Before you begin a cycle ride, be sure to look up your route so you know what to expect, how long it is and the intensity level. It doesn’t take long to do, so during a lunch break or after a game of partypoker , check out some routes and become familiar with them. Adventurous cyclist might enjoy off-road dirt tracks which allows them to cycle between the trees, ride over plants and tree roots and perform little jumps over ditches or race through puddles. It can be dangerous, but if you are used to these conditions and your tyres are sturdy, you should be fine.

Other cyclist might prefer the special tracks, designed for easy riding. They are normally gravel or concrete which makes it smoother to ride across. Easier routes tend to be flat paths, whereas a challenging route will take you uphill a lot.

It is always important to keep hydrated during your ride, so a bottle of water in your rucksack is recommended. Also, before you begin, it is important to have energy supplies with you. The best type of food for this includes bananas and energy bars. The night before you go cycling, try to have a big pasta dinner. Overnight this will digest and become fuel, ready for you to burn in the morning.

While you are cycling around the countryside, you are likely to spot some country pubs. If you are cycling for fun with some friends, it is a good excuse to pop in for a nice pub lunch and a drink. However, if you’re at nearing a race or really pushing your training you can use it to top up your water supply and perhaps get a piece of fruit.

The people who run the Ironman show (WTC) had recently placed a ban on compression socks – but it does look like they’ve reversed that decision for Kona this year.  The issue was that they thought athletes were gaining an unfair advantage by covering up their respective age categories.  Sounds like they have eliminated the ritual of putting the athletes age on the back of the calf altogether.

One final thing – if you want to use them purely for recovery you can find the perfect pair for ~$15 at your local pharmacy.  These types tend not to be designed for training (thick cotton soles etc.) but if you want them solely for recovery,  they are way cheaper than the $50-$75 price tag found on compression socks in sports stores.

Here is a great article on compression socks from wisegeek.com.  In fairness to them we’ve only put half the article up here in the hopes that you’ll read the rest on their site.

Compression socks are specialized hosiery items designed to provide extra support and increased blood circulation for their wearers. Some compression sock manufacturers may also use the term support socks to describe their product. Compression socks are not to be confused with traditional dress socks or non-compression diabetic socks, although they may look similar. The main purpose of compression socks is to provide graduated pressure on the lower leg and foot. Traditional dress and athletic socks offer some degree of compression, but not enough to be considered therapeutic.

The key to understanding compression socks lies in their graduated pressure application. Throughout an average day, the body pumps blood to all of the extremities as equally as it can. However, gravity often causes blood to pool in the lower legs and feet, causing circulatory problems such as edema, phlebitis and thrombosis. At the very least, all of this blood pooling can cause fatigue and leg cramps. Elevating the legs and feet may alleviate the pain temporarily, but it often returns after a few hours of constant standing or walking.

This is where the use of compression socks can be extremely beneficial. Compression socks use stronger elastics such as lycra, rubber or spandex to create significant pressure on the legs…


Read more at: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-compression-socks.htm

On that note – today’s tip is about driving to your race.

With the cost of air travel – plus the need to pack your bike, driving to a race can be a great option. If you need to power-drive be sure to get in plenty of rest stops. And not just a quick ‘out of the car and pee’ rest stop either, take the time for a good 10-15 minute jog every few hours. Playing hacky sack is another great way to get the muscles and joints moving. Hacky Sack will loosen up the tight driving muscles. Hip flexors in particular.  Kick a soccer ball or lie on the grass and stretch.  Anything to shake out the legs every few hours.

And we’re off…check back soon or sign up for email/RSS notification to let you know when we’re back in action.  Plenty of old tips to browse through as well.

And the ZIPP Wheel!!!  Jonathan Staats doesn’t seem to be claiming his win.  We’ll give him another couple weeks to contact us.  After that we’ll give the wheel to whoever has the matching seconds for the female winner at Ironman Pucon 70.3.

tips (at) irontritips.com

You can pick two of these tools up at most bike stores.  The other is your standard Vice Grip or Monkey wrench.

Tool #1. Chain Whip – Used to hold your cogset in place while you unscrew the lock ring.

Tool#2. Lock ring remover (A.K.A. freewheel remover) No need to get fancy.

Tool#3. A wrench to turn the lock ring remover.

The best angle to get all this going is to be standing over top of the wheel with the wheel resting on your shins, cogs facing out.  Put the lock ring remover into the lock ring and put the chain whip on.  Putting the chain whip on can be a bit confusing your first time.  Your goal with the chain whip is to hold the cogs in place and keep them from spinning when you turn the lock ring.  Then simply unscrew the lock ring with the wrench while holding the cogs in place with the chain whip.

Set it up like so – but vertical so you can put some body weight on the wrenches.

Now you can pull off the gears.  Unless you’ve got the sweetness that is SRAM Red they will most likely be individual.  If they’re not individual you can go a step further (if you want) and unscrew the little pins holding everything together.  This makes life so much easier for cleaning.

Putting them back on is easy, simply pretend you’re in kindergarten and line up the shapes and sizes.  You’ll notice the inside of each cog has some notches.  There will be one big notch that you need to line up with the big notch on your wheel.  Apply one at a time with a spacer in between each.  Or, if you were one of the few that got a Darth Vader sticker in Kindergarten you can probably hold everything together as one piece without spilling, then transfer the whole shabang.

Tighten your lock ring again(snug, but don’t jump on it) and you’ll be good to go….  adjusting your derailler not included. Questions welcome.