FOR road cycling fans the Tour de France is a heady combination of the Holy Grail, Tolkien's One Ring and your footy team winning the premiership.

It's a chance to live vicariously through our favourite rider (Richard Porte for yellow jersey and Michael Mathews for green) as he covers a tough journey of 21 stages, more than 3,000 km and across the most challenging and toughest terrain France has to offer.

But this is no easy task.

You must be dedicated to the Tour.

There's no easy ride on the Couch Peloton.

After years of working days in the newsroom, spending nights on the bike before falling onto the couch then trying to make sense at work the next day, this year will be different.

Yes, I'm taking my holidays from July 7 to 30 so I can follow the greatest grand tour of them all.

So join me.

Have fun, ride safely and check out the the special Tour report in the Northern Star this weekend.

See you in August.

Tips to survive the Tour de France

1. Ride Set up your bike on the trainer. You must ride along with the pelaton through the stages. It. Is. The. Law. It's also fun, gets you race-ready and will help keep you awake. And ensure you are near the couch so you have somewhere to fall when you bonk.* See cycling terminology.

2. Compute Ensure your bike computer is working so you can take photos and post them on social media of your speed and distance.

3. Coffee Lots. Of. Coffee. I'm setting up my machine in the front room. Double xpressos work wonders towards the end of the sprint stages.

4. Food Check out the excellent Velochef by Henrik Orre, award-winning Norwegian chef who is also the man behind the meals for Team Sky. Delicious food and easy recipes. Get your domestique a copy so they can whip up sensational snacks as you follow the stages.

5. Television. Ensure you have total control of the biggest screen in the house for the next month. Your partner / sweetheart / non-cycling family members can easily make do with watching TV somewhere else for the next three weeks.

Cycling terminology - How to bluff our way through the TdF

Aero - Short for aerodynamic, the gear (bike frames, helmets, wheels) are designed for minimal wind resistance. Important in time trials

Attack - A sudden attempt to pull ahead from a rider or group of riders, also known as a breakaway. This is a tactic most commonly used in racing.

Autobus - Also known simply as 'the bus', this is the group of riders at the back of the race in the mountain stages. The bus mostly consists of sprinters and other non-climbers, and the aim is simply to finish within the day's time limit.

Bibs - Cycling shorts that have a bib or suspenders (like overalls) instead of an elastic waistband. Elastic band shorts can cause discomfort or chafing and there's adjustable straps for easier bathroom breaks.

Bidon - French for water bottle.

Bonk - Also known as hitting the wall. Seriously. You are out of energy due to glycogen depletion (glycogen is the fuel that's stored in your muscles). Side effects vary but can be anything from muscle cramping to mental fogginess. "Sorry boss, I forgot to come to work today because of glycogen depletion...”

Bunch sprint - The mass dash for the line at the end of a stage when the whole race is still together. Despite the name, a bunch sprint isn't contested by the whole field - the riders at the front are the specialist sprinters and their lead-out men.

Cadence - Pedaling rate or the number of revolutions per minute (RPM). Cadence tends to scale with how much power you're able to put out.

Cassette - Not a musical term, it's the set of sprockets (the pyramid shaped set of gears) on the rear wheel. The chain moves up and down these gears to make riding easier or harder depending on the cyclist's needs.

Chain - A loop of roller links that transfers power from the pedals to the rear wheel to propel the bike forward.

Chainrings - Circular metal discs with teeth that are closest to the front wheel and next to the pedals. Together they make up the crankset, which is rotated by the crank arms.

Chamois - The pad in the seat of cycling shorts that wicks away moisture, prevents chafing, and provides extra cushion.

Chasers (or a chase group) - Riders, who crank away to try to catch a lead rider ahead of them.

Climb - riding up a actual hill or mountain, it's often the toughest part of the TdF.

Cog - Also known as a sprocket or gear, it's one of the rings in the cassette. The entire cluster of gears on the rear wheel is called a cassette or cogset.

Combativité - Literally, aggressiveness, but the award for combativité doesn't go to the rider who threatens to punch out his rivals, but to the rider who shows the most sporting aggressiveness by being involved in attacks, chasing down escapes and so on. Daily points are awarded according to how riders conduct themselves.

Cornering - Basically leaning your bike to "steer" around a curve. Scary on the nightmare downhills the TdF course designers love.

Crank (or crankarm) - The arm that connects the pedals to the chainrings.

Criterium (or crit) - A short cycling race on city streets that typically lasts less than an hour and covers 5 km or less.

