#FoodFriday: Every cyclist ‘hits the wall’ sometimes

Spring has arrived and for many cyclists this is the perfect moment to finally get your bike ready to cycle the first kilometers of the year. Don’t forget to bring your granola bar, though! The ‘bonk’ is always ready to take you by surprise. 

Rick Flens, a member of the team since 2006, still remembers the first time he had the ‘bonk: “My whole body started to tingle and I couldn’t see clearly anymore. It was definitely because of my youthful inexperience. As a junior, your body isn’t used to endurance sports, which makes you toss around your energy. Now I know how to use my energy wisely and I can see why others ‘hit the wall’, as I like to call it. When I go for a ride with my friends, a well filled bottle is more than enough for me, my friends need to make sure they eat during the ride.

“Once you feel weak, it’s basically already too late. You can try to start the process of recovery as fast as possible by taking a gel. They contain ‘fast sugars’. However, they don’t just magically make you fit after consumption, you need to take it slow for a while. That way, the sugars will be able to do their work, which hopefully means that you’ll get your energy back.

“I try to make an estimate with Team LottoNL-Jumbo’s nutrition specialist, Marcel Hesseling, of how much I should consume during a race, but we cannot always be precise. Why that is, I cannot really say. For example, during the Tirreno- Adriatico stage on Monday, I barely had time to eat, but I was able to perform on a constant level. However, that didn’t please me afterwards. Even if you’re not hungry, you need to eat every now and then while cycling.

“The ultimate trick to avoid the bonk? There is none.. Just don’t do more than you can with what you’ve eaten. When you’re driving a car at a high speed and you keep accelerating, you use up more gas than when you’re driving at a constant speed. Then again, it also depends on the development of the race. Sometimes you just have to go for it as a cyclist, and give it all you’ve got. When I’ve passed the finish line, and I can relax in the team bus, all is right. Plus, I’ve got a Jumbo supermarket “Hallo Hongerklop” card (Hello Bonk). With this card, I can go to every Jumbo in the Netherlands and get, for example, a banana. Ideal to ward off hunger during a ride!”