Fat Cyclist

Cycling Stinks

11.28.2005 | 7:04 pm

I love biking. I love mountain biking. I love road biking. I have a sneaking suspicion I’m going to love track racing.

I love getting ready for a big ride. I love the rhythm of riding on the road. I love picking a line on new singletrack. I love riding rocky jeep roads. I love the way I feel after a big workout.

I love the way bikes look. I love the way bikes sound. I love talking about bikes and telling biking stories, and I love hearing other cyclists’ stories.

To recap: I love biking. And yet, there is one inescapable truth about cycling that I do not love:

Practically everything about cycling stinks.

Jerseys

It’s easy to tell whether a person on a bike is a cyclist, or just a person who happens to own a bike. Just look at what he’s wearing. T-shirt? Person. Brightly-colored polyester skintight jersey with a zip-up front and pockets in the back? Cyclist.

The benefits of jerseys are many: they help you be seen by traffic. They give you a place to carry food and a phone. They evaporate sweat, so you don’t feel like you’re riding with a big ol’ soaked sponge for a shirt.

But that last bit — that bit about evaporating sweat — is a two-edged sword. Because while your jersey is doing a fantastic job of getting rid of the water part of the sweat, it’s doing an equally fantastic job of holding on to the stink part of the sweat. The fibers of biking jerseys are, in fact, specially designed to trap every little molecule of stench your upper body excretes, compound it by a factor of seven, and then time-release that smell for the next eon or so.

As a young, naïve cyclist, I used to think washing a jersey would get rid of that smell. It doesn’t. Washing it again doesn’t help, either. And in fact, if you wash the jersey too many times, you’ll just make the washing machine start to stink.

Special Note to everybody who is about to leave a comment describing how they use vinegar, lemon juice ammonia, or sulfuric acid to good effect in combating the “jersey stink” phenomenon: Feel free to go ahead and leave your comment, but please realize that I already know about your so-called remedy, and have the following observations to make:

Your remedy actually only masks the smell, and an argument can be made that a stinky jersey with a hint of rancid lemon is even worse than plain ol’ stinky jersey.
Even if your remedy does work, I don’t care. I’m barely organized enough to wash my jerseys at all. There’s no way I’m going to remember to start using time-consuming anti-stink potions every time I do the wash.

Helmet

My head starts sweating well before the rest of my body. And the straps and little pads in my helmet are nowhere near as easy to clean as my jersey. Back in arid Utah, this meant that within a few hours after a ride, my helmet straps would dry out, becoming stiff, crusty, and above all, stinky.

Here in Washington, though, the humidity keeps the straps from drying out so quickly. In fact, if you ride your bike more than twice a week, your helmet straps will never dry out. This means that instead of your straps becoming stiff, crusty, and stinky, they become dank, cold, and above all, stinky.

Interesting aside: You’d think that mildew would grow on constantly damp straps like this, but it doesn’t. My theory is that this is because the stench frightens the mildew monsters away.

Unlike jerseys, it’s possible to clean helmet straps and pads so they don’t stink. Unfortunately, to reap this benefit, you must in fact clean your helmet straps and pads. This is such a time-consuming, awkward process — which is immediately negated the next time you go out on a ride — that nobody in the history of cycling has done it more than once.

Glasses

I just found out about this recently, and admit I was astounded. Yes, my beloved Oakley Racing Jackets — the ones with the expensive frames and super-expensive prescription lenses — stink. I discovered this when my wife asked me to keep my glasses in the garage, because they smelled up our bedroom. Challenging her, I put the frames under my nose and inhaled deeply.

Wow. So I guess thousands of miles-worth of dripping sweat can permeate anything.

More, More, More

Really, I could go on. My messenger bag stinks, which is a problem since that’s what I use to carry my clean clothes to work. My biking shoes stink, which is probably the least surprising thing I’ve ever written. My biking shorts stink, which dogs seem to really appreciate. My Camelbak stinks, although — as near as I can tell — that stench hasn’t yet penetrated the bladder. This may, however, just be because Camelbak bladders have a stink (and taste) of their own.

So I have a theory: the main reason people don’t get into cycling is because they smell us before they ride with us.

