Ah, water. Good ol’ H2O. Do you ever want to know the best taste in the world? Get a bottle of water after riding hard for 3 to 5 hours. It’s the best perk me up.

While water tastes so good after all that effort, you shouldn’t allow yourself to get to that point if you want to perform at optimal levels throughout your ride. If you follow proper endurance cycling hydration, you should generally feel good after your ride. Thirsty, but not famished.

How Much Water to Drink during Endurance Ride?

Failing on proper endurance cycling hydration will definitely lead to a drastic decrease in your overall performance as well as feeling fatigued faster. 

The question really shouldn’t be about how much water should you consume, but how you should consume fluids as a whole before, during, and after your ride!

Before the Ride

You would want to stock up with fluids even before you get on the saddle. Drink approximately 350 to 500 ml of water hours before you ride. Ideally, it’s about 6 hours before, so get that big gulp of water before going to bed the night before. 

Then an hour before pedalling, get another 350 ml of water in you. 

During the Ride

Bikes are equipped with bottle cages for a reason: so you can always come packing with fluids and get a drink anytime even while moving (preferably not while descending at 50 km/h).

The actual amount of water you need would vary depending on yourself. Everyone is different and unique. But as a general range, you will need about 1.2 to 2 L of fluids for every hour you are riding.

After the Ride

Drinking after is part of endurance cycling hydration. Getting the right amount of fluids in you is a great help when it comes to recovering from the ride. Along with general health as well.

Again, the actual amount will differ from person to person, but it is generally advised to get 1.5 L of water for each KG of body weight lost. 

An important aspect here is to NOT drink all that at once. Spread it out over the next couple of hours.

What is the Best Hydration Drink for Cycling?

Today, there are tons of options for endurance cycling hydration. Each of these is designed for specific things to help your body cope with your performance. 

Good thing most bikes have two bottle cages. This means you can get at least two types of drinks as you pedal along!

Electrolyte Drinks

Sodium, potassium, and many other types of electrolytes play a huge role in your performance and endurance. These get used up as you sweat. While some can retain more than others, generally speaking, a cyclist would need to replace these lost electrolytes as they ride and can be done as part of endurance cycling hydration.

This is why electrolyte drinks are specially formulated to give back the fluids that you’ve lost in a low to no carbohydrate package! 

That last part is important because more often than not, you already had a meal plan to fuel up on carbs. Or maybe you are also packing gels or bars on your ride specifically for carbs. An electrolyte drink would be a good partner with that.

Drink Mixes

Another popular type of hydration for cyclists come in tablet forms or even mixes. There are two main types of these mixes:

• Hydration Mixes
• Carb Drink Mixes

Hydration mixes contain little carbs, instead of concentrating on giving you electrolytes. Carb drink mixes are the opposite as they are focused on providing you with carbohydrates to fuel up.

What’s great about the mix or tablet form is that you can carry water bottles in your cages and have tabs in your pockets. You can then mix it on the go depending on your needs. 

Water

Then of course there is water which some would argue is the best hydration drink for cycling. That is true in many ways, especially on the fact that this is a basic need to live. 

If you only have a single endurance cycling hydration option, this would most probably be the best choice, then supplement it with gels, bars, and sodium.

Listen to your Body; and Thirst

It is also important to realise that we all need different plans for endurance cycling hydration. As mentioned earlier, things can differ based on your body. 

On top of that, cycling conditions can change. If it’s hot, then you’ll sweat more and need to drink more. Then there are certain differences to riding styles as well which may lead to differences in when and how much to drink.

The fact of the matter is, you can use these as a guide to see how much you need to drink. But, you ultimately need to learn to listen to your body and what it needs. The next step is to try to get your body what it needs even before it asks for it. 

In this way, you will be able to save a lot of time and improve your overall performance on endurance rides.