Top 10 ways to make marginal gains

The term 'marginal gains' was made famous by Team Sky and their philosophy of leaving no stone unturned in their quest to go ever faster. From providing handlebar stems in milimeter increments to their riders so as to optimize comfort to the way they cut the bike numbers that are placed behind the seat tubes so as to make them just that much more aero, from sticking stand paper on pedals to increase the friction between the cleats and pedal surface to bringing it's own mattresses and pillows to major races so as to guarantee their riders get a good night's sleep, hardly anything is left to chance.

Regardless of what some have commented about their methods be very calculative and cold and the team being very bland in general, it's hard to deny their results. Despite having only been around for 7 or so odd years, the team have already, among other successes, amassed 4 Tour de France victories, 1 at the hands of Sir Bradley Wiggins and the other 3 by arguably the most famous Sky rider of late, Chris Froome. They were also the pioneers of certain practices that were deemed unnecessary at one point of time but have become common place among most if not all professional teams. Warming up with turbo trainers before a race and then warming down with them after and off-season training camps have now become the norm with most pro teams.

All this got me thinking, what are the various kinds of marginal gains some of us could make on our bikes? Theoretically speaking, if what separates a win from second place can often come down to fractions of a second, then wouldn't being just 1% faster be enough to grasp victory? So, here's my list of 'strategies' that will each grant you a fraction of 1%, culminating in the full 1% you'll need for victory! (Assuming you're already fractions of a second slower in second)

Cleaning your bike
One of the most invaluable things you can do to go faster. A dirty, rusty, squeaking drive train is going to eat up your precious watts as you pedal against all that extra friction which could be going to your rear wheel, not to mention the added weight of all that dirt (since we're talking about MARGINAL gains). Give your bike a good clean, degrease your drive train then put a fresh coat of lubricant on it. In fact, Team Sky have worked with MucOff in the past to create a special friction reducing chain lubricant for those extra bits of gains. Not only will all of this make the squeaking disappear and the drive train smoother, riding a clean bike will boost morale which, I'm sure, adds a couple more watts of power (MARGINAL!)

Slamming your stem
All the pros do it. The science behind it is simple, lowering your average riding posture improves your aerodynamics which in turn reduces the number of watts your have to put out to fight against all that air resistance. Not only that, if you can truly commit to the lower stem height, then cut off the excess length of fork that's left to reduce weight! These adjustments will allow you to go faster for the same amount of power. Plus, it makes your bike look pro, which again, boosts morale (so marginal!).

Removing excess cable length
As with slamming your stem, removing excess cable length on your bike will mean there's less air resistance to deal with.

Do your brake cables really need to be that long? No? Then trim em'.

That cable sticking out the back of your rear derailleur, can it be shorter? Yes? It's trimming time!

Regreasing your bottom bracket and wheel hubs
Over time, the grease coating the bearings  in your bottom bracket and wheel hubs will need to be cleaned out and replaced as even grease 'wears out'. A fresh new application of grease is sure to make your drive train a little more friction-free and your wheels buttery smooth.

If money is on your side, perhaps you can consider swapping out your standard bearings for ceramic ones, they last significantly longer than steel ones and are known to be smoother. (Almost a full 1% now)

Removing excess seat post length
Assuming you're never going to sell your bike or know how to get a replacement seat post in the event you do, trimming that excess amount of seat post that's just sitting in your frame and weighing you down will make you a tad bit lighter, there by improving your power to weight ratio and bringing you one step closer to a full 1%!

Inflate your tyres to the right pressures
When was the last time you checked your tyre pressures? Are they always at their ideal pressures? If not then you're wasting precious watts when you stomp on your pedal in a sprint only to have all that energy go into turning your underinflated sluggish wheels.

Having your pressures dialed in right will reduce your tyres rolling resistance against the road, thereby saving you precious watts. So plug in that track pump and check the pressure gauge, add a pump or 2 extra to make sure the pressures are just right, then reap the benefits of those saved watts!