Post-Ride Stench

The thing is, this residual stink — the smell that clings to all your cycling stuff — is only a tiny part of the problem. The only thing worse than the smell of a cyclist after a ride is a group of cyclists after a ride. Or at least, that’s what my wife tells me, and my kids won’t come near me when I get home from work ‘til after I clean up.

But you know what’s even worse than a group of cyclists after a ride? A group of cyclists after an epic ride, in a car, for an extended period of time. Why? Well, without getting too explicit, when one is on one’s bike for a long time, eating unusual food, one’s digestive system, well, reacts. And while most people have the most polite intentions in the world, at some point physics takes over.

And, in short, seven stinky guys with gas in a car for an extended period of time can reduce a vehicle’s resale value by 18%.

Danger of Becoming Desensitized

If you’re an avid cyclist, there’s a good chance you haven’t recently thought about the stink you make. This is not a good sign, because it means you have contracted Cycling Stench Desensitization Syndrome (CSDS). Here are common symptoms:

You think your bike clothes don’t stink
You keep any of your bike stuff in any place other than the garage
You wonder why nobody ever wants to be near you

It’s entirely possible that CSDS is incurable, but the symptoms are treatable. You must simply realize that just because you don’t notice the smell doesn’t mean it’s not there. Every bike-related item you own must be isolated from everything else you own, and treated much the same as if it were radioactive waste.

Or at least, that’s what all of you have to do. My bike stuff smells just fine.

Winner of the Banjo Brothers Messenger Bag

OK, I’ve got to admit I’ve got mixed feelings about calling this story the winner. I mean, it’s a great story, and it’s well-told, but what JuvenileTim-D describes himself doing goes way, way, way beyond stupid. Which, I guess, is why he wins with this entry:

When we were kids, the town we lived in had a marine lake, a boating lake that was separated from the sea by a low wall. Most of the year, this wall was just about at sea level, with the sea just washing over to keep the lake full. It also keeps the wall covered in slimy green algae.

One of the big tests was to ride your bike around the wall. At low tide, you risked either sliding into the lake or sliding off the wall 8 feet down to the rocks. At high tide, the fall was replaced by a dip in the strong currents of the estuary. People drowned here every year, were not talking Bike Mike Bondai rip currents, just strong tidal flows that dragged you out into the main channel. Spring and autumn, we had very high tides coupled with storm force winds. It was always exciting to go down to the sea front and watch the waves crash over the car.

One autumn we had particularly high tides, with very strong winds. Sections of the promenade, large concrete and iron sections, just disappeared. A friend who lived further up the coast woke up to find a large sailboat buried in his living room window. Cars parked on the seafront disappeared.

My friend Dave and I decided we would have to ride the marine lake wall at high tide. We met at the appointed time at the town end of the lake and the wall was already awash and waves were crashing over the promenade where we waited. High tide. I went first, followed by Dave. The first third was the worst. The wall was under about a foot of water, with five and six foot wave crashing over the breakwater just beyond the lake wall.

We got round the first third without mishap, but soaked to the skin. The second third was running with the wind and the tide. We had no idea where the edges of the wall were, only guessing from the changes to the colour and run of the waves. We made it through, with Dave closing. Final third, cutting back across the wind, but with the lake sheltering us from the tide, the easy bit. Half way through, a freak combination of wind and waves caught us both in a torrent of falling water. When did water get so heavy? We were batted into the ground. I went down left, Dave right. I went into the lake, Dave into the sea. I managed to get loose from my toeclips and was just about able to swim to the launch slip and safety. I called out the inshore lifeboat, which went looking unsuccessfully for Dave.

He eventually washed up, literally, about three miles down the estuary, his life saved by an off-duty fireman, who fished his unconscious body out of the water and made sure he was breathing.

We never recovered either bike, but we had to go back and ride the wall.

Congratulations, JuvenileTim-D. And by the way, you are insane.

Comments (34)

Into the Fire

11.23.2005 | 4:20 pm

Five years ago — by which I mean “between three and seven years ago” — Utah was in the middle of a serious water shortage. This crisis deeply affected me in several ways, including (but not limited to):

I watered my lawn only once per day, instead of the normal twice.
I stopped going to Lake Powell, because it had dried up completely. Just kidding; it was easily still 15-20 feet deep in some places.
My favorite mountain bike trails became incredibly loose and dusty.

