{"id":809389,"date":"2026-07-18T05:02:35","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T05:02:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809389\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T05:02:35","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T05:02:35","slug":"what-do-tour-de-france-riders-eat-for-breakfast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809389\/","title":{"rendered":"What do Tour de France riders eat for breakfast?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once upon a time, the Tour de France breakfast table looked very different. Speaking in 2012, Eddy Merckx recalled a fearsome pre-race eating regime that sounds unthinkable today.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d have a small breakfast with the cheese and the ham, and then steaks. It was horrible, but you know, you had to eat steaks to be strong,\u201d he told<\/a> Stuart O\u2019Grady.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s an extreme example, but things have changed rapidly even in the modern era.<\/p>\n

In 2024, Tadej Poga\u010dar described<\/a> his first season with UAE Team Emirates in 2019 as \u201calmost amateur\u201d. The Tour de France champion said breakfast consisted mostly of \u201cwhite pasta, white rice, and maybe an omelette.\u201d<\/p>\n

Modern Tour riders still need to eat huge amounts, but what they eat, and how they eat it, is now guided by science rather than superstition.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s on the menu in 2026?
\n\"HowA modern pre-race breakfast is high in easy-to-digest carbs. Olive Magazine<\/p>\n

In short, a modern pro rider\u2019s breakfast consists of lots (lots!) of carbohydrates, carefully managed protein and food that\u2019s easy to digest.<\/p>\n

As outlined in a 2022 blog post<\/a> by then EF Education-EasyPost nutritionist, Will Girling, \u201cstarting the day right, nutrition-wise, is extremely important for any bike race, especially one that lasts three weeks\u201d with riders eating \u201cseveral hours before the stage starts\u201d to allow time for digestion.<\/p>\n

That means plates piled with \u201ccereals, oats, pancakes, rice, bread, and berries\u2026 as well as eggs, avocados and high-protein yogurt.\u201d Breakfasts focused on \u201cplenty of protein and loads of lower-fibre [and] easy-to-digest carbohydrates\u201d.<\/p>\n

Carbohydrates really are king
\n\"XORRETFood fatigue can set in if you’re slurping gels every day for three weeks. Tim de Waele\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Nutrition writer Mark Bailey explains<\/a> that Tour riders \u201cneed to eat plenty of carbs at breakfast time,\u201d often mixing sources such as \u201ccereals, porridge, rice, bread, quinoa, pancakes and pasta\u201d to avoid \u201cfood fatigue\u201d across three weeks of racing.<\/p>\n

Just as importantly as keeping taste buds entertained is tailoring their breakfast to the stage ahead.<\/p>\n

For example, before a big mountain day, teams will tailor breakfasts lower in fibre.<\/p>\n

Bailey notes that fibre \u201changs around in the gut for longer, and can make a rider feel heavy or bloated when riding uphill.\u201d That\u2019s not what you want when giving it all on the slopes of Alpe d\u2019Huez, so riders often switch to easier-to-digest foods.<\/p>\n

Protein still plays a role, but in a much more controlled way than in Merckx\u2019s era.<\/p>\n

Girling notes that options such as omelettes are \u201ca great source of protein and easy to digest,\u201d helping support muscle repair without overloading already gastrically-challenged guts.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cAre you even a cyclist if you don’t like coffee?\u201d
\n\"\"Coffee is still the cyclist’s best friend. David Stockman\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Finishing touches will include fresh juices for micronutrients and, almost universally, coffee.<\/p>\n

As Girling puts it: \u201cAre you even a cyclist if you don’t like coffee?\u201d<\/p>\n

Girling told<\/a> BikeRadar that he\u2019d known riders to go to extremes in pursuit of a high-quality caffeine hit, bringing their own espresso machines or AeroPress setups on Tour.<\/p>\n

More from the Tour de France<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Once upon a time, the Tour de France breakfast table looked very different. Speaking in 2012, Eddy Merckx…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":809390,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,635,82],"class_list":["post-809389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=809389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/809390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=809389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=809389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=809389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}