and will try swapping riding positions slightly, bring back the CAAD with some clip on aero bars... It's when the LS is at 9'o clock, if that makes sense.

I'm very anti pain relief as I knowing what i'm like, I'll push through if the pain has been numbed and will make the injury worse in the long term.

@frank9755 I've been playing with saddle height and tilt, I found lowering it made the issue worse. Also cadence does help, high cadence seems to have less of a strain on my knees but when OTR it's hard to sustain into a head wind with a rucksack on. That's some great advice, I expected my body will change but naively I expected it to get stronger and become this super cyclist.... But in reality it's just about being able to pedal forward comfortably.

I'm going to try position adjustment this evening, hopefully that improves things, I've been on my Isen for a good few solid weeks now = 3000km so a change might be what my body needs.

I expected it to get stronger

Endurance events are catabolic. You break down. For sure you will adapt to the demands you're putting on your body in a bunch of cool ways but without adequate rest you will be slowly breaking down. It's a bit of a balancing act to prevent too much damage, too quickly so you can achieve a (somewhat painful) homeostasis at your new load levels.

Right now, you need to be finding coping mechanisms - lighter efforts, more rest, etc, in order to minimise damage/pain and maximise mileage. If that means going back to turbo where you can control everything a bit more closely then you'll have to consider that until you're good to go pain-free with your mates.

I'm feeling that now being almost 100 days into this challenge, it's all about the coping mechanisms. I actually enjoy the work days as I know I have a solid 9 hours without being on the bike so i can relax and do random leg exercises to strengthen the knees.

I'm going to get a power meter for my Isen in the coming weeks so I can see L/R balance as well as power. This is also a treat and will allow me to sit at the recovery pace on the roads without getting too excited. You're right with that, going back to turbo miles so I can keep up the distance without putting the extra toll on my body. I'm getting the GF to come round tonight and have a look at it, as we don't live together atm (Covid - I live alone so can bubble, if anyone cares)