LA FRINGALE - WHAT TOUR DE FRANCE CYCLISTS ARE EATING
La Grand Boucle has just set off, beginning two weeks of racing and craving. I went for a ride with the pros and discovered that the pro cyclists' menu is no longer just pasta and protein.
Cyclists have had a special relationship with food and dining ever since the Tour de France made its debut in 1903. This was before food and drink sponsors, before electrolytes and carbs and hydration were a consideration. Instead, Grand Boucle competitors used to take part in what they called “café raids”, stopping at route-adjacent bars and restaurants (starting with the race’s grand depart at Le Reveil Matin, a cafe in the town of Montgero,n just outside Paris) for tacitly sanctioned looting sessions, clattering into cafes on their cleated shoes and nicking bottles of beer, slurps of wine, ice lollies (see pic above) chocolate, pop, pastries and sandwiches to stuff into their jerseys.
This went on well into the 1960s with proprietors standing back as the riders helped themselves to their supplies, knowing that they could send a bill to the organisers after the event.
The 1904, Tour de France winner Henri Cornet's daily food rations on the long, 400 km plus stages were 11 litres of hot chocolate, four litres of tea, and champagne, and 1.5 kilograms of rice pudding. In the early days of the Tour steak with rice was a breakfast staple (1909 Tour de France winner François Faber was known to eat six onglet steaks in one sitting) and pain-numbing booze was preferred because, bizarrely, right up until the 1970s, cyclists believed excessive intakes of water to be a slowing disadvantage.
French cyclist François Faber drank so much champagne during a stage win in the 1914 Tour de France that he actually zig-zagged across the line, or the Alps stage of the 1957 race when maillot jaune rider Jean Forestier collapsed after necking a whole bidon (water bottle) full of champagne.
The other theory was…no liquids. At all. “Driest is fastest” said the five times Tour winner Jacques Anquetil back in the 1960s…when the major carb source was cakes and croissants.
So, with the Tour de France 2024’s grand depart having taken place this weekend, middle-aged men in Lycra and keen amateurs will be watching closely, trying their very best to imitate the pros’ riding styles, combativité aggression, their hosiery and ocular affections, the aerodynamic contre-la-montre competitiveness and weight-saving technical set-ups during their own, 35 mile Sunday morning pootles to the pub.
What bikes are the pros riding? What kit are they wearing? Is everyone using those fancy new electronic gear shifters… and disc brakes? What drugs are they on? And what are they eating?
After years of grim, gastro-drudgery, Cycling sustenance has gone all posh, the old Sky team’s details-centric famous ‘marginal gains’ philosophy giving way to a more holistic, body and mental health orientated approach. Fuelling up and carbo loading are out and interesting, uplifting dishes made from fresh, seasonal, local ingredients, are in.
The theory behind this theory is both mental and nutritional; the life of pro cyclist is hard, brutal and boring. With the average domestique needing to burn between 4,000 and 5,000 calories during each stage of a race, a measured diet of carbs and proteins can get relentless and repetitive. “The same thing day after day can get dull and even demoralising,” ex pro cyclist-turned global events CEO Justin Clarke, now behind the luxe cycling travel brand Leblanq. “The new thinking is - turn that chore into a pleasure. Understand that the body craves variety, taste, flavour and reward.”
Informed by science, portion, nutrition, mindfulness, chefs now come at the sport from an experimental, intelligently indulgent angle. “That way you get a more contented, physically and mentally fitter cyclist – pro or amateur.”
This all seems like a long ride away from the baked beans-on-toast, endless cups of sugary tea and fistfuls of gelatinous Haribo that fuelled my own slow-turning cycling engine when I began riding a road bike back in the 1980s…and a huge, Alpine leap from the white bread, red meat and pasta that dominated the pro diet before marginal gains, science, dietary mindfulness and kale became fashionable.
Why are food choices so important in cycling? You need the correct fuel to stave off the dreaded “bonk”. Cyclists talk about this all the time. Go on a 60km Sunday morning ride or a big Alpine adventure and you'll hear middle aged men in Lycra obsessing over it. Careful, you don’t want to bonk. Where’s Simon? We dropped him a few kilometres back…I think he’s bonked.
It might sound like a lot of fun, but bonking is not at all pleasant. It’s a grisly, debilitating and soul-destroying form of utter brokenness, a profound hypoglycemia that happens when you haven’t eaten and irrigated correctly.
Without sufficient carbohydrates and glycogen, blood sugar and energy levels plummet, your body all but shuts down and your pedalling engine quickly gives up. There’s a loss of muscle strength, a sudden fade away of power. Coordination and balance become tricky, you get muscle tremors and cramping in your legs. At worst you’ll feel dizzy and disorientated, like you are running on empty.
Leave it any longer and visual and auditory hallucinations will kick in. You want sustanence and irrigation. Quick. No wonder the French call it Fringale…literally, a craving.
A Proustian push on the pedals takes me back to a Gaelic fringale in July 1998, the day before Jan Ulrich, Marco Pantani and Chris Boardman would set off on what will prove to be the most controversial event in Tour de France history. (The notorious Festina doping scandal where nine members of the French team were found guilty of using performance-enhancing EPO). I went on a ride - a mini etape if you like - with Irish legend Stephen Roche and as we ascended the lung-busting, seven and a half kilometre Wicklow Gap, the man who won the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia in the same year (1987) revealed the technical details of his pre-race fuelling process. After an unsupervised, all you-can-eat carbo-load at the hotel breakfast buffet, young Stephen would grab a handful of bread rolls. “I’d hollow them out and fill up the insides with jam or marmalade and wrap them in paper napkins.” These proto-energy bars would be then squished down a bit and shoved into Roche’s jersey’s back pockets, to be consumed as the race progressed.