Shave

That beard and leg hair are costing you precious seconds. Shaving it all off to expose that silky smooth skin underneath will reduce the turbulence around you as you cut through the air, effectively saving you some watts. No only that, it will make massages easier and all the pros do it, so you'll end up looking pro too which itself is certain (probably) to make you faster.

Plus, if you don't mind going a for radical change to your hair game, consider chopping off that man bun/afro/bush too, it only adds weight. Heck, going bald will save you cash on hairprodcuts, allowing you spend all that hard earned money on further upgrading yourself and your bike.

Polish your bike
In Formula 1, the cars are all polished to a mirror finish so as the allow the shell of the car to be as slippery as possible as it speeds down the track. So why can't that apply to cycling too? When every last bit counts and you just need that fraction of a second to win, a smoother frame over a 100km stage will leave you a slight bit fresher as you approach the finish line over your opponent, allowing you to go on the attack a little longer or harder to claim that victory!

Do yoga
When we suffer on our saddles, we tend to do so in a relatively extreme position that's held for a prolonged amount of time. Even riding on the tops all day will get your back aching and shoulders weak eventually. As a result, our power output may diminish as time goes by due to the physical discomfort were experiencing or at the very least, hamper optimal pedaling and power output.

This is where yoga comes in. Increasing our body's level of flexibility gives rise to hamstrings that are a little more compliant when on the bike, even if we're riding on the drops. Professional time trial riders spend hours doing yoga to further hone their bodies into aero weapons. This results in a higher threshold for discomfort and an overall increase in power output, resulting in those extra gains

.

Cash!

Like Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark, if you've got a shit-ton of cash to blow, then money is your super power! Splurge on all the aero and carbon goodness the bike industry just wants to jam down our throats until the next big trend/gimmick comes. A full-on carbon aero monster coupled with a pair of deep dish aero wheels with an aero helmet and a skin suit are all sure to add multiple percents to your gains. A devastating combination that's sure to clinch that race winning sprint.

And that's about it! I had a fun time writing this, smirking away as I came up with the ideas and points. Professional riders must have it tougher than we think if they have to do even half the things on this list, all for the sake of that extra second or two.

That's about it. As always, leave any and all comments or questions in the comment section down below and I'll be happy to reply you as best I can. Thank you for reading!

Top 10 tools a cyclist should own

Cycling is a multi-faceted sport and in order to be a well-rounded cyclist, not only do we have to sharpen our skills on the bike, but a decent amount of emphasis also has to be placed on our technical know-how when it comes to working on our bikes. Indexing gears, trouble-shooting a pesky squeak, replacing an old worn out chain with a new one, replacing a punctured inner tube with a new one and so on.

However, all of that knowledge and insight won't get you far if you don't have the tools to execute them. And with the ever rising cost of living and the less than decent performance of our Ringgit over the past few years, investing in a good set of tools will help you save some cash in the long run as you'll be able to handle your mechanical problems in-house rather than get a bike mechanic to do it which is going to cost you cash. So, here are my top 10 tools every self-sustaining cyclist should have in order of increasing importance.

Spoke wrench/key

Kicking off this list at number 1 is a spoke key. After a couple of thousand kilometers or so, the spokes on our rims will twist and turn unevenly from one another due to the various impacts our tyres make with the road and all it's bumps and surprises, This, after awhile, will cause the rim to go out of true. This may not seem like an issue at first, but if not treated soon, it can cause the drive-train or groupset to wear-out prematurely, especially the chain and rear cassette. After awhile, the rim may start to rub against your brake pads or worse, the chain stays. Eventually, the structural deformity may become permanent, costing you a bomb as you'll need a new rim. A spoke key is needed to adjust the spokes of your rim in order to bring it back into true again.

The main reason why a spoke key is at the bottom of my list so to speak is because it's not an emergency tool and you're probably only going to be using it once every one to two years at most. Apart form that, in the event you don't want to buy one, most bike stores offer wheel truing services as part of their basic tune-ups which will cost you some where around RM45 to RM60. So not too much of a big deal.

