Long distance ride advice please?

[parrapower]

G'day, my names John Kitchener and ill be riding from sydney to the gold coast in support of the Indigenous Literacy Project.
Im a fairly inexperienced bike rider who has never ridden for more than 3 or 4 hours in a day. I will complete this ride in feb next year, i have bought a $1000 bike (which i hope is good enough) and have begun regualr training.
It would be greatly appreciated if anyone could give me any advice on training, diet, route, gear and supplies i should bring, rest days? time it will take, ANYTHING will be greatly appreciated!
Cheers,
John

[V17L]

Hi John
Good on you for giving it a go.

Whilst not exactly advice, it is inspriation for you

http://www.extremerolling.com/index.php ... emid=6[url][/url]

There a number of people who are touring and have talked about it in this forum. It's not to long, have a trawl and see what you find. i really like the touring rig post.
cheers
steve

[jonconell]

just remember to keep yourself always hydrated, thats the most important thing

[hartleymartin]

+1 - In Australia's climate it is especially important to think about hydration strategy. In warmer weather here, you ALWAYS end up needing more water than you plan for.

[parrapower]

cheer guys, what r everyones thoughts on gatorade? is it ideal or have a heard wrong?

[Colin_T]

Hi John

Good on you for helping out a good cause "Indigenous Literacy Project"
can you tell us a bit about it?

I can't help with the gatorade because I never use it. But as others have said it will be hot. February is summer and generally the hottest time of year. You will also be heading up the coast into Queensland and might have to deal with a cyclone as they occur around that time of year.
Get some sun protection and drink lots of fluids.

Depending on how much time you have will determine how far you have to cycle each day. I would ride about 100km per day and try to go from town to town. Try to cycle in the first half a day and then spend the second half a day in each place. Then you can do your bit of advertising and try to get some local support before moving on to the next town.

Good luck and keep us informed

[jet-ski]

Gatorade/staminade/powerade.... all good, get a plastic tub of the powder and then make it up about half as strong as the tub says to. Drink it first before the plain water, as while hot water is unpalatable, hot gatorade is even worse!!!

[il padrone]

Gatorade powder? Bleagh!

Unless diahorea is your thing. Stay away from it. It gives me serious tummy upsets during a ride. I only ever drink premixed Gatorade and only at the end of a ride.There's really nothing wrong with plain old water.

[Colin_T]

the drawback to only drinking water on a long hot ride (100km in 30C+ heat) is you can flush out all your salts & minerals and fall off the bike. Having a drink of some sort that helps repalce the lost minerals is recommended to help prevent you ending up in hospital on a drip.

[parrapower]

[quote="Colin_T"]Hi John

Good on you for helping out a good cause "Indigenous Literacy Project"
can you tell us a bit about it?quote]

Cheers Colin, basically, The Indigenous Literacy Project is a partnership between The Australian Book Industry and The Fred Hollows Foundation. They work to supply books and literacy resources to help raise literacy levels and thus improve the lives and opportunities of Indigenous Australians living in remote and isolated regions, where literacy levels are far below the average of Non-Indigenous Aussies.

And cheers on the 100kms a day advice that helps a lot, i have time on my side, so i will aim to do that and definitely raise money and awareness along the way.

[simonn]

the drawback to only drinking water on a long hot ride (100km in 30C+ heat) is you can flush out all your salts & minerals and fall off the bike. Having a drink of some sort that helps repalce the lost minerals is recommended to help prevent you ending up in hospital on a drip.

Electrolytes, they're what our bodies crave!

[parrapower]

Thanks for all the gatorade/water advice everyone!

I was wondering about food that is ideal whilst riding and any ideal stopping points or nice and scenic routes between syd and the gold coast, because i do want to enjoy the ride and from what ive heard, the pacific highway isnt the way to go.
cheers

John

[il padrone]

the drawback to only drinking water on a long hot ride (100km in 30C+ heat) is you can flush out all your salts & minerals and fall off the bike. Having a drink of some sort that helps repalce the lost minerals is recommended to help prevent you ending up in hospital on a drip.

Eat food, as well as drinking water.

[il padrone]

I was wondering about food that is ideal whilst riding and any ideal stopping points or nice and scenic routes between syd and the gold coast, because i do want to enjoy the ride and from what ive heard, the pacific highway isnt the way to go.

