Making Your Ride Race Ready

Intro: This is the TriDot podcast. TriDot uses your training data and genetic profile, combined with predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to optimize your training, giving you better results in less time with fewer injuries. Our podcast is here to educate, inspire, and entertain. We’ll talk all things triathlon with expert coaches and special guests. Join the conversation and let’s improve together.

Andrew Harley: Hey, hey, hey! Welcome to the show today. I am psyched for this episode. We all love talking about bikes and we love talking about race day and today on the show, those two things will coincide as we talk about prepping your bike for race day. Joining us for this conversation is Coach Jeff Raines. Jeff is a USAT Level II and Ironman U certified coach who has a Masters of Science in exercise physiology and was a D1 collegiate runner. He has over 50 Ironman event finishes to his credit, and has coached hundreds of athletes to the Ironman finish line. Jeff, are you ready to talk about bikes today?

Jeff Raines: Absolutely. Let’s get rolling.

Andrew: Next up is Coach John Mayfield. John is a USAT Level II and Ironman U certified coach who leads TriDot’s athlete services, ambassador, and coaching programs. He has coached hundreds of athletes ranging from first-timers to Kona qualifiers and professional triathletes. John has been using TriDot since 2010 and coaching with TriDot since 2012. John, you just got a new bike and raced on it for the first time yourself. Tell us what you think of your new Argon 18,

John Mayfield: Man, it’s slick. It took a little bit of getting used to.

Andrew: Okay.

John: A little different fit. A little different set up. I got those disc brakes I’ve had my eye on for a while, which those, man they feel really good, not that I want to use the brakes a whole lot especially while racing. The only time you really want to use them is headed into T2.

Andrew: Yeah.

John: But, yeah. I had a really good long ride over the weekend. It was kind of that one like it felt like home.

Andrew: Okay.

John: So I think I’ve successfully made the transition and it’s part of me now. So we’ve bonded and looking forward to many, many miles to come.

Andrew: Well, I’m Andrew the Average Triathlete, Voice of the People and Captain of the Middle of the Pack. As always we'll approach the show like any other workout. We’ll roll through our warm up question, settle in for our main set conversation, and then wind things down with our cool down.

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Warm up theme: Time to warm up! Let’s get moving.

Andrew: Sherpaing for another athlete on race day is a valuable part of the triathlon experience and the more friends you have who tri, the more likely you are to find yourself playing Sherpa on race day. Now, all three of us have spent many a race day on the sidelines helping other athletes to their own finish lines and many in our audience have done so as well. So for today’s warm up question, what is the wildest thing you’ve done or the wildest circumstance you’ve found yourself in while Sherpaing for another athlete? Coach Jeff Raines, what have you got?

Jeff: Tons and tons of stories. I don’t know which ones make the top of the list, but you know, I’ve just kind of seen it all. You know, stuffing a footlong Subway down someone’s bike jersey at Ironman Texas in T1. I’ll tell ya, recently at Texas 70.3 watching my three kiddos—1 year old, 3, and 5 year old—while my wife was racing. So I was on Sherpa duty and man, that was not easy. On a serious note, there was one year at Ironman Florida, Mayfield was there right by my side, a really kind of scary circumstance. We had a runner have some pretty severe heat stroke, pass out right in front of us, right in front of the TriDot tent. We called the ambulance and took care of him about mile one of the run course there. But it’s always scary when an athlete is unconscious or you know, semi life threatening circumstance. So that one was probably one of the more serious ones, Ironman Florida a few years back.

Andrew: John, do you remember that as well? Does that make a mark in your memory?

John: Yeah, absolutely. I remember we were kind of around a corner and this guy made the turn and we saw him and he was staggering and not looking good and then part of it we were trying to talk to him, but come to find out he was from Brazil and so he was trying to speak Portuguese and like we were trying to meet in the middle with Spanish and this was just one of those crazy things. All of a sudden I see two folks on bikes and I saw they had Brazilian flags on their kit.

Andrew: Wow.

John: It was like, oh my gosh. What are the odds that two Brazilians would just so happen to ride up and sure enough they started talking to him. He was a little more responsive to those guys and they loaded him up and those folks were able to translate with the medics on the ambulance. So yeah that was pretty wild.

Andrew: So John, for you what is your answer to this question? What is the wildest thing you’ve done or circumstance you’ve found yourself in Sherpaing for another athlete?

John: So my original thought was going back to Florida. This was the year after a hurricane had come through and done pretty substantial damage to Panama City Beach. So real quick, Ironman audibled and moved the race to Haines City and I will say that Haines City, Florida is not Panama City Beach, Florida.

Andrew: No it's not.

John: It is a different place. Beautiful emerald shore and not. So there we are in Haines City and the bottom absolute dropped out. It started absolutely pouring. Some of the hardest rain I’ve ever been in and there was absolutely nowhere to go. There was zero shelter and it’s like palm trees everywhere and palm trees don’t do a real good job of blocking pouring rain. The only place to find shelter was we were getting under the big trailers that Ironman moves all the gear in. So like there was like 50 people all piled up under these trailers because it was the only place to stay quasi-dry. Then the roads kind of started to flood. So now there was like a river running through this kind of place. It was just—I’ve never been so wet. I think I’m still wet from that. Then the rain reminded me of another one that was pretty wild. It was the inaugural Alaskaman up in Alaska and at the time the finish was up on top of the mountain. I think it’s down at the bottom of the mountain now, but you still climb it. You actually climb it twice; so you go up, you come back down, you go back up the other side of the mountain and we were almost to the top hitting these switchbacks and there was a guy with us who just, he was done. He went out and passed out and here we are like on the side of the mountain and so they did make us carry a cell phone for that reason so I’m like trying to get a signal, calling 911 and the next thing we knew a few minutes later the Ski Patrol comes running down the mountain with their gear and that was another pretty interesting situation.

Andrew: So apparently people pass out pretty frequently on the race course in front of John Mayfield.

John: We’ve been on lots and lots of race courses and those were the two times that we’ve—as far as I know anyway.