Torque wrench
At number 2 is a torque wrench, a highly recommended tool in the event you own a carbon bike. According to senior bike mechanics, the number one cause of damage to a carbon frame or carbon components is not crashes, but over-tightening. This is where a torque wrench comes in. It is essentially a wrench or spanar that will ensure you tighten the screw on your carbon frame and components to their recommended settings and not go beyond. You've already spent so much on your prestine carbon bike, invest a little more so it stays prestine.

A torque wrench will be significantly more useful to you than a spoke key, as you'll service your headset, groupset, seatpost and what not much more frequently than truing your wheels. Plus, in the event you have a bike bag and travel frequently with it to races, you're going to have to disassemble certain parts of your bike before storing it into the bag, that'll require a torque wrench so as to ensure everything is set appropriately.

Chain-cleaner

Next up is a chain cleaner. This takes the lead over the torque wrench as any self-respecting cyclist would clean his or her bike at fairly regular intervals or at least an appropriate amount depending on how much he or she rides. It prolongs the life of your groupset, improves your bike's performance, adds moral to your rides and it's certainly going to be done more often that disassembling parts of your bike and reassembling them with a torque wrench.

Anyone who's ever tried to get their bike's drive train absolutely spotless will know it's virtually impossible to achieve regardless of how much degreaser and detergent you throw at it. And before you say anything, I will have to admit that I was skeptical at first, but once I saw how effective and EASY it was to use a chain-cleaner, all doubts just faded away. If you're serious about how clean you want your bike to be, a chain-cleaner is going to get you a long way.

Chain tool
Perhaps the second commonest mechanical issue you'll face when out on a ride after a punctured tyre is a snapped chain. In the event you don't keep track of how worn out your chain is, it may just snap on you one fine day when you're hustling up that climb and putting all you've got into your cranks. Cleaning your bike and drive train regularly will prevent all that grime and dirt from building up but all the cleaning is the world isn't going to prevent the inevitable. Everything ages with time and so does your chain.  

'Chain stretch' comes from the bushings wearing with the chain pins. Overtime, the inner diameter of these bushings increase and the pins groove out. Not only does this result in sloppy shifts, but it increases the risk of your chain snapping.

Regardless if you're out on the road and need to temporarily mend a snapped chain with a quick link or at home and are planning on replacing a worn-out chain with a new one, you're going to require a chain tool to break the links in the new chain prior to installation or in the old prior to installing the quick links.

From this point onwards, you'll find the tools I've actually spent money on to purchase as I feel they're worth the investment in the long run and have allowed me to maintain my bike without the need to depend on a bike shop mechanic. 

Allen keys

They might not be the most useful tools in an emergency, but chances are, you'll probably be using a set of Allen keys more often to make fine adjustments when you're servicing your bike than a chain tool to replace a snapped chain by the side on the road. In fact, they're probably the only tools on this list that can be used outside of cycling. From putting together furniture to tightening a loose screw, you'll be a regular handyman with just a set of Allen keys.

However, in the event you're interested in saving some cash instead of splurging on a full drawer's worth of Allen keys, just pick up sizes 4, 5 and 6 as these are the most commonly used keys as far as bicycles are concerned. Of course, a torque wrench would be preferable over regular Allen keys especially if you own a carbon bike, but taking into account cost and overall practicality, Allen keys are far cheaper, easier to obtain, require no calibration and can be used for far more things than just bikes

Saddle bag
Probably one of the earliest upgrades to a bike a cyclist can make long before aero rims or top of the line group sets is a saddle bag. Now, granted, you're bike doesn't need a saddle bag to function, nor will having one make you go faster. If anything, it does add some amount of weight to the bike. But take a look around the next time you're on a group ride an chances are a good majority of the bikes you see, no matter how high-end they are, will have a saddle bag on them. It just makes it more convenient to carry your essential tools with you when out on a ride. Plus, they're relatively inexpensive with a decent one costing you below RM150, sub-RM100 if it's on sale. 

