By Ed Cheng

Dear Members:

Can you believe that it's already July and that Summer is upon us?  Come out in force for our Weekend Rides so we can bring back the pre-COVID numbers that we all enjoyed.  Also, a reminder to look at our Adventure Rides.  We have overnight rides for those new to bikepacking as well as for old hands.  These rides are comparable to the expensive trips with companies that charge hundreds of dollars, except ours are included as part of your membership and you get to ride with fellow members!  I did my first overnight ride with one of CRW's Adventure Rides and have been hooked ever since -- and if I can do it, you can too.

A quick shout out to the organizers and riders of the Climb to the Clouds Century earlier this month.  It's hard to believe that our Century Committee organized two centuries back-to-back already.  Erik Dentremont, in particular, made a tremendous effort to make the CttC take place this year, not only securing permits, and finding volunteers, but even carting water, tables, and equipment to the sites himself. 

 Last, CRW purchased and installed a bench for our late president, Sandy Gray.  Harriet Fell spearheaded the effort for the club.  It is on the Bruce Freeman trail at mile marker 6.8 between Evans Way and Greenwood Road - just north the Chelmsford town line and Greenwood Road in Westford.  Keep your eyes on the calendar for a ride commemorating Sandy and dedicating the bench.

While we do most of our riding in the greater Boston area, we sometimes travel and it's good to know where you can experience challenging terrain. WheelPeople Editors

By Alex Post

There are of course numerous rides that could be included as the best or most epic cycling climbs in the USA, but for this article we’ll follow the top 10 list created by the well done climbing focused site pjammcycling.com. This is their opinion, but includes among other things the length, vertical gain, average percent grade, and scenery. The details for each of the 10 rides can found here. 

https://pjammcycling.com/zone/224.US-Most-Epic-Bike-Climbs

Pikes Peak, CO  One of the most iconic climbs not just in the US but the world, Pikes Peak near Colorado Springs is a long steep climb averaging 6.1%, and if not counting the couple small descents, it averages 7.9%. 

Mauna Loa, HI  Although not as steep as some others listed, at 62 miles long Mauna Loa is the longest climb in the world. Depending on how you look at it, you fortunately don’t have to do it right now since it’s closed due to lava flow. 

Whitaker Forest, CA  Described by Pjamm as an exceptional experience, including riding through the middle of a tree. 

Mt Washington, NH  The closest ride to us, and the only east coast ride on this list, it’s an absolutely brutally steep climb, averaging 12% grade, with the steepest section at 16%

Mauna Kea, HI  According to Pjamm, Mauna Kea is flat out the hardest climb anywhere in the world. A mind boggling ascent of 13,755 feet. Starting at the ocean and at the top having 42% less oxygen in the air. 

Shafer Trail, UT  In Canyonlands National Park near Moab UT, the road on this is dirt and gravel, but described as smooth enough for a road bike, at least certainly a gravel bike. Scenery is unique and beautiful. 

Mount Evans, CO  The highest altitude paved road in the northwestern hemisphere. 

Haleakala, HI  The third of the monster Hawaiian volcano climbs, there are only a few places in the world you can do a climb this big. 

Tioga Pass, CA  Near Yosemite National Park, Tioga Pass is described as one of the most beautiful climbs anywhere. 

Nate Harrison Grade, CA  This ride in the vicinity of San Diego is primarily on dirt and gravel, so at least 28mm tires are recommended, but it’s considered a beautiful and challenging ride. 

By John Allen

What if you encounter someone whose bicycle is a crash waiting to happen? 

So, recently I was riding through an apartment complex on my way to the gym. I was half a block from the new rail trail in Waltham. It isn’t officially open yet, though people are already using it. 

I encountered a girl about 8 years old, headed home from the rail trail, riding alone. She had a very nice bike for an Internet purchase: in her size, and made for comfortable travel, rather than for acrobatics. The bike had derailleur gears, aluminum rims, and direct-pull hand-lever-operated  brakes. A kid could grow as a cyclist on this bike, with guidance. 

The girl was having trouble mounting and dismounting. We started a conversation and I coached her on that. I handed her my business card. She could show it to her mother, and maybe I could help her mother teach her? But then I noticed: neither of the brakes was working. The cables were not installed properly.

The most common kind of serious bicycle crash for young children is to ride out into the street and get hit by a car. It could be due to not noticing an approaching vehicle –  or to brakes that don’t work. 

