Ride or Pie?!

Experiments with measuring bike geometry

2012-01-26T15:13:00.000-08:00

The current weather in Montreal has kept me indoors more than I wanted. Inspired by an article in the current issue of Bicycle Quarterly, I decided to measure the geometry of my Gunnar Roadie.The article in BQ describes how to measure bike geometry from a photograph, and an older article gave instructions how to measure directly on the bike. As a quick summary: measuring on the bike works better for almost all dimensions but trail and fork rake. Trail and fork rake can be measured on a picture, but it's hard to get them accurately.

Measuring angles

For measuring angles, using a digital angle finder or an angle finder app for your smartphone is the best option. According to the interwebs, the angle finder apps are pretty accurate. The angles you need are that of the seat post, the head tube and the top tube. The top tube angle is only important for calculating the effective top tube length, as described below. So if you plan on measuring the top tube length directly, you can skip that step. For most bikes, seat tube and top tube angles will be somewhere between 70 and 75 degrees. Top tube angles used to be 0 on most bikes, but after the sweeping success of compact geometry with sloping top tubes, there now is a large range of angles. In order to get good measurements, measure multiple times and make sure that your angle finder is flush with the frame. Many frames have butted tubing that will be thicker near the intersections of the tubes and you should thus measure in the middle of the tubes.

Measuring lengths

The seat tube is probably the easiest thing to measure. The cranks are somewhat in the way of putting a ruler on there, but it's still easy to get a good measurement. Just make sure to note which measurement you're taking: either center (of bottom bracket) to center (of top tube intersecting the seat tube) or center to top (of seat tube). In addition, you will probably already know this number, as this still is the most common way in which manufacturers size their frames.

The top tube is a little bit more tricky, at least if it is a sloping top tube. In order to measure the effective top tube length you have to put a level on your ruler and then measure the distance from the center of the head tube to the intersection with the seat tube (or the seat post as its extension). I find this pretty difficult to do properly, and fortunately there is another way by employing the powers of trigonometry: You'll need the length of the actual seat tube and the angles of the seat and top tube. Using the laws of sines, you can calculate the effective top tube length x as follows:

x = \frac{\sin γ \cdot a}{\sin β} = \frac{\sin (180 - α - β) \cdot a}{\sin β}

Another relevant dimension is the bottom bracket drop, that is the distance from a line between the two wheel dropouts and the center of the bottom bracket. Jan Heine suggests tying a string around the front and rear quick release skewers and then using a ruler to measure the distance from the string to the bottom bracket. You have to correct that measurement with the radius of the skewers.

Next is the front-center distance, i.e. the distance from the front wheel axle to the bottom bracket. The problem is that the fork has to be completely straight in order to get an accurate measurement--something not easily to achieved. Jan Heine suggests measuring on both sides and then making sure to get identical readings, but I found that rather difficult.

Now we get to the tricky part: measuring fork rake and trail. I won't go into the discussions if high trail or low trail are TEHBESTTHING(tm) and instead only show how to best measure trail. Measuring trail directly is almost impossible. Trail is defined as the distance between where the front tire touches the ground and the extension of the steerer axis, as shown in the following figure.

Fork rake r and trail t

Projecting the head tube and the vertical axis through the hub onto the ground accurately just doesn't work properly. [1] Fortunately, you can use the fork rake and wheel diameter to calculate the trail. Measuring the fork rake is easier than measuring trail, but it's still tricky. Bicycle Quarterly use a custom made tool or they measure rake from a digital image. If you only have access to the image of a bike, it's even possible to get all of the above measurements from the image; however, I had a hard time producing a distortion-free image with the lenses at my disposal.

First, take a picture of the front part of the bike. Using your image editor's (I'm using Photoshop) measuring tool, rotate the bike so that the head tube angle matches the value you got from the angle finder. Measure some other tubes, too, to see if and where there is distortion. In addition, draw a circle and see if it is well aligned with the rim. If that shows too much distortion, take another picture and repeat the process. Now you will determine the scale of your image. Draw a vertical line through the hub and measure the distance from the center of the hub to the outer rim. It doesn't really matter which unit of measurement your software uses. On your bike, this distance is a known variable, and dividing the real value through the measured value will give you the scale of your image. With my bike, I measured 1.729 in the image and by dividing 316 (622mm bead seat diameter plus 10mm, then divided by 2) by 1.729 I got a scale of 1:182.8. It is a good idea to repeat the measurement a couple of times on different sections of the rim to once again control for distortion. I measured 1.729, 1.758, 1.651, 1.524, showing that there is still a good deal of distortion. One might be tempted to just take the average of these measurements, but since distortion is not random, this is not advisable. It is preferable to keep taking more pictures, with different lenses and at different angles to achieve a minimum of distortion. For now, we'll just assume that the 1:182.8 scale is correct.

Now we can actually measure the rake: Draw a thin line through the steerer axis, extending it all the way to the end of the fork blades. The draw a line parallel to the steerer axis through the hub. Parallel lines are easiest to get with copying and pasting the first line or drawing a rectangle. Measure the distance between the two parallels. In my case, this was 0.240, yielding a rake of 0.240 * 182.8mm = 43.9 mm. Common values for fork rake are between 40mm and 75mm, with most forks being in the lower range of this spectrum.

Using fork rake, head tube angle, and wheel/tire size you can now use the excellent online trail calculator to get your bike's trail. For Gunnar that would be 54mm trail with a 25-622 tire. Since small measuring errors in any of the measurements can throw the calculation off easily it's hard to say how accurate this value is. It would put Gunnar in the medium trail range (Heine gives 25-80mm as the common range).

To conclude, measuring a bicycle's geometry, either on the bike or from a picture, can be tricky. For many bikes you will be able to get the correct values from the manufacturer (please note, though, that most likely there will be minor aberrations from the values on your frame as artefacts of the manufacturing process). If you want to measure your own frames it might be a good idea to start with a bike with known dimensions to give you an idea of how good your own measurements are.

[1] I wonder if one could use a laser pointer attached to a concave piece of metal that matches the head tube's curvature. I've ordered a laser pointer and tinker around with it a bit.

Review: Innova 700x35C Studded Tires

2012-01-26T11:45:00.000-08:00

Back in November, I published a "first look" article on my newly mounted Innova snow tires. After having ridden them for only a few kilometer they seemed like reasonably nice tires: cheap, not too heavy, not too much rolling resistance. Since then I have ridden the tires for approximately 1500 km and my verdict is very different now. The Innovas turned out to be a bad investment for me.

Before...

...and after

The main reason for this are the steel studs. In the initial review I pointed out that steel studs have a reputation for not lasting long, and now I can say for sure: yes, they really don't. I admittedly rode more than usual this winter and a lot of it was not on snow or ice but just bare pavement. But the degree of wear just isn't acceptable. On the pictures you can see that a lot of studs have completely sunken into the tire. In addition, I have lost two studs in the front tire, despite following the manufacturer's advice to break in the tires by careful asphalt riding for the first 50 km¹.

The studs on the rear tire have completely sunken into the tread

The problem is exacerbated by the overall low number of studs. 110 studs make for light weight and low rolling resistance, but on a 622mm tire they limit the performance on ice. I got a taste of that when -- somewhat foolishly -- I endeavored to ride over a bike path covered in snow that had been turned into ice by freezing rain. I quickly realized that this probably was not a very good idea but once you're on the ice there is not much you can do. So I kept going at a very slow pace, but after maybe ten meters it was over. Wham! The front wheel slipped and down I went. I landed on my behind and aside from a painful bruise no physical damage was done. The mental damage, a loss of trust in my tire, however, was quite severe. In my post-accident analysis I've come to the conclusion that 110 studs is not enough for riding on uneven ice on a 622mm tire. A 35-622 tire has a circumference of 2168mm, meaning that the studs are about 40mm apart on each side. On uneven ice that's definitely enough to take you down.

