You may have noticed that I haven't posted anything for a little while. I actually got a little discouraged a couple of times over the last few weeks. That first batch I made was great. Everyone that tried them loved them. Ever since then, however, I haven't been able to find the right balance of ingredients. I've been researching information about many of the energy bars that are currently on the market and have honestly become a little overwhelmed with all the different ingredient possibilities.
With that in mind, I have decided to do a little experiment. I have never really payed attention to how well any one energy bar boosts my performance, if any, over any other bar..until now. Starting this week I plan to ride twice a week. Once I will ride having eaten an energy bar 15 minutes before I start, and the second time I will ride not having eaten an energy bar at all. I'll list some of the details of the experiment in a second, but the hope is that each week I will notice, and document, the benefit I feel from using one specific energy bar over not using any. Each week I will try a new bar and record my results. After I find the energy bar that has given me the best results then I will use some of that bar's ingredients in my own.
Sound confusing? Good.
Here are the details of my experiment:
Independent Variable - Choice of Energy bar, or lack thereof.
Dependent/Responding Variable - Resulting performance
Constants - (These may be difficult) Route. Diet prior to excercise. Amount of sleep I get the night before. Amount of water I drink. Weather.
My belief is that if I eat an energy bar before I go mountain biking, then I will notice an increase in my performance. My hope is that I will be able to notice a difference between an energy bar that is made of natural, organic ingredients and one that is not.
I will post prior to riding which bar I have chosen and it's ingredients.