Boo December

I've got good news and bad news. The good news is that I've had a lot of work come my way.  The bad news is that because of all of that work, I haven't been on a bike in almost a month.  I'm not really going to have a chance to ride until the new year so I decided to start a little side project I've been thinking of doing.  

If You Like To Laugh...

My friend Isaac has decided to start a blog here.  Isaac is hilarious and his blog, while only 3 post old, is proving to show this.  I highly recommend you stop by and take a look.

Ride Review & New Toys

In our last episode, I made three easy changes to my mountain bike in an attempt to improve it.  I have mixed results to report, but know that most of it is my fault.

Changes To The Stumpy

Since I bought a bike that is technically a size too small for me (on purpose), there are some changes that will need to be made to make the bike fit me better.  The bike came with a 90mm stem, which was nice for handling (quick change of direction) but I felt and looked really cramped in the cockpit.  A quick guess that I need a 110mm stem by Isaac, who is the shops fitter so his guess carries some merit, and I decided I would try the change.  He happened to have some no name stem sitting in his cubby at work in the correct length and I slapped it on today.

Michelin Pro 4 Service Course Tires

A couple of months ago I was doing routine maintenance on my R5 when I noticed that my tires were pretty close to shot.  I figured I had about 500mi left on them if I was lucky and would just ride them until I started flatting and then replace them.  I'm pretty lazy.

If you ever want to punch a baby...

Just decide to change the shifter cables in your SRAM shifters.  Holy shit, fuck these things.

Mad Fiber Wheel Review

One of the shops reps started repping for Mad Fiber, and Isaac's response was "demo me."  So there was a Demo set kicking around, and I just had to try them.

To start, Mad Fiber claims that they're the second coming of the sweet baby Jesus for road wheels.  Their philosophy it to take all of the individual parts of the wheel (rim, spokes, nipples) and just make everything one part.  The cool part is that they mold everything together, and tension is applied by pulling the spokes away from the center of the hub until they're in tension.  Ideally, they will never go out of true, and you never have to true them, partly because you can't.

R5 Update

Okay, I've had a little bit more time on the new bike and feel as though I have gotten over the excitement and can give an honest impression.  Nothing changes.  The bike is amazing.

Cervélo R5 VWD

I finally own a Cervélo R bike.  It's been about 2 years in the making, but I've got one, and I love.  I get to ride pretty awesome bikes on a regular basis and I'm usually impressed, but his bike has me blown away.  I can say with confidence that it is the best bike I have ever rode, and the kicker is that I own it.

Catching Up

Apparently, I hadn't posted anything since April, so let me bring you up to date.

Bike Weight Post

In the last anorexic bike update, I discussed how the gram scale was lost, so the change to the carbon FSA bar and the Control Tech skewers were "noticeably" lighter by feel and that I was happy with them.  Tonight, after the shop ride, I threw my bike in the stand and after cleaning the chain, I decided to weigh it.

One Flew Over The Handlebars

My normal riding routine is Church on Sunday (S.M.M.R.), the shop ride on Tuesday, and an unsupported, lengthy version of the shop ride on Thursdays.  Knowing I wasn't going to be able to do the ride tonight (Thursday), and not having been on my CX bike in a couple of weeks, I decided to go for a short CX ride in Betzwood today.  After a long warm up on the SRT, I got to the 422 section and hopped right in.  It took me a few minutes to get used to the cross bike again, but I felt pretty good.  I had one close call where I always do.  There's an especially slow left turn that has a small tree on the inside, a large root that as you go over, rotates the bike around too quickly, then you have to avoid the larger tree to the right, and a little, baby tree has started to grow on the left ion the middle of the turn.  What usually happens, and what almost happened today, is I hit the root as I'm turning, rear snaps around, and I bullhorn the baby tree with my handlebars.  I didn't hit the tree today, so i took it as a good omen.

Paris-Roubaix Day Ride

Sorry I'm a little late with this, but here is the ride we did for Paris-Roubaix Day.

L'Enfer D'Hunterdon

Have you ever been so cold on a bike that you constantly question why it is you're even out there?  So cold your hands can barely operate the shifters, and at times, the brakes?  So cold that you can't squeeze your water bottle to get a drink?  So cold that while you're riding, you don't have the mental strength to focus on anything but pedaling for warmth, and staying out of traffic?  After Saturday, I had, and I don't know how I lasted as long as I did.

