I TIVO the Live coverage and have it record an additional 30 minutes. For the Giro, there was only one stage where I would have missed the end (luckily I was still home so I extended the recording by another half hour).

The easiest way is for your friend to set up a Season Pass where it only records new episodes only and set up the recording options to record an additional 30 minutes. I'll tivo the pre race show but it probably only has about 5-10 min of interesting info.

At best quality, you probably get 20 hours on a 40 hour tivo but YMMV. I use the medium setting.