These problems, however, suddenly seemed trivial when my favorite bike trail in the world — Frank — got caught up in the path of a fire that chewed up and spat out mountain after mountain near my home.

Perspective

Just so you understand how important Frank (yes, everyone I rode with spoke of this trail as if it were a person named “Frank”) was to me, I should also point out that this same fire also threatened my house. But while I was concerned about my potential property loss, my indignation — my hate-filled rage — was reserved for the likelihood that I was about to lose my trail.

And then the day came: Fire trucks and firefighters were stationed at the trailhead. Helicopters were slurry-bombing burning trees just a few hundred yards away from the ride I had done hundreds (no exaggeration, for once) of times.

There was no question about it. Frank would burn.

I Was a Bland Youth

I’m now going to shift focus, both for a break in the story’s incredible dramatic tension and to give you a little bit of my personal backstory.

I think we can agree that most teenagers express their individuation via some sort of rebellion. Here are the things I did to rebel:

I grew my hair so far down it very nearly touched my collar.
I listened to Oingo-Boingo and DEVO, occasionally at volumes of which my father did not approve. I also wore out (literally) a copy of Pink Floyd’s The Wall.

I bring this list up by way of demonstrating that in general, I am a law-abiding type, one who does not cause waves.

Doing What Must Be Done

Knowing that Frank would never be the same, and knowing that access was both blocked and forbidden, I did the obvious thing: I got on my bike and got on the trail anyway, using a lesser-known trailhead that had three essential benefits:

It was not blocked by firefighters.
It was not on fire.
It was easily accessible, if you happen to know the trail so well that you can close your eyes and imagine the whole thing in perfect detail.

I wasn’t thinking about the fact that I was breaking the law or putting myself in danger or about anything else, really; I just wanted to ride my favorite trail one more time before the fire took it.

The Ride

I expected the smoke to be a problem, but it wasn’t. In fact, Frank seemed perfectly normal during the climb. Two switchbacks, both of which I had mastered. A hard scrabble up a loose, rocky section: I cleaned this maybe half the time (I can’t remember whether I cleaned it this day). Then, a nice, steady singletrack climb through scrub oak. Then I got to the top of Frank, a rock cairn where the fastest guy gets to sit and wait for everyone else to regroup. As such, it’s more of a throne than a simple pile of rocks.

This time, though, I was riding alone, so didn’t care about the rocks. Also, I didn’t care about the rocks because there was a fire coming down the mountain, about 300 yards (I’m guessing so wildly that I may as well be picking a number at random here) away. I couldn’t see beyond the fire to what it had done, because the smoke was so thick.

Better keep going.

Before the fire, the first part of the descent down Frank was a group favorite. How could it not be? You’re blasting through a tunnel of brambly trees. The trail, which had been nothing more than a deer track before we started riding it, was smooth and fast. There were embedded boulders and trees to dodge, but you could really open it up and fly.

And that is the real reason why this last pre-fire Frank ride is one of my favorite memories. Because after the fire, the tunnel would be gone. And then, a little while later, several days of rain would come, and without the thick brush and grass on the mountain to slow it down, the water would briefly form a running stream along this part of the trail, turning it from a hang-on-let’s-fly section of downhill to a rocky riverbed: a bumpy, rattle-your-teeth-out section. It’s still good trail, but it’s totally different.

For some reason, I get tremendous satisfaction that I was the last person to ride this trail as it was, before it got turned to a charred, stark, naked-looking thing that smelled of smoke for years afterward.

Finishing my ride, I dropped off the trail near the water tower. There were several firefighters and vehicles there, getting ready. I didn’t look at them, employing the “I don’t acknowledge you, therefore I don’t exist” technique. Amazingly, it worked. I just rode by them.

There were a couple kids straddling bikes on the side of the road, looking at me as I came off the trail. “Are you that guy?” one of them yelled at me as I approached.

“What guy?”

“The firefighters were talking on the radio a little while about some stupid mountain biker, riding up into the fire, about half an hour ago. Dude, they said you’re an idiot.”

A fair point.

And yet, this stands out as maybe the only very stupid thing I have ever done that I do not regret at all.

PS: You have one week left to enter the raffle to fight cancer and win a Superfly SingleSpeed. Click here for details on how!