I'm Just Not Ready

The Hell Of Hunterdon is this Saturday, and I'm just not ready for it.  Last week I went for one ride, and I haven't been on a bike since then.  Given, it was a 60 mile ride with Anna out to Green Lane on my CX bike, and 44 miles in I felt an agonizing *POP* in my knee.  Okay, if I'm completely honest, it happened two more times before I even got to my house, and it hurt to put weight on my right leg for the rest of the day.  It's what I was afraid of.

Cobbles

Today we scouted out the ride we were thinking of doing on Paris-Roubaix day, and it was an awesome, awesome ride.  My Garmin, being a Garmin, is stupid and didn't record any of it because I loaded a course.  It may be the last time I do that.

Aw! You're Killing Me

Hell of Hunterdon is sold out.  I'm a bit torn, because part of me wants an extra two weeks to train for it, and if it is sold out I can always just do the ride two weeks after everyone else.  Sure, it would probably only be me and who ever else I could talk into doing it, but I would still be doing it.  I also feel like just rolling with everyone even though I'm not registered.  They are public roads, after all.  But I'm not sure of how big of a dick I will feel like if I do that.  They need to make the ride limit larger than 350 riders.  It's clearly more popular than that.  If I'm honest with myself, I really would like to do it with a bunch of other people.

We're doing our own Paris-Roubaix tribute ride again this year.  Last years was a very half-assed "lets go ride some cobbles" kind of deal, but this year we're scouting a 25mile loop that includes two hills that have sections over 15% in grade.  One of them is half cobblestone.  I would like the mileage to be higher, but we'll see how it goes on Thursday when we do the scouting ride.  There's still time to make changes.  I think 50miles and a few more hills would make for a great ride.  I'll post up the ride when I come back on Thursday.

Bar Swap, Skewers, Front Shifting

Last night, after a little home disassembly, I headed over to the shop to swap some bars, "fix" my front shifting and install the ridiculously light weight Control Tech skewers.  I was hoping to have weights for everything, but the gram scale was sitting in an undisclosed box in the back, and I didn't feel like digging for a half an hour.  I'm a little disappointed but it's not the end of the world.

Blah Blah

I haven't gotten to ride as much as I would like the past two weeks.  I realize a lot of my posts start off that way, but here's how my last two weeks have gone.

Video/Photography work
Endurance Sport Expo that took up over 10hrs of my day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday
More work and then rain

Spin In The Mud

This summer, when I changed the component group on the Tarmac from 105 to Force, I took the crank off the CX bike and put an S-900 crank on there instead.  The S-900 is a 130mm BCD crank, so the smallest chainring I could get away with was a 38T.  I didn't mind it, especially on the road, until about a month ago when I went for a cross ride in pretty muddy conditions.

Lighter Weight Bike Update

I outlined in an earlier post my grand plan for weight loss, and mentioned how I lost 23g by cutting off the excess seatpost from my already scary light Woodman.  Step two showed up at the shop yesterday in the form of two carbon bottle cages from Specialized.  I know, I know, more of the big red S.

The Start Of Something Bigger

Anna from the shop decided she was going to do the Hell Of Hunterdon ride this March, and after looking at the profile, I was sold.  Selling Jen is a different story, but in the meantime, I'm going to train for it and if I can do it, game on, if not, there's always next year.

I Found This...

...while I was waiting for a video I'm working on to render.  If you recall, in the summer of 2009 my dad and I did the Park Loop in Acadia National Park, and I loved it.  I did not get to do Cadillac Mt. because I was sprinting back to the car so I could end the misery my dad was experiencing.  I really had to fight with myself to not do the climb.  Any way, here's a short little read for you.

http://www.rapha.cc/acadia

Return Of The Mother Fucker!

Long time readers may remember the post about The Mother Fucker I did a few years back, but if you don't recall, here's a brief reminder... I hated it.  It's a little over a mile in length, but it's a real cock tease.  It starts off as a false flat and then hits you up with a 6% grade.  At the time I had a standard crank and had been riding for less than a year, so it was daunting.  Today, not so much.

