rubbish heap two

Roadie talk. Got some calf cramps for the first time ever in tonight's hill crit and dropped out with 2 to go. Shortly before that, had some serious cotton mouth so I should have known what was to come. The temperature did just shoot up today compared to what we've had in the past few weeks, though. Kinda bummed on Time iClic road pedals as well because my cleat has weird play in the pedal. My foot is 'tilting'/'rolling' in a way that it shouldn't ever do. May go back to SPD SLs or try out Mavics, or hell, 'downgrade' to the old/more tested Time RXS's.

Try out 49/16 for a beginner gear. I'd cough up cash for the Omniums as well, and shop around online for the best deal. I got them + BB for like 175 shipped a few years back. Cranks are a great thing to invest in... they'll outlast any frame you have. Hell, get in an accident and the cranks are rarely even scuffed, even when other shit is toast.

Gossamers came stock on my CX bike. The FSA BB that comes with them is the weak point - not that great durability wise. If you want to go baller, you can run a Chris King bottom bracket. I think Shimano may work too? But really, if you're doing external BB on your fixed gear, either get SRAM Omnium's (baller) or SRAM S300's (budget) and the corresponding SRAM GXP BB. I can vouch that the Omnium's are certified stiff as fuck, although the BB isn't as smooth as it could be. But hey, like they say, you gotta pay to play... with Chris King. Joker, are you back to racing again? I didn't see you out the last two days, Tabor and PIR.

Joker, heard the news later last night. Sorry about the loss. RIP David. I'll be there for next Tues. PIR/lap of silence. Pretty shook at how close to home that death was.

Oh shit, Joker's racing again! I've had a sabbatical of my own that's nearing end...

my friend has this moots (minus carbon wheels), built up to ~20lb. i rode it (not to it's full potential by any means), and the combination of ti, light weight and geometry makes the thing fun as hell. if i had the choice of any ss mtb regardless of budget... you know it'd be ti over carbon, and hardtail over f/s. god, when i had a ss mtb, the thing was 27lb, rigid, too big for me and bottom of the barrel components. not much fun at all in comparison.

man i hear ya on that...

Being that I started skiing when I was 4 or 5 at that mountain, and have been driving up and down those roads all my life... I really wish I had the climbing fitness to do Mt. Hood stage race. 10,000ft. of elevation gain in 92 miles is no joke, but damn, what a sick course...

Stayer bikes: http://www.pezcyclingnews.com/?pg=fullstory&id=3798 http://davesbikeblog.blogspot.com/2007/05/stayers.html

wrong and wrong. http://www.digave.com/videos/bio-web.mpg

Fuck this weather. Fuck this weather. Fuck this weather. I didn't ride 15+ hours a week every week in the winter through shit rain and wind to have... more shit rain and wind in June. Guess who just turned into a big old SoCal pussy despite being native Oregonian.

Nevermind, had a mechanical en route = no race :(

Crit tonight! The only god damn geared bike race that I'm good at.

I've always had a passing interest in touring as long as I've been doing long rides. I guess I'm too roadie'd out to be content with hauling 30+ lb. of shit on the back of my bike and take hills at 5mph, so I'd personally go for credit card touring on less luggage + more cash. One thing that intrigues me is how touring and winter base training are essentially the same thing - long, slow hours spent in the saddle. I think it'd be rad to go some place warm and just tour day in and day out as opposed to the drudgery of riding slow miles in the rain.

Better than rich, he's basically sponsored, and I wouldn't be surprised if Sacha and co. weld him up another one no charge. When you're that fast, framebuilders want to see your riding their shit... Pre-wreck. Nice frame indeed.

Joker, good thing you didn't race Mt. Tabor! There was a big crash that split the 1/2/3's, and then about 6 laps after that, two Gentle Lover teammates (namely Beardsley) went down right in front of me on some lost traction slip outs. I narrowly avoided that crash and then got off to see if they were all right. When Beardsley got up, his bike looked like this: In addition to the busted fork, the down tube was crumpled. Speedvagen RIP.

Joker, I'm in the same boat. I rode rain all winter and now feel entitled to dry weather. Happens to me every year around this time. Haven't ridden much all week / gonna do shitty at Tabor race. That's okay. Floyd Landis just blew up the spot on pro cycling....

MTB pedals... I tried Beaters but the lack of platform/slippery float feeling wasn't my thing. Recently bought some Deore XT pedals but same deal, didn't like the float and didn't like that dialing the release tension in turn made clipping in harder (which means a big trade off in CX races). Sold them a day later. I guess I'm an ATAC guy for life... unless Look gets their shit together with Quartz's. Road pedals... it's a toss up between SPD SL and Time for me. Speedplays were great for everything except sprinting, and I'm a sprinter...

Just got some Time iClic pedals after ditching Speedplays. Clipping in to these blows every other pedal out of the water in terms of ease. The pedal just attracts your cleat like a mouse trap...

Ah Joker, you'll be good... our season is so long that you'll be strong during some point of it. Full summer of crits and then a full autumn of cyclocross... pick your poison and I'm sure you'll be stomping in due time. The benefits of long base mileage are slow to come on, but slow to wear away as well. Besides, everyone knows of the racers who get a bad injury and then come back with more vengeance then they had pre-injury. I've got a handful of friends like that, including one guy who's had a string of bad luck every season and recently broke his vertebrae at a pro/1 race in Trinidad... I think the mental drive to win gets a lot stronger after you go down and get over the initial hump of anxiety and apathy.

Back in the lycra today and doing intervals. Feels good man. I'm damn lucky in how I crashed - another guy who went down at the track that day punctured a lung/broke a few ribs. Joker, knee getting better?

In other news, I crashed at the velodrome two days in a row on two separate incidents. Yesterday, my foot pulled out of my Speedplay during the flying 200m (TT). I pedaled one footed for a couple seconds then slid out on my left side. Today, I rubbed tires and my front skewer failed and my front wheel flew off. Gnarly road rash, cracked helmet and a face bruise.

she's got a nice ass, what more do you need?

Did you try MSM or G/C yet?

Soul Vice, I'm gonna throw A23's on two different bikes. They're the same profile as Aeroheads + wider so I don't think there'll be any problems baring you don't go do some low spoke counts. I've had good luck in the past with Aeroheads. Honestly though, durability is about 75% builder-influenced and the other 25 component influenced. I find building wheels to be fairly intuitive as long as patience isn't running low, but if you don't know how to build then seek out the most experienced builder you can.