For foods, eat whatever you like to eat and that is convenient for you to prepare. Pastas, rice with curries or cous cous dishes are all very fine for the evening meal. Lunch it is usually best to do a filled roll, sandwiches or some soup and bread if you want to get the stove fired up. Porridge or muesli is good for the morning kick-start. In between eat plenty of snacks (I'm partial to cherry ripes, snakes, mixed nuts and any nice bakery goods found en-route

The Pacific Highway? Bleaaghhh!!

There are enough excellent side raods and back tracks along the Sydney-Brisbane route that you can travel all the way with only riding about 30 kms along the Pacific Highway. However it does help if you're cool about riding gravel roads and it will take you a good bit longer. But you're out to 'sniff the roses' aren't you?

[parrapower]

yeah im definitely not too worried about the dirt roads. Is there a site or something i can go on that will show me the best roads to travel? or should i just follow the coast as much as posible using the map? and obviously avoid the highway

[il padrone]

Do a search on bikely. I have my route from 1998 up there in three stages

Sydney exit

Getting to Port Macquarie

Port Macquarie to the border

[hartleymartin]

On the water/hydration front. I've found that Gastrolyte is good for putting electrolytes into you when you're really dehydrated. It's also good to have on long tours in you end up with a tummy bug (Mylanta also a good idea).

[WarrenH]

I like Gatorade. I buy the Lemon-Lime powder from Woolies or Coles. It is about S11.50 for a 560g tub which makes 8 litres.

A bottle of Gatorade is 600ml and costs about $1.70ea in a 4pack off a supermarket shelf, to being as expensive as $4.50 a bottle if you purchase one cold in a service station. Buying the powder costs about 85 cents to make 600ml. One level scoop of powder, the scoop comes in the tub makes 600ml. Buying the powder, the savings are substantial.

I've been using Gatorade for the past 16 months, only one 600ml bottle per ride and I haven't had a cramp in the last 16 months. No matter how much water I drink during a ride, at the end of a ride, later that evening, I get a cramp in my inner thigh or in my feet. Or I did until I started using Gatorade.

I can only say that the most tested sports drink on the planet and the official sports drink of the Australian Institute of Sport ... certainly suits my metabolism.

I've tried the other sports drinks but I find them to be too sweet and they give that sickly after feeling that artificial sugars leave you with.

Warren.

[hartleymartin]

Another way to keep your drinks cool is to put a clean cotton sock over the bottle and wet it whilst you are riding. The action of the evaporation will cool your drink.

[JustinS007]

I don't know why, but I feel like I have to 'buy' into the sports drinks debate.

Whether or not they will help you and whether or not you need them depends on what you are doing and the intensity at which you are working. If you want to work at a high intensity for many hours day after day and achieve good results then you must replace electrolytes & sugars (carbohydrates) during and post your ride. Whether you use gatorade, staminade, powerade, lucozade, some other 'ade' or gastrolyte etc., doesn't really matter. It will help you replace lost glycogen stores as a ride at high intensity progresses (after a few hours) and will help replace lost sugars in the muscles post ride.

If you potter along at whistling-dixie pace for 60km a day then you can eat meat pies and drink coffee - it won't make an ounce of difference. Well it might make a few ounces difference to the waist line.

There is absolutely a place for sports drinks, however I would think that about 95% or more of that which is consumed is of no benefit to the user as it isn't being consumed by the right people at the right time undertaking activity at the right intensity.

My 2 bob only.

[pawnii]

When crossed the Nullarbour desert from Adelaide to Perth in January i took 2 satchels of gastrolyte every day. I also took 2 salt tablets and 1 magnesium tablet daily.
I was travelling between 150-200km a day in 30+ heat so it was pretty intense and prolonged activity.

If you're touring in summer you'll probably find it's almost impossible to keep your water bottles cool. I rather drink warm water then warm anything else. Also, being able to squirt your water bottle to clean your hands, sun glasses, squirt your face other things is pretty handy.
If you do decide to add something to your water bottle then it might be a good idea to just add it to one and keep one with just water.

The reason i didn't take Gatorade powder is that i hate the stuff at room temperature. I got a bottle at almost every roadhouse