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I had a loose rivnut (without realising it). Over time it enlarged the hole in the frame, and when I eventually got to the problem and tried to put it back, it dropped into the downtube - the downtube is closed on both sides. It rattles when I am riding. Ideally I would like to get it out, otherwise I will have to squirt some glue in there. Any ideas or self-designed tools on how to extract it again through the small hole?

Check with WB what weight suspension oil you need - Fox uses 7 weight. You can get at motorcycle shop, or order through LBS from Fox.

Unfortunately 180mm's are difficult to come by, but Dura-Ace and XTR make standard 180mm lengths, although difficult to get in SA. Try Chain Reaction. If you want to go longer, there are custom cranks, but extremely expensive. Look at www.zinncycles.com .

I think again it depends on riding style and type of riding. Shorter cranks for riding flats, sprinting, track - generally very high cadences. As soon as climbing comes into the picture, longer cranks are used. That is also why MTB cranks are normally longer than road cranks. Also, body length is probably not a good way to determine crank length, as some people have longer legs compared to upper body. As an example A lot of pro's will actually change to longer cranks when they hit the mountains. The following list is quite interesting - look at Pantani using 170mm cranks, but changing to 180mm cranks in the mountains. Jacques Anquetil 175mm Lance Armstrong 175mm Chris Boardman 170mm Santiago Botero 172.5mm Angel Casero 175mm Mario Cipollini 172.5mm Fausto Coppi 171mm Malcolm Elliott 172.5mm Tyler Hamilton 172.5mm Bernard Hinault 172.5mm Miguel Indurian 180mm (190mm for second Hour record!) Laurent Jalabert 172.5mm Greg Lemond 175mm Brad McGee 175mm Robbie McEwen 175mm Eddy Merckx 175mm David Millar 175mm (180mm in TT) Francesco Moser 175mm Marty Northstein 167.5mm in Keirin (170mm in kilo) Graham Obree 175mm Marco Pantani 170mm (180mm in mountains) David Rebellin 172.5mm Roger Riviere 175mm Jean Robic 170mm Tony Rominger 172.5mm (175mm for Hour record) Oscar Sevilla 175mm Jan Ullrich 177.5mm Rik Verbrugghe 175mm Erik Zabel 172.5mm Alex Zulle 175mm (180mm in mountains)

Look at this link - it is maybe extreme, but I do think as a result of "standard" crank lengths being stocked by LBS's, we do end up with shorter cranks. I have gone for a 180mm crank and really see an improvement in climbing. http://www.nettally.com/palmk/crankset.html

Already planning for next year's Epic. Looking at custom wheelset with ZTR rims and DT 240's. Any experiences with these rims in the Epic? Can they handle the 9 days, or should one look at a slightly heavier rim?

Did anyone do the Epic on V's, and what was your experience? Titus, which discs did you run?

I see there were quite a lot of issues with disc brakes binding in the Epic. Would V-brakes have been an option, or should one stick with disc brakes for the Epic. Maybe V's on cermaic rims?

Also looking at ZTR build with 240's. Is this strong enough for doing the Epic with?