Main set theme: On to the main set. Going in 3…2…1…

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Andrew: Not only is the bike leg of a triathlon the longest of the three disciplines, it’s also the portion of the race where the most gear considerations are to be made. With loads of options for things like wheels, tires, tubes and nutrition storage, there’s no shortage of ways to prep your bike for race day. Coaches Jeff Raines and John Mayfield are with us today to help us think through the best practices for race day bike setup. Now guys, I do want to start today with somewhat of a small disclaimer. Some of the things that we talk about today involve making some extra purchases, some things are free, some go above and beyond and some are necessities. So I want to throw out the disclaimer that it can be very simple to take whatever bike is in your garage and go do a triathlon. So before we get into the more specific questions, what does the beginner or more simplistic triathlete need to consider when it comes to setting up their bike for race day?

John: So there are three main things that we are overcoming with our bikes. There are three opposing forces, things that we kind of—so it goes back to that law where an object in motion tends to stay in motion until it encounters something else and when we’re on our bikes there are three things that we tend to encounter that are working against us. So that’s really what all these things are trying to mitigate or minimize that. So one is weight. So we have gravity that is working against us. So the heavier we are, the heavier the bike is, the heavier that rotational items are, the more gravity is going to impact what we are doing. Then we have, probably everyone’s favorite, is aerodynamics where the air effectively is—we’re working against that. So the more aerodynamic, the easier we can move through the air, the better off we’re going to be. Then there’s rolling resistance. That’s the tires and the contact with the ground. There’s friction there that is working against us and there’s going to be a different amount of these on different courses. So all of those are really kind of the three variables that we’re working against whether it be gravity, air resistance, or friction on the road. All these things are relatively simple and that’s what we want to do, kind of as you mentioned, it doesn’t take a whole lot, but make it simple, make it efficient and then choose function over form. So a lot of times we’ll see somewhat of the opposite of that. There are a lot of things that we want to do. A lot of things that look kind of cool, but aren’t necessarily going to produce those best results. So keep it simple and efficient and choose that function over form.

Jeff: Absolutely and I would throw out being safe is the number one priority. If you’re new to the sport or you’re new to that bike, it’s your first tri or you’re a beginner, you’re kind of testing the waters. So you’re just kind of using maybe a startup bike or more of an elementary bike one that you’re just testing the waters. So just making sure that that bike is safe and that you’re safe on the bike. Take that bike, whatever it’s going to be, take it to a local shop. Get a tune up. Make sure it’s safe. Have a professional give the all clear on that bike so it is maybe road, race ready, and safe for you. Don’t really rush into all those toys and extras yet. You don’t have to have the Torpedo nutrition system. You don’t have to have that alien looking aero helmet yet for that first one or those disk race wheels. Your first triathlon there’s so many other elements and thoughts going on that those few extra watts probably won’t help you in your first sprint tri. So don’t rush into anything like that if you’re not ready.

Andrew: As we get deeper into this sport, you guys obviously coach your athletes, most of your coached athletes are more experienced triathletes who are trying to optimize their bike for race day. So kind of as they’re heading into race weekend what are the common talking points that you go over with your athletes when making sure their bike is ready to rock and roll?

John: So it’s kind of one of those things that you always want to have and this is kind of one of my things, I’ve talked about it before on several podcasts, but is it in the best possible working condition? Bikes work better when they’re well maintained. A clean bike is a fast bike. So make sure your bike is clean, especially the drive train. Making sure that the chain, the gears, all of that is clean, free of debris. That is going to reduce the friction, reduce that rolling resistance, reduce that drive train loss so that you can actually translate more of that power you’re generating to forward propulsion. So make sure it’s clean. I’ve run into this before, I’ve been guilty, having brakes rub. Same thing, like if that is a maintenance issue, the brakes either need to be adjusted, they need to be replaced, the cables need to be replaced, whatever the case may be, but I’ve been in races where my brakes have rubbed the rim and again, just losing watts like crazy, adding friction that doesn’t need to be there. There’s enough friction on the road. There’s enough of these other variables that we have to overcome. Let’s not make it harder on ourselves by…

Andrew: Yeah.

John: …just neglecting to take care of things like that. Then good, functional tires. That’s kind of an abstract thing as far as that goes. Obviously you want the tires to be in good condition and then for those race situations make sure that they are appropriate for the course. Everything like your bearings. We’ve talked about that before. Bearings do need to be replaced from time to time. If you don’t recall the last time your bearings were replaced, it’s time, and that can make a huge difference. Then from there, once the bike is ready, then what are the course-specific tweaks that need to be made. Specifically things like your cassette or your gearing. Is that appropriate for the course that you’re going to be riding? On a flat course, you can get away with a very aggressive set up. If you are riding a hillier course then you’re going to need to make adjustments for that. The same cassette that is going to be optimal for a flat course, you’re going to hate it in a hilly course, and vice versa. Then also making sure that you’ve got good setup for your hydration and nutrition. It is absolutely critical especially in the longer course races that you stay up on your hydration and your nutrition. If you get behind it’s very difficult to come back from that. So you want to have a setup that is going to be conducive to that; that’s going to be easy to stay up on that. Easy to remember to eat and drink according to your protocol and safe to do so as well. Then which of those variables are you primarily going to be overcoming? Those three that I talked about? And usually it’s either an elevation change where you’re overcoming gravity on those hilly courses. Or is it air–air resistance where aerodynamics are going to trump that. So do you want to drop weight or do you want to be more aero? There are certain situations where you want to favor one over the other. So if you’re going out to do a very hilly course, then aerodynamics are going to be a little less important. You’re going to want to really emphasize dropping any unnecessary weight. Whereas on that flat course, you’re going to want to emphasize aerodynamics over that. Those aerodynamic items are going to be a little heavier, but at the end of the day, they’re going to get you to that finish line faster.

Andrew: Yeah, yeah, yeah. All very fascinating stuff. Jeff Raines, for you when you’re talking to your coached athletes and they’re heading into race day, what do you go over when talking about bike set up?

Jeff: Everything John said absolutely. Some kind of just additional or kind of semi-outside things to think about. I’ll ask them, “Are you shipping your bike? Are you using a soft case or a hard case? Have you ever even disassembled your bike? Are you going to disassemble anything?” Some of these bike bags are awesome now where you don’t even gotta do anything but take the wheels off. But some of them you have to take the head unit off. You’ve got to take the pedals, the seat, and stuff like that. Have they ever done that? Then proceed into if they’re going to rent different race wheels, do they have extra tubes, right? Do they have the correct stem length on those spare tires? Stuff like that, right? Are they going to carry three bottles on the bike or two? Do they need to put another bike cage on their bike. When was the last time you just added a little bit of torque to your seat post screw. I mean, you hear those horror stories of the seat post falling down halfway through the race. So I’m just checking those bolts, nuts, screws and then obviously the flat tire kit. Just make sure it’s updated. Open it up, dump it out, and just make sure everything’s in there.

