--- description: Journalist Nicolay Ramm recorded a video of his effort to match the 8000 daily calories of a Tour de France cyclist. It doesn't end well. title: Watch this Reporter Try to Eat Like a Tour de France Cyclist image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4607c294b7fbb855/69885a2c0b72e3408b6e4d8b/screen-shot-2015-07-09-at-12-01-47-pm.png?branch=production&width=1440&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Sports](/section/sports/) ## Sports Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Cycling](/tag/cycling/) ## Cycling Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Watch This Norwegian Reporter Try to Eat as Much as a Tour de France Cyclist by [Alissa Greenberg](/author/alissa-greenberg/) ## Alissa Greenberg Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jul 9, 2015 4:10 AM CUT  by [Alissa Greenberg](/author/alissa-greenberg/) ## Alissa Greenberg Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jul 9, 2015 4:10 AM CUT Ever wondered what would happen if you, an ordinary mortal, ate like the beautifully honed physical specimen that is a Tour de France Cyclist? Now you [don’t](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWgsLGJUOc0 "undefined") have to. Norwegian journalist Nicolay Ramm has recorded a video of his heroic effort to match the 8,000 calories Tour cyclists eat on every day of their punishing 2,100-mile, 23-day ordeal. It goes about as well as you might think. The diet itself isn’t so unusual — it’s the sheer quantity that does it. Take breakfast, for example. Coffee, oatmeal and eggs all sound like pretty standard fare. But in the first “stage” of his culinary Tour, Ramm also downs orange juice, and a smoothie, three ham and cheese sandwiches, four ounces of pasta, and a yogurt. For a snack, Ramm eats an apple and banana, a handful of nuts, and two energy bars, plus more coffee. (Tour cyclists, the video says, drink “enormous” amounts of coffee.) Then he adds what cyclists would grab during the ride: two croissants, two cans of Coke, seven energy bars, two energy gels, and a generous sprinkling of sports drink. That’s where the intrepid journalist can take no more. Trying valiantly to finish off the gels, he instead admits defeat, running to the bathroom with lunch and dinner still uneaten. He consumes 4,300 calories in just over five hours. Not even close. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3950601/tour-de-france-cycling-calories-diet-food/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3950601/tour-de-france-cycling-calories-diet-food/"},"headline":"Watch This Norwegian Reporter Try to Eat as Much as a Tour de France Cyclist","datePublished":"2015-07-09T04:10:22.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:21:55.351Z","description":"It doesn't end well","url":"https://time.com/3950601/tour-de-france-cycling-calories-diet-food/","keywords":["Cycling","Newsfeed","Sports topic","Race","bicycle","norway","tour de france"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4607c294b7fbb855/69885a2c0b72e3408b6e4d8b/screen-shot-2015-07-09-at-12-01-47-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alissa Greenberg","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alissa-greenberg/"}],"articleSection":"Sports","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4607c294b7fbb855/69885a2c0b72e3408b6e4d8b/screen-shot-2015-07-09-at-12-01-47-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2015-07-09 at 12.01.47 PM","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/sports/","name":"Sports"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/cycling/","name":"Cycling"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3950601/tour-de-france-cycling-calories-diet-food/","name":"Watch This Norwegian Reporter Try to Eat as Much as a Tour de France Cyclist"}}]}] ```