- When it comes to race day,
it's not just about getting yourself ready.
You also need to get your bike ready,
so we're gonna be running through a few of the main points
to get your bike race ready,
and I'm gonna be getting help from this guy.
This is Tom from BMC Vifit Sports'
professional triathlon team,
and he is their bike mechanic.
He's gonna be running through the why's
and I'm gonna be running through the how's.
(light techno music)
Okay, thanks for joining us, Tom.
- You're welcome. - Before we get started,
are there any dos and don'ts
when you're getting your bike race day ready?
- Yeah, the first thing I like to say is
it's important that one month or something before the race,
don't change your position or things like that.
No major changes,
because it's not good to be on the race
with another position than you were riding before.
Second thing I like to say is
when you start working on your bike,
changing wheels, gears, things like that,
don't do it one day before the race,
because if it's not working out fine,
then you are having a lot of panic and trouble.
You won't have any time to solve it.
- Okay, well, first point, the wheels.
- Yes, the wheels, of course, important
in a DT bike and triathlon bike.
You might have another set for the race
instead of the training wheels,
so you maybe will swap them,
but it's always nice to have a race or two.
- Starting to feel like aerodynamics,
but then, I guess they might change
for different courses as well.
- [Tom] Yes, that's always a choose on the course.
The wind, how the weather conditions are,
it's always important to, if you have the possibility,
you can look at that and take a different set of wheels.
The guys of the team, they have three kinds of wheels.
They can choose about different types of rims.
- Okay, and even a disc. - We also have a disc.
Yes, they have a disc also.
- Okay, we all know how to switch wheels out,
so I'm not gonna bore you with that,
but like Tom says, switching to a set of race wheels
for race day can have a huge performance benefit.
But unlike a pro team, not all of us have
an array of wheels to choose from.
Most of us just have one set of race wheels for rule,
and if you haven't actually got
a set of race wheels already,
it's worth considering what type of courses
you're predominantly going to be racing on.
Is it gonna be a hilly course?
It's gonna be a flat course?
For instance, I know that I'm gonna be racing
on both hilly and flat courses,
so I've opted for the Enve 7.8s,
because I know they perform well on both the flats
and on the hills.
Another thing to consider is actually with the cassette,
so you can have a cassette ready installed
on your race wheels so that you can
flip your wheels in and out nice and easily,
nice and quickly, but your cassette does actually wear in
with your chain on your training wheels,
so you may equally want to just actually take that cassette
off your training wheels and pop it on your race wheels,
but we'll get into that a little later on.
And secondly, tyres.
- Yes, tyres.
We can say a lot about tyres, of course,
but normally, if you have a second wheel set for race day,
you will have also a pair of nice race tyres on it
with less rolling resistance than the training tyres.
There are, of course, different widths of tyres.
You have the 25, 23,
even sometimes 28 now,
but it also depends on how the surface is
where you're riding on.
If it's really, really rough, you can have more.
A wider tyre is better for the rolling resistance.
- For your team, what's the optimum with kind of
your wheel set up and the frame?
- I think the optimum setup is,
of course, the Vittoria Corsa.
It's a really nice tyre.
You have it in 25.
We use it normally at the back 25
and in front, for the more aerodynamics,
we take the 23 millimetre.
- But dependent on the course.
- It's, of course, the course.
- Okay, and how about the tyre pressure as well?
- Tyre pressure, it depends a little bit
on the weight of the athlete, of course,
but also, that depends on the surface.
If it's really smooth surface,
you can go a bit higher in pressure.
If the surface is really rough,
you better go a bit lower.
Also, again, for the rolling resistance to be optimum.
- So you actually have a couple of options here,
depending on the type of wheels you have.
You either have tubular tyres or clincher tyres.
Now, tubular tyres will need glueing
or sticking onto the wheel,
and they were traditionally thought to be faster
with less rolling resistance,
but the technology is advancing with the clincher tyres.
Actually, proven to be very little difference
if no difference in the rolling resistance
between tubular and clincher these days.
Actually, I opt for clincher tyres,
because, well, when it comes to travelling,
it's really easy.
It means I just take one set of wheels, my race wheels.
I use a set of hard wearing training tyres on the wheels,
then just a few days before the race,
I'll switch over to my race tyres,
but like many of you out there,
I've struggled with putting my race tyres
onto my race wheels, so here's a few tips to help.
First of all, check whether the tyre
has a rotational direction, like this one,
and then put one side of the tyre
onto the rim of the wheel.
Then, you want to insert the valve of the tube
into the rim of the wheel,
and then feed the rest of the tube
around the inside of the tyre.
