Yeah, I should have been clearer. I’ll take in some carbs if I go out and do a 20 minutes FTP test but that would only happen a couple times a year.
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A lot of what I see being described sounds like Bob Seebohar’s Metabolic efficiency training. Basically LCHF most of the time doing a polarized style training plan working on being able to utilize mostly fat up to 80% FTP (or higher, at least he hopes). Then when the high intensity days hit cycling more carbs in to fuel those workouts. Not saying I’m here to espouse or defend his points but he has interesting ideas. I preferred his “Nutrition periodization for athletes” book where he touches on the metabolic efficiency but has a lot more interesting dietary stuff versus his “Metabolic Efficiency Training” which has a lot of filler and could have been an addendum or an updated chapter to his first book. But if you don’t have the first book going straight to the second could work.
I was listening to the How to Become a Pro Cyclist podcast the other day. Mostly the last podcast is a sales pitch for his new book. The interesting thing he was talking about was carb periodization - stuff like eating high carb two meals before and one meal after a hard session. On easy days he’s eating lower carb and lower glycemic index. He’s also doing an 8 hour eating window on easy days - first meal at 11am and dinner at 7pm.
He claims this has been the ‘cheat code’ for him to stay as lean as he needed to while cycling and not be under nourished.
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I did a keto diet for a while. I would drink 60g+ of sugar per hour and still stay in ketogenesis. As long as you burn the sugar during the ride, you don’t get out of keto.
I did it with dextrose which is not supposed to go through the liver to be absorbed. Not sure if it’s the same with fructose
That’s consistent with my experience, with maltodextrine. I messed with keto for a couple years, got to a point of fat adaptation that I could go into and out of ketosis pretty quick, but couldn’t hold it for any length of time because I needed carbs to do intensity, and would eat them during and after rides. Finally decided I needed to get a keto mojo meter and dial in some targeted carb intake and see what kicks me out of ketosis, and also used it to get a good feel how different foods and timing affect my blood sugar. Turns out I can (and need to) eat lots of malto while riding, and stay in ketosis, and not binge after (“lots” being highly subjective). I don’t worry about being keto these days, but still use what I learned to fuel my workouts (my ftp is >50% higher than it was then) for the week without taking in some of the crazy amounts of carbs that some people espouse, and still lose some weight.