Follow On From 4+ Hour Nutrition Strategy

I've been doing 4 hour workouts with water plus NUUN (which has no calories), gels and clif bars.   It has been working well, and it will be my nutrition for my HIM in July.

As long as you take in carbs, it doesn't matter their form (assuming you can digest them).

http://www.leppinsport.com/product.cfm?p=2

So those will be all good?

Do you need to take in electrolytes? Will this have them? Will this have enough salt/sodium in it?

Just thought I'd update on my first trial with el-cheapo Maltodextrin (it's actually the main ingredient in most gels and hi-calorie sports/energy drinks.)

I ordered 50 lbs for $57 including shipping from Honeywell online. It arrived in TWO days via UPS, and I didn't even ask for any special handling. Impressive. It comes it a big brown box, and the malto is in a big brown bag about 2 x 3 feet in dimensions.

The texture of malto is like flour, and it's not really sweet at all.  Dissolves fairly well, but to make thick goopy gels, you have to heat it. (I tried that.)

I kept it really simple on my 80 mile bike ride today:
- 3 x 22 oz bottles, each with water + 1 cup of maltodextrin (roughly 300-400 calories per the web.) I combined the water/malto in a pot, and added 1 packet of Sweet n Low just to give it some sweetness. Dissolves pretty easily (stirring required), stays clear and is not messy/viscous. 

I took in no solids on this ride. Only used the bottles for hydration + calories. It worked very well, in my opinion. Not a single hiccup. I am normally famished after a 4+ hr bike ride, even with a CLIF bar or sandwich on route, but with the malto, I felt no hunger at all after the ride. I think I got lucky with the amount of calories per bottle I need. I think it's an overall hypotonic solution, so I didn't need any extra pure water to quench thirst. Just drank it as I would water, and I felt fueled for the entire 4+ hr ride.

I don't want to make it sound like a magic bullet (it's not); it won't make you ride any faster unless you're bonking out at the end of your rides. However, I will be honest and say that I felt stronger today at the end of the ride than I ever have before - and I just bonked out on a 55 miler last week. I even cranked out an extra 5 mile hill sprint loop at the end just for kicks, and I was averaging 22+ mph on flats in the final 10 miles per my Garmin.

Best part, is that I'm home now, it's lunch time, and I'm not even hungry or dizzy. I actually feel, well, pretty normal. First time that's happened to me after a 4+hr workout.

I do have to add electrolytes, though - I think all that salt loss would become an issue later on, as my homebrewed malto has zero electrolytes added right now. 

I'd guess that the malto powder costs over 10x less than a commercial product. Hammer's perpetuem (a similar malto-based product) is $45 for 16 servings - I would have used 4 servings of this to get the caloric equivalent of my malto calories for my ride. My ride today would have cost me $10+ in Hammer Perpetuem if I used it to fuel!