Then, starting from the valve,
you want to start pulling the other side of the tyre
onto the rim of the wheel,
and working your way around
until the tension becomes too much
that you can't get that final bit of the tyre on.
So, getting that last bit on can be really tricky,
so here's a couple of tips to help.
Generally, the inside profile of the rim is raised
towards the outside, where the tyre sits,
so if you pull the bead of the rim on both sides
into the middle of the rim,
it actually gives you a little bit more room to play with,
so just work your way around,
pulling both sides of the tyre into the middle.
So, once you've done that,
start on the other side of the tyre
that you're trying to work onto the wheel.
Just grab the tyre and pull it in either direction
and work it around the wheel,
back to the point you're trying to pull on.
This should have given you
a little bit more of the tyre to play with,
a little less tension in the tyre,
so now just use your tyre levers
to pull the remaining part of the tyre onto the wheel.
Then, finally, and as always,
just check that you haven't pinched the tube anywhere,
and given that the tyre is so tight,
it's quite likely, so all you need is the tyre lever
to poke the tube back under the tyre.
Okay, thirdly, the brakes.
- Brakes, of course, very important on the bike for safety.
If you swap the wheels from the training to the race setup,
it's important to check the clearance of the brake pads,
if they are not rubbing against your race wheels.
That would be a pity for the racer.
- Yeah, 'cause they often tend to be a little bit wider.
- Yes, sometimes they are wider.
Also, if you have a race set in carbon full
and the training set is alloy, you have to be aware
that you change the brake pads, of course.
Otherwise, you'll damage your race set.
That would be a pity.
- And, obviously, check wherever they're worn out.
- [Tom] Of course, you have to check.
- For safety. - Yeah, yeah, for safety.
- So, I've actually got disc brakes on this bike,
which is still perhaps a little unusual
for a time trial bike,
but let me run through these first
before we then move on to rim brakes.
When it comes to disc brakes,
it can seem quite daunting,
the thought of having to rebleed the brakes and whatnot.
Well, it's actually a lot more simple than that
when you're changing a set of wheels over for race day,
because the alignment of the disc
shouldn't really change that much,
but should you get any rubbing of the rotor on the brakes,
the first step is just to loosen off
the bolts here and here,
and then squeeze down on the brake itself,
and then, whilst you're holding onto the brake,
you want to retighten the bolts,
and it should just realign the brake block for you.
And for the rim brakes, I've got my road bike here,
and if you are actually riding a road bike
and you're about to drop some race wheels in
with a slightly wider width,
you can actually simply just adjust the calliper width
by this little mechanism on the front.
It's nice and easy, like so,
or you can actually release the cable
to open up the calliper,
which is slightly neater option, perhaps, just here.
And then, for a TT bike with rim brakes,
now, they're very similar,
although you may not have this little mechanism
on the front, which is nice and quick and easy.
Instead, you're probably going to have to release this bolt
to adjust the tension of the cable,
which can get tricky if you've got a rear brake
below the bottom bracket.
Now, here's a little tip to make things a bit easier.
Rather than you having to undo this bolt every time
to adjust the tension of the cable,
if you have brakes with a barrel adjuster
that adjusts the tension,
and when you go to pop your race wheels in,
release the cable off using this bolt,
but when you go to pop your training wheels back in,
all you need to do then is tighten the tension
through the barrel adjuster,
and then, when you go to put your race wheels back in again,
all you have to do is release the tension.
Okay, next up, the gears.
- The gears, very important, of course,
because it transfers the power from you to the wheel.
What's important?
Check first the course.
If there are any stiff climbs or things like that,
you need to have the correct race heels for sure.
Then, if you changed from the training to the race wheels,
check if the chain is still working on the other gears.
- So, it's all indexed and working right.
- Yes, it's indexed, working right.
If they are not worn too much,
then you have to change the chain also.
What's also important for the DI2 we are running,
check the battery for sure.
Doesn't matter.
Load it before the race.
You'll start with a full battery.
You'll never have any problems in the race.
- Always pack your charger.
- Always pack your charger, very important.
- So, like Tom says, you may be considering your gear ratios
depending on what type of course you're doing,
and you can obviously change the front rings,
but even simpler than that,
you can actually just change the rear cassette,
so let me run you through that.
So, to begin with, you'll want a chain width
and a cassette tool to undo the lock ring,
and do watch out, because the lock rings do change
from cassette to cassette,
so make sure you have the right one.
So, to start off with, we want to put the chain width
around the cassette like so,
so it's holding it nice and firmly,
and then we're gonna insert the cassette tool
into the front lock ring,
and just holding onto the chain width,
and we're gonna stand over the wheel now.