Do I have anything good to say about the tires? Well, they have a nice tread which works well in snow. And as long as the studs were still reasonably new they worked well enough for Montreal conditions. Because of the wear issues I can definitely not recommend this tire; however, if Innova would produce the same tire with carbide studs, like the very similar Suomi Tyres W106, it would make a pretty good commuting tire for urban conditions with infrequent ice. For next season, I will probably switch to something like the Schwalbe Marathon Winter with 294 studs.

Product details:

Innova TR5263 Snow tire
110 steel studs
700x35C (37-622), also available in 700x45C
Price 40-75 USD

¹ This is fairly common, however, even with more expensive tires from Schwalbe or Continental.

Measuring the SP PD-8 hub

2011-12-21T15:20:00.000-08:00

CORRECTION: Please note that an earlier version of the post claimed that the center-to-flange distance is 32mm. I've corrected that to 22mm. Sorry for the confusion.

I'm getting read to build up new wheels with my recently acquired dynamo hubs. In my previous post, I had posted the manufacturer's stated dimensions, but I realized that they only provided the pitch circle diameter and the flange diameter--the latter being irrelevant for determining spoke length--but not the center-to-flange distance and also not the spoke hole diameter.

The best instructions for measuring a hub come from Roger Musson, author of a popular book on wheelbuilding. Fortunately, he has made this part of the book freely available. All you need to take the relevant measurements are calipers and a ruler. Musson suggests to drill a piece of wood, so that you when you insert the hub's axle the wood will be flush with the locknuts. If you're building a lot of wheels this probably makes sense. As an alternative, you can just measure from the end of the axle and then subtract the easily measurable distance between axle end and locknut. Then use the ruler to measure the distance between the wood/axle end and the inner side of the lower flange (what Musson denotes as x). Then turn around the hub and repeat the measurement on the other side, giving you the y value. With the SP disc hub that's a bit tricky, as the diameters of the two flanges are different. Musson's suggestion is to use a small piece of cardboard, mark it, and then measure on the cardboard. I was in a bit of hurry and thus just eyeballed it with the ruler after seeing that x and y would likely be the same for this hub. X and y are not the actual values needed for calculating spoke length, but they allow you to calculate the desired value by subtraction from half of the over-the-locknut dimension of the hub, z in Musson's system. On modern front hubs for regular bikes you don't really have to measure this, as it is a standardized dimension at 100mm. For the PD-8, x and y equal 28mm (32mm-4mm for the distance from axle end to locknut), yielding a center-to-flange dimension of 22mm on each side.

The flange diameters can directly be measured with calipers. Just make sure to measure from the centers of the spoke holes. The PD-8 comes out to 52mm and 58mm. The spoke hole diameter is a bit tricky to measure: The inside jaws of regular calipers tend to be too big for such small holes. I measured 2.7mm, but as most hubs use 2.5mm holes I'm assuming this is a measurement problem.

Now you can plug your values into the spoke length calculator of your choice and voilá! I recommend Karl Stoerzinger's Freespoke or the DT Swiss calculator.

First impressions: SP Hub Generators PD-8 and PV-8 (updated)

2011-12-14T19:30:00.000-08:00

Wouter Scholten's website is a great resource for all hub generator lighting issues. He extensively tests almost all models of hubs and lights on the market in real world settings, and he is also unusually well-informed with regard to the introduction of new products. A while ago, he wrote about a new player on the hub generator market, Shutter Precision Ltd. from Taiwan. As the name implies, they started as a supplier for digital cameras and then later moved into bike component manufacturing. While the company itself has little name recognition, they are (presumably) the suppliers for two better known companies, Velo Orange[1] and Supernova.

After having introduced their switchable dynamo (in my opinion a solution in search of a problem), at the 2011 Taipei Cycle Show SP announced what would be the lightest generator hub, the SD-8 (disc brake)/SV-8 (rim brake). These two hubs, however, only are rated to a power output of 2.4W in a 622mm wheel, making them not street-legal according to the German StVZO requirements. However, they also announced a slightly more heavy model rated at 3W, the PD-8 and the PV-8. The technical specs and the prototype tests by Wouter sounded promising, and when Wouter's shop, Gambiet Fietsen, offered them for pre-order in September I went in for two generators, one disc, one rim. The disc one will replace my Shimano DH3-N80 on the Cross-Check which I unfortunately messed up while trying to re-grease the bearings, and the PV-8 will be part of a second front wheel for Gunnar, finally allowing me to turn him into a real brevet bike.

The hubs arrived yesterday, at a total price of 180 Euro shipped. The actual wheelbuilding will have to wait for a little while longer, but I wanted to share some pictures and impressions.

PV-8 in its original packaging. I'm not sure if all the color and spoke count variants are or will be actually available.

The hub looks quite similar to the current SON 28...

...but it does have the same terminal as Shimano hubs

Here you can see the German K-certification wave, making the generator street legal in Germany


The weight pretty much exactly matches the claimed weight.

Both the disc and non-disc version of the hub match their claimed weight of 390 g and 410 g, compared to 440/460 for the new SON 28, 490 g for the Shimano DH3N80, and 399 g for the Supernova Infinity S (center lock disc mounts). Only the SONdelux at 390 g (rim) and 395 g (disc) can match this, but at a significantly higher price point.

SP claims that the new generators do not only excel in weight, but are also "the most efficient" generators (this refers to the 2.4W ones) and their product sheets has a couple of graphs that show the generators to be more efficient than the SONdelux. I'm somewhat skeptical about those claims and am very much looking forward to some independent testing.

Measuring the dimensions of the hubs is a bit tricky with the tools I have and I've only been able to find the manufacturer's numbers for the 2.4W version. Probably they're going to be the same for the 3W, but I'll confirm this with Wouter or measure myself. The bearings are sealed cartridges and I'm not sure if they are user-replaceable.

I think that's all I can say for now. Once I have the wheels built up and ridden them a bit, I will post an update.

Update 2011-12-16:
In the meantime I've found the website of SP's distributor, and their catalog lists the relevant dimensions as follows:

	PV-8	PD-8 (non-disc/disc side)
Spoke P.C.D.	52mm	52mm/58mm
Flange diameter	60mm	60mm/66mm

They also have "replacement instructions" on their site that might contain instructions on how to replace the bearings. Unfortunately, the document is corrupted, though, and can't be opened. I've sent them an e-mail and we'll see if I hear back.

[1] If I remember correctly, the Velo Orange switchable dynohub got some bad reviews. At any rate, they no longer seem to sell it.
[2] There is also a 2.4W version, called SD-8/SV-8, suitable for those on small-wheeled bikes or those who don't care about the extra power/street legality in Germany.

First impressions: Innova 700x35C Studded Tires

2011-11-24T11:22:00.001-08:00

Update 2012-26-02: I now have posted an extensive review of the tire.

The first snow of this winter has arrived in Montreal, and it was quite a lot. As an avid follower of various kinds of weather forecast (yesyes, I'm soo boring) I was, however, well prepared. The night before I put on my new studded winter tires. I bought them sometime in spring, knowing that in winter it can often be tricky to still find studded tires in stock. The only tires in a suitable size -- my fenders only allow a max of 38 mm wide tires -- that my bike shop had available were Innova Snow Tires in 37-622. The tires have a pretty aggressive tread and a total of 110 steel studs, positioned in two rows near the tire's center.

The Innova website is pretty uninformative, and I also couldn't find much information elsewhere on the interwebs. I'm curious how the steel studs are going to hold up. More expensive snow tires from Schwalbe, Nokian/Suomi, or Continental use carbide studs which are harder than steel and should therefore last longer and will also not rust -- even though that is primarily a matter of aesthetics. In principle, the studs should be replaceable and I'm assuming that I could use carbide replacements if necessary. Measured width was about 33 mm on an Alex DA-16 (internal rim width 19mm).

Price

I paid 40 USD per tire at my LBS, which is a pretty good price for studded tires in North America. Last week I saw them at a bike shop in Montreal for 75 CAD each and on Amazon they sell for 64 USD (if you can fit 45mm, you can currently get them for 36 USD there). So they're not cheap when compared to normal tires, but in the world of studded tires they're probably the cheapest you can get. And if they prevent only one crash they're probably already worth it.