Andrew: Yep. So we’re going to go a little bit more into depth about several of the things that you guys just mentioned as we kind of check off the list–tick, tick, tick–of all the things we need to consider as we’re prepping our bike for race day. Now, for me personally when those big A races come around, I get real into making sure my bike is in tip-top shape. I spare no expense. I want to get every watt I can out of my bike so I really go for it and make sure it’s seen by professional eyes before a big A race. For those B and C races, sometimes I’m rolling up to race morning not really at all pulling out any stops to clean and prep my bike. Sometimes I’m just getting it off the trainer, throwing on the wheel, putting in some PSI, and then going to the start line. Is that normal? How much effort should we expect to put into our bike race prep for our races?

John: I would say kind of yes and no on that, is it normal? As I mentioned before, maintenance is easy. It’s as simple as five to ten minutes worth of cleaning, wiping it down, getting a fresh coat of oil on the chain and you’re good to go. For every race you don’t need to go in and replace the cables and the housings and go through the full tune-up, but I would say if you are investing the time and the money and the blood, sweat, and tears to go race, it’s absolutely worth taking just a few minutes to go over everything one, from a performance standard to make sure that again, is the bike pretty much, without going and spending extra money or extra time, is it as fast as it can be? Or can I take a few minutes to make it a little bit faster? I would say that’s absolutely worth it and then kind of as Raines alluded to as well, is it also safe? Is it ready to go and race? Is it ready to go ride with other cyclists in a close proximity at a high speed? So yeah, I would always say take just a few minutes. It doesn’t take a ton of time. Take a few minutes just to make sure that one, your bike is ready to race and two, it’s safe.

Jeff: Yeah, if I’m four or five weeks out from an A race, and I’ve got two big rehearsals coming up, I’m going to go spend 75 bucks. Get a tune-up, get a new chain, do all those things. But a B or C race, yeah I might pull out that bike race week, a few days out, Monday of, and just test a few things like John said. Now if you want to go out and get that full force bike tune-up, that’s totally fine you know. But for some people we don’t always do that or we want to do some of that maintenance ourselves. If that’s you, then really what I would do is everything John said. Make sure it’s safe. One thing I would do is test your race wheels. Like for an A race, two and four weeks out, I’m going to test those wheels. I’m going to use the race wheels, make sure they’re all good. If I replace the tubes, I’m going to go ride them a few times, but it might be two days before a B or C race and really what I would do is just kind of dust off those race wheels and at least put the PSI up to 80 to 100, somewhere in there the night before or sometime during race week and just see if the next day they’re holding air. Little things like that. Really test the gears. A lot of people are afraid to mess with that derailleur. They hear some clicking, click, click, click, click. It’s very easy to adjust that and there’s some self-help videos on YouTube on all sorts of ways to make sure that all your gears are running smooth.

Andrew: So looking aero gets all the press, but equally important and perhaps under talked about in time savings opportunity comes through improving the efficiency of your drive train by reducing the friction within your components. We’ve talked on other podcasts about upgrading to ceramic bearings and pulleys as a part of this, but without even spending money on ceramic we can win valuable watts just by properly maintaining and prepping our chain with a good wax or a good lube. What are our options for showing up on race day with a smooth drive train?

Jeff: You know, for a lot of athletes, triathletes, I think cleaning their drive train is kind of like replacing the air filter in your house. Are you really doing it exactly every six months? It’s not that hard, but you get dirty. It’s just inconvenient. You know, I can go three more months. So we all know that most don’t clean their drive trains often enough. I had kind of a “rule” that I have with my athletes is that you’re supposed to clean that drive train every few hundred miles. But my kind of rule is absolute worst case. Just do it every four weeks before you do your TriDot Assessment weeks. Every four weeks we have that bike test in TriDot and just make sure you’re doing it a day or two before that bike test. You’ll get a few extra watts on the bike test and if you just kind of have that rule, worst case, you’ll clean your drive train every four weeks.

Andrew: That’s a great idea.

Jeff: But, there’s a couple different ways. What are our options? You can degrease and then oil. Some of these oils out there now are kind of a two-in-one where you can degrease and oil with the same product for time. But I think the argument is what I just said. It’s time and how often? So oiling has been the way. It’s been the traditional way for a long time and it’s probably been around, probably about a decade now. But really what is happening with oiling your chain is the oil penetrates deep into the chain, like the internals, to reduce that friction John was talking about. What that is is metal on metal. It also forms a protectant kind of barrier against corrosion, right? But the caveat or why waxing is becoming so important is the oil is wet, right? It attracts dirt and grime. It forms kind of like a paste that essentially acts like sandpaper and if you’re not cleaning that drivetrain often enough, that can kind of grind away at the mechanisms of the chain and the shifting and how smooth it is and adding those watts like John was saying. It also creates that black grime, right? You get it on your fingers which is a lot of the reason why people don’t do it. You get dirty, it’s just not fun, but if you rub that finger over your chain and there’s a bunch of black on your hand, it needs cleaning. Because oiling all that happens and it’s a wet surface, you have to do it a lot more regularly and we don’t do it enough. So we want to re-lube and clean that chain every few hundred miles and especially a big outdoor ride or especially one that was wet out there. So you have to do it more frequently. Waxing became popular five to ten years ago and it’s in place of that wet oil based lube and you submerge your chain in a heated wax kind of a bath that really penetrates into that chain like the oil does, but what happens with the wax is as it cools, that wax hardens and it completely dries out so you don’t have that wet grime, that wet surface where dirt is going to stick to as quick or as often and it prevents that dirt from sticking and causing that friction which can damage your components. So you get the benefits of the lube, but without the dirt with waxing. The bike stays cleaner with about half the maintenance and those drive trains now run and shift a lot more quietly and you save money on having to replace parts over time.