I asked the girl for permission, got out my tool kit  and went to work on her brakes.  The cables were in a tangle, iIt took some time,  but I got the brakes working properly. 

I asked, “who assembled the bike?”

“My Mom.”

“There’s nothing wrong with your Mom, but that is a job for a bicycle mechanic.”

I showed the girl about not using the front brake too much. 

We parted. I rode home without going to the gym.

What lesson does this encounter hold? 

On paths and in parks especially, you’ll see many people – children and adults – riding bicycles with serious safety issues. It may distress you, as it does me.  

How to deal with this? 

Might a Karen, there’s a word for it, have called the police on me as a predator? When I described my encounter to my wife, she reminded me that two adults always had to be present in a Sunday School class in our church, in case of such complaints. Point taken, I hadn’t thought of that, but then we were out in the open with people going by. That assuaged my wife’s concerns.

I am not going to let myself be consumed with fear about a favor I do anyone in good faith, in plain view of passersby. But I wish now that I had not been in such a hurry to get home. If I had walked home with the girl, I could probably have spoken with her mother face to face, gone on to offer more coaching, become a family friend….

People’s attitudes about accepting help differ. I have helped a couple times on CRW rides to straighten bent chain links, allowing the riders to complete their day of riding – description  of the technique is in this article.  I have lost count of the number of flat tires I have fixed – other people’s and my own. I have straightened bent derailer hangers, adjusted brakes…I could go on. The tool kit offers a great way to connect with people when used in the right context. 

Indeed, context matters. My assistance has usually been welcome, or politely declined – “all set” –, when the bicycle was disabled. Offering help to someone who is still able to ride is trickier, and I often avoid it. 

But this was my first interaction with a child whose bicycle put her in serious danger. It was a learning experience for me. I missed out on making it the best experience for the child, and learned how I might do better next time.

Beyond that, community events – bicycle rodeos and the like – offer an opportunity to address bicycle maintenance where more people are available to assist, and in a more impersonal context. So, do consider setting one up in your community. 

By Coach John Hughes

I was 46 when I bought my home in Boulder, CO in 1995 and the heating and cooling systems were like a cabin. When it was cold I chopped wood and built fires in the wood stoves. When it was hot I opened both low and high windows to increase the airflow. About 10 years ago my wife and I decided that getting up when it was only 50F in the house and building fires wasn’t tolerable any more so we put in heat in each room. This year we’ve decided that 85F in the house is too hot and we’re putting in air conditioning next week. As we age we feel less tolerant of the heat. But is loss of heat tolerance inevitable with aging?

Epidemiological Studies

Data collected across large samples of the older population show a correlation between age and hot weather and more heat-related illnesses and deaths. “Older individuals, regardless of how one classifies ‘old’, are the most rapidly growing portion of the population. Statistics from heat waves and other morbidity-mortality data strongly suggest that older persons are at greater risk of developing life-threatening manifestations of heat stress such as heat stroke.” Heat Tolerance, Thermoregulation and Ageing

However, the data are for the general population. It’s not clear the extent to which these heat-related problems are due to chronological aging or due to other factors. These variables change may change with age, and could affect heat tolerance independent of chronological age.

1. Sedentary lifestyle. In the general population physical activity decreases with age. This contributes to the next five factors.
2. Decreased aerobic capacity (VO2 max).
3. Your body dissipates heat via two basic mechanisms: 1) greatly increasing blood flow to the skin and 2) producing and evaporating sweat. Decreased aerobic capacity means decreased blood flow and therefore less cooling.
4. Physical changes such as decreased lean body mass and increased fat tissue. The basal metabolism slows by about 2% per year and this combined with less physical activity results in weight gain.
5. Increased prevalence of chronic diseases. Decreased physical activity also increases the occurrence of hypertension, heart disease and diabetes.
6. Increased use of prescription medicines. The chronic diseases are often treated with medications that reduce heat tolerance, e.g. diuretics, vasodilators, beta blockers.
7. Chronic poor hydration from not drinking enough and/or increased fluid secretion by the kidneys.

If you keep exercising you can greatly reduce the effects of these factors.