Bike Diet Gone Mad

When I had a carbon fibre frame, I didn't really care about how much it weighed.  The Tarmac was 19.5lbs when it was stock, which made it a complete pig in the world of carbon bikes.  I didn't really care.  The King/IRD wheels I had built up for it knocked the weight down to 18.5lbs, but I enjoyed how quickly they spun up much more than I cared about how much lighter my bike was.

StumpJumper Evo

I spent a lot of time deciding what mountain bike I wanted to purchase.  While I occasionally work at a shop that sells both Trek and Specialized, I extended my search to include companies like Santa Cruz and Niner, as well as just looking for dirt cheap frames that I could build up for next to nothing.  I tried hardtails and full suspension, as well as 1x and 2x drivetrains.  I skipped over the idea of a single speed because people who ride single speed mountain bikes are either really fast, or hate their legs.  I'm neither of those.

Phoenixville Ride

Aside from bikes, I'm also really into photography.  I often think about taking pictures while I ride, but always get too caught up in the ride to want to stop and do what it takes to take a respectable picture of something.  A couple of weeks ago I was determined to finally take some pictures of my friends while we rode bikes and informed everyone what it would require from them and asked for their participation.  Everyone was excited.

Long CX Ride

Lately I've really wanted to do more mileage than the shop ride (25 miles) and ride my CX bike more.  Yesterday, I accidentally combined the two.

Drew and I set out to do a ride at Betzwood.  He just likes getting out on a bike, and I really wanted to play in the mud.  I more than got my wish.  It rained two days ago but Betzwood looked like it rained five minutes ago.  In the first section, it was super sloppy and traction was occasional.  I would have loved smaller gears to just spin through it, but thems is the breaks.

Power Advantage Class/ Allez First Impression

I got to the shop early today so that I could finish putting together the Allez and dial it in (read: make it work).  After bending the derailleur hanger and making some cable adjustments, It's all good.  I slapped on the white Speedplay Zero pedals I bought for the Tarmac, but never got to use, and some white Roubaix bartape and she was ready for some Power Advantage.

New Bikes

That's right, plural. I'm now the proud owner (much to my wife's dismay) of three bikes. One of them is 90% built, the other is fully assembled and ready to rock.

Specialized BG Fit

For a really long time now, I've been talking about getting a fit from Isaac to make sure I was 100% on my bike. It was more important to me that I be fit on the Tarmac because the Guru is custom geometry, and was always the more comfortable of the two bikes. The last round of changes I did to the Tarmac before I disassembled it made it feel fantastic, and after taking measurements, everything was identical to my Guru with the exception of the stem. The Guru has a 100mm stem flipped to -6*, the Tarmac had a 90mm stem flipped to +8*. Measuring from the saddle, the drop to the bar was identical, the Guru had a bit more reach.

To Tubeless? Or Not To Tubeless?

I was in the shop the other day, and a customer I sold a Roubaix to, who is a huge MTBer, stood there looking at me funny. In his defense, I had two 29er tubes and rim tape hanging from my neck. I had just made a StumpJumper tubeless (or 2bliss as Specialized likes to call it) and we got to talking.

Hed Belgium + Chris King = YesPlease

Title says it all. I went out on a 2.5 hour CX ride with Jude and Jeremy (wrench and sales guys from the shop and all around awesome guys) and it was fantastic. Jude knows a lot of trails in the area and he showed us some that I had never been on around Betzwood. We skipped the more MTB type terrain and just stuck with some single track and rooty, rocky dirt trails. About half of the trails I had been on before with my cross bike, and I would get bounced around and have a hard time pedaling out of things. So I was blown away today when I just rolled over roots and barely felt it. The bike is so much more comfortable in every situation. They're noticeably stiffer as well. Because of the wider rim, the tire is pulled wider and the handling is much improved, both on road and off.

The bottom line is I'm stoked. I may end up running a tubeless set of the Captain CX tires I'm running now (which are just awesome, by the way), in the future, and word of mouth is that the feel of the Belgium rims with tubeless tires is pretty close to a tubular. Seeing as how I just rotated the tires for the first time a few weeks ago, I'm pretty sure I have a lot of time before that will happen. But it is on the list. If you're looking for a custom built wheel, road or cross, look into this combo.