PPS: My sister Jodi at Pistols and Popcorn and I are both finalists for the 2009 Bloggies awards. She’s in the “Best-Kept Secret” category; I’m in the “Sports” category. Click here to go vote for us.

Comments (11)

Into the Fire

11.23.2005 | 4:17 pm

Five years ago — by which I mean “between three and seven years ago” — Utah was in the middle of a serious water shortage. This crisis deeply affected me in several ways, including (but not limited to):

I watered my lawn only once per day, instead of the normal twice.
I stopped going to Lake Powell, because it had dried up completely. Just kidding; it was easily still 15-20 feet deep in some places.
My favorite mountain bike trails became incredibly loose and dusty.

These problems, however, suddenly seemed trivial when my favorite bike trail in the world — Frank — got caught up in the path of a fire that chewed up and spat out mountain after mountain near my home.

Perspective

Just so you understand how important Frank (yes, everyone I rode with spoke of this trail as if it were a person named “Frank”) was to me, I should also point out that this same fire also threatened my house. But while I was concerned about my potential property loss, my indignation — my hate-filled rage — was reserved for the likelihood that I was about to lose my trail.

And then the day came: Fire trucks and firefighters were stationed at the trailhead. Helicopters were slurry-bombing burning trees just a few hundred yards away from the ride I had done hundreds (no exaggeration, for once) of times.

There was no question about it. Frank would burn.

I Was a Bland Youth

I’m now going to shift focus, both for a break in the story’s incredible dramatic tension and to give you a little bit of my personal backstory.

I think we can agree that most teenagers express their individuation via some sort of rebellion. Here are the things I did to rebel:

I grew my hair so far down it very nearly touched my collar.
I listened to Oingo-Boingo and DEVO, occasionally at volumes of which my father did not approve. I also wore out (literally) a copy of Pink Floyd’s The Wall.

I bring this list up by way of demonstrating that in general, I am a law-abiding type, one who does not cause waves.

Doing What Must Be Done

Knowing that Frank would never be the same, and knowing that access was both blocked and forbidden, I did the obvious thing: I got on my bike and got on the trail anyway, using a lesser-known trailhead that had three essential benefits:

1. It was not blocked by firefighters.

2. It was not on fire.

3. It was easily accessible, if you happen to know the trail so well that you can close your eyes and imagine the whole thing in perfect detail.

I wasn’t thinking about the fact that I was breaking the law or putting myself in danger or about anything else, really; I just wanted to ride my favorite trail one more time before the fire took it.

The Ride

I expected the smoke to be a problem, but it wasn’t. In fact, Frank seemed perfectly normal during the climb. Two switchbacks, both of which I had mastered. A hard scrabble up a loose, rocky section: I cleaned this maybe half the time (I can’t remember whether I cleaned it this day). Then, a nice, steady singletrack climb through scrub oak. Then I got to the top of Frank, a rock cairn where the fastest guy gets to sit and wait for everyone else to regroup. As such, it’s more of a throne than a simple pile of rocks.

This time, though, I was riding alone, so didn’t care about the rocks. Also, I didn’t care about the rocks because there was a fire coming down the mountain, about 300 yards (I’m guessing so wildly that I may as well be picking a number at random here) away. I couldn’t see beyond the fire to what it had done, because the smoke was so thick.

Better keep going.

Before the fire, the first part of the descent down Frank was a group favorite. How could it not be? You’re blasting through a tunnel of brambly trees. The trail, which had been nothing more than a deer track before we started riding it, was smooth and fast. There were embedded boulders and trees to dodge, but you could really open it up and fly.

And that is the real reason why this last pre-fire Frank ride is one of my favorite memories. Because after the fire, the tunnel would be gone. And then, a little while later, several days of rain would come, and without the thick brush and grass on the mountain to slow it down, the water would briefly form a running stream along this part of the trail, turning it from a hang-on-let’s-fly section of downhill to a rocky riverbed: a bumpy, rattle-your-teeth-out section. It’s still good trail, but it’s totally different.

For some reason, I get tremendous satisfaction that I was the last person to ride this trail as it was, before it got turned to a charred, stark, naked-looking thing that smelled of smoke for years afterward.

