I love to eat. In fact, a key attraction of cycling is the accelerated calorie burn. Depending on one’s metabolism and effort, a cyclist can torch between 400 and 800 calories an hour on a long ride. There is no way to replace the calories at that same rate, but that doesn’t stop some riders from trying. The best we can hope for is to replenish them at the maximum rate the body can absorb, which, according to the folks at Hammer Nutrition, is about 200 to 300 calories an hour.

Like a lot of riders, I had heard of Hammer Nutrition. But I had my on-the-bike diet worked out and I didn’t want to risk a change. Until the day it failed. I was riding a 600K in southwest Washington. I hooked up with a pod of strong riders who were going after it pretty hard. Our 300K split was just over 13 hours, my fastest ever. We were the second group to arrive at the overnight control. Though I felt good all day long, I realized I had been riding well-over usual average speed. I dutifully downed my recovery drink, showered, ate a light dinner, and then went to sleep.

The next day, with about 220K to the finish, our route took us east into the Cascade Range between Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainer. The guys I was with were moving up the highway at about the same pace they had been riding the day before, but I was riding slower. Where I had been able to take long pulls at the front, today I was struggling to hang onto the back. I decided to let them go. I watched as they pulled ahead up the grade. I figured I would finish alone. But then, I saw one of them drop off the back. He was soft pedaling, waiting for me to catch him. When I got along side him, he asked me what was up, and I told him I just didn’t seem to have the energy to ride with them. He reached into his handlebar bag, grabbed a packet of Hammer Gel and he gave it to me. Within a few minutes, I felt the energy returning. He gave me a second pack, then pulled me back up to the group.

After a few minutes of riding I noticed a second member of our group take a long swig from his water bottle. I noticed that the liquid was white, not orange like the stuff in my bottle. I asked him what he was drinking.

“Hammer,” he said.

I was beginning to get the picture.

Riders will tell you that food choice on the bike is a factor of the iron content in one’s stomach lining. That may be so. But judging from what I have seen on the longer rides, two things are clear. The faster riders eat less than the slower ones. And, whether brought about by heat, altitude, or a desolate route without services, riders who swear by solid foods eventually hit the wall. Eventually, most will ask, “Are there any better food choices that I can make on the bike?”

In a recent edition of the RoadBikeRider weekly newsletter, Ed Pavelka suggests a diet of dried fruit, nuts, and sandwiches. This was my on-bike diet of choice, too, for many years. Yet Hammer Nutrition argues that solid foods digest too slowly and may not supply the basic caloric requirement quickly enough.

Many sports drinks available in retail stores digest quickly and work well on shorter rides. But on longer rides, or when the weather turns hot, the taste can become unbearable. After a few hours of continuous use, they can cause stomach upset, gas, or diarrhea.

No matter what diet you use on the bike, when the day comes that you find you can’t consume it, eventually something has to give. On a bike it is typically the downward pressure on the pedals.

One of my goals for 2007 was to find a food regimen that would work. Ideally, food for long distance rides would provide enough nourishment to replace the calories I was burning; it would cause no gastric distress; it would be compact and light weight.

I began experimenting with Hammer fuels in January at the start of a 26-week training schedule I used to prepare for the Portland to Glacier 1000K. Committing to Hammer isn’t something that I could do in one fell swoop. According to Hammer, the fuels work best when all you eat are products with a Hammer label. The reason is that Hammer powders and gels are based on complex carbohydrates, while most sports nutrition products are based on simple sugars. Mix them and you introduce risk of digestive issues. Likewise, eating solid fuels while you’ve got the Hammer down can slow the flow of calories to your system. When you put something solid in your stomach, it closes up to speed digestion. During that period of time, nothing enters the intestines, where it can be metabolized and reintroduced to the bloodstream.

A 600K supply of Hammer fuels

On the table: 8 x 4-hour meal kits. One 3-hour bottle of Perpetuem in pre-measured ziplock bag, one hammer bar, 1-2 servings of Hammer Gel from a flask, and 2 to 4 Endurolyte Caps.

Over the last six months, I have attempted longer and longer rides on a mostly Hammer diet. Recently, I completed a 600K and I stayed with Hammer fuels almost exclusively through 15 hours of riding on Day One, and 12 hours on Day Two. The exceptions were solid foods for breakfast and dinner. On Father’s Day weekend, I took it up one more notch. I rode an 8-hour century solo, traversing two mountain ranges and one coastal headland. On this ride, my first meal of the day was a Hammer bar, and I consumed two of my 4-hour meal kits before the ride was over.

The results have been remarkable. I find that I feel consistently strong. I rarely feel the physical or emotional highs and lows that I felt on solid foods. For the most part, I do not feel hungry, either. I am very much aware of the social cues around meal time. I find it is much easier to eat a Hammer bar at noon and keep riding when I am alone then when I am with a group that wants to stop for a sandwich.

In fact, one of the key benefits of carrying Hammer on a brevet is the time-savings in the controls. Since you don’t need to buy anything, you can simply have your card signed, refill your water bottles, mix-up another bottle of Perpetuem, get back on the bike and ride.

Top photo: Pacific Northwest randonneur Eric Vigoren with David Rowe refueling en route. From the Cascade 1200 series by Nate Armbrust.

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