Heat Dissipation During Exercise in Warm Conditions

Some physiological changes that affect heat tolerance are inevitable with age:

Decreased cardiac output. How much blood the heart pumps decreases by about 30% between the ages of 20 and 80. Cardiac output is a function of heart rate and stroke volume, how much blood your heart pumps per beat. While your maximum HR inevitably declines, through exercise you can maintain your ability to sustain a reasonably high HR and slow the decrease in the elasticity of your heart, which is what reduces stroke volume.

Decreased skin blood flow. Skin blood flow is 25-40% less in older athletes. The reduced flow is due to changes with the blood vessels in the skin. Staying very fit does not prevent the skin from aging.

Sweating rate. Compared to younger equivalently fit athletes, most older athletes have lower sweating rates. Although the same number of sweat glands are activated each gland produces less sweat. Genetics plays a large role in determining sweating rate and there is wide variability among older athletes. Decreased sweating is more of a problem in hot, dry environments than in humid ones.

Bottom Line

The bottom line is good:

• As athletes get older the capacity to sweat declines although there are exceptions. This does not mean that older athletes are less tolerant of hot conditions.
• Older athletes can acclimate just as well as younger athletes.
• The ability to exercise in hot conditions is primarily a function of physical fitness, especially VO2 max, rather than chronological age.
• One caution is that the sensation of thirst diminishes with age. For athletes the general recommendation is to drink to satisfy thirst but not more because drinking too much fluid risks diluting the blood sodium to a dangerous, potentially fatal level. For older roadies be sure to drink enough whenever you are thirsty. For more information see my column 12 Hydration Myths.

Much of this information is from The Older Athlete: Exercise in Hot Environments.

My eBook Anti-Aging: 12 Ways You Can Slow the Aging Process includes information specifically for older cyclists on all of the different physiological changes with aging and how you can mitigate the changes. The 106-page eBook is available for $14.99

Summer Bundle for all roadies regardless of age.
The 65-page summer riding bundle includes four eArticles:

1. Cycling in the Heat, Part 1: Ride Management is 19 pages and covers how to acclimate to hot conditions, how to train in hot months, what to wear, eat and drink, how to cool down if you overheat, and how to deal with heat-related problems.
2. Cycling in the Heat, Part 2: Hydration Management is 21 pages and covers how to determine how much you should drink depending on your physiology and sweat rate, how best to replace your fluids and electrolytes, the contents of different sports drinks, how to make your own electrolyte replacement drinks, how to rehydrate after a ride, and how to deal with hydration-related problems.
3. Preventing and Treating Cramps, 10 pages. A detailed look into the causes of cramps, prevention techniques, and tips (both on-bike and off-bike, including photos) for breaking and flushing cramps.
4. Eating and Drinking Like the Pros, 15 pages. What pro riders consume before, during and after a stage and the benefits for cyclists at all levels. Eating and drinking like the pros offers recreational riders the same nutritional benefits, which you can customize to your own needs at a fraction of the cost of commercial sports food and drink, if you choose to make our own. I worked with a professor of nutrition and an expert on hydration and electrolytes (both experts are cyclists) in creating recipes for both sports drinks and food.

The cost-saving bundled 65 pages of eArticles Summer Riding are just $15.96 (a $4 savings).

Erik D'Entremont and Mark Nardone ran the Climb to the Clouds Century on Saturday June 10, 2023. We ordinarily provide a photo record of the event, but breaking precedent, we are reporting Erik's report to the CRW Board. It goes without saying, the century is a complex undertaking as evidenced by the elaborate number of steps involved and the work that was generated. The Club owes Erik a pat on the back.

WheelPeople Editors

By Erik D'Entremont

Dear Board, 

Here is my Climb to the Clouds recap, and yes, it’s long, for a reason. 

 Wow! Rosalie and Susan, I am so appreciative of your effort and volunteerism on the Climb to Clouds Ride after party. I was very worried about you and Susan. When I was out riding century sweep with a VIP CRW member and very dear close friend Ms. Dayle Aqualano James. We got caught in 2 rainstorms and took cover with Larry Kernan’s riding group at Berlin Farms. I tried to reach out to Susan while waiting under cover to check in but wasn’t able to connect. 

I am glad that tent covered you and the party was still able to be successful. Thank you for the positive and constructive feedback on food ordering. I am glad the after party went well and we had enough food for our members at the end of the ride. Cutting a pickle lengthwise into quarters is a handy skill to have, I did the first jar myself! 

If you’ve’ ever wondered, here is what it takes to make the Climb to the Clouds Century successful.  Just remember, “volunteer!” 

