show episodes
 
The Marginal Gains Podcast, presented by Silca is the show that makes a big deal about the little things, and how those little things...can be a big deal. Josh Poertner of Silca, along with Hottie and Fatty, talks about all aspects of cycling — design, manufacturing, marketing, riding, racing, management and most likely every from a thoughtful perspective. It's a podcast for the thinking cyclist.
  continue reading
 
Leadville — The 100 Mile Mountain Bike Race Podcast, p/b Shimano is the show for people racing (or just interested in) The Leadville Trail 100 Mountain Bike Race. Fatty (a 23-time LT100 finisher), Hottie, and a host of experts answer your questions, give you training tips, detail the course, and tells the stories about the highest and hardest one-day mountain bike race in America: The Leadville Trail 100 Mountain Bike Race.
  continue reading
 
Loading …
show series
 
Rob Britton is an accomplished pro road cyclist who has turned to the off-road scene in the second half of his career. He’s been doing the Lifetime Grand Prix and other mass start events but he is also taking on ultra endurance challenges. This summer it was an event called Badlands: Longer than Unbound XL, more climbing than an Everest Challenge a…
  continue reading
 
This is it: the season's final episode. Like in other seasons, we end with Fatty's race report...but this was no ordinary day on the course for Fatty. In this episode, he talks about what it's like to do his 25th Leadville 100...less than three months after a C2-C5 spine fusion.
  continue reading
 
Josh, Hottie, and Fatty take on your questions in this, our 101st episode of the Marginal Gains Podcast (we forgot to check that we hit 100 episodes -- and 1,000,000 listens -- last time). From contemplating the aerodynamic benefits of chain guards to analyzing terrifying moments of physics in action when riding a high speed descent, to raising our…
  continue reading
 
The 2023 Leadville 100 Mountain Bike Race is now behind us and it's time to look back at the day. Hottie and Fatty talk about and with scores of racers, chatting about Keegan's record-breaking day, how numerous former guests did, and even a few surprising statistics. Enjoy this 2023 retrospective!
  continue reading
 
Hottie and Fatty talk about their Top 15 Tips -- five each for racers, crew, and spectators -- as we get close to race day. Whether you're out there on your bike trying to get yourself to the red carpet, taking care of your (let's face it) crazy cyclist, or just hanging out at Twin Lakes Dam watching this incredible race unfold, this is an episode …
  continue reading
 
Industry legends Dave Koesel and Stephen Doll join Josh for a discussion about the Stromm track bike, a frame and fork aiming to take advantage of recent UCI tube shape restrictions being lifted. If you love wind tunnels, marginal gains, and engineers getting into the weeds with other engineers (and let's face it, we know you love all these things)…
  continue reading
 
We've never raced the Leadville 100 with a power meter, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done. There's a lot to be learned from racing with power, and a good case to be made for it. Coach Jonathan Lee of TrainerRoad joins us to make that case. We also take on the question of whether it's worth the time and travel for flatlanders to spend less …
  continue reading
 
If you think the stories you've heard about the 2023 Unbound are crazy, wait 'til you hear Kristen Legan's story of her XL win. She focused on this race this year, and her preparation and dedication will resonate with any endurance Margingal Gainer. Kristen's joined in this episode by Nick Legan: author of the popular book Gravel Cycling, Unbound v…
  continue reading
 
LT100MTB Race Director Tamira Jenlink joins the show to catch us up with what's changed, what's new, and how to be have a great day on the course. We ask her about course changes, crewing, parking, shuttles, road closures, new aid stations, weather and smoke problems, qualifiers, aero bars and bar ends, and much more. It's a packed hour of info you…
  continue reading
 
At some point, you're going to wish you'd listened more closely to this episode. And we're betting that point is as you're riding inbound from Pipeline to the base of Powerline and confronting a headwind that can charitably be called "evil." The fact is, we all think about iconic climbs when we think of Leadville, but you'll spend far more time on …
  continue reading
 
This podcast has always been about regular people who are racing the Leadville 100: real people with real jobs and families, who find a way to do something big and bold: ride the highest and hardest one-day race in the country. Natalie Dyksterhouse is doing exactly that. She has a career (as does her husband). She has two young children. And this y…
  continue reading
 