Directeur sportif - Team director who's role includes management tasks such as selecting which of a team's riders will ride a particular race; directing the day-to-day and hour-to-hour tactics and strategy on the road. The DS takes care of all the team's sporting activities, while a general manager looks after issues such as sponsorship and salaries.

Domestique - Domestiques are the worker bees of a team, responsible for looking after the team leader and the other stars. Domestiques ferry food and water to their team leaders, provide a wheel for the leader to follow and in extreme cases even surrender their bikes if the leader has a mechanical problem. One say they will have a domestique of their own...

Drafting - Cycling behind another rider so they block the wind for you and you save heaps of energy.

Grand Tour - The Tour de France Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España are the three European Grand Tours. A GT must involve three weeks or riding, time-trials, climbs, sprints and more than 3,000 km.

Hammering - Pedaling hard in the big gears, which have the greatest resistance and pack the most power.

Half wheel - When you're riding behind someone and you let your front wheel creep up on the back wheel of their bike. Often results in crashes. Ouch.

Headset - A ball bearing system (commonly hidden inside the head tube) that allows your handlebars to move so you can steer the front end.

Hub - The center cylinder of a bicycle wheel that allows the wheel to rotate around one point.

Jersey - In the Tdf riders wear a team jersey. But the best riders are after the coveted yellow jersey (for the overall race leader), the polka dot jersey (for the best climber, or King of the Mountains), the green jersey (for the rider with greatest number of stage points for sprinting), and the white jersey (for the best young rider under 25 years old). The the rainbow jersey, worn by the reigning world champion.

King of the mountain - see jersey polka-dot. The rider who conquers the hills, the Sir Ernest Hilary of the peloton.

Lanterne rouge - The last rider on GC. The term means 'red light'. There's no dishonour in being the lanterne rouge. Let's face it, just being able to be selected to start the Tour is a substantial achievement, and to finish it, something to celebrate.

Lead-out man - A rider who specialises in providing a wheel for a sprinter to follow in the final stages of a race. Nestled in the lead-out man's slipstream, the sprinter waits for the final possible moment, then accelerates for the line as the lead-out man pulls to one side. Pairings of sprinter and lead-out man often travel together from team to team, but not always.

Musette - The little cloth shoulder bag handed up to riders at feeding stations, containing food and water bottles. An eagerly sought souvenir by fans when the riders tosses it or misses it in the feeding zone.

Peloton - The largest pack of riders in a road race, also called a bunch or pack. They ride together to allows cyclists to take advantage of drafting, saving them energy during long races.

Piano - Riding at a gentle pace, this phrase can be heard on grand tours, aimed at a rider who is going hard for no good reason - "hey mate, piano!”

Pull - Riding on the front of a paceline or peloton. If you are the pull, you're working the hardest since you're not benefiting from drafting.

Roadie - A nickname for a dedicated road cyclist.

Radio Tour - The broadcast station that keeps the whole Tour caravan and spectators informed of what's happening out on the road in the TdF.

Road rash - The scrapes and brush burns you get from crashing on the road. A badge of honour for many sprinters.

Rouleur - A rider who specialises in steady, consistent riding, often 'super-domestiques' able to provide a wheel for the team leader for hours at a time.

Slipstream - The still air behind a rider. At racing speeds most of a rider's effort goes into overcoming air resistance and it's therefore significantly easier to ride in the slipstream of another rider than to break the air yourself.

Soigneur - A member of team staff who looks after the riders, performing duties such as giving massages, handing up food and water bottles, basically the the den mother.

Sprinter - A rider who is capable of accelerating very quickly at the end of a race. Sprinters are born, not made: you need a high proportion of 'fast-twitch' muscle and steely nerve to go shoulder-to-shoulder with a dozen similarly gifted riders at 70km/h.

Team car - The car that the team's directeur sportif, a soigneur and a mechanic ride in. The team car is the team's mobile base on the road and from here the directeur sportif dictates strategy and the mechanic and soigneur look after the riders.

Team captain - Sometimes but not always the team leader. The team captain is in charge of what happens out on the road, relaying information and instructions to and from the directeur sportif. If the team captain is not the team leader, then a very experienced rider will take the role.

Team leader - The team's best rider, for whom the rest of the team is working to achieve a goal like the overall victory, or the points jersey.

Tempo - Riding tempo means setting the pace for the peloton.

Time bonus - Awarded in some stages for the top finish positions, and for intermediate bonification sprints in stages. .

Time limit - Riders in each day's stage must finish with a certain percentage of the winner's time or they are eliminated from the race and not allowed to start the next day.

Time trial - A race against the clock, either solo or in teams. Known as the "race of truth”.

UCI - Union Cycliste Internationale - the world governing body of bike racing, based in Switzerland.