Men's Journal

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Field tests and other advice on sports equipment and apparel for anyone preparing to race as a runner, cyclist, kayaker or all three
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by Brad Wieners
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To prepare for and finish the Speight’s Coast to Coast, a 151-mile adventure race down under, my relay partner (and wife) Mary and I faced two broad challenges and scores of little ones when it came to gear.

For one thing we were complete novices at two of the sports (road racing on bikes, whitewater kayaking), and we were about to get a re-education on the third (running). So we needed to borrow, purchase, and gain a basic competence with a lot of gear we didn’t already own.

The second major hurdle was that we were preparing for a event that takes place on February 12 and 13 — austral summer in New Zealand, but the dead of winter where we live in New York. As such we needed apparel (for training in colder temps) and some specialized equipment (such as a trainer, so we could spin on our bikes inside) that we wouldn’t use in the race itself.

Meanwhile, as anyone who has taken on an endurance event discovers soon enough, there is no end of gadgets to make your workouts more precise — or complicated, as the case may be. During my six months of training, it seemed like I spent every other week not quite comprehending another user manual. At least one watch I tried still goes off every night at 7:30 PM, as I haven’t been able to disarm the damn thing. And for one whole week my “onboard” bike computer readouts were all in Swedish (which I have in my heritage, but do not read).

What follows is an expanded version of the “Prep & Gear” sidebar that accompanies the feature in the May 2010 issue of MJ on our experience taking on the Coast to Coast. My wife and I are dedicated amateurs, not professional athletes, and our gear picks reflect what worked best for us—not a larger test group. We remain grateful to many manufacturers who made their products and apparel available for testing free of charge, and with the understanding that they’d receive consideration, but not positive coverage for participating.

Six Months Out
Learn to kayak: Master the prerequisite skills for Class II whitewater — breaking in and out of swift current, ferry-gliding, self-rescue. Sign up for lessons on consecutive days so the techniques become second nature. Do not fixate on the Eskimo roll; the point is not to need it. The Mystic, a creek boat from Bliss Stick (right; $1049; bliss-stick.us) helped me, a novice, gain equilibrium and confidence. Start budgeting: Back-of-the-envelope, all-in estimate: $7,625 per person, including the $656 (U.S.) entry fee.

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Four Months Out
Buy your ride: No niche racing bike required, just a versatile, fast road bike. Because of my height (6-foot-7), I bought a custom Seven Axiom S (below right) for $5,300. It’s built on a straight-gauge titanium frame that I plan to be riding 20 years from now. I ordered my Seven from Signature Cycles in New York City (212-706-0025; signaturecycles.com). Prior to my visit to Signature, I’d have thought the three-hour appointment to get fitted for the bike overly elaborate — the kind of lavish attention to detail that is less about performance than it is about convincing a customer to spend a lot of money. But with Signature’s Grant Salter, I became a believer in the process, as he determined the dimensions of the bike, and ultimately the position for my body on the bike that generated the most power and speed. For cleats, I sprang for spendy Shimano SH-R310Ls ($370); Mary did just fine with Specialized Elite shoes ($115). It’s easy to spend a fortune on bike attire and still look undignified. I kept to functional, understated, and relatively inexpensive shorts and tops from Sugoi. A paper-thin windbreaker, the Helium from Sugoi (left; $100; sugoi.com), hits a sweet-spot for fending off gooseflesh without overheating you when you pick up the pace.

Go long: Add weekly bike rides of up to two hours, and to build running mileage without injury, incorporate one-minute walk breaks every mile or so, as advised by marathon guru Jeff Galloway. Seem lame? It may, until you find that at distances of 10 to 15 miles, you clock better times taking the breaks than you do running the whole way. Add hills and distance to twice-weekly bike rides. Seek out a pose running instructor, especially if you develop shin splints, and if you find that longer runs cause old joint injuries to nag, consider shorter, more intense intervals on a track, and sneakers that mimic the way your foot hits the ground when running barefoot. I did not make the switch to these somewhat faddish shoes, but Mary overcame shin splits and reduced calf soreness when she ran in Inov-8 Talons — basically, 7.4-ounce trail runners for those who wish they could run over tree roots and scree barefoot, but realize that’s insane (right; $100; inov-8.com).

