How long before a climb should you take a gel?

Why not whack some "slow carbs" in 20 minutes before, instead of "fast carbs" 10 minutes before?

Cycling nutrition, and nutrition in general is very complex, so there isn't a straight answer. It depends on the energy mix of the gel and what you have eaten / ridden before.

The energy mix is not just what it says on the nutritional information in terms of carbs, and sugars. For example SiS gels say they have virtually no sugar in them, and a lot of carbs, but what they have is maltodextrin which metabolises very very fast, in fact its GI (glycemic index) is double that of honey and significantly higher than fructose (both of which would show up as sugars in nutritional information). What that means is you will get the energy hit much faster with a high maltodextrin gel than gels than a 'natural' product using honey, or a gel with a mix fructose/glucose. A glucose only gel would be just as fast.

I use SiS gels about 10 minutes before an effort (really only crits and climbing over 200m gain). For short, high intensity efforts, say box hill or less, you can probably get by with general nutrition on the ride (honey sandwiches, dried bananas, energy bars). On rides less than a couple of hours, I have porridge and honey before I leave and don't bother at all with food when I am out (much rather have real food than gels!).

There is less than 30g of carbohydrates in a Torq gel, 23g in High5.

If you are consuming carb sources like an energy drink and jelly babies I doubt that downing a gel will make much difference.

Personally, I'd only eat before a climb that's going to be longer (like 2 hours of up) than I would want to wait before I get to the top where eating is going to be easier. I wouldn't expect banging a gel in my mouth to make the effort any less painful.

Surely you've taken a gel before to know how your own body reacts to them during one of your 170km rides? And if not, why do you suddenly feel like it's going to magically give you some sort of competitive edge you've been missing?

Worth bearing in mind that most gels only have about 60g of carbs in them.

S13SFC wrote:

"I've a couple of tough climbs (for me) to tackle at the weekend. I was wondering how far in advance of them I should suck down a gel to give me that boost going up them?!"

What is "that boost" you get from the gel? Caffeine?

when I was a boy in a club in Glasgow in the 80s we would go off on 60-70 mile runs with nothing but 50p and a can of soup in our pockets, stop half way, light a fire, eat the soup and spend the 50p on irn bru and crisps.

All seems a bit more high tech nowadays

They start to work within minutes so I'd say take it at 5 mins max.

I'm not a big gel user but I was in a race a couple of weeks ago and in a break riding hard and finding it very difficult. I hadn't eaten enough because it had been so fast and the roads were tricky.

I was literally at the point of quitting the break and dropping back - I didn't think I could go on. But I missed a turn to shove in a gel. Within a minute I was feeling better and back in the rotation.

Having said that, in most situations I prefer to have a mix of things not just gels. Dried figs are good and easy to stash in pockets. Just makes a change.

See this is where carb intake gets confusing, British cycling say

"A general rule is to take on one gram of carbohydrate per kilo of bodyweight, per hour. This would equate to approximately 75 grams of carbohydrate per hour for a 75 kilo rider"

But also say

"An easy mistake some people make is to over eat on the bike, I've seen this with club riders who will have so much energy drink they'll actually end up consuming a lot more than they really need. Your body can deal with about 60 grams of carbohydrates per hour"

90g an hour seems a lot to me..........

For most rides 1 fruit bar or snickers per hour seems to be enough for me. Don't seem to get really hungry as long as I have something. If it's a tough or long one (3hrs+) I'd put some energy drink in one of my bottles, plain water in the other, and alternate. Little and often is the key.

I wouldn't use gels except in an emergency (i.e. bonk) or race.

You ought to be looking at eating more regularly than every two hours, really. Little and often - as someone else said, 90g of carbs an hour. I find it hard (and not really that necessary) to take that much on, but you should eat to keep energy levels steady. You burn up your glycogen stores after about an hour of medium/hard riding.

Rule of thumb is 90g of carbs per hour which I find works for me regardless of terrain as my effort on training rides is constant be it up, down or flat. Most energy gels are digested extremely quickly so 15 minutes should be a decent guide if you're not perma-fuelling.

For a long ride (more than 50 miles) shouldn't you be fuelling up every hour regularly with carbs and fluids ? I carry gels for long rides and the 15-20 mins guide is about right for me but I only use them in dire need as I can't stand them ! I know nutrition is a matter of personal preference but potato cakes, flapjacks, malt loafs, ham & egg rolls etc are far preferable than hitting up on gels when you're close to bonking !

I normally take one on at least mins before, ideally 15 - 20.

15-30 mins maybe? Depends how fast you digest really.