Sports Then and Now

Ensuring your road biking checklist is complete and well thought out could mean a more enjoyable bike trek, if not a life-saver. As road biking season heats up, remember to find the right equipment and keep these items in mind. Here are just a few essentials you’ll want to consider packing for your next ride.

WATER
Experienced riders pack up to a gallon of water, but you’ll need a way to refill when you run out. Plastic bottles are durable, easy to carry, and many include built-in filters that remove sediment from untreated water, ensuring an endless supply. Try to plan a course that puts you near parks with drinking fountains or gas stations that offer free water. You can also get a lot of water on your rides by making use of camelbaks.

CALORIES
Your body needs calories to stay active, and since cycling burns them at a faster rate, stockpiling as many calorie rich foods as you can might be a good idea. Fruit is a great source of energy because your body stores them for longer periods of time and essentially burns them slower, allowing them to power your body longer. Nuts are easy to carry and an excellent source of carbs and protein. Be sure to have some form of electrolytes on hand for your journey as well. This could be in powder form for drinks or as part of your snacks. Read the rest of this entry →

Extreme sports are activities that can provide an adrenaline rush to the participant and usually involve some level of danger, speed, and physicality. In recent years extreme sports have become more popular for both recreation and competition. There are different types of extreme sports categories such as vehicle sports where the vehicle is either motorized or non-motorized like skateboards, and non-vehicle sports. Many extreme sports can be expensive due to the cost of the activity and equipment, but there are also inexpensive options for the adrenaline junkie with a limited budget.

Vehicle-Based Cost Effective Extreme Sports
Motorized vehicle based extreme sports are typically more expensive because of the equipment required. Motocross racing is a popular activity and is a form of off-road motorcycle racing on enclosed circuits either inside or outdoors. For safety reasons, participants must be a minimum of 15 years old. Snowmobiling is another popular motorized extreme sport which involves driving the snowmobile in snow and ice conditions on trails or open terrain. You can find lots of equipment for cheap at places like Bob’s Cycle & Snowmobile Supply. Non-motorized vehicle extreme sports are less expensive and offer more opportunities to participate. Mountain biking, freestyle biking, surfing, and windsurfing are extreme sports that are easy to pursue and typically don’t cost too much.

Non-Vehicle Based Cost Effective Extreme Sports
Non-vehicle extreme sports are a favorable option for extreme sports enthusiasts who do not want to spend much money. These sports include roller derby, rock climbing, paint balling, canyonering, white water rafting, body boarding, zip lining, and parkour. These activities all provide the thrill of danger, are physically demanding, and cost a fraction of vehicle-based extreme sports. Other budget friendly adrenaline driven sports are caving, street luge, bungee jumping, hang gliding, paragliding, and base jumping.  Read the rest of this entry →

Having bought or rented your first road bike the temptation to plunge straight in by riding long miles, riding in a pack, or climbing mountains is irresistible. Or maybe you are a bit more nervous, since you aren’t sure what to expect with your first time on the asphalt. When equipped with the right road biking tips, you are guaranteed to ride better, stay stronger, go faster, get fitter, and most importantly stay safer.

Night Riding
It is inevitable that at some point you’ll find yourself riding at night or before the sun gets up. Statistics show that this increases the chances of getting into an accident. Relying on street lights is not enough. The use of headlights enable people and vehicles to notice you and you can flash your light by twitching the handlebars so as to signal approaching drivers. Make sure you have plenty of reflective material on your clothing and bike, and that your headlamp or other lights are illuminating the most road for you to see clearly. Read the rest of this entry →

Some people are cyclists and some people are serious cyclists. Up until last year, I definitely fell into the former category, but this year I decided that I wanted to up my game when it came to my bike riding, and so I turned to the people who manage to turn cycling into an endurance art form, those people who I would never want to be in the shoes of, but would love to be able to ride like: Tour de France cyclists. They’re truly incredible. They slog it out, rain hail or shine for twenty-one days on thankless terrain, in the toughest and most prestigious cycling race in the world. So of course, who better to learn from about how to get a better cycling technique? I have combined the workout which I followed when I was training this year, and I am very happy to say that I managed to get a far better time on my daily commute and have smashed all of my previous best times on Strava. Not too bad, really! Take a look to see how I did it.

Set a benchmark for yourself

When you’re training, there’s really no way to know if you’re doing better unless you set up some benchmarks for yourself. You can do tests in order to figure out where you’re standing, and these are usually one, five or 20 minute tests which are going to determine your best power. In order to do these tests, you pelt it out on your bike for the requisite times, and while they may be mentally and physically exhausting, they’re also the best way to get a benchmark of where you’re at. If you don’t have a power metre on your bike, you can map out a course that usually takes you around one, five or 20 minutes and then track your progress on these. You’ll know how you’re doing by how long they take you! Read the rest of this entry →

As a group, cyclists tend to look at the same thing with a unified fear: hill climbs. The uphill portion of any ride presents a serious challenge, and your ability to handle long rides usually comes down to how well you perform during the climbs. Whether you ride competitively or just for enjoyment, the burning deep in your legs toward the end of a hill climb is a feeling riders know all too well.

While there is nothing that can be done to make hill climbs easy, the tips below may just give you a boost during your next ascent to the top.

Consider Staying Seated

Many riders feel inclined to stand up on the bike as soon as they begin a climb, but you may find more success by staying in the saddle. Hold your position as you begin to go up the hill, and work hard to maintain your cadence. It is okay to stand up from time to time when the road gets extra steep, but dealing with the majority of the climb while in your seat is usually the best bet for a good steady pace.

Think Ahead

Before you head out on any road ride, look over your intended route and identify the hills you plan to climb. With the hills highlighted, create a plan for your ride that will allow you to store up energy in advance of the uphill portions. If you are going flat out right before you arrive at a hill, you won’t have anything left in the tank when you need it most. Read the rest of this entry →

Some people are not fond of cyclists. Whether it’s some latent, xenophobic distaste for anything vaguely European or just motorists’ contempt for anything on the road that doesn’t go five over the speed limit, cyclists engender animosity from a vocal portion of the population.

And even when cyclists aren’t hated, they’re frequently disrespected. When Kenny Powers said, “I play real sports; not trying to be the best at exercising,” a nation of lacrosse stick-wielding, ball-tossing dude-bros laughed — not because they thought him ignorant, but because they thought him wise.

Yet even in the midst of this hostile environment, bike racing is growing in popularity. Perhaps because Lance Armstrong committed the only capital crime besides murder in the United States — lying to Oprah — mountain biking seems to be catching on more than road racing.

I Want to Ride My Mountain Bicycle

As you might expect of a sport that has an enormous geographic feature in its name, mountain biking has been increasing in popularity more rural than urban areas. The club sport is catching on in Idaho, where the Idaho High School Cycling League has created a four-race season. That league was founded by the National Interscholastic Cycling Association, which has made fifteen leagues in fourteen states.

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