Questions about nutrition and weight loss? Post them here!
What do you recommend for breakfast on non-riding/recovery days?
thanks!
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Here’s the breakfast we recommend: https://fascatcoaching.com/tips/what-to-eat-for-breakfast/
I recommend this for both recovery and non recovery days. You can adjust the carbohydrate amount to match your caloric expenditure.
IOW 1 cup of steamed white rice for big ride days or 1/2 cup for recovery days. Don’t forget your vegetables!
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Do you need to scale the breakfast down/up dependant on weight? i.e. I’m 55kg and can eat A LOT but I’m not sure I can eat all of this for breakfast!
Has anyone found any sweet alternatives? I currently make porridge with egg and wouldn’t be opposed to having veg on the side!
I’ll let @Jackson chime in here but the short answer is yes. To throw a wrench in that wrinkle it should also be scaled according to how big of a ride you are about to do!
Hey!
Heavier/bigger riders and humans do typically need to eat more than smaller ones, but it’s not something you should focus on too much. Focus on quality over quantity of food and slow down when eating, and eat until satisfied (if eating high quality, whole foods).
I’m definitely a sweet for breakfast kind of guy so I feel you on that - I usually stick with a big bowl of oatmeal or muesli with cashew yogurt or almond milk, nuts & seeds, nut butter, and fruit/berries. Delicious!
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For on the bike nutrition you recommend every 30 min that we switch off between gel, blocks and then a bar. Those things can get rather expensive ($5-10 per 1.5hrs), do you have any good ideas or resources for homemade versions of those items?
Also how do the carbs from drinks fit into this? Also, any low cost options here?
Go back and listen to the podcast about making your own rice cakes. The show notes has the recipe 
Speaking of the show notes here are the recommended calories per hour
< 2 hours: 45 g of carbohydrates per hour (~ 180 calories/hour)
2-5 hours: 30-60g carbohydrates per hour (120 – 240 calories/ hour)
5+ hours: 60-90g carbohydrates per hour (240-360 calories/hour)
Getting your calories from hydration counts as well so you can strive to hits those hourly totals from both your gels>blocks> bars and your water bottles. When you do your BIG simulation training rides you’ll want to experiment to determine what works for you. For example 80% gels>blocks>bars and 20 % thru your hydrations, 50/50 or something else. That is the reason why you experiment during the simulation rides.
Not sure about low cost electrolyte drink mix alternatives… but the rice cakes are very economical. I used to have a homemade clif bar recipe from the back of a Quaker Oats package, let me see if I can find it. Tasty, effective and affordable
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Amazingly using the Way Back Internet Machine I have found the original Homemade Clif bar recipe from 2003 [check out the FasCat site way back then!]
https://web.archive.org/web/20030807050846/http://www.fascatcoaching.com/powerfood.html
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Hi Frank is this breakfast for before or after your morning ride. If i’m planning a 5 hour training ride is this what I eat before going out?
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Yes but also consider the timing of that ride. If you have 2-3 hours from eating until you ride, then yes, this much food. If you are riding early in the morning, like at first light use your dinner the night before as your pre-workout meal and just have for example a banana and coffee before your start riding.
In that case, watch this
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Hi, Matt from Wales in the UK here.
Firstly, if Frank and Jackson happen to read this then a big thank you for the podcasts - informative, fun and brilliantly delivered. You guys have kept me company on many a long training ride.
I’m hoping to get some advice on body comp and nutrition. Wanting to lose some weight I followed your advice and focused on it during my base period; however I was a couple of kilos off where I wanted to be when my build began and now - due to a couple of short stints of illness - have put on an additional kilo or so.
So I’m now racing and doing hard training interval sessions but would love to shave a few pound off, but I remember what you guys said on previous podcasts about not losing weight during the build/race periods. However would a very carefully and slowly managed (eg strict Winning In The Kitchen, and a loss of approx 1 kilo / 2 pounds per month) be okay? Or is it a 100% black and white complete no-no and that anything apart from maintenance (or even a tiny gain) would have a negative impact on performance and impact on potential gains from the high intensity phases?
