Feeding the Molar Rollers

Feeding the Molar Rollers is full time job.......and their
diet is very specific and very cariogenic - designed to give them instant energy when they need it, plenty of salt when they are dehydrated, low GI carbs to fuel them and milk - gallons of it, when they finish the day - to replenish their muscles, so that they can cope with the endurance challenge and them punishing theirbodies day after day after day. Every morning around 7am the support team are at the supermarkets, shopping for stores, then making sandwiches and packing up the cars and trucks with cool boxes....cans of drink, boxes of fruit and endless packets of crisps.

Meanwhile the molar rollers saunter down to breakfast around 8am and at breakfast the rollers

fall into two distinct groups

Group 1 - eat exactly as the sports med ireland pro instructs them, muesli, porridge, brown toast, scrambled egg

and a tomato. Group 2 - hide sausage under their toast - or is that fried bread? bacon under their scrambled egg, substitute the tomato with a hash brown and skip the porridge and the muesli ;)))

And then there is Viorel of course who eats five times as much as everyone else and including a box of cornflakes as his appetizer, before pulling his chair unto the breakfast buffet itself.

Then its time for the first ritual of the day, as the rollers fill their water bottles with energy drinks or water and some 'special' powder that is supplied by Brian O'Connell, and I am still not sure what it is - but they all crave it and line up at his door every morning for him to supply it.

Then they fill their pockets with fig rolls ( a molar roller staple core food item) for their morning break, and then it's ready for off.

On arrival at lunch, its a sad sad moment for dentistry......and hurts us dentists in the support

team to the core - as we hand out the instant sugar fix required on arrival

The minute they secure their cycles, the rollers run for their can of coca cola and the sweetie of the day - and as those sugar depleted cyclists arrive at the lunch stop having burned hundreds of calories en route - woe betide anyone who gets in their way as they power towards their sugar fix......they can't even think straight till they have restored their glycogen balance!!!!-

it's those groups again Group - 1 those who fight for the jelly babies

Group - 2 those who choose scramble for the wine gums

Then its sandwiches, crisps (the saltier the better) and bananas all round

The lunch stop is found by the scout and can vary from a leafy park, to a car park....just one essential requirements from the rollers....a toilet over all other requests!!!!

Finally, the end of the cycle, at the final destination of the day requires another ritual - 'the arrival food fest' before the room keys are allocated and the cyclists run for their showers

This is the time for another erosion assault.....

Can of coke and instant sugar fix - it's those groups again this time jaffa cakes v banana bread followed by glasses and glasses of milk......has to be ice cold - or again you can watch those sugar starved rollers scowl;((((

Then it's smiles all round, and the first group to arrive,once satiated, chat about the days events, the size of the hills, tattoos, the drivers that hooted them, and the drivers that gave them the fingers.......and then it's time for the next group to be applauded as they arrive, and the same all over again for the third group.

The food is important for the cyclists, the sports pro has it spot on - the requirements for the endurance athlete are very specific, and would be considered an unhealthy diet to an inactive person....but this fuel is powering the molar rollers every day and repairing their tired muscles, and its amazing to see them injury free and managing to cycle long distances day after day - thats the power of the 'right food' at the right time it seems.

Lets not mention the liquid fuel in the evenings shall we ;)))) lest our sports pro is listening

Alison