Lactate testing: cycling's new obsession (and why you probably don't need it)

Suddenly lactate is everywhere. Pros are pricking their earlobes between intervals, the Norwegian method and “double threshold days” dominate the podcasts, and there are now pocket-sized meters so you too can find your threshold “like a World Tour rider”. The honest question is a different one: do you need lactate testing to ride better? If you're not a pro, almost certainly not. And the best bit: what's really holding you back is far cheaper to fix.

Lactate isn't the villain of the story. It's fuel.

For decades we blamed lactate for sore legs and that “burning” feeling in the muscles. It's not true. Lactate isn't toxic waste: it's energy. Your body produces it when it burns carbohydrates quickly, and it recycles it constantly. The heart, the liver and the muscles themselves reuse it as fuel. In fact, tracer studies measure exactly this: as soon as you raise the intensity, that lactate is oxidised again and powers the effort. Like in a good kitchen, it isn't waste, it's a by-product that gets used in full.

What we call threshold is simply the point where you produce lactate faster than you can recycle it. Knowing it precisely lets you fine-tune your training zones. That's why it's useful. The question isn't whether the data is useful, but who it's useful for.

Why the pros do test it

A pro trains 25-30 hours a week, makes a living from scraping out an extra 1% and has a physiologist interpreting every measurement. For them, knowing whether their first threshold has shifted after a base block changes the sessions for the following weeks. The data is valuable because there's a huge structure around it to turn it into decisions. That's the context amateurs don't have, and that's absolutely fine.

Why you probably don't need it

If you train 6, 8 or 10 hours a week, your room for improvement isn't in nailing your threshold to the decimal point. The very scientists who study this keep saying it: for amateurs, much of the improvement comes from factors outside the lab. Training consistently, week after week. Sleeping. Adding some strength work. And the one close to our hearts: eating enough carbohydrates.

Here's the awkward paradox of amateur lactate testing: people spending €300 on a meter to discover they're performing below their potential, when the most likely cause is that they went out for four hours with two bars in their pocket. The sensor confirms there's a problem. Food solves it.

The awkward fact almost nobody tells you

There's a number that should come up in every one of these debates and never does. Studies show, again and again, that amateur cyclists take in between 40 and 60 g of carbohydrates per hour on rides whose effort demands 90 g or more. That's a huge deficit, and it's the real limiter of endurance performance long before any threshold.

The consequences? Predictable: power fades in the last third of long rides, intervals lose quality after the first block and you recover worse between sessions. It's not your threshold. You simply ran out of fuel.

And the physiology of how that fuel gets in is exactly what we're good at: glucose is absorbed by intestinal transporters that saturate at around 60 g per hour. Add fructose, which comes in through a different door, and your body can reach 90 g/h. That's why the 2:1 ratio of glucose to fructose isn't marketing: it's the mechanism science recommends for getting more energy in without wrecking your stomach.

The useful version of lactate, no needles required

If you take away just one practical idea, make it this: the harder you push, the more carbohydrates you burn. If fuel doesn't go in at the rate your effort demands, the system collapses, you bonk, and your “threshold” for the day sinks without any sensor having predicted it. The rule that really moves the needle for amateurs doesn't come from a drop of blood, it comes from your pockets: 60-90 g of carbohydrates per hour on long efforts, from a source your stomach can handle hour after hour.

Real food: the oldest performance technology there is

Our stance at PICO isn't anti-science, it's exactly the opposite. The science is crystal clear: carbohydrates are the number one nutritional factor in endurance performance. We just add one thing: those carbohydrates can come from real fruit, with a ratio close to 2:1, sea salt and nothing else. Energy that performs just as well as the lab-made stuff and that you actually fancy eating in hour four. Which is precisely the difference between fuelling properly and getting by on sheer willpower.

Before you spend €300 testing your blood, try something cheaper and with more impact for two months: fuel your long rides properly. The Tasting Pack (4 flavours, €10.90, free shipping to Spain and Portugal) costs less than a handful of test strips. And if you want the full plan for using those carbohydrates on race day, carry on with our guide to what to eat in a gran fondo.

Enjoy the ride,
Lucca