How Many Carbs Per Hour Do You Actually Need? The 30/60/90g Guide for Runners and Cyclists

Ask ten endurance athletes how much they eat during a session and you'll get ten different answers — most of them guesses. Yet carbohydrate intake is one of the few performance levers you fully control, and getting it right is simpler than the confusion suggests. It comes down to three numbers: 30, 60 and 90 grams per hour. Here's how to know which one is yours.

Carbohydrate is your body's premium fuel — the energy source it reaches for when you're working hard. But you can only store enough for roughly 90 minutes to two hours of intense effort. Beyond that, performance depends on what you take in. Measuring intake per hour, rather than per gel or per session, gives you a target you can plan around and rehearse — whatever the distance.

Think of it as three tiers, matched to how long and how hard you're going:

30g per hour — shorter, steadier efforts (roughly 1–2 hours)

For sessions around 60–90 minutes, you often need little to no fuel. Push toward two hours, or ride/run at a decent clip, and around 30g/hour keeps energy topped up without overloading a stomach that's working hard. One 30g gel like Rosso — or a couple of our 22g gels — covers this comfortably.

60g per hour — the endurance baseline (roughly 2–3 hours)

This is the workhorse target for most endurance sessions and races in the two-to-three-hour range: marathons, long sportives, half-distance triathlons. At 60g/hour your gut can keep up using glucose alone, though a dual-source blend still helps it sit lighter. Two Rosso gels an hour hits this exactly.

90g per hour — long and hard (roughly 3+ hours)

For the big days — ultras, gran fondos, iron-distance racing, fast marathons — 90g/hour protects your pace deep into the effort. This is only possible with dual-source carbs and a trained gut. Three Rosso gels an hour gets you there.

Here's the science that underpins the whole framework. Glucose is absorbed by a single transporter in your gut that saturates at around 60g an hour. Take on more glucose alone and the excess just sits there, causing bloating and nausea. Fructose uses a completely separate transporter — so combining glucose and fructose (dual-source carbs) lets you absorb up to 90g an hour. That's why every Veloforte gel is dual-source: glucose and fructose from real fruit juice, the natural way to reach the top of the range.

Our new Rosso energy gel was built to make carbs-per-hour planning effortless. Each gel delivers a boosted 30g of natural dual-source carbohydrate plus 150mg of sodium, so the three tiers map straight onto it:

• 30g/hour = 1 Rosso gel

• 60g/hour = 2 Rosso gels

• 90g/hour = 3 Rosso gels

No mental arithmetic mid-race, fewer gels to carry, and a real raspberry recipe that's Informed Sport certified and made without artificial sweeteners or colours. Our 22g gels — Tempo, Primo, Riba, and caffeinated Doppio and Desto — round out the range for finer adjustments and different flavour and caffeine needs.

• Match the tier to your session: length and intensity first.

• Factor in your size and pace: bigger, faster athletes tend toward the higher end.

• Respect your gut: if 90g feels rough, train up to it gradually rather than forcing it on race day.

• Always rehearse: practise your target in training so it's automatic when it counts.

Know your number. Fuel to it. And let real carbs carry you further.