We're gonna put pressure down
onto the cassette tool like so,
and the lock ring will undo.
There you go, and you can spin that off.
Lock ring comes off.
Take your chain width off,
and if we place the wheel down here,
you can actually just pull the cassette off
nice and easily, like so.
And for the purpose of this video,
I'm just gonna put exactly the same cassette back on,
so just align the ridges of the inside of the cassette
with the free hub body,
and slide it back on.
There we go.
Okay, and then use the lock ring.
Screw that back in on the front.
You can start off by hand,
and then, stand back up,
and all we need now is the cassette tool.
Insert that in and just rotate it round to lock back on.
Same with the gears, their alignment,
their adjustment, and their indexing.
Well, I'm running electronic gears here,
and so they can actually be micro-adjusted,
and whether you're running Shimano or SRAM,
they can both be micro-adjusted using their control
or their junction box,
simply adjusting the gears in very small increments.
But for the mechanical gears,
we need to switch to my other bike.
Now for the mechanical gears,
and if you have swapped over for some race wheels
on a bike with mechanical gears,
you may find that the chain won't go into the smallest cog
or the largest cog, or in fact,
it might actually go to far.
It might throw the chain off into the frame
or into the spokes,
and that's where the high a low limit screws come in,
so let's take a look at them.
So, let's take a look at the high limit screw
or the H-limit screw, and that simply adjusts
how far the chain shifts downwards and outwards
towards the smallest cog,
so we need to pop the chain into the smallest cog,
and then we're gonna be adjusting the screws just here,
and the H-limit screw tends to be the top one.
And if you turn that screw clockwise,
it tightens it, therefore stopping the derailleur
from shifting outwards, and then if you loosen it,
it allows the derailleur to shift further out,
so if you're not able to get the chain into the bottom cog,
you want to loosen that ever so slightly,
but not so far that it then throws the chain off.
Now for the low limit screw or the L-limit screw,
and that basically adjusts how far the chain
shifts up the cog towards the spokes.
So, we're gonna pop the chain in the largest cog,
and we're gonna be adjusting the screw at the bottom here.
If we adjust it anti-clockwise,
that then allows the chain to shift up
into that very top cog
if you are struggling to get it into that,
and then, if it is actually over shifting into the spokes,
you want to adjust that screw clockwise.
Now that limit screws are set,
now we want to index the gears,
and we do that using this barrel adjuster here,
and it basically adjusts how smoothly the chain shifts
from cog to cog.
Now, main thing to remember here is the tighter the cable,
the easier it shifts up the cog into the largest gear,
and the looser the cable, the easier it shifts down,
so say, for instance, it's shifting absolutely fine
up the cog into the larger gears,
but you're struggling to shift down.
Then, it probably suggests that the cable's too tight,
so all you need to do there is loosen off
through the barrel adjuster.
In this case, I just need to rotate the barrel adjuster
in a clockwise motion, but if it's vice-versa
and it's shifting down absolutely fine but not up,
then you want to adjust it by tightening the cable.
In this case, again, it's in an anti-clockwise motion.
Okay, finally, cleaning the bike.
- Yes, it's very important, of course,
especially the chain and the gears needs to be clean.
You can see, on this bike, it's been riding yesterday
all day in the wind and the sandy conditions,
and the chain is.
- I didn't wanna say.
- Yeah, the chain is really, I need to clean it,
but it's important on race day that it's really clean.
It's even more important than put the oil on it.
- Okay.
- That it is clean.
It saves you more watts.
- Okay, and I guess, also,
it's like it's showtime.
It's the big dance. - Of course.
The bike has to be really super clean
when you are on the starter.
That's also good for you.
You'll ride on a clean bike.
You will enjoy it, and everybody sees your nice, clean bike.
- So, after all those training miles
you've done on this bike,
we need to get that drive train clean,
so we're gonna use a degreaser
to break down the dirt and grime.
Then, once you've left the degreaser to work its magic,
just use an old rag to clean off the dirt.
Another really key area to clean is the jockey wheel pods,
and you may want to clean the cassette, too,
so you may want to actually take it off,
as we did before, to give it a really good
and thorough clean, and finally,
you want to apply a bit of lubricant to the chain,
and then, of course, because it's your big day,
you're gonna want a nice and shiny bike,
so make sure you give the frame a bit of TLC, too.
Well, I hope you like the video.
If you did, hit that thumbs up button,
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and to see our maintenance videos playlist,
just click up there,
and to see what some of the pros are carrying on the bike
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