Andrew: When it comes to waxing the chain, I love the idea of waxing the chain. It’s just I agree it’s a little bit more work. It’s more work than I’m willing to put in. So kind of the middle ground that I’ve found there Jeff is for my big A race last year I bought a CeramicSpeed already pre-waxed chain. Now that wax CeramicSpeed says is good for around 400 miles, that initial coating. So Silca, there’s a brand called Silca that sells pumps and lubes and bike tools, and they actually sell a wax based bike lubricant that applies to your bike like an oil does. Like it comes out as a liquid and then immediately hardens on your chain as you’re running it through. So you get most the benefits of a waxing without actually having to dip your chain in a pot of wax and leave it there and go through that whole process. So that’s been a nice middle ground for me. I’ve recommended that to a few athletes. So definitely look into Silca’s wax-based lubricant options if that appeals to you, but you don’t want to go through all the trouble of it. We actually on the cooldown today, we’ll hear from an athlete who switched to waxing her chains and kind of has some 411 on what making that switch has done for her. For many triathletes, what wheelset to run on race day is pretty obvious. You just use the one set that you’ve got. So for folks who are #blessed with deeper wheels for race day, how do we go about deciding which wheelset to race on?

John: So yeah, most people have one or two sets of wheels. Maybe it’s a training set and a race set. Or these days, really with the proliferation of carbon clinchers, the one set of wheels that is ready for racing has really become somewhat of the norm. So there’s not always a whole lot of decision going into it, but for those that do have multiple wheels for different things, kind of going back to what we first started talking about. It’s like, what is that primary force you’re going to be overcoming? Is this going to be a hilly course where you’re overcoming gravity, or is it a flat course where you’re having to overcome the air resistance? So on that hilly course, you’re going to want to–depending on how hilly it is, you’re going to want to prefer that lighter wheel. The rotational weight, it trumps your static weight. So if something is moving, if it’s spinning–so your wheels, your cranks, your cassette, all of that–that to lighten those is more important to say lighten your frame or something that’s not moving in that rotational way. So if you’re on the hilly course, you may want to prefer a lighter wheelset just because there’s going to be less weight to carry up those hills. If you’re on a flat course, you’re going to want to prefer the aerodynamics, so that deeper wheel that is going to help you move through the air easier. It’s going to be heavier, but on that flat course, that gravity is less of a predominant force than the air that you’re going to be moving through.

Andrew: I’ve made this real easy on myself. I just pretty much always run my carbon race-day wheels whether I’m training, whether I’m racing. If I’m outdoors on my bike, I just feel like life is too short to ride aluminum wheels. If you’ve got the carbon wheelset, why not use it into the ground as much as you humanly possibly can. I think I personally, before I wear those carbon wheels out, I will just want a new pair because they’ve come out with that much newer technology by then anyway. So I just kind of always ride the carbons myself regardless of the scenario. Alright, a common question that we see triathletes ask if they had this as an option, should I run a disk wheel even if it’s windy?

John: Especially if it’s windy. This is one of those things, it’s a very common question. We are in all of the race specific Ironman groups and I see this question come up prior to every single race.

Andrew: All the time.

John: We just had Ironman 70.3 Texas which is on Galveston Island. It’s a little sandbar out in the Gulf of Mexico. It is always windy and the answer there is yes. Run a disk. Again, kind of as Jeff alluded to, a lot of times there’s some misunderstandings, misconceptions around the disk and one is with the way the aerodynamics work, that disk wheel can actually provide stability. So it’s kind of counter intuitive, but that disk wheel can actually be more stable than a traditional wheel that is allowing air to pass through it. That disk wheel is in the rear, obviously, so one thing to consider is that rear wheel is not hinged. So it is going to be much less susceptible to those side winds. That’s really the threat. Headwind, tailwind, not so much an issue. It’s the side wind that’s going to be blowing you. That’s where people get nervous about having that big sail that’s going to catch that side wind. But again, that rear wheel is not hinged and you have probably 60-70% of your body weight over that rear wheel. So think about the fact that the vast majority of your weight is on the saddle which is over that rear wheel. A much lower percentage of your weight is over that front wheel when you’re in the aero position. So for those reasons that is why your front wheel is actually much more susceptible to those cross winds. It’s hinged. There’s not as much weight over it. So if there is a consideration of those cross winds, think about your front wheel. If you have the option go with that smaller depth front wheel because you’re going to feel the effects of the wind less, but as a rule that rear disk wheel is not going to affect you in the wind. Now there certainly are situations where extremely high winds or extremely high gusts can be so high that it does become an issue. This is why disks are not allowed in Kona. But in Kona you’re in the middle of the ocean on top of a mountain. The winds out there are just not duplicated other places.

andrew: Yeah.

John: I want to say there are a couple other races around the world where they don’t allow disks, but it is extremely, extremely rare. So only in those kind of one off cases like in Hawaii would you not want to, but as a rule normal windy conditions even 15-20 mile an hour winds for most people that rear disk is going to be fine.

Jeff: And on race day, especially that A race, especially long course because you’re out there longer and you have a higher percentage of potentially getting a flat, in your tire kit you may want to have two tubes in there. I used to never want to carry two tubes. I was like, “I don’t even really want to carry one. Do I even really bring a flat tire kit? Should I risk it?” But you need to have two tubes in there; one for the rear wheel especially if you’re going to use the disk because that stem length is a little bit different. There’s only a tiny little hole to be able to put air into that wheel, that tire. So you may want to put that little crack pipe, that little L-shaped tool that helps get air into that shorter stem of the full disk rear. So don’t forget to have a shorter stem in your tire kit and the crack pipe for the rear wheel, but also you would want to have another tube in that tire kit for the front wheel. Just little things like that. Just make sure that your tire kit is locked and loaded and ready to go.

Andrew: Yep, no. Easy thing to forget about there for sure. So whatever wheel you have chosen, whatever tube is in there, whatever tire is on there, make sure you have all the tools you need to change a flat. So with our wheel choice locked and loaded, we move onto the tires that we are putting onto that wheelset. Now guys, this can get super sciency. I’ve listened to a certain cycling podcast that has multiple 90-minute long episodes dedicated just to tire selection. It can fry your brain if you’re not super into the science. So there are aero considerations here. There are rolling resistance considerations here. There are puncture resistance considerations here. What do our athletes need to know to pick the right tires?