Three Months Out
Pick up essential gear: With winter arriving here in the States, you’ll need a warmer set of layers for your training sessions than you will for the race itself. Dress as if it’s 10 degrees warmer on runs and 10 degrees colder on bike rides. The system that worked best for me in 30-50 degrees, from the bottom up: SmartWool socks (from $17), from Eastern Mountain Sports; ibex Men’s Energy Tight ($130; ibexwear.com); Icebreaker Body Fit 150 quarter-zip, merino top ($70); synthetic or cotton jersey; one of two shells I favored out of six I tried: the Mountain Hardwear Epic jacket ($120; mountainhardwear.com) or the Momentum Jacket ($225), from an UK company I hadn’t known before, Rab (us.rab.uk.com). If the temperature dropped below 30 degrees, I added a Turtle Fur beanie (turtlefur.com) and another merino or fleece mid-layer, such as my 10-year-old, trusty Patagonia R2, or Icebreaker 260 or 320 weights Tech Top 260.

On snow days, we cycled indoors on trainers. The Kurt Kinetic Road Machine indoor trainer ($370) I had on loan in our basement served us fine, but required changing out the skewer (axis) of the rear-wheel every time and, when I didn’t get the pressure on the wheel just right, I’d chew up the tire (even the harder compound rubber tires designed for indoor spinning, pumped to 120 PSI). The Cycleops SuperMagneto Pro ($399), which we used for spin classes at TOGA!, our local bike shop, proved easier to get in and out off, was just as stable, and didn’t have the same tendency to shred rubber.

Pick up a dry top (the Kokatat Rogue; $400 is a worthy investment) for frigid whitewater sessions — on the river it’s always easier to cool down than to warm up. For the rest of your kayak kit, I recommend Werner’s Sho-Gun paddle (from $340); the Langer Basic spray skirt ($120); the Pro-Tec Two Face helmet ($57); and the Stohlquist Descent ($200), which afforded the most range of movement of the three PFDs I tried.

Buy a hydration pack just big enough (25 liters) to fit the mandatory first-aid gear and extra clothing layers for the 21-mile mountain run. Go even smaller by ditching the hydration bladder and drinking from streams as locals do. (As a rule, you do not want to drink from streams near livestock, campgrounds or industry.) For the race, my wife, Mary, opted for the Mountain Hardwear Fluid 26 ($100). For longer training runs, she swears by the Osprey Raptor 14 (right; $99). I found that there’s no hydration pack that fits my torso that well. If I cinched the shoulders, the hip belt ended up squeezing my diaphragm. If I loosened the shoulders and cinched the hip, the pack banged against my shoulder blades. And so I came around to something I swore I’d never be: a waist-pack guy. For runs over 8 to 10 miles or longer, I carry water, snacks, mobile phone, ID in an Osprey Talon 4 (below; $54), a sturdy belt that easily carries up to 240 cubic inches (room for a shell, even nano-puff jacket), and two quart/liter water bottles. Just don’t call it a fanny pack; the preferred terms are hip or lumbar pack.

Get on the water: Log time in a sea kayak or, ideally, a “long boat,” such as the Sisson Evolution, the kind you’ll want to rent/race in New Zealand. Get used to cycling in a pack: Drop by your local bike shop and ask, “So, when’s ‘the ride’?”