  

 

• Read here about my paid coaching life for an update coming soon: https://www.jedendurance.com/success-stories 

  

Then I went to bed as I had to get up at 6AM to be in Springfield at an Ironman 70.3 water-stop to support my athletes as Coach Erik and network for my foundation Manny Tubes  http://267foundation.org/ all day Sunday. 

Here is what our efforts resulted in making the Climb to the Clouds successful for CRW. 

The Climb to the Clouds statistics are as follows: Revenue $2920.00 

Registered riders: 237 

Checked in Riders: 144 

Not Checked in 83 

Guests 7 

Virtual Riders 4 

I had a mostly lovely day (barring the rain) riding with my friend Dayle, catching up with lunch at the Mountain side Café, sharing memories of CRW centuries we road together in, hearing stories of Covid survival and laughing in the rain. (We like pina colada’s and are not into yoga…) We very much intentionally needed our personal time together to catch up, it had been almost a year since we saw each other, Thank you Larry for reading the room and giving us the space we needed. 

The club made arrangements for a memorable bench to honor Sandy Gray, a CRW past president. The bench is located on the Bruce Freeman Bike Trail. It is at mile marker 6.8 between Evans Way and Greenwood Road - just north of the Chelmsford town line and Greenwood Road in Westford. Harriet Fell was lead on this project.

This article was written with the help of news accounts, government publications, and the gracious assistance of Richard Williamson, a member of the Board of the Bruce Freeman group.

by Eli Post

An Impressive Bridge

Those of you that regularly travel on Route 2 in Concord have witnessed a remarkable construction project. It is one of the longest rail-trail bridges in the country and connects dozens of towns so that you can travel 25 miles (50 miles round trip) and that distance will increase as more segments of the Bruce Freeman trail are completed.

Let’s start with a bit of history.

Back in the 1870’s when the Framingham/Lowell railroad  was being designed and constructed, the railroad engineers had to figure out how to bring the railroad across one of the major highways, in particular, Route 2.  The obvious solution was to construct an at-grade crossing and supply a traffic signal.  That solution worked for about a century.

However by the 1970’s, traffic on Route 2 increased by a large factor and an at-grade crossing was no longer going to be acceptable.  A conductor swinging a lantern to lead freight cars across the highway was a very poor solution.  The obvious good solution was to build a bridge.  Obvious, but not straightforward.  The Mass. Department of Transportation MASSDOT had a host of problems to deal with including an ongoing traffic mess on Route 2 at the nearby rotary in front of the Concord prison.  On top of that, a proposal to construct a rail trail (the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail) was moving along in the planning process and the BFRT would cross Route 2 just west of the rotary.  The MASSDOT folks decided to tackle the situation head on by totally redesigning the rotary and including the BFRT crossing in the overall design.  After lots of planning and traffic  modeling, the whole complicated thing was shelved, including the BFRT crossing.

By 1980, the BFRT had been largely designed, cleared, funded, permitted, constructed etc. from the south all the way north to a point just south of the Route 2 crossing in Concord.  A similar story applied to the BFRT coming from the north through Acton.  The dilemma to connect didn’t go away.  How do you bring the BFRT across Route 2?  On a bridge, of course, but not so simple.  The original 1870’s alignment of the rail bed crossed Route 2 at the shallow angle of about 30 degrees.  A little trigonometry tells us that the bridge would have to be about twice as long as it would otherwise have to be if it were to cross perpendicular.  

Nevertheless, good luck and good fortune prevailed, and by fall 2022, the bridge was done.  In spring 2023, the only remaining tasks are finishing the approaches. You may be able to ride across the bridge by the time you read this. As in any large construction project, there were technical problems to overcome. We share one with you. In Acton, the MA State Police horse farm sits alongside the west side of the BFRT.  In fact, the farm's pasture overlaps the BFRT right of way.   No one wanted to see collisions between cyclists and grass-munching horses!   So the pasture's east-side fence had to be moved a short distance to the west.

You can enjoy a long ride on a traffic-free Bruce Freeman bike path starting in Chelmsford at the northern end or Acton at the southern end. Or park by the prison and take a joy ride over the bridge. In any case make sure you enjoy a remarkable edition to our biking opportunities.

by John Springfield

In spite of all my bicycle touring in New England, I realized that few miles were ridden in Maine.  So in May 2023 I departed on a week-long tour of Maine.  The plan was to start at the southernmost town of Kittery, head north, then east to Augusta, and back to Kittery.  As it turned out I finished in Portland.  The steep hills were not very friendly to my 74-year-old body.