No more needing to constantly stuff inner tubes, a mini pump, a multi tool, patches, etc into your back pockets every time you want to go out for a ride. Keep it all in a saddle bag so you'll never have to worry about such things ever again. 

My trusty 12 year old saddle bag, still going strong

Tyre levers
A puncture is an eventuality every cyclist will have to face one day. Even if it occurs not too far from home and we're able to pedal back at a snail's pace, the inner tube will still need replacing nonetheless. Plus, the ability to replace a punctured inner tube is considered by many to be a must-have skill for any cyclist, regardless of skill level.

Even though you can, with some degree of difficulty, replace a punctured tube with a new one without the aid of tyre levers, a pair of plastic tyre levers will cost you less than RM10, are small and weigh next to nothing, making them ideal tools to carry with you on any ride so as to be prepared for a pesky puncture. Most bike shops tend to sell 'puncture kits' that include a couple of tyre levers with one or two spare inner tubes and some tyre patches too.

Some tyre levers and spare inner tubes

Mini-pump
While we're still on the subject of punctures, a pair of tyre levers will only get you half way. In the event of a road side puncture and your hours away from home, you're going to need a pump to inflate the newly installed inner tube. As conveniently quick it is to use a track pump when inflating a tyre, they're far to big and cumbersome to be carried on a long distance ride, even if your bike has panniers and a pannier rack. Here is where a mini-pump comes in.

They may take a little while longer in comparison to a track pump, but they're far more portable and light, making them ideal pocket tools on long distance rides. The mini-pump I bring along on long rides is attached to a holster of sorts which integrates well with the bottle cage mounting holes on the seat tube. However, in the event you choose to get one that has to be carried in your back pocket, then I'd recommend prioritising portability over inflation speed. The way I see it, I'd rather have something that I'm going to have to carry all the time be portable rather than save an extra minute or two on that rare occasion when I have to do a road-side fix.

Multi tool
In the event you want to be well-equiped but don't want to have too many tools cluttering your house, then perhaps you could invest in a multi tool containing most of the aforementioned tools. A decent RM100 - RM200 tool usually comes equipped with 50% of the tools on this list. The one I'm using is the Crank Brother M17 which has Allen keys sizes 2mm, 2.5mm, 3mm, 4mm, 5mm, 6mm and 8mm, a chain tool that's 8, 9 and 10 speed compatible, a spoke wrench/key, a flat head and Phillips screwdrivers, a T-25 torx wrench for disc brake rotors and 8mm and 10mm open wrenches. If you do enough digging, you can probably find one for under RM130. The one I have is from USJ Cycles.

Ever since getting it, I've not had the need to reach for other individual tools, even when I'm sat at home and need to make adjustments to my bike. It's extremely portable and fits nicely in my saddle bag along with 2 spare tubes and 2 tyre levers. It weights just 168g and while it's probably not the lightest multi tool out there, what's a couple of extra grams for something that delivers exceptional value for money. 

Track pump
And finally, the most important tool, in my opinion, that every cyclist needs to have is a trawck pump. Even though you may have a mini-pump, there's no way it can beat out a track pump when it comes to practicality. It almost goes without saying that if you own a bicycle, you have to own a track pump. Even if you didn't have all the other tools on this list, if your tyres are underinflated or plain flat, there's no way you're going to be able to ride your bike without potentially damaging your tyres or rims or worse. It's like a owning a pair of running shoes without laces or a badminton racquet without it's string. Do I even need to get into this?

A pressure gauge like the one you see here would be preferable

And that's about it. This list wasn't put together with tons of scientific data to back it up. Instead, it's a very subjective one that takes into account my own personal experience with cycling tools as well as my opinions on how useful they are to the average cyclist, especially one who's on a budget. That's it for now. As always, feel free to leave any and all comments or questions in the comment section down below and I'll try my best to answer. Thank you for reading!