After chatting to a friend who has Parkinson’s, and completed 100 mile lumpy night ride with very little training, I have signed up to 100 audax in 5 days time! Have done these before but have only covered 70 miles in the last year on the road bike! And tips?? Apart from the obvious pacing and nutrition! I have those figured out!
Do you mean you’ve only ridden 70 miles total this year, or that your longest ride this year was 70 miles?
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Second Question, 70 miles on a road bike? Meaning lots of time on a trainer, using TrainerRoad? 100 miles will take 5 to 7 hours, which requires conditioning and time on the bike.
Only rode 70 road miles this year, 40 is the furthest, I have done a few 100 mile rides previously, but not since 2019
I’m aware I’m not exactly prepared, this is why I was looking for any helpful “ get me through it “:tips. This was same route last attempt
pace well and eat well.
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Have you got any fitness from other sports, eg running?
Considering you haven’t trained for it and have no time to do so, these could be options:
- sack it off
- borrow an ebike
or… - give yourself plenty of time, go easy, have plenty of breaks, and just keep pedalling
It might be worth thinking about “exit points” in case you really can’t go on. Are there any trainstations you could bail out at? Also maybe find some cafes along the way that you could tick off ( so that you can tell yourself “only an hour to the cafe”).
Imo, anyone can ride 100 miles, but it might be a slow and miserable experience if your body isn’t used to it
Start eating/drinking carbs from the beginning, target around 90g an hour.
My carb bottle is 800ml and 90g malto/fructose. About 375 calories.
Your last attempt was 3300kJ estimated work over 8.75 hours. Consuming all the calories burned, that is 9 bottles of my carb mix. Or about 1 bottle an hour. However I respond better if I start eating food around hour 3 or 4. So I would back off the liquid carbs and start eating more real food if possible.
So my tip is to figure out a fueling strategy that works for you, and stay on top in order to have plenty of energy to finish.
I think this is important. You may think that your nutrition needs to cover 7 hours, but really needs to cover 9 hours. Even though you weren’t riding, your body is still burning fuel for those 2 hours stopped. And whatever your nutrition strategy is, make sure you have enough salt. 1000mg per hour for an average person will help you stay hydrated, aid digestion, and keep that blood plasma from turning into syrup.
So just going to have to face that it will be a bit rough with really not having ridden much at all this year.
Pace it super easy and plan to take regular breaks along the way. If things start to feel tight, or you start getting knee pains, then stop and stretch. Quads especially can get tight after not riding a long time, and when this happens your knees can start to hurt.
Wear the best bibs you own with a good chamois. Use chamois cream!
I’m big on nutrition and would normally say 90+gm of carbs an hour, but likely your gut is not trained for this at all since you haven’t been riding. I’d probably start out with a more conservative goal of about 50 -60gm of carbs (or roughly 250 calories) an hour and see how your stomach is feeling 4 hours in. You can always up it later if feeling ok. However if you get sick early on, it may really make the day miserable.
Try and have fun and make it a good day. Just pace it easy. If you feel amazing at mile 75, then you can always speed things up.
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Mental attitude also has a lot to do with it. Its awesome scenery in the borders btw 
There are 3 cafe stops, one every 25 miles… I’m going to approach it as 4 25 mile segments, rather as 1 100 mile.
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The last one I had 5 bottles, and a piece of cake at each of the 3 cafes. A breakfast of 3 egg omelette and some porridge. And the rest was a couple of gels an hour
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It is, don’t appreciate it so much when seeing it every day though
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You’ve got 13 hours 20 mins elapsed for it. Audax is not about how quickly you can complete them. No one cares. Take as much time as you need whether that’s riding slower than before due to reduced fitness or taking longer stops at the cafes to fuel to recover.
Aim to complete not to compete
Sounds similar… I wouldn’t do 9 sugar bottles, maybe 4 and another 2 or 3 water bottles. And some real food.
You’re brave for attempting and I think you can do it. I’m very interested to hear the post ride report. As others said, just keep pedaling and eating. How about one egg and more porridge this time. Good luck!
Break the course down into smaller segments of 15-20 miles, only focus on completing that segment before looking at next segment. Look at each segment being an achievement and give yourself a reward when each one is done, whether that be a favourite snack, coffee at a service station, 10 minutes out of the saddle…enjoy!
I would ride slow and eat everything you can. Pack extra food. Bagels, sandwiches, gummy bears, etc. Start eating early before you’re hungry and eat every 30 mins. You don’t have to stuff yourself, but eat or drink something carby every 30 mins. Think of this as an eating exercise where you’re riding for 100 miles.
Don’t try to keep up with faster groups! Slow and steady wins the race/ride! Eat!