 

However, I had near perfect weather (50-70 degrees), no rain, and no flats.

 Scenic view on highway 5, just north of Limerick

Going north from Kittery I went through an area where towns were named after countries and European cities:  Norway, Mexico, Peru, Denmark, Paris, etc.

The farms gave way to forests and vacation camps.  Some towns are so small that they lacked general stores and gas stations.  I was always on the hunt for local diners, but alas, they were sometimes non-existent. Photo on left is a local river with rusty colored water.

 

One of the highlights was the town of Wilton (on Wilson Lake). It was here that the Bass Shoe Company prospered until 1998.  The factory is now an Italian eatery (where I had a great meal).  Bass was known for it's rugged outdoor shoes and boots. But it was also the company that "invented" the penny loafer.

After visiting the state capital in sleepy Augusta (it was early Saturday morning), I headed south along the scenic and historic Kennebec River.  The river is quite wide, allowing ships from Boston to navigate their way north.  Along the river is Bicycle Route 1, the Eastcoast Greenway, and the Merry Meeting Trail.  Some of these routes are on traditional bike paths, while others are on paved and dirt roads. 

 On the top a view of Downtown Winthrop. At the bottom is Lake Wilson. 

But the many steep hills were taking their toll, so I decided to head to Portland and call it quits.  However, I really enjoyed a long break on the Brunswich town green. It has a food trailer with some of the best hot dogs and lobster rolls around.  It was here that I conversed with a couple of other bike riders.  One noticed my classic Rivendell touring bike.  And I noticed he had a Burley tandem.  Made my day.

By Doctor Gabe Mirkin

The old guideline recommending 30 minutes of exercise three times a week just isn’t enough, according to the latest research. Athletes know that they need to work out every day, and all people who just want to stay healthy can benefit from the same type of exercise program.

Why Athletes Need to Exercise Every Day
Knowledgeable athletes train by stressing and recovering. You have to damage muscles to gain strength and enlarge muscles. You become more fit by taking a hard workout and then resting for a day or two than you will by exercising at the same leisurely pace every day. Every muscles is made up of thousands of fibers like a rope is made of many strands. Every fiber is made up of blocks called sarcomeres that fit end to end like a row of bricks. Sarcomeres butt upon each other, end-to-end, at Z-lines.

Muscles contract only at each Z-line. When you exercise vigorously, you damage these Z-lines and when they heal, the muscle fibers are stronger. So all athletes train by stressing and recovering. On one day, they take an intense workout to damage their muscles at the Z-lines. On the next day their muscles are sore and damaged and they exercise at a relaxed pace. When the muscles are healed and the soreness lessens, they take their next intense workout.

If athletes exercise at low intensity during the healing phase of the Z-lines, their muscle  fibers will become stronger than if they rest. If they exercise vigorously when their muscles are sore, they are likely to tear them and be injured. Athletes need to exercise every day to gain maximum strength.

Why Non-Athletes Also Should Exercise Every Day
Forty percent of North Americans die of heart attacks. One of the common causes of the arterial damage that precedes heart attacks is a high rise in blood sugar after meals. Blood sugar always rises after meals and because of faulty lifestyle habits, most North Americans have blood sugars that rise too high. Resting muscles remove no sugar from the bloodstream, but contracting muscles remove sugar rapidly from the bloodstream and can do so without even needing insulin. This effect is strongest during exercise and diminishes to no benefit after about 17 hours. If you want to use exercise to help control blood sugar, you need to do it every day.

An Exercise Program for Everyone
Because a person with blocked arteries leading to the heart could suffer a heart attack during exercise, please check with your doctor before starting a new exercise program. Whatever activity you choose, try to exercise every day. If you are just starting out, spend about six weeks at a slow pace until you are comfortable in your activity. Then you are ready to alternate more intense days with easier workouts.

Intense Days
Stress refers to intensity, not the length of your workout. You can gauge the severity of the stress by the amount of burning you feel in your muscles during exercise. interval training means that you start out slowly, pick up the pace, slow down immediately when your muscles start to burn, recover by going very slowly for as long as you want, and then pick up the pace again.