Interesting, Floyd had a very bad day before he recuperated and had one of the best days ever on a bicycle (same with Vino last year). In both cases it seems that there has been some extra help - so his views on tapering is probably not relevant for us mere mortals that play the game by the rule. Epic is probably more taxing on your body than Ironman, as you need to recover, get up, ride and then recover again, 8 days in a row. Six times Ironman Triathlete Champion, Mark Allen wrote the following article: The final touches to any training program come during the taper. This is the period of your season leading up to a key race when you cut back your overall training volume and allow your body to absorb all of the hard work you did during your base building and speed phases. Doing the right kind of taper is an art unto itself. A taper is tricky because of what is happening internally when your body is given a chance to recover. When athletes start to give themselves rest, the system in the body that responds to stress (which is the system that allows you to get up for big workouts) starts to shut down. This is like working on the engine of your car. You cannot give the engine an overhaul while it is running. You have to shut it off. <?:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> The same is true for our bodies. You have to shut the "engine" off for it to recover and charge up for the big races. And when you do this, you might feel like you are out of energy, sluggish, and getting out of shape. THIS IS NORMAL. This requires a readjustment of mindset. Allow yourself to feel less-than-stellar. It is just a signal that your body is repairing itself and getting ready for a big effort in a few weeks. Resist the temptation to go out and test your fitness just to make sure you are not losing it. As best as you can, stick to the plan I will outline for you. This is the toughest part of a taper...the rest. The Perfect Taper The perfect taper is about four weeks in length. Yes, four weeks! It is slightly different for each of the three sports because of the difference in recovery time each one of them needs. Running takes the longest because of the impact. Cycling takes less time, but is still longer than what you will require for swimming. So the peak week of training, where you will have both your longest individual workout and largest weekly volume for each sport should be placed on your workout calendar as follows: Running- largest training week should end with five weeks to go to your biggest race. Cycling- largest training week should end with four weeks to go to your biggest race. Swimming- largest training week should end with three weeks to go to your biggest race. After each of these peak weeks, draw a straight line reduction in both the length of your long workouts and the overall weekly volume down to zero training two days before your race. Let's look at how this would look for the long ride for someone who is training for an Ironman. If you hit a peak cycling volume five weeks out (the week that ends with four weeks to go to your big event) is say cycling 250 miles and in that week you have a long ride of 6.5 hours, the next four weeks would look like this: 4 weeks out: volume reduced to 210 miles, and a long ride should be about 5.5 hours. 3 weeks out: volume reduced to 170 miles, and a long ride should be about 4.5 hours. 2 weeks out: volume reduced to 130 miles, and a long ride should be about 3.5 hours. Race Week: volume (excluding the race itself) should be roughly 100 miles, and a long ride (not including the race) should be no more than 2 hours. What to Expect During a Taper Week One- You start to feel good. The energy system that raises your energy up for peak workouts will still be switched on but you will begin to build energy reserves because of the reduced volume of training. The result is that you will start to feel supercharged. Week Two- The "respond" systems start to shut down that are normally active during high volume training. You start to go into hyper-recovery mode. Legs and arms can feel heavy. Motivation for working out can drop. But have faith... Week Three- Your energy will start to come back and you will feel the spark and the spring come back into your mind and body. Remember, this is still not the time to test yourself. That will come in the race a week away. Week Four- All of the rest pays off. If you thought week three felt good, this will blow your socks off. You will hardly be able to contain yourself. This is exactly what you want. You are now ready for your best race. Three Key Days of Race Week- The day before the race do all three sports, about 10 minutes of running, 30 minutes of cycling and about 5-7 swimming. Do each sport easy but have about 5x10 second pickups where you gradually accelerate over those 10 seconds to just a little faster than race pace. Two days before the race, do absolutely no working out. This is a day of complete rest. Make sure you go to sleep early this night and sleep in on the day before the race morning. The sleep you get (or don't get) will have little bearing on your performance the night before the race. Three days out from the race again do all three sports for a total workout time of 2-3 hours. Get it done early (before noon) and resist all temptation to test yourself. This again is just putting in some time so that your body will store up the glycogen you need on race day. Have your final long swim (roughly the course or about 3500-4000) done by Sunday at the latest 7 days before the race, your longest ride done 8 days before the race (no more than about 60-70 miles), and your longest run 9 days before the race (no more than about 7-8 miles). Remember, during your taper REST. Take naps (if possible), reduce the overall workload in your life (if possible). Avoid the temptation to fill your free time with a million other things. Rest means rest. By race day the goal is to be so bored with sitting around that you are bursting at the seams to get out there and mix it up with 1800 other athletes! See you in Kona! Mark Allen 6-Time Ironman World Champion

I think the mistake we tend to make is to apply what the pro's do on us, which are maybe older, genetically less suited for cycling and generally train at much lower levels and time than the pro's. A 4-6 hour week for a pro is a serious taper. Rule of thumb is normally that if you are doing 3 weeks of taper, cut volume by 20% on the previous week, with first week's cut determined by average of previous 3 weeks (excluding any rest weeks). Last week is really there only to keep sharpness, and could be as little as 50%-30% of last real week of taper. Based on this, pro riders probably spend 30-40 hours per week training, then 4-6 hours in week before a big race is really nothing. In the last week focus on short high intensity efforts, as this will keep the dead feeling away.