Finishing my ride, I dropped off the trail near the water tower. There were several firefighters and vehicles there, getting ready. I didn’t look at them, employing the “I don’t acknowledge you, therefore I don’t exist” technique. Amazingly, it worked. I just rode by them.

There were a couple kids straddling bikes on the side of the road, looking at me as I came off the trail. “Are you that guy?” one of them yelled at me as I approached.

“What guy?”

“The firefighters were talking on the radio a little while about some stupid mountain biker, riding up into the fire, about half an hour ago. Dude, they said you’re an idiot.”

A fair point.

And yet, this stands out as maybe the only very stupid thing I have ever done that I do not regret at all.

The Banjo Brothers Messenger Bag Giveaway: How Stupid Are You?

OK, for this week’s Banjo Brothers Giveaway – and this is for a messenger bag (regular-sized, not the enormous ones they’ll be rolling out next year), folks – tell me about something stupid you’ve done on a bike. But not just any old stupid thing. Tell me about something stupid you’ve done on a bike that you would gladly do again.

I won’t be posting again ‘til Monday (11/28), so I’m going to let this contest go through Sunday. I’ll announce the winner in Monday’s post, although I’ll very likely be dropping into the Comments section between now and then, making snarky remarks about how stupid everyone is.

Also, I reserve the right to post something before Monday, if I feel like it.

Happy Thanksgiving

You know what I’m thankful for? I’m thankful for everyone who stops by and reads my blog. You make writing this thing a lot of fun.

Comments (63)

Great Moments in Cycling: The Roller Derby

11.22.2005 | 5:44 pm

I’m just going to come out and say it: the cycling trainer is an abomination. Trainers take two of the best things about cycling — freedom of movement and the ability to go somewhere while you exercise — and strip those things away.

Trainers are very simple. They grip your rear wheel’s axle, lifting your bike into the air, and apply resistance to your rear wheel. Thus, in a matter of moments, a trainer converts your bike from your favorite thing in the world into a loathsome piece of stationary exercise equipment.

But you know, I kind of like rollers.

With rollers, you just put your bike on top of the free-spinning drums and ride. Sure, you’re still not going anywhere, but at least it takes some skill — rollers require that you use a very light touch on your steering, balance evenly, and ride a nice, straight line.

This is not to say that I would ever pick riding rollers over going outdoors to ride, if it’s an option at all. All I’m saying is that while rollers are a poor substitute for riding, they’re not as poor as trainers.

How to Tolerate Riding Indoors

I don’t think there’s any force in the world that could make me ride the rollers for more than one hour. Which is odd, considering one hour on the bike outside doesn’t seem like much of a ride. It just goes to show, I suppose, how critical the "going somewhere" component of riding is to the whole experience.

I do, however, have a secret that makes it possible for me to ride for a full hour on the rollers (just ask any avid cyclist: an hour on the rollers is actually more than most people can tolerate): Martial arts movies.

Yes, that’s right. Martial arts movies. Bruce Lee. Jean Claude van Dam. Jackie Chan. Especially Jackie Chan. These movies are perfect for exercising to, for the following reasons:

The constant action helps you keep your cadence and energy level up.
You can look away from the screen for a few moments without fear of missing something crucial.
If you zone out for a little while, you can come back without having missed much.
When you get to the point where you’ve just got to get off that bike, you can turn off the movie and pick it up the next day without having it occupy your mind the whole rest of the day.

Back in Utah, I had a perfect setup for riding on the rollers in the winter set up in my unfinished basement:

A TV and DVD player
Wireless headphones, so I could hear the movie over the drone (quite loud) of the rollers without fear of tangling a cord in my front wheel
A Netflix subscription, giving me all-I-could-stand access to martial arts films.

Loudest, Most Embarassing Crash Ever

You know, I don’t know if I even need to recount this anecdote. You know what’s coming, don’t you? Of course you do. Oh well, I may as well soldier on.

About four years ago, while riding on the rollers, I got deeply involved with a movie. I’m pretty sure it was the one where Jackie Chan plays a loveable misfit with — for some reason — extraordinary improvisational martial arts skills. During one of the action scenes, Jackie is using a ladder, a shopping cart, and a mannequin’s arm to defend himself against the entire Mafia.

Before I continue, I would like to say that anyone who is not amazed and entertained whenever Jackie does one of these scenes is a stuffy old fart.

