I add salt to malto/fructo mix and personally quite like the sweet/salty taste. I don’t use any other flavouring 
Do you fuel every ride? I train about 12h/week, and usually my shortest ride is around 2h. It almost feel like everything is better if I take lot of carbs during ride(+90g/h), but I still keep questioning it time to time. I’m probably mostly concerned about my teeth, even though I rinse with water after carbs. Usually in life, nothing comes without some negatives
Also feedbag for rinse bottle must cost me precious watts.
So if I do 60g carbs per hour, do I also need to watch overall calories?
At my intensity I burn around 700-800 kcal per hour (according to my power meter). If I get 30g carbs per hour through my drink and a 30g carbs gel per hour through a gel am I good? This would amount to 200 kcal overall.
I always heard overall caloric intake should at least be 50% of calories burned.
@Dr_Alex_Harrison I’ve found your contributions in this thread extremely helpful. Just wondering… I’m primarily a swimmer, and I’ve been trialing using more carbs before and during my swims in the last month or so and have a suspicion it’s helping. Would you make the same or similar recommendations re: carb ingestion for swimming as you would for cycling? I do most of my swimming at ‘critical swim speed’ - which is very similar to swimming and threshold work on the bike.
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Great!
Awesome.
Maybe 10-20% less carbs per hour. All dependent on gut tolerance and proclivity for reflux. Burping up stomach contents because you’re prone and breathing hard isn’t a fun or ideal experience.
The total magnitude of carb need may be substantially lower for swimming for most folks because the primary determinant of intra-workout carb recommendations is duration of workout, and most folks don’t go swim for 3+ hrs!
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Thanks for the fast reply Alex - helpful thoughts! It sounds a bit like having carbs BEFORE the workout might be a bit more important than INTRA workout, especially if proclivity for reflux starts being a factor (gut tolerance is already something I have under control).
For example - if I’m hitting the pool at 5am and not eating a meal beforehand (which is most often what I do), it might be better to have a 30g carb gel 15min BEFORE the workout (which doesn’t lead to reflux for me) rather than trying to slug it down between laps and getting burpy (which definitely happens when I’ve tried).
Would you agree?
And yeah - my workouts are usually 90min max, so good point on the total magnitude.
Let’s try and not let too many people know we’re talking about swimming here by the way, we might get kicked off 
It’s always worth a crack - I’d be interested to hear how @Nate_Pearson would fuel his swim workouts, though I’m assuming it’s been a long time since he was working on his swim!
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I do love carbs these days. It’s not that I didn’t know I needed them, just not how much!
But I have a question for you you all!
How do you get them in while going hard?
The other evening I was on a group ride.
Every turn at the front I was going hard and with at times only 3-4 of us rotating I don’t know how to get enough carbs in as there was not much recovery time in between.
Ideally I’d like to get 2 bottles of mix and a pack of clif blocks or a couple of gels but it’s hard to reach for and get anything but the mix in while going that hard.
Any tips and tricks?
Sugar water, the best and cheapest! (I usually put about 70g in a la the Dr’s advice on here)
Yeah, I have carbs and elektrolytes in the bottles. But I find it hard making it even sweeter then it already is.
Yes. Consume gel with water. I might do 10min before.
Check out this thread if you haven’t already.
For shop rides like you described, where everyone is ripping each other’s legs off, there’s no time for gels/chews etc. Fuel has to come from your bottles for sure. It’ll be sweet. Chase with water. Reduce flavor intensity by using malto+fruc and/or sucrose.
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I’d really like a copy of Dr Alex book but the format seems to fail on Kindle / Apple Kindle reader (UK). Is there anyway I can get another format e.g. PDF?
Let me check with our admin and get back to you. We used to sell PDF versions.
Edit: PS. Could you tell me the trouble you’re having with the Kindle failure? I’d like to report that to our admin as well.
Thanks Alex
My Kindle says " This format is not support by your device" which is a Kindle Paperwhite download in the usual way from Amazon UK.
I also tried it on an iPad using the Kindle reader app - it appears in the library then when selected say “Opening is taking a little longer than usual -hang tight!” …but never opens.
Looking into it!
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Thank you!
From our admin:
Have them contact info@renaissanceperiodization.com so they can take a look into it for the client. Have them send a screenshot with proof of purchase to info as well and CS can hook them up with the PDF version.
A very public thank you to Dr Alex and Renaissance Periodisation who have sorted me out, And what a guide, thats done more for me in 90 minutes of reading than years of surfing the 'net - easy laid out and to read with helpful tables to calculate your carbs. Thoroughly recommended!
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I followed all of the RP information back when I was a powerlifter - have to agree on the level of content… first class!
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Wow, thank you! Glad it’s been helpful.
This forum has been amazingly useful for me in countless areas (many involving wrenches, lol). Pumped to contribute where I can!
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Glad you are here. Your sugar water mantra, i.e., 1:1, is a game changer, especially for my wallet! 