Physiologically, it takes about 7-10 days for training to have a specific muscular effect. Last week is therefore to "keep the feeling" and is more psycological than anything else. Epic specific you need a long taper - it is not a 1 day Argus or 3.5 day Sabie. More like equivalent of 3 Argus' per day or doing Sabie in 2 days, 4 times over. In Audax, organisers recommend last long ride 4 weeks before start.

If all else fails, get Shimano - on FD's they are still the best. Look at how many top riders on SRAM use Shimano FD's.

For long hills, you need muscular endurance, a combination of endurance and strength. You can do this on an indoor trainer. I would, however, concentrate in the winter to develop endurance and strength seperately. Endurance - long weekend ride. Strength, you can do 2 minute intervals, with 3 minutes coasting inbetween, at high wattage 300-500W (high resistance), low cadence (50-60) (be careful of the knees) - this works well on an indoor trainer. Do this once a week only, and get about 20-40 minutes of interval time (10-20 intervals). Also in late winter start working in hills into your long ride. I find to hit the gym in winter also helps with strength, but don't overdo the number of exercises. Most important is to get squats and step-ups in, with some upper-body and core strength as well. Twice a week works for me. Come summer, reduce gym work, and change to muscular endurance workouts. On IDT, start doing tempo rides, i.e. 60 minutes in heart rate zone 3. Later start doing 5x6min intervals with 3 minute coasting inbetween in Zone 4. Move this up by 1 minute each week, until you hit 15 minute intervals. Don't do more than 2 musculkar endurance sessions per week. Continue with long rides, but work hills into it. This type of regime helped me a lot, and I did all of this on IDT.

Liquid grease is not oil, as both have base oil as component, but grease has a thickener as well. It comes in a spray can, but once sprayed it thickens a bit to have the consistency of grease. It is ideal to use in difficult to get to places (except if you take things apart) where grease is a better thing to use. I believe that for these nipples, grease or as mentioned in previous reply, anti-seize or copper grease is used (same stuff used when working with titanium). Grease will protect longer, but you can use oil, but will have to attend more frequently.

Just spray a bit of liquid grease on each nipple every now and then.

Did Sani2C on Nobby Nic's. Must be one of the best tyres I have ever had. I have had Pythons, Crossmarks, Bontrager, etc. It rolls fast, but has excellent grip. I think for the Epic, with less technical stuff, the new 2008 Racing Ralphs should be an excellent tyre. Go for tubeless version, and sidewalls should not be a problem. Can import these for around R400 per tyre. Otherwise, I will go for Crossmark.

Thomson. KCNC ok, but only for sub-75kg - it is not the post that breaks, but the clamp. Similar issues with Extralite.

For V-Brakes, the Mavic Crossmax SLR is really a good wheel. But, the problem is response times locally for spares, as well as the price of stuff. On-line prices from especially Germany for these wheels are about 60% (including shipping and VAT on this side) of local retail price. That is a lot to pay (about R5000 more in RSA) for service, etc. I have found that I also get the stuff much quicker buying from Germany (as quick as 6 days to maximum of 12 days). I think, like in all industries, local importers and bicycle shops will have to look at their value proposition, and charge more for the value they add and not charge for where they do not add value. If they argue that they work on your bike, therefore you must buy spares from them with a higher margin to compensate for this, rather charge more for working on the bike and less for the spares - this is nothing new and happens in all industries. With regard to Dragon not selling spares to people who own wheels legally (either bought from overseas or on a bike), that is totally ridiculous - it is the sign of a company that is not confident of its value propisition and now trying to protect their market share by means of control. It will not work - they will either force people buying from overseas or buying other products that do not have similar restrictions. If I want to buy a spoke for my wheel that I bought from overseas, and they do not want to sell it to me, they will loose the margin on the spoke, and I will buy it from overseas (much cheaper). As I am also involved in a huge export business, I can say that an approach like this is nothing short of idiotic.