Jeff: It’s tough. Like, do you get the dimples? Do you get the striations? Do you– It’s crazy. Yeah that is a whole podcast in and of itself, but some of the brands if you’re in a bike shop and you need new tires and you’re in there a lot of them will actually have a visual tire guide, like a model on the package that shows you kind of where in the spectrum that tire kind of plays to. So the spectrum might be like racing for sport, training, urban commute, puncture protection, you know, stuff like that and then it might show you it might have a dot above the racing section. So it’s a racing tire. So a lot of the– if you’re just when in doubt or a deer in the headlights, you’ve got to buy that tire in the moment, just read the package and see if it’s for racing or training or puncture resistant if it’s heavier. Sometimes that will help a lot.

John: So yeah, as Jeff said there’s a whole spectrum of race tires versus training tires and everything in between. Your race tires are going to be faster, but you’re going to have some additional risk of potential flats where as those ones that are going to reduce your risk of flats, they’re thicker, they’re heavier, they’re not going to be as fast. So you have a whole spectrum there in. So I tend to have a rule that it’s going to depend on the length of the race and the priority of the race. A shorter race or a lower priority race you can tend to be a little bit more aggressive. So if sprints and Olympics, you’re going to be out there for not more than 40K, there’s less risk. You’re doing fewer miles. You’re encountering fewer stretches of road. You know, you can be a little bit more aggressive especially if you’re familiar with the road quality. That needs to factor in as well. If you’re on bad roads, you’re going to need to go with a little heavier tire just to mitigate some of that flat risk. But if you’re doing a pretty short race and it’s maybe not the race that you’ve been training for two years for, you can tend to be a little bit more aggressive and take advantage of that. But the longer the race is, you’re out there for more miles. You’re putting more miles on that tire. You’re encountering more road so there’s a higher chance that you could pick up some glass and metal or something like that along the way and then if that race is really important to you. It’s almost counterintuitive, protecting yourself with that little bit slower tire that’s going to be a little bit more puncture resistant because any gains that you make from having that real aggressive, fast tire, if you flat those gains are gone and they’re going to cost you exponentially.

Andrew: Yeah.

John: So whereas you may make up a minute or two with that faster tire, if you flat it’s going to cost you– the fastest guys are somewhere in the neighborhood of three to four minutes to change a tire. Most of us are more in that ten minute range and it’s one of those things it’s just a risk/reward kind of a thing. So I would tend to error towards kind of the middle of the spectrum. I would never advise racing on like a Gator Skin or something like that that is super, super thick and heavy and won’t flat. You know, you can drive through glass or hot coals or whatever and you’re not going to get a flat. You’re really going to be kind of unnecessarily losing some speed there.

Andrew: Hopefully there’s no hot coals or shards of glass on your–fields of glass–on your race course.

John: It may feel like it. Some of those summer courses get pretty hot. Those Coeur d’Alene roads were pretty hot last year. But yeah. It’s just kind of finding the right balance for you. There’s a little bit of risk. There’s a little bit of reward. So where are you in your risk tolerance and then how aggressive do you want to be?

Andrew: Yep. I personally, John, just to kind of give people a concrete idea, the race wheels that I run it’s the brand Vittoria. I picked them up at my local bike shop and they’re not the most aggressive race wheels Vittoria has for my tri bike. They’re kind of like the second tier down in terms of aggressiveness and speed. It just gives you a little bit more protection from the flats and it’s still a pretty fast wheel. So you can get some really good tires that are made for race day and still have a little bit of flat protection built into them. So that’s what I personally have chosen to do.

John: I think my new bike actually came with those and then kind of my vehicle forever has been the Continental 4000’s, now 5000’s. They’re a good kind of that middle of the road tire. It’s not super heavy, not super slow, but I’ve put thousands of miles on those tires and had very, very few flats. Knock on wood.

Andrew: So just like tires go onto those wheels, tubes go into those tires unless, of course, you run tubeless or tubular tires. Guys, educate us on our options for setting our wheels, tires, tubes up for race day with our tube selection.

John: So you kind of have two choices here on your tubes. You can go with latex or butyl. Butyl are cheap and easy to find. They also stay inflated longer so they just do a better job of holding air. As a rule, your default tube, if you go into a bike shop and buy a tire, very good chance it’s going to be a butyl tube, but there’s the ones that are give or take 10 bucks or so. So they’re cheap. They’re easy to find. Especially with like your day-to-day training you may not have to pump those up every single time you do a session every two or three days. Latex are a little bit more expensive, but not much. It’s a couple dollars. Instead of 10 dollars for a tube you may be paying closer to 15, something like that. They are a little bit harder to find. Sometimes your bike shops are going to have them. Sometimes not. Especially if you have like a deeper rim like I do. I tend to buy mine on Amazon just because I don’t have a local shop that stocks them, or it’s a little bit more cumbersome to go in and find them. But the latex have lower rolling resistance so that’s one of those things for just a couple bucks you can get some free watts. There has been talk in the past that they are higher puncture risk. That has not been my experience. I’ve seen it go both ways. So for me, that’s a risk/reward that I’m willing to take. I don’t necessarily feel like it's a substantially increased risk. So for me, I spend the couple bucks, I save those watts, and run the latex tubes.

Andrew: Have you guys ever heard the Jim Gaffigan comedy routine where Jim makes bacon jokes for like 15 full on minutes? Have you guys heard that one? Are you familiar with that?

Jeff: No, but you had me at bacon.

Andrew: Yeah so Jim, it’s just like he keeps cracking bacon story after bacon story after bacon story and eventually like you get to the point where you’re like, “Really? We’re still talking about bacon.” That’s what I feel like now with my final question, I promise, about the trifecta of wheels, tires, and tubes. We’ve been on this for a minute now, but it’s so important to bike race day setup. So, we talked PSI just a little bit earlier, but I want to make sure we circle back around and make sure that everybody is prepared to run the correct PSI for them on race day. So talk us through it. How much PSI should we put in our tubes on race day?

