Not all gels are created equal

Many cyclists, both professional and recreational use energy products including gels. The reason for this is that the body needs a regular amount of carbohydrate intake per hour as its natural stores only last a limited time. There are many sources of fast releasing carbohydrates but the most common ones used in sports energy products are maltodextrin, glucose and sucrose. Enough of the science.

The reason for this post is that recently I bought a selection of gels. Whilst having a spare few moments I started reading the packets these things come in and I noticed something interesting. The amount of carbohydrates you get in each gel. This is an important factor in how good value for money a gel is. I've compared the gels to factor the cost per gramme of carbohydrate. The full results are below, but the best value was the ZipVit ZV7 and the worst value was the SIS Smart 1.

Another observation was, that gels containing caffeine varied considerably. For reference, a can of Red Bull contains 80mg of caffeine. One gel, the IsoGel+ from High5, contained as little as 30mg and at the other end of the spectrum, the ZipVit ZV7c, contained an impressive 160mg!

As an aside, the flavours and thickness of each gel can vary greatly. Some people will therefore prefer a product that is less value for money because they don't enjoy others.

Hopefully some useful information for product comparison there.



Product Name
Size
Carbs
Caffeine
Typical Cost
Cost per g (carbs)
ZipVit Sport ZV7 Energy+ Gel
60ml
51g
none
£1.20
2.4p
ZipVit Sport ZV7c Caffeine Energy+ Gel
60ml
51g
160mg
£1.50
2.9p
Lucozade Sport Body Fuel Gel
45g
30g
none
£0.99
3.3p
High5 IsoGel+
60ml
22g
30mg
£0.99
4.5p
Torq Gel Banoffee
45g
28g
89mg
£1.50
5.4p
SIS Go Gel
60ml
22g
none
£1.25
5.7p
SIS Smart 1 Gel
60ml
22g
50mg
£1.85
8.4p

9 comments:

  1. Very interesting analysis. I'd never thought to look at it that way. Now I need to run home and check the labels on my Hammer gel.

    Mike

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  2. That's brilliant stuff, that is Toby. As a diabetic, I worry about the sheer size of snacks - I was brought up to finish my mouthful like a good lad, but anything over 20g CHO is too much for us demics really.

    So I'm not typical here. I'd choose the High5 or SIS products for their portion size. I might ping to this post or quote it in future if you don't mind mate.

    Excellent analysis mate.

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  3. dwarf gel! arrghh. I wonder how that compares in carbs to say, dried fruit? Gonna try that one out next? ( I know, I could JFGI but I CBA ;) )

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  4. Dried fruit and some gels contain fructose. A natural fruit based sugar. The body doesn't absorb this as fast as glucose or maltodextrin that are most commonly found in gels.

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  5. Great post Toby very imformative mate

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great post mate very informative

    ReplyDelete
  7. Great post mate very imformative

    ReplyDelete
  8. Came here via Phil Connell, interesting post - thanks :-)

    ReplyDelete

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