Ride quality

I took the tires on a first 80 minute test ride on the night before the snow actually arrived. It is advisable to break in studded tires, i.e. riding them without hard cornering or braking, for a couple of kilometers in order to allow the studs to set themselves in the tire and avoid losing them prematurely. So I rode along the Lachine Canal bike path, which was mostly dry with some icy puddles. On dry pavement, you can clearly feel the increased rolling resistance of the tires. Up to now I have been on Vittoria Randonneur Pros in 35-622, which roll very nicely, and thus the difference was very noticeable. The best way to describe the feeling of the tires is "riding into a slight headwind." What is even more noticeable than the rolling resistance is the noise of the tires: people often joke that you can take off your bell when you're riding studded tires, and I have to agree: the sound is very similar to riding on fine gravel, even though I think the tires have gotten a bit quieter on the third day. There were some frozen puddles on the Lachine Canal path, and I somewhat cautiously tested riding over them. All went well and so I got a bit bolder: Braking on the ice also worked pretty well.

The next morning I rode into work once the snowfall had mostly stopped. I tried going my usual route on the Lachine Canal, but they don't clear the snow there at all and riding through deep snow wasn't too awesome, even with the new tires. At the next intersection I therefore turned onto the streets which were more or less snow-free. On the more snowy parts, the tires performed reasonably well -- I would say better than the Ritchey Cross-Pros I had been riding during the past winter, but it's hard to tell. On the way back, the roads were mostly snow free, but I did go across an icy pedestrian bridge near Atwater Market. Here the studded tires were great, and I think not having to worry about icy patches that can often be hard to spot is the main advantage of studded tires.

Since then it had gotten warm again and I have taken the tires off. The next snow and ice will come soon, though, and I will probably post an update at some point.

Product details:

Innova TR5263 Snow tire
110 steel studs
700x35C (37-622), also available in 700x45C
Price 40-75 USD

Ride report: 150 cold kilometers

2011-11-21T10:46:00.001-08:00

It's time for the annual winter trophy again, and this year I'm member of a pretty hardcore team. My last two weekends were spent with conference and work travel and I had fallen behind quite a bit. The weather forecast for Saturday looked okay -- about 5 degrees and dry -- and so I decided to do what could be the last really long ride of the season. I combined a bit of a previous route with some new bits, resulting in a 150km course that would be almost exclusively on bike paths and lanes.

I made up my mind of where to go last minute, as per usual, and only got on the road around 11:30. The only crossing of the St. Lawrence that hasn't been closed for the winter yet is the Jacques-Cartier Bridge. The offramp of the bridge is only a few blocks away from the Route Verte 1, which led me out of Longueil first on bike lanes/cycle tracks and then on bike paths more or less away from traffic. There was a steady headwind coming from the south which kept my speed at around 20 km. Once I reached Chambly I made my first stop of the day on the beautiful shore of Lake Chambly. One of the things that suck when biking in the winter is that you can't really have any longer outside stops, and thus only ate a Clif Bar (as an aside: their new coconut-something flavor is great!). I had done this part of the ride before on the 100k-ride with the Biketopus, but now I crossed the Richelieu river instead of continuing along the Chambly Canal.

On the OpenCycleMap I had found the Route des Champs which leads east toward Granby. The description on their website promised a mostly paved, partly gravel route and so I was quite shocked when I got to what I thought was the trailhead outside of Chambly: the trail was basically an old railway bed with the tracks removed. I tried riding on it for maybe 50m, but it was almost impossible to ride on the loose rocks. At the next intersection I stopped and considered my alternatives. Only then did I spot the actual trail only 30 meters to the north, parallel to the busy highway. Phew.

The Route de Champs was very nice to ride on: very long straight stretches, few intersections, and a nice hardpacked gravel surface. The Route des Champs meets the Route Verte 1 in Granby, but that would've been too far and thus I turned south in Saint-Cesaire, now following the Yamaska River on a very quiet country road with surprisingly good pavement.

In Farnham I then turned west again on the Route Verte/Monteregiade and took another Clif Bar stop, which was highly overdue -- I could already feel some bonking symptoms. The Monteregiade, built on the right-of-way of a former CN railroad, is lovely to bike on and for the first time on the ride I had a bit of a tailwind. After less than an hour I arrived in St. Jean-sur-Richelieu and took another rest stop at the gas station (note to self: never again buy grape-flavored Gatorade). I was a bit disheartened to see a Route Verte sign saying "Montreal 60 km," but once I got going I felt pretty good again.

It was pitch black at this point, but with my trusty B&M Cyo lights riding the gravel trail along the Chambly Canal was very pleasant. The ride back to Montreal was not very eventful and after almost exactly 150 km and 7 h 25 minutes I arrived back home. The 29 Winterpokal points (at least temporarily) catapulted me on the third place in our team.

A Converge Show, a Night Ride and a Skunk

2011-05-26T08:14:00.000-07:00

Mephitis mephitis by Dan Dzurisin, CC-By 2.0

A couple weeks ago I heard that Converge were going to play at the Lost Horizon in Syracuse and, Converge being one my absolute favorite bands, I wanted to go!

Only how to get there? Bus service to Syracuse is basically non-existent and taking the carshare car would have been too expensive. That left me with either getting a rental car or taking the bike. It's about 90 km to Syracuse, i.e. easily manageable for a one-way ride, but pretty far for a return trip. Initially I planned on riding there, staying overnight in a cheap motel and then riding back the next morning, but riding back the same night seemed like an interesting and challenging option.

I left Ithaca around 2 p.m. on Wolfgang, loaded with only a Frontroller. A large part of the route I had done previously on my Winter Adventures ride. Between Freeville and Munsons Corners I had a flat due to a not properly vulcanized tube patch. Because I only had brought one spare tire and didn't like the idea of potentially having to patch a tube on the night portion of my ride, I decided to stop at a bike shop in Cortland. Thanks to my smartphone and an open wifi access point I found my way to Action Sports on N Main St -- only to realize they were closed on Tuesdays! Oh well.

After that little detour I continued north on NY-281, with traffic gradually getting lighter. After a short break in Tully, I turned east on NY-80 and then turned left again onto Apulia Rd, leading me north towards Syracuse. Apulia Road is lovely: following a river and the railway, it is slightly downhill most of the time, pavement is great and traffic is very low. At Jamesville Beach County Park I made a stop to refill my water bottles (their restrooms were locked, unfortunately) and continued towards the huge quarries just outside of Syracuse. After going through an underpass across I-481 I then rode through nice residential neighborhoods on low-traffic streets and finally arrived at the Lost Horizon a bit past 7 p.m.

Unfortunately, there was no proper bike parking anywhere near the club and thus I hid Wolfgang behind hedge. The Converge show was really awesome and made me forget my slightly sore body. Therefore I decided to indeed skip the motel and ride back right after the show ended.

Converge by Francis Bijl, CC-By 2.0

I left around 10:30 p.m. and returned on the same way. Riding at night can be really nice: almost no cars, no noise except for the sounds of wildlife, and also no wind. The sky was mostly cloudy and the moon did not rise before 2 a.m. To prevent tiredness and boredom I listened to podcasts on my phone for quite some time but eventually ran out of them. Then somewhere between Tully and Cortland it happened. I wasn't properly paying attention to the road and suddenly I hit something. I didn't crash but it was quite a bump and a gross, cracking sound. I must have run over an animal, presumably an already dead one. I had little desire to go back and take a closer look and just continued on my way home. Only when I arrived in Ithaca at 4 a.m. and carried the bike up the stairs to our apartment I realized something was wrong: during the ride I had smelled skunk every once in a while but didn't think much about it -- it's a fairly common thing in rural Upstate NY. But not in our building! So it dawned on me that the run-over animal must have been a skunk. A smell test on Wolfgang's tire confirmed by suspicion and I decided to park outside...

Stats: 190 km, about 1400 m of climbing, average speed of 21 km/h

What keeps a bike upright?