Now, one thing you must do when riding rollers is check from time to time — every thirty seconds or so — to make sure you’re not drifting off one side.

I drifted off. All the way off. While pedaling at about 24mph.

Must I really describe what happened next? I must? OK.

I shot forward, my wheels making nice skid marks as they made contact with the concrete floor, straight into the table I had the TV and DVD player on.

The TV, DVD player and wireless headset base station fell over with a mighty crash, the bike and me on top of it.

"Is everything OK down there?" I hear my wife yell from upstairs. I look at the damage. I’m scraped up, and the TV has a nice divot in the tube.

A pause while I stifle the screams, then: "Everything’s fine, dear!"

Actually, the TV was toast, the wireless headset would never work right again, and I hurt like crazy in about seven different places.

But I wasn’t quite prepared to admit that I had just accidentally sprinted my bike into an entertainment center.

Comments (26)

A Review of Several Energy Gels, In Spite of the Fact that I Think They ALL Taste Nasty

11.21.2005 | 5:10 pm

Not that I ever hold myself up to any kind of journalistic standard, but today’s headline is particularly flawed. I didn’t, for example, go out this weekend and buy a bunch of different kinds of energy gels and try them out. That would be gross.

Further, I didn’t go on the Web to find out what kinds of energy gels are out there right now, and which kinds experts recommend. If you want to do that, though, I’d be interested to know what you learn (but only mildly interested, to be honest).

Instead, I just dug into my years and years of being a gullible gel consumer. I’ll base the strength of recommendation for each gel on how weak of a gag reflex the memory of that gel inspires.

And the thing is, that’s a totally unfair way of reviewing gels. I mean, Hammergel in particular is going to get a raw deal out of my review; my aversion to their stuff is due entirely to my own stupidity.

So, let’s begin: my subjective, non-scientific, unfair, and totally non-comprehensive review of gels I have tried.

PowerGel

This is the energy gel I started with. And I stuck with it for years, for two reasons, neither of which I’m especially proud of:

Taste: PowerGel Lemon Lime flavor tastes better than any other gel, by any other brand. On one hand, that’s not a half bad selection criterion. On the other hand, admitting that I like the taste of lukewarm key lime pie is not something I’m all that enthused about.
Cost: PowerGel seems to be free. Oh, sure, you can go into your bike shop and buy it for a buck a shot, just like any kind of gel, but if you race at all, you’re bound to have noticed that organizers always seem to have boxes and boxes (and boxes) of free PowerGel just lying around. And the organizers don’t want to take it home after the event. So, while I have consumed more PowerGel than any other brand, I have spent less on it than on practically any other brand.

I have no science at all to back this claim, but it seems to me that PowerGel hits you faster than any other gel. This is both good and bad. It’s good because just a few minutes after you suck it down, you’ve got a big spike of energy.

It’s bad because I chose the term “spike of energy” in the previous paragraph very carefully. PowerGel drops you off a cliff, energy-wise. If you haven’t queued up the next boost of PowerGel 15 minutes after you took one, you’re in for a sudden and discouraging energy sag.

Clif Shot

When Clif Shot first came out, it came in little toothpaste tube-like containers, with a resealable twist cap. It also made a big deal of using brown rice syrup, and so didn’t have that same spikey surge of energy that other gels had.

The problem was, it tasted so bad that nobody ever finished a single tube. People would buy one sample tube, tried it, twist the cap back on, and never twist it back off again.

Clif came out with a second iteration of Clif Shot, this time in the single-serving foil pouch. And this time they did something really clever: they put a little connector between the top tab that you rip off and the main pouch, so that you don’t accidentally lose the top tab and litter.

I used Clif Shot for about two years in this second iteration, because . . . well . . . because I got it for free. I got about a truckload as partial payment from a race organizer for building him a website. I love the bartering system.

The best Clif Shot flavor is to mix Razz Sorbet with Viva Vanilla. The vanilla tones down the insanely sweet taste of the Razz Sorbet to something nearly tolerable. Wow, that’s quite a recommendation, isn’t it?

My final observation on Clif Shot: while it isn’t as obvious as it used to be, the brown rice syrup flavor is still back there, and it leaves a molasses-like aftertaste.

