Athletes, Whats in your Water Bottle?

Reading an article from a recent sports science test, I was shocked to see the vast differences in performance levels based on "what the athletes had in their water bottles"  Of course my goal with these blogs is to get to the point REAL FAST so here is deal....

...According to a 2009 study (Martinez-Lagunas), 12 highly trained cyclist were given an exercise test of 2.5 hours, first consisting of 55 % VO2 and then riding to exhaustion.  Each cyclist performed the test 3 times.  Okay, here is the point...  Those consuming only WATER went to exhaustion during the second test within 14.7 mins, those consuming a sport drink lasted 26.9  mins and furthermore, those consuming a sports drink with a protein added went on to ride 30.5 mins until full exhaustion!

In other words, durning intense exercise consuming carbs or better yet, carb and a 1:4 protein mix, yielded almost twice the performance than water alone.

The study mentioned Accelerade as sports drink with the 1:4 protein mix, I personally like to use a amnio acid liquid and cytomax - a teammate of mine turned me on to it last year and I was doing it, without really knowing exactly what or why, but felt good about the results.  It also kept calories in me on longer 3-5 hour rides opposed to consuming solid foods.  Remember you only need 5 grams or so of protein per bottle, anything more will might fill you up too much and have a not so light stomach effect.

Think about what is in YOUR WATER BOTTLE and fuel your body while exercising.  Seriously. Let me know if you want to babble on why this is or if you are just happy knowing that real studies show the above results.

Florida State CX Championships

Major thanks to Julian at Tempo Cycles for loaning me the 1/8in Nature Boy rig.  My personal bike was having all sorts of problems with the chain line in Saturday's races.  I only dropped my chain once during the single speed event and came back swinging with a podium finish after chasing down the field that wizzed past as I was fixing my rig... Later that day, the mens Cat B event had me dropping my chain twice and trotting across the line frustrated for 13th place.

Sunday's State Championship was on and from the gun the number one man attacked hard and staying away.  Tall skinny Pete is a natural VO2 machine, winning 3 out of 4 races that weekend.  I gave my chase  in the first lap, dropping the field but was not match for strong, skinny Pete.  With two laps to go the field started to bring me back in and I gave every once of leg power to churn 60 rpms thru the grass pulling a nice 30 second gap back into the chasing field.  Across the line with two fingers in the air.... 2nd place in the state single speed cross race.  First race back after a level III ac joint separation at the FLA State Road Race on Oct 31st.  I was more than pleased to finish up the racing year with two more podiums!  YEAH.

Clean cyclist

Hats off to Phil for making it cool to be clean / dope free. It gives us clean kids a cool hip new way to express ourselves with a clean tattoo. Put on your body and become a certified clean athlete... Just finished my full sleeve tattoo - might need to wait on any more ink right now

Check out the link - good stuff
Link to Clean Athletes Site

EGCG? GreenTea is your bring home performance boost!

EGCG?  GreenTea is your bring home performance boost!
Not only does it have all the antioxidants you need for day to day recovery from working out... a recent study from Colorado St University is stating that green tea or EGCG,  the chief antioxidant found in green tea can also raise your VO2 max slightly, up to 4 percent with consumption of 2/4 cups of green tea per day.

Hey looking for the easier way to rock some EGCG - just incase you don't have time to make or drink 4 cups of tea a day :))
Look for the supercharged antioxidant EGCG extract in Teavigo products.  They are much cheaper than actual tea too.  60 pills for 19.99 at your local vitamin shoppe or heath food store.  I use both, the pills and the teas, just not on the same day.  Good stuff for better living, and better cycling!

It is always a good idea to an antioxidant in your supplement stable.http://www.dsm.com/en_US/html/dnp/hnh_nutra_teavigo.htm

Ac joint separation - oh yeah!

So after two years of racing, I finally got mine at the Florida state championships - a 65 mile race I hit the deck at 45 mph in the last 200 meters... Didn't even get a chance to tap the breaks... Broke my helmet, went into a neck brace. Had to count to ten and then arrived at the local hospital. My shoulder was well, not movable and rather whacked! No worries if this happens to you, 8 days later I was back on the bike, a few days after that I was bag to normal training and even a little ripping it up on the trails. All and all I was a lucky duck, no surgery needed for my level III ac joint separation. Check out this bit from velo news on all the possibilities - be good

Article from Velo News on the Types of shoulder injuries

Why buy a cross bike???

Why not? Think about base training - hours of hours or turning the pedals over day after day. Sounds like a blast reading it but on the bike boredom sets in. A cross bike gives you options, new roads, new routes, new trails, the smell of dirt, nature and solitude in some cases. Also noticing that the trails are not as cold as the open roads. Give it a shot and your really might enjoy this years base season even more!   I personally like the single speed set up.  All City Nature Boy is a pretty sweet RIDE.