SiS Beta Fuel

[VTR1000SP2]

Got the SiS e-mail this morning that the product is now available on the US site. https://email.scienceinsport.com/2578-5UHDD-NHL58N-3A0IE9-1/c.aspx

Does anyone have any thoughts on this product?

While it's not the first 80g sports drink (Maurtens), it promises no gut issues. A decent read about sports drinks - https://www.pressreader.com/uk/cycling-weekly/20180628/282149292049155

[Bentley]

For that price it better include some Performance Enhancing Additives. I am unclear about this product but most of the research points at a low sugar content of any hydration product being important. I have used OSMO and it works well but about a year ago I started using Liquid IV and it works great. The taste is a little salty but with a Lemon-Lime flavoring you only notice the salt on the "back end". I would want to know more about this product before I plunked down that kind of cash for this product.

The Team Sky thing with all this marginal gains might be useful to the top 1%, but really that is waaay expensive.

Ray

[VTR1000SP2]

For that price it better include some Performance Enhancing Additives.

Code BETA25 gets you 25% off.

[ptourkin]

Got the SiS e-mail this morning that the product is now available on the US site. https://email.scienceinsport.com/2578-5UHDD-NHL58N-3A0IE9-1/c.aspx

Does anyone have any thoughts on this product?

While it's not the first 80g sports drink (Maurtens), it promises no gut issues. A decent read about sports drinks - https://www.pressreader.com/uk/cycling-weekly/20180628/282149292049155

I have ultra runner and endurance MTB friends who have been very happy with Maurtens. Both pricey but this science applies to using it as race fuel. Cyclists can get the calories in other ways for training.

[John H.]

I know that Sky says their guys use this- Question is- "Is it appropriate for you and your riding, riding goals, gut, etc."

It is a high calorie fuel- Not a hydration drink. Anything with that density of calories will not clear the gut as quickly as a 3% solution.

So- do you need it as a fuel?
As others have mentioned- It is an expensive fuel, so you would want to choose it over food if it was:
1.) Easier to consume- especially for events
2.) Works better for you than solid food

Or else why not eat food and drink a 3% cycling drink?

Other question is how your gut tolerates a fairly strong calorie bomb of maltodextrin and fructose?
Some will be fine- others not.

[benb]

Is this just more supplement company "science"?

If it's proprietary the research probably hasn't been released which means it was not a published paper in a journal and then reproduced by others... so not particularly sciencey.

As for the price.. since it's very basic ingredients I'm sure someone else will come along with a version at 1/10th the price shortly. They're not going to get a worldwide patent on mixing fructose and maltodextrin or anything. My guess is the fructose would seriously screw my stomach up. They're also mentioning pectin.. pectin bomb I'm pretty sure would also put me on the side of the road.

BTW to be fair the linked articles do not claim this stuff is actually "science".

[ptourkin]

Is this just more supplement company "science"?

If it's proprietary the research probably hasn't been released which means it was not a published paper in a journal and then reproduced by others... so not particularly sciencey.

As for the price.. since it's very basic ingredients I'm sure someone else will come along with a version at 1/10th the price shortly. They're not going to get a worldwide patent on mixing fructose and maltodextrin or anything. My guess is the fructose would seriously screw my stomach up. They're also mentioning pectin.. pectin bomb I'm pretty sure would also put me on the side of the road.

BTW to be fair the linked articles do not claim this stuff is actually "science".

There have been recent studies regarding a higher caloric intake and getting the gastric emptying numbers right for running. The various sub-two hour marathon projects by Nike and others are part of the impetus for this. For cyclists, who were already taking in 250-300 calories/hr via food and maltoextrin etc.. the efficacy of these products is less demonstrable.

Endurance runners typically took in far under the amount we do, especially in shorter distances like the marathon. They are now hitting 300-350 and more and products like this can benefit them. As I said, friends who are running 100s have good things to say about Maurtens.

For cyclists, unless you have a problem with less expensive nutrition, I'd say something like this would only be advantageous right now for racing when you really only want to fuel from the bottle.

[benb]

Sorry I didn't mean this stuff isn't important in big business sports.

Just commenting on the sciencey marketing. If they hire a legit scientist but then they just do some work on their own and never release any papers or anything it's not really science, it's right back to the same supplement nonsense.

E.x. Osmo. Hire a scientist, etc.. come up with some claims but if they're not publishing research and having others reproduce and affirm it then it's not really science.

Of course you can not hire any legit scientists and still pretend you are... no one is stopping any of these companies from doing it.

But yah, if runners don't eat and drink then getting them too might help.

"Our drink is a secret weapon based on our research and we're not telling anyone how we did it" is almost automatically not science.

[zap]

Edit

My guess is the fructose would seriously screw my stomach up.

Same. I avoid products with fructose.

[ptourkin]

Sorry I didn't mean this stuff isn't important in big business sports.

Just commenting on the sciencey marketing. If they hire a legit scientist but then they just do some work on their own and never release any papers or anything it's not really science, it's right back to the same supplement nonsense.

E.x. Osmo. Hire a scientist, etc.. come up with some claims but if they're not publishing research and having others reproduce and affirm it then it's not really science.

Of course you can not hire any legit scientists and still pretend you are... no one is stopping any of these companies from doing it.

But yah, if runners don't eat and drink then getting them too might help.

"Our drink is a secret weapon based on our research and we're not telling anyone how we did it" is almost automatically not science.

They are pretty much telling you that it's the same hydro-gel transporter principle that Maurten is using and that has been tested extensively. I'm sure it will be published in the near future.

I'm not defending SiS or telling anyone to buy it but people are oversimplifying this. This is a subject that is a hot topic in endurance sports and it is being studied in research institutions. If you follow any of the sub 2 projects, you'll find a lot. I doubt the Nike people will publish everything any time soon, but others will.

Overcoming the issues with gastric emptying rate has been the subject of research for a while now. This and Maurten are some of the attempts to solve it.