'Hardware'

If you are starting out as a complete beginner like me, then I'm afraid we have to accept that it's going to cost a fair amount of money. In the 5 months since I started preparing for the Etape, I've probably spent £3-4000 on a bike/spares/pedals/clothing/food etc. The good news is that I consider every penny of it money well spent, because it's given me so much pleasure and fulfillment.

That's just a warning, because it won't stop there. I'm already starting to wonder about 'upgrades', and I know I'm not alone in being physically unable to walk past a bike shop without going in 'just for a quick look'.

Anyway, starting at the beginning...

The Bike

I was really lucky with my purchase. I got a Felt F55 from Wiggle. Because it was a 2008 model, I got a very hefty discount. I didn't really know a lot about components when I first started out, but I know now that to get a bike with almost a full 'Dura-Ace' (Shimano's top level component range) groupset for around £1000 was a really good deal.

My original budget was actually somewhat less than this, but because it was such a good deal I thought it was worth stretching a bit. I'd say that for £1000 you should be able to get a bike to get you through the Etape in reasonable comfort and most importantly with good reliability. Clearly, you can also do it for less than that. My original budget was around £700 and there appear to be a number of good quality entry-level road bikes in this range - some of them aimed squarely at the Sportive (ie. comfort) side of things. As you'll probably have to upgrade things like saddles/pedals anyway...this may not be a bad route to go down.

I had some concerns about buying a bike mail-order. However, the people at Wiggle were very helpful, and the bike came immaculately built and packed, and I would have no qualms about doing the same again. I didn't realise at first, but if you buy accessories at the same time, Wiggle are happy to fit them for you when they build the bike, which saves a bit of time and hassle - particularly if like me you're not the best with mechanical stuff.

In many ways, getting a bike from your local bike shop may be the 'ideal' way of going about things, because you can try the bike out for size properly, and talk about/test worthwhile upgrades at the point of purchase. For me, however, the deal on the Felt was just a bit too good to miss.

I've no experience with any other bikes, but I certainly had no problems with my Wiggle experience. If money is an issue, then getting hold of 'last year's model' if you can is clearly a great way to save a significant chunk of cash without sacrificing much in terms of quality.

Gearing

This wasn't something I'd thought about in any great detail before the Etape, and I think was a major oversight. I'd always been a bit intimidated by talk of gear ratios and as I'm not very mechanically minded, I found the whole thing a bit befuddling. I'd thought my reliance on the lower gears was down to my fitness - and it probably is to a certain extent - however I definitely could have done with a couple of extra gears on the Etape. On Ventoux, my cadence dropped below 35 at times - which is clearly ridiculous. I'm not that unfit! It would probably have been worth me swallowing my pride and having a chat with the people at my local bike shop and seeing what they recommended. I could get away with it on the Surrey Hills and UK sportives, but the climbs you get in the Etape are of a completely different order.

Saddle

As a beginner with the aim of completing the Etape or a similar challenge, I think it's most important to think about your contact points in the 'engine' area of your bike, as they're what's going to affect your enjoyment and performance most. The saddle and pedals/shoes are crucial, so I'll deal with them first.

I upgraded the saddle on my bike when I bought it. However, I went for what looked like a good quality saddle which had a huge discount from Wiggle, so hadn't really tried it out. If you're starting out, you WILL be sore when you first start riding - there's no getting away from it. However, although the pain has lessened for me, I've never quite got away from it. The best tactic is probably to try out a few saddles for size, and again a local bike shop can probably help out with this. I'm probably going to try out a few more - it may be that the 'Specialized' type saddle with a cutout down the centre would be best for me, as that's where I get the most pain.

Pedals

I started out with a set of Look 'Keo' pedals. I'd been used to using Shimano SPD pedals on my commuting bike, and I have to say I found the Look pedals much harder to use. I had real struggles clipping into them accurately, and I thought they were weighted oddly, so that you always had to flip them over with your shoes before you could clip into them. After the fourth or fifth time I'd had my foot slip off the top of the pedal, smashing it back into my shin, it started to get tedious. They also have minimal 'float' so if you have any problems at all with your knees - as I did - then they're a bit of a recipe for disaster.

After reading a bit about them, and also having them recommended by Dave Brailsford, I switched to Speedplay pedals. I instantly found them much easier to use because they're 'double' sided and the clip-in mechanism is very quick and secure. They also have plenty of 'float' which allows your legs and knees to settle into the position which is best for them. This can end up being different on each side, but that's natural variation.

They're fairly expensive, but for me at least, they worked out infinitely better than more 'fixed' pedals.

Shoes

Again, I think there is a little bit of 'you get what you pay for' with cycling shoes. I started out with a pair of Pearl Izumi mid-range shoes which were about £60-70 pounds I think. They were fine, but I found that my big toes ended up being squeezed into the toe box of the shoe, rendering them numb after 30 or 40 miles - which can't be a good sign.

My knee problems necessitated an upgrade in shoe fairly close to the Etape. Normally changing such an integral part of the 'drive train' so close to a big event wouldn't really be advisable, but I didn't really have much of an option. I ended up going for some Specialized shoes which were above the £100 mark. I went for these because you can buy specially designed footbeds and inserts for them which are a relatively cheap way of correcting slight 'deformities' in your legs. I have very 'bowed' lower legs which were contributing to my knee pain, and my physiotherapist was impressed by how much correction the shoes managed to achieve.