John: So yeah. Big Jim Gaffigan fan, been so for years and years and years. Always love his stuff. So a big Jim Gaffigan fan there. If you’re not familiar, go check it out and one of the cool things, it’s super family friendly. He’s good stuff. Go check that out. So kind of as a rule of thumb on the PSI, too little is going to increase the rolling resistance. So the epitome of two little PSI would be a flat. You know, when you start to get towards that spectrum where you have 0 PSI, that’s going to increase the rolling resistance. So too little increases that rolling resistance. Too much, you increase your flat risk, it becomes uncomfortable, you get into the bouncing, several other things we discussed with over inflating now. So the rule of thumb is to error on the side of less PSI, but it’s really about finding what’s optimal for you and there are several considerations to take into consideration. The wider the wheel and the tire, as we discussed, the lower PSI you can run. Rider weight is also a consideration. So the heavier the rider, the more PSI is going to be necessary to achieve that same pressure on the tire. Then road conditions as well. What is the quality of the road that you’re going to be riding on and then what are the conditions? So when it’s wet, we want to reduce the PSI a little bit more. That’s going to increase the amount of rubber meeting the road so to speak and provide just a little bit more traction, better grip on those wet roads.

Jeff: John, earlier you kind of mentioned just seeing some of those kind of Ironman groups online and you know, “what’s the water temp?” You know it’s three weeks out. You see some of those posts and you’re just like “oh man, here we go. Or someone will say like, “hey what PSI should I ride for this race?” It’s our famous answer, it depends. It depends on your make and model and all the things that you just said and so 80 PSI for one person is not the same for someone else. So, definitely do your research. But we know that the wider tires now let us run a slightly lower PSI more safely because there’s more distance between the tire to compress before it hits the rim and it can cause that dreaded pinch flat. We know that. Just to kind of sum it up, the standard now seems to kind of be that 25 - 28 width wheel rim with about an 80 to 90, maybe 80 to 100 PSI, right instead of that 19 to 21 width with 120 to 180 PSI. So those are kind of the standards nowadays, right. Kind of like you said in the question, like, to sum it all up, Andrew, I have a quote here that I found–from Chris Foster wrote an article in Triathlete Magazine and it really sums up this kind of, he calls it the wider, lower trend. It’s that simple. That’s kind of where we’re at now in the cycling world. All these tubes and tires and wheels and all the stuff we’ve been talking about, it really is summarized as wider, lower trend, right? This wider, lower trend. Wider tires, lower PSI and so here’s his quote. “For triathletes, this wider, lower trend is an absolute jackpot. A wider tire with lower pressure will make a substantial difference in how much road vibration we feel during the bike leg. This can be like the difference between harsh aluminum bars, wheels, frames and something made of carbon that helps give a little bit. You’ll be gripping the bars lighter in a more relaxed aero position. Your back and butt will take far less abuse without having to spend on fancy carbon. Less road fatigue means faster run splits and that’s all triathletes really want, right? Right!” That’s kind of how he ends his quote.

Andrew: Jeff I wonder how many people are going to hear this episode and upon completing listening to this episode, they’re going to go to their bike and check what is the width of my wheelset. What Is the width of my tire? Because there are some folks that maybe bought that bike and have no idea and that's okay. That’s what we’re here for today to learn.

Jeff: And on that tire, it’s hard to see, but you can see it. It tells you on the kind of the rim of the tire, it tells you the recommended range of low-to-high end PSI levels. So again, not all 80 PSI is the same so look on your actual make and model and see what that manufacturer recommends.

Andrew: You hope to never need it, but just in case you do it is highly advisable to carry a flat kit on your bike. What do we need to have in there for race day and where on our bike should we put our flat kits?

John: So personally I carry two tubes, two CO2’s and tire levers. So especially the longer the race there is again more chances to have those flats. Knock on wood, fortunately in all my years of racing I have flatted one time and that was on what should have been a really great road surface. It was on the Hardy Toll Road during Ironman Texas several years ago, but you know. It’s one of those things, it's a little bit of extra weight which we talked about especially on a hilly course trying to reduce weight, but it’s one of those things where you want to be self sufficient in that regard. So it’s relatively easy to do. Most bikes have the setup for that. A lot of the bikes now have some integrated storage. That’s one of the cool things in my new bike. It actually has some integrated storage down in the bottom bracket area and then I also have some space in the rear wing where my hydration is that I store some tubes in there. Then back in the day when we had the tubular tires I would always carry a razor blade. So that was one of the things–the razor blades and the crack pipes. Everyone was like, “What's going on here and what is this?”

Andrew: Triathlon was an edgier sport back then.

John: It was. We were tougher back then. But I would carry a razor blade under my elbow pad kind of where that velcro is. I would have a razor blade under there and you can imagine how nasty that razor blade would get after several months of sweat and Gatorade and all that.

Andrew: Sure.

John: But yeah, if you flatted you basically had to cut the tire off. It was very difficult to break the glue loose so the easier thing to do was just take that razor blade and slash it and peel it off that way, but fortunately all we need now is the tire lever and we can get those things off.

Andrew: Rusty razor blade sounds like the name of a metal band, just for the record.

John: It probably is.

Andrew: Yeah there probably is one out there somewhere.

Jeff: I’ll just throw out, know how to use your CO2 and the adapter. People don't tend to practice that. Maybe they do get a flat in the middle of a race, they screw on the adapter to the CO2 canister to then apply it to the tire, but all that air escapes out of there and then they’re in trouble. Just have it all– maybe have that extra CO2 in case something like that happens and you lose all your air. So know how to use it, practice, but also throw in an extra CO2.

Andrew: And I would just say, just think through what's going to work best for you and if you start looking around at the races–I think that’s probably the way I learned this sport at first. My first couple years in the sport as just an amateur doing sprints and Olympics around Dallas-Fort Worth area, I would just look around and see what other athletes were doing. How were they storing their nutrition? How were they storing their water? How were they storing their flat kits? You know, would try some things that I saw that I thought were clever ideas and I know for me I landed on for my flat kit, I put it behind the saddle setup. I have a bottle cage behind the saddle. I am not very good at reaching back there for hydration or nutrition while training and racing. I’m just not very good at it. I guess I don’t have the arm span for it. It’s tough to get an arm back there and pull a bottle out for me and so since that bottle cage is there, what do I do? I put my flat kit in there instead. So it’s a place where I’m not going to need that flat kit while I’m riding and ifI do need it, I’m stopped and I can reach in that bottle and that keeps all my hydration and nutrition in front of me. It keeps my flat kit behind me. So just think through what works best for you. What’s going to work best for your setup and your abilities and what you have. So guys, as we talk food and hydration, some athletes like to travel light and like to live off the course when it comes to nutrition. Others like to carry their preferred items with them. What are our options for storing food and fluids on our bikes?