Cheers
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Great question and thanks for listening!
I think what you’ll find as you continue to win in the kitchen (that’s 80% of weight loss) and you ride more (the other 20%) is that you’ll naturally lean up.
Once you have and are doing that then you can micro tune your caloric intake to match your training in calories:kiloJoules.
1 kJ of work in training = 1 calorie of food as described in the Training Tip:
“Using your Powermeter for Weight Loss”
https://fascatcoaching.com/tips/using-your-powermeter-for-weight-loss/
What you can do on your off days (no kJ’s) is adjust your caloric intake (reduce) but then the night before and on days you do train meet those prescribed kJ rides with calories. Only undercut 250 calories per day and you may be able to shed a kilo over 6-8 weeks or so.
As always listen to your body and if your power goes down, increase the amount of calories you are taking in. Hope that helps!
Amazing stuff - thanks so much for replying, I shall give that a go exactly as you suggest.
And again, thanks for the podcasts
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Hey everyone! Resident pudgy rider here, recently took 3.5 months off the bike and gained a bunch of weight (first time off the bike in years). Now trying to get down to something reasonable before my event (multi-day mountain) in late August.
Height: 6’2"
Current: 210
Goal: <195.
The strategy I’m experimenting with is fueling really well before and during rides, and simply not eating much at all after rides (aside from hydrating) after workouts.
So far, my performance hasn’t suffered but I’ve only been doing it for a week.
Question for everyone: how important is post-ride re-fueling for riders with weight to lose?
I guess this is contingent on the fact that most of my weekday workouts are in the evenings, I’m still feeling like between sleep and pre-ride meal I’ve got plenty of time to recover. I don’t think I’d do this on the weekends. Anyway, thought I’d throw it out there to see if anyone has any experiences playing around with post-ride and how it affects future performance/weight etc.
I think it depends partially on what a workout consists of. If you’re doing Z1/Z2 work for an hour, it’s not super important to eat afterwards. If you’re doing intervals for an hour, 2 hour sweet spot work, 2+ hr ride outside it’s SUPER important to re-fuel. All the research shows eating after difficult and/or long workouts isn’t just important but really necessary for a variety of reasons.
On a side note: eating vs trying to eat less isn’t dependent on whether you want to lose weight as much as it should be determined based on where you’re at in your season. If you’re in base, it’s a great time to cut calories and try to lose weight. You still need to re-fuel after a long workout while doing this. But if you’re doing interval works leading up to a race, or in between races spaced pretty close to each other. You absolutely have to be keeping your body fueled all day long if the goal is to perform well.
So in some ways it really depends on what you’re trying to accomplish and where you’re at in your training. Re-fueling though shouldn’t ever be skipped.
*** Coaches please comment on anything I get wrong LOL…
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Hey @qquincyjones thanks for your insights!
I think you’re right that it’s not a great idea. I’ve been working on being very specific about fueling my workouts as well as very simple recovery meals. I’ll report back on my progress hopefully I can get to the goal.
I just wanted to say how much winning in the kitchen helped me in my recent gravel grinder. I cranked out my best performance EVER, of course thanks to #ftfp, but as well thanks to following Franks winning breakfast recipe race day and then the Gel/chews/bar routine every thirty minutes in the race. As well wearing a hydro pack, being one of only a few to do so, made a massive difference in terms of staying regularly hydrated and having access to my food without any hassle. No cramping, no bonking, just tempo/sweet spot power almost the whole race for a top 20 performance. Thanks Coaches! You rock…
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Heck yea, congrats! What race was it that you did?
A local race on Vancouver Island…The Cowichan Crusher. It was 117km
I placed 19th. Winning time was 3:41, I finished at 4:06.
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