Hammer Gel

I have always understood the cardinal rule of endurance racing: don’t try anything new on race day. No new clothes, no new equipment, no new food. Especially no new food. So I have no excuse for why, a few years ago, I bought a big Apple-Cinnamon Hammer Gel jug the day before the Brian Head 100. Maybe it was because of all the positive recommendations I had heard. Maybe it was because it seemed so convenient to be able to just put the bottle the gel came in in the water bottle cage. Maybe it’s because I had gotten cocky from having done a lot of endurance rides, and thought the cardinal rule no longer applied to me.

It still applied to me.

Within an hour of the beginning of the race, I had decided that I hated the taste of Hammer Gel.

Within three hours, I had decided Hammer Gel hated me. I was experiencing stomach cramps in a unique, almost exquisitely painful way.

So I stopped using the Hammer Gel. And of course, in the absence of a nutritional Plan B, I bonked in a manner most colossal.

I finished the race, but I have only one enduring memory of that year’s Brian Head 100: Hammer Gel = pain.

Which is unfair to the Hammer Gel folks, of course. I shouldn’t have tried it for the first time in a race. I should have found a flavor I liked. And it’s totally possible that the cramps were due to something I ate the day before.

But that doesn’t change the reality: I can’t even think about Hammer Gel without shuddering.

Honey Stingers (Warning: Website has Very Annoying Audio)

I love honey. I confess, as a kid I would secretly get the honey bear out, upend it and suck out a mouthful (Note to parents and sisters: sorry ‘bout that. Also, sorry I did the same thing with the milk jug. And the Hershey’s Syrup). And so having a company come out with a “gel” that is really nothing more than honey with some flavoring and salt seemed like pure genius.

There are just a couple problems, though:

Sticky: Any gel is capable of making a sticky mess. However, honey is stickier by an order of magnitude. And it spreads, somehow. You get a little on your lip and soon it’s on your glove, then on your handlebar grip, then on your jersey. Soon, gnats and road debris are sticking to you. It’s less attractive than it sounds.
Does Not Play at all Well With Others: Most gels mix badly with some things, but as near as I could tell, honey mixes badly with every single kind of sports drink that exists.

I tried making my own honey-based energy gel by diluting honey with water, adding a little salt, and microwaving it to make it easy to mix together. The result tasted really good, but the 5-serving gel flasks I used to hold this honey didn’t seal well, with predictably disastrous results involving me stuck to my saddle.

Gu

Gu is the gel brand I’ve settled on for now. Specifically, Vanilla Bean Gu. The way I stumbled on this flavor underscores how subjective these preferences are. My riding buddy Nick had bought a box of Vanilla Bean Gu and hated it so badly he asked if I’d take it off his hands. Always the scrounge, of course I said yes. Turns out, I can tolerate it just fine.

Here’s what I like about Gu: I can slurp one down with a mouthful of water, and it’s gone. The energy pick-up comes quickly enough, but doesn’t pitch me off a cliff immediately afterward. It is, in short, moderately good at everything a gel needs to be good at.

I declare Gu the Honda Civic of energy gels.

PS For DIY Types: Kent’s Choco-Peanut Goop

Cycling guru and expert at keeping things simple Kent Peterson shares the following recipe for making your own Reeses Peanut Butter Cup –flavored gel in a randonneuring ride report. I haven’t tried it yet, but Kent’s ideas are generally worth investigating. Plus, I like chocolate and peanut butter a lot.

1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup chocolate syrup (like what you’d put on ice-cream)
1/4 cup water

Take the ingredients listed above and put them in a mug. Heat the mug in a microwave for about 30 seconds and then stir everything up. It should all blend together nicely and and have a thin, creamy texture. Spoon it into one of those refillable Gu flasks. Be sure you taste the leftover Goop that’s stuck to the mug and the spoon. If you don’t like the taste of this stuff at home, you probably won’t like it on the road. But I find it delicious. Unlike commercial Gu which is basically just carbohydrates, Goop has some protein, fat, sodium, niacin and vitamin E in it as well.

PPS About All Those Brands I Didn’t Mention

Yes, I know. There are a lot of brands out there I haven’t mentioned. Carb-Boom, for example. If they’d like to send me a batch, I’ll try it and even write about it. Same thing goes for pretty much any other brand (except Hammer Gel, which I’d have to give to someone else to try).

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