John: So I carry three bottles and then I also have some backup nutrition if I’m racing Ironman. I can generally get through a 70.3 or shorter on just those three bottles with a little bit of water from the aid stations, but I will carry actually in a bag my backup nutrition. I keep that in my kit actually. I’ll throw those in in transition, but there are tons and tons of options. This is something that’s really come along nicely over the last decade where as you mentioned there’s front options, there’s rear. There’s options that go below, even inside the bike. So some of those now have the integrated storage inside the frame. So lots of options and like you said, just whatever works best for you. Whatever you’re comfortable with. Whatever’s going to meet the needs that you have. Something else that has improved and really is becoming more integrated into the bike design are those top tube storage bins. I mentioned I have a new bike. I raced it for the first time a couple weeks ago and one thing I found was that when I do my dismount I come over the top tube and I noticed that every time I did that I would hit that little box, storage bin…

Andrew: Hmm, yeah.

John: …on my top tube and I wasn’t planning on using it so I was going to remove it. I was going to go ahead and take it off and just that way my foot would come over the top tube that much easier when I dismounted. Come to find out it was actually integrated and when I took it off there was a huge hole in my top tube. So I had to put it back in and I actually ended up using the gel that I had stored in there. So I’m kind of glad that I did.

Andrew: Okay. Yeah.

John: Something to consider is what is the aerodynamic impact of what you’re doing? Round is a horrible aerodynamic shape. So bottles when they are vertical are not good. So you think about that, instead of putting a bottle on the downtube where it’s going to hit a lot of air, consider doing something different with that. That’s why the rear hydration are so popular is because the body is blocking that wind so you have less of that impact. Then another thing I see, I actually took a picture of a bike in transition at 70.3 Texas. It was slick. It was super nice. This was easily a $15,000 bike. It had everything high end on it, everything aerodynamic. It was a brand new S-Works Shiv which is probably 12-13 grand off the shelf. It had a disk wheel and a super deep front wheel. This thing was aero, but they had taped like a dozen gels to the top tube and this is something that we used to do on a regular basis kind of before we knew and come to find out that is one of the worst things you can do for aerodynamics is have that. Aerodynamics likes smooth shapes whereas each one of those gels along that top tube apparently is just like little sails working in the wrong direction. So I was like, man this guy spent a ton of money on their bike and just no telling how much offset they did by taping those gels to the top tube.

Andrew: The next part of the bike setup is the electronics. If you have Di2 or whatever the Sram equivalent is called– sorry Sram I’m a Di2 guy, don’t know what yours is called– it’s very advisable to top off that battery before a race, but beyond that we have our Garmins, we might have a cycling computer, we might have a power meter and/or heart rate monitor, what’s the best way to have our electronics all connected and setup for race day?

John: So it is eTap is the Sram equivalent which my new bike has.

Andrew: Okay, got it.

John: Forever I’ve been a Shimano guy. A little bit of Campy back in the day when I had some road bikes.

Andrew: Okay.

John: But, yeah. As far as triathlon goes, in the last ten years it’s always been Shimano and Di2. Like I said, I am very impressed. I really like some of the eTap stuff. So super cool there from Sram. So I’m happy with my conversion over to Sram. In this case it’s one of those things where you train like you race. You want to on a regular basis make sure that everything is charged, everything is in good working condition. Make sure that all those devices are connected and working together and really test it every time you go out and ride. Should you ever encounter an issue, make sure you know how to fix it so if you encounter that on race day you can fix it there. Then one thing I always advise is replacing those hard batteries on your race rehearsal. So things like your heart rate monitor, your power meter, go ahead and replace those batteries a couple weeks out so that you know they’re fresh for race day, but if you get a bad battery or something like that you’re not putting it in right before the race and finding out on race day. Do it a couple weeks out. Use those race rehearsals as that reminder and that way you’ll know you have good topped off batteries that are good to go.

Jeff: And a lot of products now will kind of give you a green, yellow, red if that battery is getting low or something like that and a lot of these are rechargeable which is nice. But yeah, the little 3 volt I think that’s a great rule of thumb. Four weeks out when you start race rehearsals just throw a new one in there and you know it will get you through that race day and you get to test it a little bit. Another thing I think with so much indoor riding these days, it’s been a while since we've used those outdoor bike computers and just make sure that your heart rate, your power is bluetoothed or synched up to that device so that you don’t get out there on race day and your heart rate isn’t displaying the whole time or something like that. So train like you race just like John said.

Andrew: I’ll throw in one more thing that made a big difference for me was just talking about the placement of your Garmin. Obviously when you’re running, your Garmin or equivalent is on your wrist that you can look at. When you’re swimming you’re just swimming. You might steal a glance or two here and there, but while you're biking it made a big difference for me getting my bike computer–I have a little Garmin Edge cycling computer–and getting that as far forward on my setup as I could so that way it's just kind of naturally in your eye line of sight without having to look down and break aero or bend you head to look down at it. Being able to kind of get your Garmin or cycling computer as close to your natural line of sight while you’re cycling as you can just means that you're constantly able to monitor the data that’s there whether it’s power or heart rate or speed that you're going off of. So I’ve just got a little Garmin kind of little Garmin mount that I put right at the end of my TT bars. There’s a lot of options out there. A lot of companies have accessories that can help you do that, but the further out in front of your setup and the closer to your natural line of sight in the aero position you can get that data the better. So last question here for our main set. You know it's race time when you break out the race number stickers and start attaching them to your gear and no joke, for my very first sprint triathlon I had the sheet of stickers in my hand and I had to Google “where do I put all of my triathlon race number stickers?” I know I’m not the only one out there that had to do that. There’s no shame here. Over time, you pick up some tips and tricks on numbering your bike gear. So guys, help us optimize our sticker setup for race day.

