The Tour de France, now in its 11th day, is a certifiable slog. Riders are in the saddle upwards of six hours a day for three weeks and nearly 3,000 miles. And all those miles necessitate proper hydration, which necessitates proper…elimination. So how does one relieve himself in tight spandex without dropping in the standings?

"It’s different for every rider," says British sprinting phenom Mark Cavendish, who crashed out of this year’s Tour in the first stage. "Some riders maybe take two, three, four pisses during the race. I go right at the beginning of the stage."

It’s common for the peloton—that’s the pack of riders pedaling together all day—to stop near the start of the race and take a leak on the side of the road en masse. (The TV cameras offer common courtesy in this case.) But every man’s bladder is different, and sometimes guys _just have to go. _Which is why the camera occasionally catches riders with their pants down or taking advantage of a flat tire. "People have different ways," Cavendish says. "Some guys lift up their shorts and go. Normally, if you’re on a slight downhill, you can kind of just move to the side of the group and continue while you do it on the bike. Or you can get a teammate to push you."

Three-time Tour champion Greg LeMond just couldn’t do it from the saddle. "I’ve never been able to pee off the bike," he says. "I always found a tree." But you can’t simply pull off to the side of the road. There are tactics involved in watering that tree. "You go to the front of the pack," he says. "And hopefully you tell everybody you’re peeing so they don’t attack."

Riders have to be somewhat careful when marking their territory, though. Belgian rider Johan Vansummeren was fined three different times (!) for urinating in front of fans in 2010. And Cavendish received a slap on the wrist for whizzing in a river. "I didn’t know it was illegal," he says. "I stopped on a bridge and pissed off the bridge into the river. And then I heard it’s not allowed. So I won’t be doing that again."

Peeing on the bike can have other benefits, especially if temperatures dip in the mountains or the windswept French countryside. "In races that are soaking wet and freezing cold, I like to piss myself," Cavendish says. "It warms me up for a split second. You get warm and you don’t have to fuss around."