Sign up for our informative, free weekly email newsletter. (Always easy to unsubscribe.)
If your ride includes hard efforts, do them near the start, while your legs are still fresh. Save the easy miles for the end. It’s tempting to warm up with a long, relaxed stretch and then hit your intervals once you’re deep into the ride. The problem is that by then you’re already carrying fatigue,…
When it’s going to be extremely hot, the simplest way to beat it is to beat it out the door. Roll out early, and you can finish your ride before the day turns brutal. The hottest part of the day usually falls between noon and 3 p.m. It isn’t just the air temperature, either. Radiant…
Ever wonder if you’re drinking enough on hot rides — or too much? Your bathroom scale can tell you, and it only takes one ride to find out. Sports scientists call this a sweat rate test, and it’s the same method pro team staff use in the field. Every liter of sweat you lose weighs…
By Lars Hundley This month marks 25 years of Road Bike Rider. Ed Pavelka and Fred Matheny sent the first newsletter in July 2001, following their earlier work at Bicycling Magazine, and it has gone out just about every single week since. Over 1,200 issues! John Marsh published it for the better part of a…
If you finish summer rides with white streaks on your helmet straps and salt crust on your jersey, here’s the cheapest hydration upgrade in cycling. Add a pinch of table salt to your bottles. Sodium is the biggest electrolyte you lose in sweat, and many riders lose more of it than their drink replaces. Sweat…