2011-04-15T04:50:00.000-07:00

It's rare that bicycles feature in the Cornell Chronicle, but today there is an article about interesting research by Cornell prof Andy Ruina on what prevents bikes from falling over. The main finding is that conventional theories of self-stability -- the gyroscopic effect of the spinning wheels and trail of the front wheel -- are not the main factors in keeping a bike stable. Ruina and his collaborators have constructed a bike (well, it doesn't look exactly like a bike) that has no gyroscopic effect and no trail -- but still stays upright on its own. Fascinating stuff with potential practical implications for bicycle design.

There's also a video explaining the research, and here's a the pre-print of the article which will be published in Science.

January to March Summary

2011-04-02T08:26:00.000-07:00

Due to my injury there is not much to summarize here. I've just started to get back on the bike and in March I logged 170 km, all on Wolfgang. I lost some kilometers in January, before I broke my wrist and lost the bike computer, but that probably wasn't that many. I'll be back with happier news at the end of April!

Winter(pokal) is over

2011-04-02T08:23:00.000-07:00

The Winter Trophy is over. Due to my broken wrist I ended up with only 182 points, putting me on place 1826 out of 2414 participants. I think the Winterpokal is a great motivational tool for getting you on the bike and I'll join again next year -- then hopefully without any further injuries.

Review: SKS Longboard Fenders

2011-03-27T15:44:00.000-07:00

SKS Chromoplastic fenders are great. They're stylish, lightweight, and durable. The only problem was that they are too short and they don't come with mudflaps. If you're riding your bike year round, in any kind of weather, the longer your fenders are the better. A couple of weeks ago, ecovelo pointed out that Rivendell was selling a new model of SKS fenders, the Longboards. The main distinguishing feature is that they are longer and they do have mudflaps in the front and in the back -- perfect! Thus I ordered a pair from Swan Cycles and picked them up today.Of course, I couldn't wait to put them on and I wanted to share some pictures and give an initial review.

Before: front wheel with DIY Fructis mudflap

Before: rear wheel

The fenders come with minimal, functional packaging

Step one was to remove the old fenders. This was largely unproblematic, but requires taking off the rear wheel in order to get to the screw next to the bottom bracket. To give you a direct comparison between old and new fender, I've put them on top of each other. Clearly, they provide much more coverage, especially the front fender. (I bought the old fenders in 2008; I've heard that in the meantime the regular Chromoplastics have become a bit longer, but I'm not sure about this.)

Difference in length is not that significant

Much better coverage

Installing the new fenders took an unexpectedly long time. The main issue was cutting the struts to length. Now the older fenders, in addition to the coverage issue, had the problem that the end caps provided for covering the potentially sharp ends of the struts tended to get lost quite easily. I think I lost three of them within the first week of mounting the fenders. SKS has solved this issue by making the end caps longer and wedging them between the mounting hardware of the struts and the fender. While this may sound like a neat solution it comes at a cost: the struts have to be at exactly the right length for the system to work. Therefore, you first have to mount the fenders without the end caps, mark the struts, unmount the struts, cut the fenders to length, and then reinstall everything with the end caps in place. Cutting the fenders took me a bit, since I don't have the proper tools (read: bolt cutter); and fiddling the struts into the caps also was quite tricky. Well, fortunately you only have to do this once and now the fenders look really nice:


The end result

The coverage looks really good, even though I would have like then to extend a bit further to the front on the front wheel. The mud flap is made of a flexible material and is close enough to the tire that it shouldn't be an issue when riding down a curb. Now I'll just need a good downpour to confirm the Longboards' function.

SKS Longboard Fenders
45mm wide
available in black, silver, and creme
around USD 40.-

Edit 2011-04-02: After using the fenders for a few days, I noticed that the front fender does reach down very far -- maybe a bit too far. Therefore I have moved the fenders from being mounted at the rear of the fork crown to the front. This slightly increases the ground clearance of the fender and also extends them further by maybe 3 cm. I've ridden in light to medium rain a few times by now and the fenders work very well!

The toll of winter

2011-03-26T15:47:00.000-07:00

I've said it before and I'll say it again: salt is bad for your bike's health. Don't believe me? Well, then check out the following pictures of Wolfgang.

These brakes no longer move by themselves.

Hopeless...

Okay, not directly salt-related, but anyway

Due to my wrist injury, Wolfgang was sitting outside for several weeks and when I tried reactivating him, it was pretty hopeless. The chain was stiff, the front derailleur only moved when being kicked with the foot; and the rear canti brakes didn't reset themselves anymore.

So I switched the chain, which also required me to put on a new Shimano XT 11-34 cassette, replaced the Tektro Oryx cantis with an Avid SD7, and replaced some of the brake and shifter cables. Quite annoying, but that's the price you have to pay for riding all year on well-cleared roads in Upstate NY.

Back on the bike

2011-03-26T15:16:00.000-07:00

Okay, my wrist is no longer fractured, the cast came off 3.5 weeks ago, and thus I'm finally back on the bike. Of course, being in a cast and off the bike for over 2 months took its toll, and the wrist isn't fully healed yet. So I started slowly, with a 38 km ride into familiar territory: to Taughannock State Park and back. Spring hasn't arrived in Ithaca yet, and so I had to deal with temperatures of -5°C, cold winds, and at the end of the ride some snow. It felt very good to be back riding, even though my wrist hurt quite a bit when riding in the hoods -- riding on the tops seems to work better. I hope this is going to get better soon, as I need to do some serious riding to get back into shape for the season.

<br><a href="http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/30387330">Taughannock Variation</a><br/><br><a href="http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/?location=Ithaca, NY">Find more Cycling Routes / Bike Rides in Ithaca, NY</a><br>

Great Sigma Customer Service

2011-02-12T14:26:00.000-08:00

In the previous post I mentioned that I lost my Sigma BC1606L bike computer. I had always been very satisfied with the computer and replacing it with another model would have been rather costly when adding the price of an extra mount and cadence sensor for my second bike. Getting a replacement, however, appeared to be difficult: The 06-series has been out of production for quite some time now and thus I sent the (German) Sigma customer service an e-mail, asking if they could tell me where to get a replacement. Within a few days, the US distributor Sigma sent me an e-mail and offered to send me a replacement -- free of charge! This was a very pleasant surprise. The computer wasn't terribly expensive in the first place, but this is nonetheless great customer service. If I ever do replace my computer it will most likely be another Sigma.

Don't break your wrist!

2011-02-12T13:50:00.000-08:00

Dear reader,
may I offer some good advice? Don't break your wrist.

A month without any blog posts is not due to the fact that I've been riding all the time, or to the awful winter weather. No, three-and-a-half weeks ago I broke my left wrist while---not cycling, but snowshoeing. Somewhat ironically, on just that day I had ordered my own pair of snowshoes, as I no longer wanted to rely on Glenn Swan's generosity in lending me a pair of his. To add loss to injury, I also managed to lose my bike computer while awkwardly trying to bike back home with my broken wrist.

While I'm on the way to recovery, biking will still have to wait for at least two more weeks. I tried getting some exercise today on the trainer, but my wrist still can't support my weight, and riding one-handedly gets old pretty quick. In order to get at least some exercise (and to get to places!) I've done a lot of walking, both with and without snowshoes. Once my cast will be removed (March 1), I'll hopefully be back on the bike, if not for longer rides then at least for running errands and buying groceries.

Be safe,

Hobbes vs. Boyle

Snow!

2011-01-12T10:28:00.000-08:00

Ride report: Dip into Pennsylvania

2011-01-02T15:15:00.000-08:00

"Visit PA" is what is written on Pennsylvania license plates, and last Wednesday I was ready to heed that call and do a bike ride into the Northern Tier of the Quaker State.
As per usual, I had a late start due to complete lack of preparation on the previous evening. The planned route was about 130 km and I didn't mind the fact that I would have to do parts of the ride in the dark. The weather forecast predicted temperatures around and slightly above freezing and possibly even some sunshine in the afternoon.

