Now I know the meaning of "BONKED"

[winjim]

I would suggest that if you are physically able to ride home and prepare a meal, you ain't bonking. Bonking as I understand it is more like what NormanD is describing, you literally run out of energy to do anything, accompanied by nausea, vomiting, headache and require immediate cessation of activity and intake of glucose. It's not just feeling a bit tired...

 

[the snail]

I would suggest that if you are physically able to ride home and prepare a meal, you ain't bonking. Bonking as I understand it is more like what NormanD is describing, you literally run out of energy to do anything, accompanied by nausea, vomiting, headache and require immediate cessation of activity and intake of glucose. It's not just feeling a bit tired...

This. What others describe is just over exertion/knackered legs, bonking is something else. I had it happen once after about 100 miles, not having eaten properly the night before or breakfast - nausea/headache unable to pedal more than a few hundred yards, plus I felt totally confused and disorientated. The surprising thing was when I made it to the next town and had pie and chips and a bottle of coke I felt fine, and did another 30 miles no problem.

 

[ayceejay]

Let's just say there is more than one way to bonk, I think hitting the wall is something else, having suffered both, you can actually run on through the wall as in my experience it is just a mental wall (what the heck am I doing to myself type of thing) the disorientation connected to bonking is a lack of oxygen in the brain and should be attended to immediately with glucose - nothing else as anything else will slow the absorption and you need it quickly you should eat your fry up or whatever after 15 - 20 minutes.

 

[NormanD]

"Hitting the wall in cycling"
Such fatigue can become seriously debilitating; in cycling, exhaustion can reach the point where the cyclist is unable to stand without the support provided by the bicycle. Symptoms of depletion include general weakness, fatigue, and manifestations of hypoglycemia, such as dizziness and even hallucinations. This condition will not be relieved by brief periods of rest.

 

[DefBref]

Yep thats bonking, from the same wikipedia page as normanD post above:

Etymology, usage, and synonyms[edit]
The term bonk for cycling fatigue is presumably derived from the original meaning "to hit", and dates back at least half a century. A 2005 video issued by the British Transport Films Collection contains several old films, one of which entitled "Cyclists Special", a color film produced in 1955, tells the story of a party of cyclists touring the English countryside. At one point they stop for refreshments and the film's commentator states that if they didn't rest and eat they would get "the bonk".[1]

The term is used colloquially both as a noun ("hitting the bonk") and a verb ("to bonk halfway through the race"). The condition is also known to long-distance (marathon) runners, who usually refer to it as "hitting the wall". The British may refer to it as "hunger knock," while "hunger bonk" was used by South African cyclists in the 1960s.

It can also be referred to as "blowing up". [2]

 

[ACS]

Last years Snow Roads Audax, 3km before Tomintoul I hit the wall, bonked, call it what you will it was most unpleasant. Heart rate suddenly went through the roof, vision went blury, energy levels became non existent, hyperventilated, I think you may be getting the picture.

Swerved into a lay-by, sort of throw myself on to a grass bank and lay there in a very bad way. After about 10 minutes I began to recover, the heart rate decreased and the nausea and stomach cramps subsided. I tried to eat something (gel and a bar thing) and used the last of my water (it was a very hot day +22 or so) in an effort to get it down and to try and gain some recovery.

Couple of minutes and it all came back again. Great I thought bonked and now totally dehydrated. Didn't recover; abandoned. A concerned couple swept me up and took me to the control in Braemar. For which I will be ever grateful.

The dangers of bonking in a very remote part of the Highlands are obvious and without the kindness of the couple from Aberdeen I could have been in a great deal of trouble.

To paraphrase Sergeant Phil Esterhaus "Lets be careful out there and look after one another"

 

[Dogtrousers]

Never happened to me as a runner or a cyclist. I go gradually through tired, very tired, knackered, to utterly knackered. But it's always a gradual process - and not reversible in the short term. Never a sudden "bonk" or "hitting a wall" or "blowing up", and certainly nothing that can be remedied other than by stopping. Just a long slow process of enfeeblement. A bit like life really.

 

[Sully]

For me it felt like my eyelids had weights attached to them, not in a tired falling asleep kind of way, it was a very strange sensation, and I did feel dreadful, if this is tiredness I pitty anyone who has "bonked" so an I missing something in my preparation because everything I do 40 + I get terrible "lactate" pain in my thighs, What du think ?

 

[Shut Up Legs]

While we're being pedantic, it's lactate, not lactic acid.

 

[Sully]

Amended ^