On your hard days, warm up by going very slowly for five to 10 minutes. Going slowly at the start of a workout warms up muscles to help make them resistant to injury. If your muscles still feel tired or heavy, do not try interval training. Exercising with tired or sore muscles can cause serious injuries.

After you warm up, pick up the pace gradually until you feel burning in your muscles and immediately slow down. Then go at a very slow pace until the soreness goes away, your breath returns to normal and you feel recovered. How long it takes to recover is irrelevant. You take your next faster pick up when you feel that you have recovered, not from any preset time. Then pick up the pace until you feel burning again.

If you don’t compete, you do not ever need to go at 100 percent intensity. People who are just starting to do interval workouts should pick up the pace only slightly and not become short of breath. Slow down and get out of the burn as soon as you feel it. As soon as the burning and fatigue go away, and you are not breathing hard, try to pick up the pace again. In early workouts, you may only be able to do one hard pickup after you have just started your workout. Do not start your next pick up until your legs feel fresh. As soon as your legs start to feel heavy, stop the workout. Trying to increase the pace when your muscles feel sore and heavy invites injury.

Easy Days
The day after your hard workout your muscles will probably feel sore and you should take an easy workout. If the discomfort does not go away as you continue to exercise, is worse on one side of your body, or increases as you exercise, stop exercising immediately. You are injured and continuing to exercise will delay healing. Take off the next day also if you still feel sore in one place. If you feel better as you exercise casually, continue to exercise until you feel any discomfort or heaviness. Always stop every workout when your muscles feel heavy or sore. Keep on taking easy days where you exercise at low intensity until you feel fresh again. Do not do another hard workout until the soreness in your muscles has gone away.

My Recommendations
Every healthy person should try to exercise every day. You will gain a much higher level of fitness by “stressing and recovering”. That means to exercise more intensely on one day, feel sore on the next and go slowly. Only when your muscles feel fresh should you try to pick up the pace again.

This aricle is courtesy of Dr.Gabe Mirkin MD https://www.drmirkin.com/

By Nancy Clark

Many athletes, coaches, referees, and support crews—including parents, partners, and siblings—spend a significant number of mealtimes on the road, traveling from one sports event to the next, be they training sessions, regional games, or national tournaments. With food budgets being tight and encounters with affordable (but often less-healthy) foods being ubiquitous at every gas station and convenience store, the ease of grabbing questionable sports meals and snacks can weaken one’s will to search elsewhere for higher quality sports foods.

Without a doubt, eating a decent sports diet becomes a challenge when healthful food options are scarce. Regardless, athletes who travel by car deserve to be optimally fueled to be able to perform at their best. That means being creative—and also planning ahead.

The following tips can help you eat a reasonably well-balanced diet from a gas station or vending machine— or at least, eat better than if you were to have no plan at all. Bigger gas stations and those closer to a main highway or busy towns tend to have more offerings of nutrient-dense foods than the small-town gas station’s shelves stocked with just a few bags of pork rinds and some candy bars. Hence, you (or the team’s driver) want to keep nutrition in mind when planning fuel stops. Getting gas sooner at a bigger station is better than later, if later will be in the middle of nowhere.

Eating well on the road

 For the purposes of this article, I offer the following definition of  “a well-balanced sports diet”:

A “well balanced sports diet” includes foods from at least three—ideally four—of these food groupings:

1. Fruits and vegetables for vitamins and minerals to boost your immune system and help keep your body healthy.

2. Grain-based foods to fuel your muscles and your brain.

3. Protein-rich foods to build and repair your muscles.

4. Calcium-rich foods such as dairy, to enhance bone-health and also offer high-quality protein for muscles.

Please note that “well balanced” applies to your entire day’s eating, not just one meal or snack. Hence, a good breakfast, lunch and dinner can help offset a sub-optimal snack. “Balance” also includes calorie-balance. By reading the calorie information on food labels, you can determine the portion-size that fits into your calorie budget, so you avoid undesired weight loss or gain. Approximate targets could be at least 600-800 calories per meal for a female athlete and 800-1,000 calories per meal for a male athlete.

The following list of some typical gas station snacks organizes the foods according to nutrient profile. Using this template, you can manage to pick a somewhat balanced, halfway decent sports diet when you are on the road (or at a vending machine). Remember: at least three of the four kinds of food for meals and two kinds of foods for snacks.