The plan for the ride was to get out to Spencer, head towards Waverly and then turn around, taking a different route. Since NY-34 between Ithaca and Spencer is somewhat annoying to ride on when you go towards Spencer (traffic, narrow shoulders, constant uphill), I decided to take a longer, more strenous, but also much more scenic way to Spencer and then take 34 on the way back. On my newly installed Vittoria tires, I headed out of town towards Buttermilk Falls State Park and then up Sandbank Road. From there I took the very quiet country roads towards Danby, from where I followed NY-96B for a few kilometers. Had it been summer I probably would've taken Michigan Hollow Road but I knew that it was a dirt road and I was worried that it might be too snowy. Instead I turned right onto S Danby and the continued on Fisher Settlement Rd. It turned out that most of Fisher Settlement Road is also a dirt road, and a pretty hilly one at that. The road surface was mix of snow and wet dirt but aside from slowing me down it was okay. Just outside of Spencer, Fisher Settlement Road merges with NY-34 and in Spencer Downtown I turned left onto NY-96 towards Candor.

On an FLCC Sunday ride earlier this year, I had ridden on Halsey Valley Road, but going the opposite direction. Today I followed Halsey Valley Rd South and then continued on Oak Hill Rd. Oak Hill Road leads all the way into the Susquehanna Valley. On small roads running parallel to the river and NY-17C I finally got into Waverly and after crossing the Southern Tier Expressway I was in Pennsylvania. The part of Pennsylvania I ended up in turned out to be a rather unexciting mix of warehouses, strip malls and lots of scary sounding warning sign about dangerous drivers. I took a longer rest stop at the Sayre McDonalds and refueled with a large coke and fries. I knew that the way back would be shorter, but I still had about 50 km to go. I followed NY-34 out of Waverly, heading north, until after 10 km I turned right unto Dean Creek Road. This turned out to be a very quiet country road, gradually climbing and then descending towards Spencer. In the meantime the sun had set and because the moon wasn't visible, I rode in almost complete darkness. I've really come to enjoy riding in the dark a lot -- at least as long as it is on quiet roads.

Once in Spencer I quickly contemplated stopping for a cup of coffee at the gas station but the prospect of the rest of the ride being almost all downhill made me continue. Traffic on NY-34 was light but still too much to make the ride in a starry night as pleasant as it could've been. After a quick stop at Taste of Thai Express in Ithaca to pick up dinner, I finally arrived back home after seven hours of riding time. A strenous but very enjoyable seven hours.

First Impressions: Vittoria Randonneur Pro 700x35c

2011-01-02T14:01:00.000-08:00

I picked up my new tires last Tuesday and already put almost 200 km on them. Tueoo early for a comprehensive review, but not too early for some first impressions.

Sizing and weight

Dishonesty in tire sizing is a well-known phenomenon in the bike world. In order to be able their tires as especially light-weight manufacturers make them narrower than their designation implies, so your 700x28 c tire might be only 26 mm wide.¹ This is definitely true for the Randonneurs. Their measured width on a 19.6 mm Mavic Open Pro rim is only about 32 mm.

The tires' weight as measured on my kitchen scale is fortunately closer to the manufacturer's claim: 472 g vs. 460 g advertised.

Rubber and Tread

The rubber is definitely softer than my Michelin Krylions and also a bit softer than my Continental Gatorskins. Tread is rather minimal, as you can see in the picture.

Mounting the tires

The Randonneur Pro is a folding tire and was reasonable easy to mount. Folding tires tend to be a bit more difficult to mount than wire bead tires because they don't stay in place by themselves. The trick thus is to fix them on the rim in one spot with a zip tie. From there I could easily mount them with two tire levers.

Ride quality

I took the tires on a 130 km ride, mostly on the typical wintry salt-water-grime pavement, but also several miles of partly snowy, partly muddy gravel roads. For pressure I followed the Bicycling Quarterly guidelines, i.e. 60 psi in the front and 70 psi in the back. The tires had a surprising amount of traction and the ride quality was nice. The rolling resistance is hard to assess: The moving average on this ride was only 19 km/h, which is fairly slow for me. But if that's due to the tires is unclear. The dirt roads, the hills and my general lack of energy on that day probably contributed more than the tires. But I will keep an eye olin that.

Conclusion

So far I'm happy with the tires. I'm annoyed that they are narrower than advertised but since I'm riding mostly on snow-free asphalt roads it probably doesn't matter too much. The main question is how puncture proof the tires will be. Updated will follow.

1 The whole issue gets complicated because of the various tire sizing systems. I have a rough understanding of how they work, but I, for example, still don't understand why 622-35 is the same size as 700x37C, and I have no idea if said tires are 35 or 37 mm wide.

December Summary and 2010 Recap

2011-01-02T11:06:00.000-08:00

The final numbers for a successful 2010 are in and it time for both the regular monthly and the first annual summary
The larger goal of getting to 6000 km by the end of 2010 motivated me to keep my riding up in December, despite increasingly adverse weather. 6000 was still 491 km away at the beginning of the month, and only by December 30th had I reached the magical 6000 km. Most of December's riding was done on Wolfgang (494 km vs. only 15 km on Gunnar) and the average 16.4 km/day totaled at 509 km -- exactly the same value as last month.
For the whole year, I rode a total of 6018 km, at an average of 501 km/month or 16.5 km/day. I'm pretty impressed! The only months during which I rode less than 500 km were the wintry ones and July, during which I was traveling. I don't want to make any predictions for next year, as there are too many life changes ahead. But it's safe to say that 2010 was an awesome cycling year. I did my first 200 km ride, I rode more than ever, I did my first real road race (and probably my last one, too), I built up and rode the lovely Gunnar, I went on a nice bike weekend in the Adirondacks, and, most importantly, I had loads of fun and no crashes at all!
Happy 2011!

Flat problems and inflated solutions

2010-12-20T10:05:00.000-08:00

As reported in the previous post, December has already been a bad month with regards to flats for me, and in the meantime it has gotten only worse. I had to get some stuff to and from campus yesterday, and when riding down our driveway I immediately noticed that Wolfgang had another flat in the rear! While waiting for my new tires (see below), I had put on the Conti Gatorskins in the back---the tire that up to now had never failed me. I fixed the flat this morning and it seems like the tire is worn down enough that a small glass piece could make its way through it. I guess I'll have to replace the Contis next season.

For the winter, however, I ordered a pair of 700x35 Vittoria Randonneur Pro tires. Requirements were:

32 or 35mm wide
flat protection
some tread but not too much
fairly lightweight

It's more difficult than one would think to find this kind of tire. The Schwalbe Marathon series generally were too heavy (and they have a reputation for having high rolling resistance); most Conti models either had too little tread or were not available in the right size. I would have loved to test the new Top Contact Winter II, but it's not available in the US yet (and the 37mm width might have caused problems anyway). Cyclocross tires from most manufacturers failed on the flat protection requirement. The Vittoria Randonneur series finally seemed to offer what I was looking for. Ideally, I would have like to get the Randonneur Cross Pro, yet my local bike shop couldn't order it via QBP. Thus, I settled with Randonneur Pro in 700x35 which fulfills all requirements except for having potentially having not enough tread for snowy conditions. I should get the tires on Wednesday and will report how they hold up.

Winter adventures

2010-12-14T12:51:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago, I found out that Madball were scheduled to play a show at Syracuse's Westcott Theater in mid-December. Since I haven't been to a decent show for many months, I thought I could do a little bike/music mini-trip, cycling up to Syracuse on the 14th, seeing the show, spending the night at a cheap motel, and then riding back the next day. I sent out an e-mail to the FLCC listserv and received lots of good advice about route recommendations. So far, so good.

Unfortunately, the show was canceled. If I couldn't have a bike/music experience, I thought I could at least do the bike part and test my new winter gear. Since Syracuse itself is not exactly the most attractive destination and going all the way there and back in one day would have been a bit much, I mapped a route that would combine two of the route suggestion but did not go up all the way into the city.

The weather forecast for Saturday looked pretty good -- mostly sunny and temperatures around 0° C. I didn't sleep well the night before and I hadn't done any preparations on Friday, resulting in a pretty late start at around 10:30. I knew that a significant portion of the ride would be in the dark, but Wolfgang is well equipped and I actually enjoy riding in the dark.

