I’m not sure many of you have heard that Cliff Bar has a new product out called “Cliff Blok”. I had my first taste of the lemon/lime one this morning after my swim, and then had some again during my run. (2,000 yards + 40mins of running)
Do you like Cliff Shots?
I found the brown rice base of the cliff shots to be intolerable. I just couldn’t stomach the stuff, so I was very hesitant to try the new cliff blocks as they are brown rice based.
The Taste: Quite good
The lemon/lime flavor I had, was fairly good. They seemed to mask the brown rice base nicely, and it was probably more enjoyable than most gels I’ve had.
The Texture: Gummi Bears
Yup, if you’ve had gummi bears, that’s exactly what these things were like. My thoughts are, how do you take these things with you. You’d think they would have the soap bar effect and be all slippery while you are sweating on the bike or run to try and fiddle with.
Conclusion
I’ll try them again. I might put them in my run special needs bag on an IM distance just to give me something different to ingest, but I’m not sure I’d use them for anything else. I am still searching for the perfect Gel that isn’t gutbomb sweet. These things, if taken extensively, seem like they would kill your stomach over an IM bike/run distance if it was all you used.
Haven’t tried the Clif product, but Sharkies are similar, and I love those. Plus they stick in your teeth, so there’s always a little something for later.
Somehow, I got some in the mail from Clif a few weeks back. I tried them yesterday on a long ride. I had the strawberry ones and liked them a lot. I was able to rip a little hole in the packet and squeeze them out through there, but the packaging seems like it could be improved. I can see how the bloks could have ended up gluing the pocket of my jersey shut if they spilled out. Strawberry flavor was tasty!!
Got some of the red ones as samples in the mail and they tasted pretty good and went down easy.
I’m not sure there really is a market for this product though. Clearly they are targeting the space between the gel and solid food, especially for people with GI/digestion issues, but I would think these individuals are pretty picky about what “works” for them. I didn’t notice anything special nutrition-wise that would make me go with blocks over bars, although the blocks were more palatable than gels which I view more as a necessary evil. Also, definitely not something that you just tuck in a pocket in your tri suit on the run.
Personally, I like Clif Shots. I also got the bloks in the mail and I thought they were terrible. Weren’t to bad at first and then the after taste was awful. I wasn’t a huge fan of the sports drink they sent me either.
I’ve tried the Clif Blocks and the Sharkies and like them both a lot. The Clif Blocks seem to be a little softer. As for the packaging, my very organized friend Ann, takes the blocks and puts them in “press & seal” plastic wrap, so that each block has it’s own jacket. Seems a bit labor intensive to me. I had a pack of them in my pocket for my long run yesterday and it was pretty easy to just get one out at a time. They seem to have some sort of substance on them so they don’t stick together.
I’ve carried these on long runs and prefer them much more than gels. With a gel, I need a drink. With the Shots, I pop one per mile on my long runs and don’t feel like I need a drink with them.
I might have to try the sharkies… I thought it was an interesting idea. I did feel like I still needed water with them. I’m not 100% certain I would/could/should replace gels with these things though.
I really like them. I have tried all the flavors and like the cranberry razz the best. I was training for a century and had a lot of gi distress. I was really worried on ride day what I would do. I had tried everything during the long training rides and nothing worked, consequently I would get behind in my nutrition.
I found some at the Expo, (trisports.com had a booth) and bought a box. I used them during the ride and had no troubles what so ever. It’s really interesting though, because I managed to eat everything else that they had at the rest stops with none of the problems I had during training.
They are convenient in that you could cleanly carry a couple packs worth in a single baggie and take however many bloks you wanted without having to carry partial gel-packs around ozing all over the place. Gel flasks are nice, but are sometimes hard to know exactly how much you have consumed.
Well, they definately gave me a big pickup this morning after I went pretty hard on the swim. We did a short 40 min run, and were doing some pretty danged fast fartlek runs. I think gels would have picked me up in the same way though. They’ll be interesting to experiment with for sure.
Someone said something about cost… they really aren’t that much more expensive than Gels, cause you’d take probably the same amount relative to any given time.
Right, and I don’t know how many times I’ve had tons of gel goo at the bottom of my bentoo box from not quite getting all the gel of out the packet. So, gels aren’t exactly the perfect solution either. Maybe it’s even less messy, and less trash, to just deal with one ziplock baggie instead of a bunch of empty gel packets, or as you said, a gel flask.
I really don’t see a need to narrow down to a 33 calorie increment, as I remember it was 3 bloks to 100 calories. Personally I have never eaten half of a gel pack.
I see your point on the gel flasks but I normally get it pretty close. I kind of look at a gel flask to be consumed over 3 hours.
Have you worked with the blocks and seen the same results as you have with gels? I haven’t really trained with them at so I’m not sure if you get the same energy boost. I’d be interested in your opinion.
Haven’t used the Bloks, but was just offering a scenario where they might be useful. There are lots of people who can’t stomach gels or who do not use a whole packet or who want more than one packet and in those cases it might be useful. When compared to bars, they’ve gotta be MUCH nicer in the cold weather as they shouldn’t get rock hard!
They are supposedly the exact same “stuff” as the ClifShots, so there ought to be the same sort of boost associated with them. The only additional ingrediant I think is some coconut oil on the outisde to keep them from sticking. That might possibly disagree with some folks’ GI systems.