John: Cut them up. It’s one of those things a lot of people are nervous about it. I’ve done it in dozens of races. I’ve recommended it to hundreds of athletes. I’ve never had an issue with it. One of the things, like kind of the default, is to take a large rectangular number sticker and stick it over your top tube where it’s kind of flapping down there in that diamond shape. One it’s annoying. Two, I’ve even seen people like cut their legs on them.

Jeff: Yep, it’s happened to me.

Andrew: Yep.

John: And especially now with head tubes getting real deep there’s plenty of room where, obviously you don’t want to modify the number itself, but when you’ve got a whole bunch of white background and that sort of thing, it’s just not necessary. It’s not doing anybody any good so I like to cut mine out and keep it where it’s just flat on carbon so I don’t have any of that decal out hanging in the wind doing anything like that. Then this is a pro tip I learned a long time ago. A lot of times these are like paper kind of stickers where if they get wet or anything they tend to fall apart and you just have leftover adhesive, they’re very hard to get off. So what I do with my race helmet is actually have a piece of packing tape that I leave on there that is kind of right there on the forehead and that is where I apply those stickers to.

Andrew: Interesting.

John: So that little piece of clear packing tape just makes it super easy to get those race numbers off after each race so you're not having to mess with– Worst case, you peel the packing tape off and put a new one on, but you're not having to mess with the adhesive and paper and all that that can be left behind

Jeff: Well done. I am stealing that pro tip.

Andrew: I’ve never noticed that Jeff. We've been with John at race sites–I’ve seen John’s race helmet a dozen times, dozens of times. I’ve never noticed that.

Jeff: I actually have– the sun sometimes bakes those numbers on there and when you try to peel the stickers off your bike there's grime and glue all over your bike and you do that four, five, six times a year it can ruin your bike. So just putting that one big piece of packing tape and putting the sticker on top of it, it peels on and off easy and it doesn’t ruin your bike.

Andrew: Genius. Genius.

Cool down theme: Great set everyone! Let’s cool down.

Andrew: Earlier on the episode, Coach Jeff Raines talked about oiling your chain versus waxing your chain. Oiling is quicker and easier, but you have to do it more often and waxing is more a process, but it lasts longer and is claimed to save you more watts. TriDot ambassador and staff member, Jenna Gorham has switched fully to waxing her chain and has cut oil based lubricants out of her life completely.So I asked her to join us for the cooldown to lend usher thoughts on the waxing your chain process. Jenna, take it away.

Jenna Gorham: Hi Andrew. This is Jenna Gorham. I wanted to share with you my story of how I switched over to wax-based lubricant for my bike chain. I did this back in 2020 after doing some research and with encouragement from a friend of mine. We decided to both go through the process together and so I’m going to share with you a little bit about that. We started off with needing to degrease the chains because the new chains come with oil on them as well and the old ones obviously are dirty and oily. So I purchased two new chains so that I would have three and had to degrease all of them. It involved degreasing, especially the one that I had been using already, soaking in gasoline overnight to really get that oil broken down. Then we used Simple Green to degrease them a little further and finally we used denatured alcohol, also known as methylated spirits, to get the final grease off. Hang them to air dry and once that was done we were able to heat up some paraffin wax, about 2 pounds or 0.9 kilograms in a small slow cooker to around 200 degrees fahrenheit and we chose to use tungsten disulfide as our additive. That’s WS2. You can search for either tungsten disulfide or WS2 on the Internet and we had a 10 gram bottle that we added to the 2 pounds of wax. You can also use molybdenum disulfide. That’s a very common one as well. So they get mixed together. You put the additive in suspension that way and the chain gets put on a bent water with the quick links, sit in the pot with the heated mixture for about ten minutes to thoroughly heat up the chain and then it gets drip dried and hang to cool and harden. When it’s cool you have to break the links loose so the chain moves freely and then you can add it to the bike with quick links. So when you've used your bike, ridden maybe about 200 miles or so, you can pull it off with quick links and re-wax it. You can either use a digital ultrasonic cleaner, or you can pour around two quarts of boiling water over the chain in a strainer and then hang it to dry then do the re-waxing again. The process is really pretty easy. There’s nothing real complicated about it once you know what to do. It’s a little bit time consuming. I think the part that's the most time consuming for me is actually when I have to clean the chain to get the old wax off and the process is really inexpensive. I have actually not had to replace any of my chains since I bought all of them back in 2020. Sothey’re lasting miles and miles and miles. I do do most of my training indoors and that does make a little bit of a difference, but the wax actually repels the dirt and so it does not get in between all the fine moving parts and so you don’t get as much breakdown of the chain. You don’t get dirt in there actually taking away some of the metal. So it doesn’t actually wear the chain out as fast. Riding with a waxed chain is quieter, smoother, faster, and I said it repels dirt. It pretty much feels easier at the same wattage with a waxed chain than it does with an oiled chain. Since I started using the waxed chain, I qualified for the championship in Ironman 70.3 World Championships. So I don’t have a number, like number of watts. I can tell you it’s easier and I’ve had some really successful bike rides as a result. If you want to find my video on the degreasing and hot waxing process you can look on YouTube under Jenna Gorham, that’s G-O-R-H-A-M and it’s called bike chain hot waxing. There’s more details, comments, and a list of items that I used for the process. So I would encourage anyone who is thinking about it, it’s definitely worth it I think if you really want to optimize your watts and get faster.

Andrew: Well that’s it for today folks. I want to thank Coach Jeff Raines and John Mayfield for helping us prep our bikes for race day. Shout out to DeltaG for partnering with us on today’s episode. Head to deltagketones.com to learn more about the health benefits of DeltaH and use code TRIDOT20 to save 20%on your order. Also thanks to UCAN. Head to UCAN.co to check out their lineup of Super Starch based fueling products. Use code TRIDOT to save 20% on your order. It used to be a 10% discount, but the fine folks at UCAN have upped it to 20% for the TriDot family. So take advantage of that. Enjoying the show? Have any questions or topics you want to hear us talk about? Head to tridot.com/podcast to let us know what you're thinking. We’ll do it all again soon. Until then, Happy Training!

Outro: Thanks for joining us. Make sure to subscribe and share the TriDot podcast with your triathlon crew. For more great tri content and community, connect with us on Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram. Ready to optimize your training? Head to tridot.com and start your free trial today! TriDot – the obvious and automatic choice for triathlon training.