After climbing out of Ithaca through Cayuga Heights, I took the regular route along Hanshaw/Lower/Upper Creek/NY366 into Freeville and continued on CR105/Fall Creek Rd into McLean. After a quick ClifBar stop at the post office there, I continued on the McLean-Cortland Rd towards Cortland. Traffic was a bit heavier on this stretch but not bad at all. In Cortland I then turned north on NY281 (the sensor activated left turn signal at the intersection of NY34B and NY281 is not triggered by bikes) and would follow this road for many miles. Within the Cortland city limits, up until the junction leading to I-81, was the most trafficked part of the ride but, again, it was still fine. Once out of Cortland, the road became wide, flat, and empty. 281 runs parallel to the Interstate and therefore only carries the little bit of local traffic for the few scattered houses in the valley. In Tully, NY281 becomes US11, and had I gone towards Syracuse I would've taken this road or possibly an option further east. Instead, I crossed the Interstate again and then turned onto NY11A. This part starts with a real nice downhill that takes you out of the Susquehanna River and into the Oswego River/Finger Lakes Watershed. In the small township of Cardiff it was time to replace my GPS's batteries and turn West on US-20.

When planning the route I wasn't quite sure what the traffic on 20 would be like, but as it was only a short stretch and there was no good way to go around I just gave it a try. Traffic indeed did increase, but it was still very low and the shoulders were in good shape. US20 takes you into the Cherry Valley and, indeed, the valley is basically filled with orchards. Because 20 doesn't really follow the valley, I turned right onto Hitchings Rd/CR151 and then zig-zagged my way on small back roads to Cedarvale Rd/CR42, later turning left onto Pleasant Valley Rd/CR119. This road leads right into Marcellus where I took another rest break at a gas station. There were still more than 75 km left to go and shortly after Marcellus, on the Old Seneca Turnpike my woes began.

While riding up a hill I noticed that somehow my bike felt very soft and 30 seconds later it became obvious that I had a flat rear tire. Now I wasn't so much surprised, as I've had flat tires with my winter tires pretty frequently, as more annoyed at myself that I hadn't spent the money and gotten myself tires with puncture protection. Well, no big deal, I thought, and quickly put in a new tube. Of course, I inspected the tire for what had caused the flat and somewhere close to where it should have been, I saw a little hole but without anything stuck in it. Thus, I assumed that whatever had caused the flat had already fallen out and went on to reinstall and reinflate the tire. Only a few minutes later, however, the damn tire went flat again. I pondered my options and since I was pretty much halfway between Marcellus and Skaneateles I initially decided to give up, walk the bike to Skaneateles and call the accomplice to pick me up. It was still more than 5 km to Skaneateles still and at some point I got annoyed enough to give it another try. I took out the tire again, patched the tube, inspected the tire, didn't find anything aside from holes, put it back in, and continued. I knew this was my last chance, as now it was dark enough to make another repair really difficult. Well, the tire held the air for a little bit longer, but not much. So I walked/rode/rolled Wolfgang the rest of the way into Skaneateles and called the accomplice. She, of course, was not too thrilled about having to drive more than hour on a potentially icy road, but of course she came pick me up with "Virginia," our trusty carshare car.

Aside from the tires, my gear held up pretty well. The new shoes were warm enough (feet still felt cold at times, but much less so than on previous rides in similar conditions) and so was the work glove/liner glove combo. I'm still waiting for my new wool baselayer shirt to arrive and eventually I might have to increase the warmth on my legs. The dhb winter bib tights were okay, but had it been colder they probably wouldn't have cut it anymore.

Winter stuff

2010-12-06T12:12:00.000-08:00

Winter has arrived somewhat later than usual in Ithaca, but now it's definitely here. Last week was the first time that I had to ride home on snow covered streets and there is a lake effect warning for today. As always, I'm committed to riding year round, and winter after winter I'm fine-tuning my gear to make riding in the cold a more pleasant experience.

Tires

In the past couple of winter, I always switched from my 28mm Conti Gatorskins slicks to the 32mm Ritchey Speed Max that came with the Crosscheck. The main issue I've had with they Ritcheys is their bad puncture resistance. I haven't kept exact records, but I definitely had more than 1 flat/1000 km. Flats suck, and they do so quite a bit more in the winter. To deal with this, I originally intended to just keep the Contis with their basically perfect puncture protecting on throughout the winter. After all, most of the time roads are clear of snow and even when there is snow, it's nice to have a skinny tire that will cut through to the road surface. However, in last weeks first snowfall, I realized that this didn't work out so well. I was able to ride home, but definitely noticed that the Contis lacked traction. Consequently, this morning I put back on the Ritchey tires, but eventually I want to get something else. Probably some kind of 'cross tire, but with the added puncture protection.

Shoes

Regular readers of this blog will remember my persistent issues with cold and numb feet. Since this was basically the main point of failure during previous winters, I decided to spend big and get proper winter cycling boots. Glenn Swan, owner of my trusted local bike shop and year-round rider himself, highly recommended the Lake MXZ302. It took a long time to get the shoes in size 15 wide, but two weeks ago it finally arrived. Due to end-of-semester stress and a cold I haven't been able to test them on a long ride, but they do feel very cozy on shorter rides. I'll keep you updated about their performance.

Gloves

Another recommendation from Glenn Swan were my Kinco winter work gloves. I had bought one pair last winter and was overall satisfied with them. They had two issues, however: the cuffs on them were of the "safety cuff" variety, meaning they were pretty wide and therefore made it difficult to keep cold air, snow, and rain out of them. In addition, they weren't really waterproof. Well, a month ago I lost one of the gloves, giving me an opportunity to find something even better. It turns out that Kinco also make a waterproof version of the glove with a knit cuff (model is 1938 KWP instead of 1938) and that's what I got. So far I'm pretty satisfied -- they are indeed waterproof and as warm as the other model. I'm not quite sure yet how much I like the knitted cuffs. They do prevent water and snow from running into the cuff, but they're also the part of the glove that gets pretty cold. Maybe I'll need some kind of wrist warmer to go with the gloves. In terms of warmth, the gloves alone should be warm enough down to around 0° C, but below that I'd recommend using them with a woolen liner glove. The liner glove is a good idea anyway, as it will absorb some of the sweat that definitely accumulates in the glove on warmer days and harder rides. For really cold days and emergency situations, I still have a big stash of chemical hand warmers.

Jacket

Because everybody--both people I know and people on the interwebs---is raving about how great their products are, I bought a Showers Pass Touring jacket. While it is a decent jacket, I've become more and more critical of it. First of all, it's not really waterproof. The company makes a big deal about being from the Pacific Northwest and therefore making gear appropriate for really wet conditions, but this doesn't really hold true for my jacket. Whenever I'm either riding for extended periods in light to medium rain or in heavy rain for as short as 20 minutes, the jacket always lets in quite a bit of rain. The largest amount of rain enters through the ventilation zippers under the arm pits. But even the fabric itself is definitely not waterproof. Now I must say that previous to this jacket I've never really owned any bike specific rain gear and therefore can't compare the jacket with other ones. But given how expensive these things are (the Touring has an MSRP of $150) I'm feeling disappointed. I even sent an e-mail to their customer service, trying to figure out if this was a common issue or if maybe my jacket had some manufacturing defect. Well, I've never heard back from them.

December Summary

2010-12-06T08:19:00.000-08:00

500 km seems to be my magic number. 500 km per month is what I will probably have ridden on average throughout 2010, and almost exactly 500 km has been the monthly kilomentrage during the last couple of months. Here are the detailed stats for November: Even though winter has definitely arrived, Gunnar got more kilometers than in the previous months -- 204 km total. Wolfgang clocked in at 305, making a total of 509 km/month or 17 km/day. The annual odometer thus is at 5509 km and I'm pretty confident that I will get it up to 6000 at the end of the month.