Two Months Out
Dig deeper: It’s time to transition from fitness to performance. First, make your workouts more precise and efficient. Buy a bike computer to track mileage, cadence, distance, speed, etc., and a heart-rate monitor. For the bike I went with the intermediate range Sigma BC 1606L DTS Wireless for $80 (sigmasport.com). While I checked my pulse the old-fashioned way, finger to neck artery, eyes on a clock or wristwatch, I bought my wife a Polar F6 heart rate monitor ($120; polarusa.com), which she found easy-to-use and incredibly helpful for spinning, especially, at heart rates prescribed by her trainer. And for those who want to approximate the elevation gains and terrain of a race prior to reaching the course, consider investing in a Suunto X10 (right; $650) watch — expressly designed for adventure racing, with a GPS for navigation and barometer for weather. Aside from the basic functions — time, date, compass — the X10 takes some time to master, and, honestly, I haven’t mastered my trial unit. However, inspired by the X10, I plan to create a Google Earth-enriched log of the runs in our region that will give me specific climbs, distances, and intervals of increased and diminished effort, and my own performance times that I can use to prepare for future events. Some apps for the 3G iPhone record some of this data, but, for example, I found RunKeeper a bit funky. On more than one occasion when the GPS signal was weak, the software indicated I’d run across the Hudson River and back six times and finished a 300-mile ultramarathon at an average of 135 miles per hour. I’d actually run from Nyack, New York, to Piermont — about four miles.

Next, add CrossFit training for core strength and conditioning. At Crossfitendurance.com, a virtual trainer can supervise your progress with simple calendar software. CrossFit Endurance honcho Brian MacKenzie has integrated CrossFit with sport-specific training. Use of the site is free. Under his one-on-one, online supervision ($500 per month), a typical week might include time trials for intermediate distance runs, cycles, or kayaks, intervals (4 x 1-mile repeats; three minutes on, one off on the Concept 2 rowing machine), isometrics (100x push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, and squats, for time), and up to six CrossFit sessions in a group class. In the New York area, you cannot improve on the Brooklyn Barbell Club (from $125 per month; $175 for 10 classes) for CrossFit training. Keith Wittenstein and his staff at BBC clean up your form so you can go to very limits of your ability without going to the hospital.

Book travel: Fly Air New Zealand, which offers 13-hour nonstops (a must) from SFO and LAX to Auckland, then book an 80-minute connection to Christchurch. If it’s within your means, upgrade to Air NZ’s business class ($6,660), grab eight hours’ rest in a sleeper sofa, and enjoy service that’s equal or better than British Airways to London. Leave yourself two hours between flights to clear customs.

Reserve your kayak and other race gear: The folks at TopSport in Christchurch aren’t cheap, but they’ll hustle to get you exactly what you need (topsport.co.nz).

Three Weeks Out
Recruit a support crew: Post a request for help on the Coast to Coast website, or ask for referrals from your innkeepers.
Do the race distances at least once: Pick a Saturday and prove to yourself that you can run 20 miles and kayak 40.

Make a fueling plan: In The Paleo Diet for Athletes (below), the authors provide excellent formulas for carbo-loading (while being vehemently opposed to the traditional pre-race plate of pasta). Although I used them sparingly, the best energy bars I’ve found are from ProBar (from $23 for 12).

Experiment with energy gels: Disgusting but essential for a huge physical challenge like this. For longer runs and rides, I came to rely on Roctane ($15 for 6), a Gu with more sodium. Also sample electrolyte mixes and recovery powders well before race day to find the ones that agree with you. Try unflavored Hammer Perpetuem ($25 for 16) to avoid burping artificial banana. Instead of Gatorade, I turned to coconut water (such as Vita Coco or Zico) and, after lifting weights, chocolate milk.

One Week Out
Practice reassembling your bike: Keep a record of key measurements, such as effective seat height (center of the bottom bracket to the top of your saddle). Choose race day attire: You need at least one lightweight shell for sudden squalls. Icebreaker’s L/S Velocity ($90) is the ideal base layer/race jersey. The superfine merino works well in the breezy heat of the lowlands and the chilly shade in the mountains.
Recon the route: Once in-country, study the stages of the race up close, but don’t hire a private guide; keep costs down by joining a group tour.

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