Advice and tutorials
How to fight the heat in triathlon?
If finishing a triathlon is already not an easy task, finishing it in the heat is even less so. After a "cool" swim in the water, the bike and run will dry you out and the salt from the sea water will be replaced by the salt from your sweat. How to avoid sunstroke and heat stroke during a triathlon? Léonie Périault and Dorian Coninx, bronze medallists in the Triathlon Mixed Relay event at the Tokyo Olympic Games and Zefal ambassadors, give us their tips.
Adapting and protecting yourself from the heat
For Dorian, "Acclimatization and hydration are the two most important elements to face the heat!", it is true that the fight against the heat begins way before the day of the competition by acclimatizing to the practice of efforts under the heat days and weeks before your triathlon. To do this, our two triathletes simulate the heat and humidity conditions they encounter in certain events, such as the Olympic Games, in the thermo-room of the CREPS in Montpellier for Léonie, and in his bathroom for Dorian. The rest of the time, Léonie recommends "to hydrate more and to rest in cool places".
On D-day, Léonie advises "to be vigilant about exposure by not being in the sun before the race", you will have plenty of time to sunbathe during the event. She is also experimenting with the use of menthol "which has refreshing properties for the heat".
Once the start and the swimming section is over, "the sodium in your water bottle can provide solutions", your body eliminates salt by sweating, the sodium in your drink will limit the risk of dehydration and cramps.
Léonie is ready to face the heat with her Arctica Pro 75!
The Arctica insulated water bottle, an important ally
The fact remains that the contents of your water bottle must remain cool between the time you drop your bike off at the closed park and the time you leave the swim, a period that varies depending on the format of your triathlon, but which is long enough to warm up your drink.
To overcome this problem of maintaining the temperature of the drink, Léonie started looking for a bottle that was "light and would protect the contents of my bottle from outside temperatures".
"I tried different types of insulated water bottles in preparation for the races I was going to have in hot conditions. I had the best results with the Arctica Pro." This is how Dorian Coninx discovered and chose the Arctica Pro insulated water bottle. A water bottle that also meets the criteria set by Léonie Périault: "Traditionally, insulated water bottles are heavy and can be awkward to carry on a bike (difficult to hold on the bottle cage). The Arctica water bottle is light and allows me to take advantage of the conservation properties of a traditional insulated water bottle."
The Arctica Pro's multi-layer insulated system keeps your drink at the right temperature for up to 2.5 hours, so you can be sure to have a cool drink during the bike section of your triathlon. No more unpleasant feeling of drinking a hot drink under 30° in the shade! The Pro Cap system guarantees the watertightness of the bottle and its soft push will give a pleasant sensation in the mouth.
The two capacities proposed, 55 and 75 Cl, will allow you to define the quantity of water necessary according to the distance of your bicycle section and to distribute in each of the bottles the type of drink wished.
If it's just one factor among others in the fight against the heat, the cooling moments offered by the Arctica Pro during the bike section of your triathlon may make the difference in the success of your run and your goal.
Mandatory during a heat wave.