Rennrad-News Winter Trophy

2010-11-10T05:40:00.000-08:00

Riding in winter is hard. You have to find ways to keep all of your body parts fairly warm (and usually fail with at least one of them), it's dark, road conditions vary between "sucky" and "outright dangerous," and your poor bike has to suffer from the constant spray of highly corrosive salts. In order to encourage people to ride in the winter nonetheless (or do at least some other physical activity), the German road bike forum rennrad-news.de has an annual winter trophy. The idea is fairly simple: you log all your cycling and other physical exercise on their website and accumulate points for it. 1 point for 20 minutes of running, for 15 minutes of cycling, and two points for any other sports activity longer than 30 minutes. The trophy began on November 1 and will continue until March 27. I've joined a team with two guys who recruited me on radreise-forum.de (they seem to be much tougher than me...). You can track my progress at the top of this page.

October Summary

2010-11-10T05:27:00.000-08:00

With a bit of delay, I present you the summary for the lovely fall month of October. The bad news: not too many long rides, mostly everyday riding. The good news: I'm still en route to fulfilling my 6000 km at the end of the year goal. Details:

453 km with Wolfgang, 46 km with Gunnar, totalling at 499 km for the month. October had 31 days, which means that's only 16.1 km/day, a pretty low value. Total kilometrage for the year is exactly 5000 km! (No, I did not plan this).

The goal for November basically is to stick with the 500 km/month goal. So far I'm doing good and tomorrow I'll go on a longer ride with a friend from the FLCC. Sometime this month, I'll get a pair of winter cycling shoes, hopefully allowing me to ride in the winter without the constant numbness of feet which has started to become a problem again.

September Summary

2010-10-06T13:10:00.000-07:00

It's October and since this month I didn't forget to note my bike computer stats, I can present my September riding summary.

The overall kilometrage is 521 km, which is neither particularly high nor low. What is noteworthy is that this riding was almost all done on Wolfgang (494 km). A large proportion is commuting and transportation, and there was our 135 km camping trip to Greenwood County Park. No Sunday Rides this month and no long rides with Gunnar. Average daily riding was 17.4 km and overall annual kilometers are up to 4501. I think I'll try to reach the 6000 km mark at the end of the year.

Terrible Hills! Mos Def!

2010-09-15T08:22:00.000-07:00

Two posts ago, I mentioned the crazy "Terrible Hills involving the Letter B" ride, and indeed I was insane enough to actually try and do it. There are already several ride reports out there from other people in what was a great group of riders, and I will keep it short.

I hadn't done any long ride since the first week of July (traveling, moving, ...) and thus I was slow and suffered a lot. I fell behind the rest of the group quite early due to general slowness, having to buy new batteries for my GPS, and a wrong turn on Buffalo Road. Probably that was not the worst thing to happen because that at least allowed me to ride at my own pace. I did, however, catch up with the
rest of the group at the end of their lunch stop at Wegmans. Fortunately I spotted Sam's brightly colored FLCC jersey and reached the group just as it was getting ready to go again. Unfortunately, that meant that I didn't really have time to eat and drink more and in the long run that should prove to be disastrous. Anyway, I was fairly determined to make it the whole way, but the not terribly steep but long climb up Bostwick was draining. (Bostwick is my favorite downhill...) I knew that what was to come was my most feared climb: Blakeslee Hill. I had ridden up there a couple of months ago and barely made it -- and that was on a pretty short ride with fresh legs. Well, I completely bonked, taking two short stops on the climb and taking a long stop at the top of the hill. My body clearly had run out of fuel and I gobbled down two whole Clif Bars in record speed. It was obvious that the ride was just too much for me and I decided to ride back home. At the end of the day I had logged about 135 km and 2600 m of climbing. I didn't bring the camera, but fortunately Max Kraft took some nice pics.

On a side note, I decided to throw on my new shiny Brooks Swift for the ride. I was a little skeptical if it would be a good idea to attempt an extremely hard century ride on a new leather saddle. But it turned out to be quite okay. The saddle is comfortable, not too narrow, and it's already showing signs of breaking in.

July and August summary

2010-09-15T07:24:00.000-07:00

As mentioned in my previous post, there are no separate summaries for July and August. In both months together I rode a meager 600 km, 338 on Wolfgang and 262 on Gunnar. If we'd assume that the riding was evenly distributed between the months (which it was not, because I did almost zero riding in July), that would bring both months down to the lowest average daily riding, even worse than the winter months. It's definitely time to crank it up a couple of notches before winter comes!

I'm back

2010-08-25T16:42:00.000-07:00

After a long absence, due part to summer travel and part to no interwebs at home, I'm back with regular updates. Just some quick items:

I forgot to write down the end-of-the-month kilometrage for July! Sigh. So no accurate July and August summaries. The inaccurate one: not a lot of riding, as I was traveling for 3/4 of the month.
Gunnar has a new saddle. After not being able to make up my mind and being annoyed, sometimes by the high prices and idiotic design choices of Brooks, sometimes by the fact that I constantly had to switch and re-adjust saddles between Gunnar and Wolfgang, I finally ordered a Brooks Swift. It got here last week, is hard as a rock, very pretty and hopefully will see some riding this weekend (see below).

Holy smokes!

This coming Saturday I will attempt the epic "Terrible Hills Involving the Letter 'B'" century. 165 km and about 3400 m of climbing. I'll do the ride with a couple of FLCCers and hope not to die. I'll keep you updated.

Odo Wolfgang 5152 km
Odo Gunnar 2429 km

June Summary

2010-07-03T09:30:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of last week I was under the impression that June wouldn't be a particularly good bike month. We had been traveling quite a bit and I didn't make to any FLCC Sunday Rides. Well, it turned out that I nonetheless rode a total of 802 km. Due to good weather and lack of commuting, Wolfgang's kilometrage reached an all-year low with 224 km. Gunnar, on the other hand, did an all-time high of 578 km. Daily average riding was 26.73 km, a little less than last month. Total accumulated annual kilometrage is at 3380 km.

Cannibalization of Lean Muscle Tissue: A Random, Non-Controlled Experimental Study1

2010-07-03T09:03:00.000-07:00

Abstract

In case my accomplice hasn't told you yet: this Wednesday I undertook an attempt to become a legit randonneur by riding more than 200 km in one day. And with a total distance of 231 km in 11.5 hours, going from Ithaca to Lake Ontario and back, I succeeded.

1 Introduction

The plan to ride all the way to Lake Ontario and back has a long history, probably dating back to the winter of 2008/09. The distance, about 110 km, seemed very long and probably beyond my reach, but not insanely so. This was especially true since the elevation profile was definitely one of the more harmless ones around Ithaca. In addition, the existence of a nice-looking state park made me think that it might be a good two-day trip, riding up, camping for one night, and riding back the next day. After having done my first century last year and some serious riding this year, I thought that I should be able to do the ride in one day. The goal of 200 km, the lowest distance that randonneurs do, was a very appealing challenge and I was fairly confident that I'd be able to do it. It might hurt, but whatevs. Because I hadn't done a lot of riding in June and already knew that I couldn't ride much in July, on Monday I decided to do the attempt on Wednesday, the last day of June. The weather forecast was very good–dry, sunny, not too hot–and I would have plenty of daylight.

2 Method

I tend to be terribly slow with everything when I have to get up earlier than usual and thus I tried to get as much of the ride preparations as possible done the previous day. I switched the Brooks and the seatposts from Wolfgang to Gunnar (note to self: need second Brooks!); raised the handlebars by one spacer; cleaned and lubed the chain; replaced the battery on my rear light; put on the Carradice rack and bag, made a heap of all the stuff I was going to bring on the ride; and printed two copies of the cue sheet. I was excited about my ride, resulting in rather bad sleep and therefore I didn't feel too peppy when the local country station woke me up at 5:40. I quickly ate two slices of the tasty banana bread (Figure 1) the accomplice had made for me and by 6:15 I was ready to roll.