Above and beyond the 'correction' effects, the shoes instantly felt much stiffer than my Pearl Izumi's and it felt like there was noticeably more power going through my pedals.

The footbed of the Specialized shoes also 'kicks up' a bit under the ball of the foot, which serves to anchor the foot in place and stop your toes being pushed into the front of the shoe. They were significantly more comfortable, and were responsible in large part for me getting through the Etape.

I made a mistake in not thinking harder about shoes/pedals when I started out, and just going for a set which looked good value. It's not worth rushing this part of the equation, and I would recommend trying out a range of shoes in a bike shop which know something about positioning and fit. I ended up with knee trouble and having to buy new pedals and shoes, both of which were far from ideal.

Cycle Fitting

I set up my cycling position by reading advice and going with what felt right. We also had a positioning workshop with Ben Wilson from British Cycling, and he seemed to be fairly happy with my setup.

You can also get more scientific fittings from people like CycleFit or various other bike shops. This costs between £150 and £225.

If I'd known what trouble I'd have with my knees, I might have had one of these done when I was starting out. Cyclefit, for instance, do custom footbeds which might possibly have helped with my troubles. By the time my knee problems had developed, it was too close to the Etape to go changing my position radically.

Having said that, other people whose opinions I trust, have suggested that people who go to any of these 'custom fitters' end up coming out with a very homogeneous position which might not actually be right for their individual characteristics. I guess it's a question of you pays your money and you takes your choice.

If my knees continue to be a serious problem, then I might not have any alternative but to at least give a custom fitting a try to see if it might help. I've dealt with all my training in a fairly scientific manner and it does make sense to me that a scientific analysis of riding position might be able to achieve real benefits.

Heart Rate Monitor/GPS

Although these are clearly very different things, I've put these together because my solution combined the two. I was lucky enough to get hold of a Garmin Edge 705 for review purposes, as I would be using it on the blog.

A heart rate monitor was absolutely crucial to my training and is definitely something you need. There are plenty of people that do them, and the decision will ultimately come down to what your budget is.

I found the Garmin hugely useful for its GPS functions, because I was doing a lot of my training rides on my own and needed to map routes that I hadn't travelled before. I ended up discovering lots of routes on websites like 'Bikely', and it was then just a question of downloading them, dragging and dropping them onto the Garmin, and then following them out on the road.

You can also use the Edge to program interval training sessions for your turbo trainer with heart rate alerts and countdowns - basically everything you're likely to need for your training programme.

It's also really useful to be able to analyse your performance on the Garmin Connect website once you've downloaded your rides when you get back.

The Edge 705 is a bit pricey, but I would say that to me it would have been worth the retail price if I'd had to pay it. I figure you're going to have to spend £50 to £100 pounds on a heart rate monitor anyway, and for me the extra functionality of the Garmin Edge is worth the bit of extra outlay.

On the other hand, if you've been cycling a bit and are aware of good training routes near you, then the GPS functions may be less worthwhile. I have to admit I do love a gadget, and a big attraction for me was the analysis you can do on your stats 'after the event', and the fact that I could post them on the blog. Other people may not be so bothered about this stuff.

Turbo Trainer

I almost forgot about this, because mine's now been consigned to the shed for a few weeks! This is just because I'm not 'allowed' to go on the bike for six weeks at the moment, but until then, it had set up camp in a corner of my living room for 5 months. I did a little video demo on my turbo trainer here earlier on during my training, which might be worth a little look. It's not great, but I wish I'd done more videos now.

I bought a fairly basic Tacx Sirius Soft Gel Turbo which I think cost me £120 or so. I found it fairly easy to put together and use. You didn't have to take wheels on and off - it just has a specially designed rear skewer with a big 'knob' which fits into the grips on the trainer. I tended to just leave this skewer on all the time, as it wasn't going to make a massive difference to my day to day performance and saved faffing when I wanted to put the bike on the trainer.

My version did have a cable operated mechanism by which you could adjust the magnetic resistance whilst on the bike, but in practice I used the gears on the bike to do this - it's more realistic and frankly easier, so this feature was unnecessary to me, and I could have got a slightly cheaper model. Apart from that, the trainer did everything I needed it to do. You can get much more advanced models which included computer control/DVD's where the resistance changes with the route of your 'ride' displayed on a monitor. They look fun, but were just a bit too rich for my blood

I'd say it's fairly crucial to have a turbo trainer - particularly if you're starting training a bit earlier than me - ie. Winter.

However, they're not just useful when the weather's rubbish. Often, you'll need to do training sessions where it's important to keep your heart rate in particular 'zones' for long periods or intervals. This is next to impossible on the road, as you're constantly battling traffic, changes in gradient etc. On the turbo trainer, you're in complete control of the resistance and therefore your heart rate.

I found this particularly useful for doing longish interval sessions at 'threshold' heart rates, which are the best preparation for the long climbs which you face on an event like the Etape.

Despite being pretty ill in the weeks leading up to it, a series of these threshold interval sessions are what got me through the Dragon Ride. It's absolutely no fun, but I think it just has to be done.

A fan is also an essential for turbo sessions - as otherwise it gets very messy. I also got a bike 'thong' for turbo sessions. It's a bit of towelling which goes from the headset along the top tube to the saddle, which stops you getting sweat all over your bike. It also has a holder for your TV remote and phone, which I found surprisingly useful...not essential, but handy.