Not everyone has dozens of crewpeople available to deposit at each aid station along the course, so in this episode Hottie and Fatty give their advice for where to situate your crew if you have one person to help you. We also bring back Dr Kevin Sprouse for practical guidance on being fast by staying cool. Don't miss this episode!…
  continue reading
 
We take our mission of making a big deal about the little things very seriously in this episode, where we talk about whether there's any actual basis for the superstition behind where you rotate the wheel to before inflating a tire. We then move to the admittedly more pragmatic questions of how much of a draft an aero rider provides to the riders b…
  continue reading
 
Dr Allen Lim joins the podcast for a second time this season, this time to guide us through race day nutrition strategies. We also talk about one of the key factors in this race: altitude. You know that all of the LT100 is way up there, but how much time do you actually spend at what altitudes? The answer may surprise (and encourage!) you.…
  continue reading
 
For Silca’s E-commerce manager, Travis Verhoff, the 2023 edition of Unbound has been a bit of an ongoing science project. In this episode of Marginal Gains, we dig into Travis' expectations, last-minute changes, and key learnings from this experiment...and after all is said and done, what he would change and whether he'd ever race this monster agai…
  continue reading
 
A lot of living happens between lottery registration day and race day, and sometimes that means you have to make a decision: do you line up and race, or do you defer? Fatty's confronting that question right this second, so obviously we get into it -- plus we have info about the deferral policy that we're pretty sure will be news to most people. We'…
  continue reading
 
You've no doubt heard Josh mention Slowtwitch.com many times on this show. It's one of the key places he goes to share ideas and get feedback. But Slowtwitch is more than just a place. It’s a person too. The site was founded by Dan Empfield in 1999, and remains publisher to this day. But before Slowtwitch even existed, Dan was a competitor. He did …
  continue reading
 
If you're ever at a Leadville Party and the energy starts to lag, you know with 100% certainty you can jumpstart the conversation by asking, "So what tires are the best for Leadville?" In reality, though, that question doesn't really make much sense until you understand the anatomy of tires: their composition and performance characteristics. That’s…
  continue reading
 
We're excited to have Dylan Johnson back on the show to talk about how to approach the big X-Factor in the LT100: altitude. Dylan puts thought into every race and every situation and in the case of Leadville, he worked very hard at getting his arrival to high altitude right. He’s here to share his approach and how the citizen racer can figure out h…
  continue reading
 
When you roll up the long red carpet at the end of the LT 100, chances are you're going to hurt. How much you hurt and where you hurt are -- to a degreee -- up to you, but a lot of people certainly experience hand soreness and numbness. In this episode we take a good hard look at this important contact point and get some great expert advice on your…
  continue reading
 
It's an Ask Josh Anything episode! We talk about The Rule of 105, the extent to which "bigger is better" is true for fairings, whether tire inserts need to be factored in when using air pressure calculators, why you might get conflicting recommendations from different air pressure calculators, how many watts a slow-turning old derailleur cog might …
  continue reading
 
Dr Allen Lim knows more about sports nutrition than most of us know about...well, anything. And he knows the Leadville course, too. We have a feeling this is going to be one of those episodes that people refer back to, over and over. We also get into the question of how much time we've shaved (or in Fatty's case, increased) between our first and se…
  continue reading
 
There was a time when the choice between hardtail and full-suspension bikes at the Leadville 100 was obvious: hardtail if you wanted to be fast and efficient, full-suspension if you wanted to be slow and comfortable. Times have changed, and full-suspension bikes can now be a no-compromise solution for the Race Across the Sky. In today's episode, we…
  continue reading
 
Silca's own Travis Verhoff has an unusual work assignment: plan, train for, and execute the most Marginal Gain-y Unbound possible. If you've been following the Silca YouTube channel, you've been tracking his progress. In this episode, we catch up with his bike setup, key learnings and surprises from time in the wind tunnel, using the Chung method o…
  continue reading
 
Loading …

Quick Reference Guide