1. Fruits and     Vegetables	2. Grain-based foods	3. Protein-rich     foods	4. Calcium-rich foods       / Dairy **
Orange Orange juice 100%-Fruit Juice   Apples Applesauce   Bananas   Raisins   Canned fruit (peaches)   Salsa V-8 juice	Triscuits, Wheat Thins Graham crackers   Peanut butter crackers BelVita Biscuit   Popcorn/ SmartFood Corn chips, Tostitos scoops Pretzels   Clif Bars Powerbars Nature Valley Granola Bar   Muffin (bran, corn) Cereal cups (Raisin Bran)	Peanuts Almonds Mixed nuts Trail mix Sunflower seeds   Jerky (beef, turkey)   KIND bar Clif Builder’s Bar Canned tuna Egg, hard boiled   Milk Yogurt Cheese	Milk, dairy or soy   Flavored Milk: Chocolate Strawberry, Vanilla   Yogurt, regular Yogurt, Greek   Cheese sticks Cheese sticks Pre-sliced Cheese (Individually wrapped)

** If you are lactose intolerant, sharp cheddar cheese is virtually lactose-free— but you might want to travel with Lactaid™ Pills. Other low-no lactose, calcium-rich foods such as soy milk or calcium-fortified orange juice can be harder to find on the road. Calcium-fortified almond milk might be available—but other than calcium, almond milk is a nutrient-poor choice.

Turning convenience foods into a balanced sports diet

     When you are at home, a well-balanced diet that includes all four food groups in a meal might look like this:

            Granola + milk + banana + hard boiled eggs

            Whole wheat bread + turkey + cheese + lettuce/tomato and an apple

            Brown rice + chicken + broccoli + yogurt (for dessert)

 

When you are eating from the gas station/vending machine, your balanced diet might resemble these tasty (hahaha) meals:

            Orange juice + popcorn + protein bar + yogurt

            Salsa+ corn chips + almonds + milk

            Banana + peanuts + Wheat Thins + cheese sticks.

 

Fresh fruits and vegetables can be the hardest foods to find when you are on the road. You are unlikely to suffer from malnutrition if your traveling diet is low in fruits and veggies for a week or so because your body stores vitamins in the liver. A healthy person’s liver stores enough vitamin C to last for at least three weeks. That said, you will want to re-stock your liver's diminished supply when you return home! Make an extra effort to enjoy fruit smoothies, colorful salads, and generous portions of fresh fruits and veggies whenever you get the opportunity to do so.

 

Traveling with a cooler

A wise alternative to “dining” at gas stations is to travel with a cooler (and re-freezable ice packs). Stock the cooler with sandwiches (PB&J, ham & cheese, hummus), water, 100% orange juice, chocolate milk boxes, yogurt, and other wholesome sports foods. A pre-trip food-shopping spree at a BJ’s, Costco, or large supermarket can save a team a lot of money. Portable food suggestions include:

Perishable items: Oranges, fruit juices, baby carrots, peppers (eat them like apples); yogurt, sliced cheese, milk chugs; ham, hard boiled eggs, hummus; tortillas, wraps, mini bagels.

Non-perishable items: tuna in pop-top cans, small jar of peanut butter, almonds; granola bars, graham crackers, Fig Newtons, dried fruit, V8 juice.

Note: your teammates might come begging for food from your personal cooler, so pack extra —or better yet, encourage them to pack their own food!  

  

The Bottom Line

Performance starts with good nutrition. If you make the effort to travel to sports events, you want to make the effort to eat a winning sports diet. No amount of training will over-ride a poorly fueled traveling athlete.

 

 

Nancy Clark, MS, RD CSSD (Board Certified Specialist in Sports Dietetics) counsels active people at her private practice in Newton, MA (617-795-1875). For more information about Nancy Clark’s Sports Nutrition Guidebook and her online workshop, please visit nancyclarkrd.com

-- Nancy Clark, MS RD CSSD Sports nutrition counselor Nancy Clark's Sports Nutrition Guidebook, 6th Edition www.nancyclarkrd.com (Books, presentations, blog) Twitter: @nclarkrd Office: 1155 Walnut St., Newton Highlands, MA 02460 Phone:617-795-1875 "Helping active people win with good nutrition." Secretary, Professionals in Nutrition for Exercise and Sport (PINES) www.PINESNutrition.org