I only do MTB'ing (too scared of road, with all the safety issues). For me, in general, racing is a bit over-rated, although I get quite good results in Vets. I choose 3 or 4 races a year to keep me motivated, but otherwise we have started to organise weekends, where we go for 2 to 4 days and do a big ride with between 10-20 cyclists. This is much more enjoyable, and also is better preparation for the real growth area in cycling, i.e. MTB stage races. If you talk to big sponsors, there interest has now really moved to stage-racing, as these races are normally over-subscribed by up to 5 times. I think this has probably had the biggest impact, as many people now focus on the one or two big stage races, i.e. Epic, Sani, Sabie, and plan their calendar around this. I know plenty of guys that raced a lot previously, but now focus on stage racing. I also think 45 km to 80km MTB'ing races are growing, but there is definetly also a limit, as traditionally MTB'ing only had a couple of races. With the many events now on offer, I think numbers per race will stabilise or even go down a bit. I think the K2C has been fairly stable in terms of starters over the past 2-3 years.

Personally, I would not go for a Crossmark for Sani2C. If one looks at the long-range forecast, there will be mud. Kenda Karma or Schwalbe Nobby Nic would be my choice.

I seriously doubt the validity of Stan's breaking down the tyre. It is a water-based latex sealant, which in my opinion can not break down rubber. Stan's do not publish all the ingredients, but do have a list of recommended tyres - those that are not recommended are as a result of weak beads and not rubber compound. There is a long-term test on www.mtbtires.com which found no breaking down of rubber. I think as tyre manufacturers also make tubes as well as UST tyres, products such as Stan's now reduce their sales. Also, most of them now also has a tyre sealant product available - so I think their voiding warranties because of using sealant is more of a market share protection tool than anything based on real science - not one of them has ever been able to proof that Stan's break down their tyres.

Not difficult at all. Just be careful when taking the hub body off, as the pawls may take off. Preferably do it on a white sheet. Also use mineral oil, not grease - Pedro's Road Rage is easiest obtainable and works best. Here is the Adobe file. Check www.tech-mavic.com. Username: mavic-com Password: dealer

I got about 3000 km on my last Crossmarks. Not a puncture, riding in Southern Cape rocky conditions. Only problem is the delamination problem when the tyre is really on its last legs - this unfortunately seems to be standard for Crossmarks. For Epic I will not use any other tyre, but for Sani2C, will use a more all-round tyre - it seems that it is going to be wet this year, so a tyre with more widely spaced lugs would be better, e.g. Kenda Karma, Kenda Nevagal, Schwalbe Nobby Nic, Maxxis Ignitor, etc.

I saw an old topic where there was an argument on if carbon really have better vibration damping than alu or titanium. I have spoken to some highly qualified materials specialists at one of our universities. I will try and explain in non-scientific terms, as I myself struggle to understand. As carbon is a composite material, a lot of what is claimed wrt carbon (e.g. strength, flexibility) is actually dependent on how the carbon was composed (there are different processes, with different properties), but in general, it should have better vibration damping than aluminium. The stucture of carbon basically consists of a hard molecule (skeleton) surrounded by some softer molecules (the resin binding it). That is the reason why it will not break in a straight line, as when it breaks, it will turn away when it gets to the hard molecule, and follow the route of least existince. As a result of this structure it also should have better vibration damping, as the impact will be absorbed better by the softer parts. A case in point is tennis racquets, where aluminium was short-lived, as it caused tennis elbow as a result of the low damping capacity of aluminium. See http://www.azom.com/details.asp?ArticleID=216. I also asked about strength, and the opinion (they have never been on a bicycle) is that the welding process of aluminium will cause weakness in the frame - if one then uses the adage that a chain is just as strong as the weakest link, they feel that if a carbon frame is designed right, it could have superior strength. The one weakness is that one has to design very carefully, as the strength is more uni-directional, but this is overcome with using different layers in different directions. Carbon is also more brittle, therefore the need to keep to torques specifications - falling, in general, will, however, not cause a similar stress to this. i.e. crushing. I suppose one can debate endlessly about this, but in the end when you buy a carbon frame or component, one must make sure that it is from a company that has a solid reputation in this field (tested by cyclists all over the world) - interesting is the fact that if you go on www.mtbr.com, one can pick up some manufacturers which carbon frames seem to break regularly, and others that never get a mention wrt breaking - it therefore seems to be much more in the design and manufacturing technique than in the material.