This was an era when cycling was both sport and suffering. The diet was frugal and joylessly pragmatic. Feeling a bit tired on those last few miles of a stage? A few gulps of scientifically sanctioned energy-boosting, (flat) Coca-Cola, administered from the team car window would sort you out.
On the last few vertiginous klicks of the Wicklow Gap ascent Roche and I spotted a pub on the side of the road. We stopped for a pint of the cold and malty black stuff and kidded ourselves that Guinness must contain some element of isotonics.
Sprint forward to 2012. Now I am mamilling around the hills of Pollenca, northern Majorca, as a (very slow) guest rider training with Team Sky – future Tour de France champions Bradley Wiggins, Chris Froome and Manx Missile / Olympic Gold medal winner Mark Cavendish all present. At breakfast, the hotel kitchen staff have been given the day off and Sky’s specialist sports chefs have taken over. As part of team manager Dave Brailsford’s revolutionary “marginal gains” philosophy (everything from the pros’ mattresses to their choice of socks, judiciously considered) fat and carbohydrate intakes, levels of hydration and protein are closely monitored, the team’s racing diet based around raw vegetables, ripe fruit, beansprouts, goat’s milk, onions, figs, carrots, beetroot and miso.
Instead of a serve-yourself carbo-buffet, every wiry domestique, plucky sprinter, muscular climber, lithe time-trialist and rail-thin puncheur has his own bespoke plate of food, meticulously, strategically tailored to personal requirements as indicated by a forensically examined, post-ride urine test on the previous day.
The dietary regime is rigorous, disciplined, ascetic. If a rider’s skin is looking dry, a nutritionist will feed him fish oil. For the road, drinks are individually concocted for each professional, energy bars custom made by the chef and then re-wrapped up in branded packaging to keep the sponsors happy. There are no jam or marmalade butties at the Team Sky breakfast table. No cans of fatty, sugary-black Coca Cola in the team bus cooler either.
Some 12 years on, following the new creative, holistic cycling-thinking and ingredients-centric, broadened palette, former cooks from Heston Blumenthal’s burners have migrated to cycling. Henrik Orre, once head chef at Stockholm’s two Michelin-starred restaurant Mathias Dahlgren-Matbaren now works for Team Ineos while Emma Grant of Noma’s experimental kitchen in Copenhagen, is established as cook and nutritionist for cycling teams such as Team Saxo Bank – Tinkoff Bank, Team Dimension Data and Orica-Scott.
This breed of velo-chef creates a logistically savvy, fine fuel diet designed to optimise mental and physical health, FTP (Functional Threshold Power), recovery times and performance (“Mood swings, crashes and rainy days, all have a knock-on effect,” Emma Grant has said. “Riders are only as professional as their emotional states will allow them to be.”
Measurement, temperature, weight, viscosity are all meticulously monitored. precise detail at a higher level of cooking is easily applied to the science of sports nutrition. Adapt Michelin-starred cuisine for cycling and it will have massive benefit to performance.
“If you eat good food you will be a more fulfilled, happier person and a better sports person,” says Justin Clarke. “It is a legal high.”
AN (AMATEUR) CYCLING MENU
BREAKFAST
A sugary little croissant or pain au raisins or two. (‘It’s not the pastries that hurt,” Belgium’s five times Tour winner Eddy Merckx once said. “It’s the climbs.” ) Coffee is macchiato or espresso, no milky cappuccinos or Grande lattes. A water chaser (and a pre ride wee) is recommended
ON THE ROAD
Commercially available gels and energy bars are useful but expensive. A jersey pocket-full of Haribo, or one of mum’s flapjacks will do just as good a job - share the rider next to you as you spin. A banana is always a good idea. Make your own electrolyte drink for the bidons with water, salt, orange powder.
FOR LUNCH
Everything you put in your mouth has to be French / Belgian European (or Scandinavian) so stodgy English and American foodstuffs are not acceptable. Baguette au jambon beurre (ou fromage). Pasta sal e pepe. Rice, tuna, and chicken. No pies, chips, burgers or curries. The road cycling fraternity thrives on hunger and craves a lean, light, lithe physique. It’s a constant battle with vanity and efficiency, vitality and gastronomy, style and sustenance.
SOFT DRINKS
Step away from the Monster and Tango. You’ll be having a dinky little glass jar of peach juice or a nicely designed can of Pellegrino Limonata or, somewhat perversely, a classic Coca Cola (Again, strictly bottles only).
STOP LOCATIONS
Avoid pubs and coffee chinese. Indy cafés with outdoor seating (where you can keep an eye on your bikes and prevent small children from clocking your offensive MAMIL package) are preferred. Orangina-liveried parasols a definite bonus.
APRES BALADE
If anyone fancies a beer at the end of the ride, whilst still in Lycra, they are allowed one only (maybe two) and it has be a cold but diddy serving of a bottled European variety – San Miguel, Moretti, Peroni - no ugly pints of foamy British bitter or American gas.
“11 litres of hot chocolate, four litres of tea, and champagne, and 1.5 kilograms of rice pudding.” I’ll have what he’s having!
This is fascinating, Simon. I’ve often wondered what fuels those elite cyclists up those mountains.