Figure 1: Banana Bread

2.1 Materials

6 Clif Bars, assorted flavors
1 Hammer Gel pack
1 pack of Hammer Perpetuem
1 pack Hammer Endurolytes
1 bottle 1:3 apple cider/water mix
1 bottle water
1 patch kit
1 multi tool
1 spare tube
1 speed lever
2 copies of cue sheet
1 credit card
23 $ cash
1 driver's license
1 pair of arm warmers
1 wind vest
1 head band
1 MP3 player
1 bottle of sunscreen
1 tube of Chamois butt'r
1 cell phone
1 Road Morph pump

3 Results

I started the ride rather tiredly. I could still feel the racing on Saturday and the rides on subsequent days in my legs and I was pretty sleepy. What did wake me up were the low temperatures. I was wearing arm warmers and a wind vest but I was still a bit cold. After traversing Ithaca downtown, I followed NY34 up the hill alongside the Cayuga Lake shore. From Lansing I then descended down into the Salmon Creek valley and after 25 km continued on Indian Fields Road. Indian Fields Rd (which further north continues as Black St) is a nice rural backroad with little traffic and good pavement, but it also has one major disadvantage: dogs! The first pair of them appeared right next to me out of nowhere and scared the bejeezus out of me. Not many km further down I was chased by another beast and by the time I made it to Auburn I had been chased by a total of 5 dogs. This was really pissing me off and for the way back I considered avoiding this route and instead following NY34 all the way. Auburn was 60 km into the ride and around 9 a.m. I took a rest stop at the gas station there to have a cup of coffee and make a wake-up call to the accomplice. My average speed was fairly good, despite several bathroom and one seat adjustment break. The route through Auburn, bypassing the downtown area on the west, turned out to be a good choice and I cut across the city on quiet residential streets (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Dunning Ave in Auburn

Once out of Auburn, the landscape became slightly less agricultural (and less dog-infested). Until Port Byron, a little village next to I90, I stayed on quiet backroads parallel to NY 38. From there on I followed 38 almost all of the way to the state park. Even though it was state highway, the traffic on NY38 was very low. A few km north of Port Byron I made a quick stop at the Seneca River and it had finally gotten warm enough that I could take off the wind vest.

The rest of the ride of the ride to the park was characterized by rolling hills (Figures 3, 4). I had been aware that this portion of the route wouldn't be completely flat, but I hadn't expected the constant rollers that tired me out quite a bit. The constant crosswinds from the Northwest didn't help either; however, the prospect of being at the state park soon kept me going. With arms, calves, and shoulders hurting a bit, I took a final turn from NY38 onto 104 and arrived at the state park at around 11:30, after 115 km. The park turned out to be really nice, providing a great view of the lake and, more importantly, a large sandy beach with significant waves. After a coke from the convenience store and a lunch Clif Bar I put on my swim shorts and went swimming (or rather: standing in the water and enjoying the waves) for a bit. (Figures 5, 6)

Figure 3: Not long, not steep, but tiring nonetheless

Figure 4: Another roller

Figure 5: Great beach, great surf

Figure 6: Someone as excited as me to get into the surprisingly warm water

Even though I still was well within my schedule I didn't stay for too long and got back on the road at about 12:15. In addition to refilling my water bottles, I also prepared one bottle with Hammer Perpetuem, an endurance "food" that apparently is very popular amongst randonneurs and other endurance crazies. I might write a separate review at some point, but let's just say that a) it didn't taste quite as bad as expected and b) I have the suspicion that my stomach can't deal with maltodextrin, one of Perpetuem's main ingredients. Anyway, I was in good spirits and going in this direction the wind actually helped a bit with the rolling hills. I could really feel the uphills in my legs but overall I still held up a respectable speed (for the first half my moving average was somewhere between 24 and 25 km/h). Once back in Auburn, after about 165 km, I made another rest stop at the same gas station and got a big bottle of Gatorade and a pack of peanuts. While consuming these items, I chatted with some teenager on a BMX who wanted to know if there was any money to be made by riding your bike for long distances. If only…

For the last leg of the ride I decided to stay on NY34 to avoid the annoying dogs (somewhere around Port Byron another one had chased me, this time with the owner being present but unable to control it). This turned out to be an excellent decision, as the road had just been repaved. First I was a little annoyed, as the pavement was so new that it was still sticky, but this was only for a short stretch. After that it was super-smooth tarmac in combination with a mostly level road and I sped away in the drops until I got to the intersection with NY90. There it was time for a last stop for another bathroom break and another bottle of Gatorade. Just a few hundred meters after the intersection I reached the 200km mark! (Figure 7) A happy moment, as you can see in the picture. (Figures 6,7) The last section of the ride was rather uneventful and at 5:45, after 11.5 hours and 231 km and with an average moving speed of 24.5 km/h, I arrived back home.

Figure 7: 200km!

4 Discussion

4.1 Pain

The ride was a complete success. By its end I obviously was tired (Figure 8), but compared to some of winter rides this ride wasn't the most painful one. My butt was feeling quite alright, the neck was not too sore (I attribute this partly to me not wearing the helmet) and raising the handlebars seems to have reduced the stress to the upper arms and shoulders a bit. What did hurt surprisingly were my Achilles heels, but I attribute that to Monday's riding in Birks and a saddle that probably was a bit too high. What was also sore was my lower back, something I hadn't experienced on any previous ride.

Figure 8: My tired self (yeah, I do need a haircut)

4.2 Nutrition and Hydration

My nutrition strategy worked very well. By the end of the ride I had
consumed:

5 Clif bars (250 kcal each)
1 Perpetuem (270 kcal)
1 large bottle Gatorade (200 kcal)
.5 small bottle Gatorade (50 kcal)
2 slices of banana bread (400 kcal?)
1 small pack of peanuts (300 kcal?)
1 can of coke (155 kcal)
1 cup of coffee with 1 pack of sugar (15 kcal)

I never felt terribly bonked and only while drinking the Perpetuem did my stomach feel upset. In the future I'll just stick to my Clif Bars which are tasty, energy-rich, and stomach-friendly. Because of the relatively low temperatures I also never was dehydrated. The overall calorie intake of about 2600 kcal was probably pretty close to the maximum possible intake. (Your body can only deal with about 250 kcal per hour)

4.3 Equipment

Aside from the need to readjust the angle of the saddle once and dropping the chain twice I didn't have any mechanical issues. Props to Gunnar for being such a reliable sport. My newly acquired headband did a great job of keeping the sweat out of my eyes (and making me look pretty goofy).

4.4 Route

Because my GPS hasn't made it back to me yet I solely relied on my cuesheets for navigation. This worked perfectly fine. The GPS's stats would've been nice but are not quite necessary. The route itself was a little boring. The landscape between Lansing and Auburn is monotonously agrarian and the section between Auburn and the lake is not too much more exciting. What is great about the route is the very low traffic volume and the halfway point at Fair Haven Beach is really awesome. If I were to do the ride again I would definitely avoid the dog-infested sections (or bring a big can of Halt!)

1.5.5 Future Researchiding

Obviously, the next milestone would be a 300km ride. Not sure if I will do it this year, but at some point I will…

Acknowledgments

The author is very grateful for the accomplice's support in the form
of banana bread, a great post-ride dinner and a positive attitude
towards my odd hobby.

Footnotes

[1] "Cannibalization of lean muscle tissue" is what Hammer Perpetuem is supposed to prevent. Not sure if it worked. My muscles felt quite a bit cannibalized but maybe that's just me.

Race Report: Corning Circuit Race 2010

2010-06-27T08:08:00.000-07:00

Yay, I had my first race evar (unless you want to count the 2009 Cascadilla Hill Climb) and--important things first--I've completed 4 out of 4 goals!

Getting to the race

As announced in the previous post, I rode out to the race and back, which turned out to produce some minor complications. Somewhat spontaneously, my accomplice had decided to come to the race with me and cheer and take some pictures. So we and our bikes got on the bus to Enfield at 1:10 and arrived in "downtown" Enfield at 1:35. The race was scheduled to start at 4 and since I had planned to get there for the sign-up etc. half an hour early that gave us about 2 hours for the 35 km to The Glen. Well, complication 1 was that Enfield Center Road turned out to be not only a "seasonal access road," but supposedly also was completely closed. Probably we could've gotten through with the bikes, but Gunnar's 23 mm Dachshund-slicers (German bike slang for thin tires) aren't made for dirt and I knew there would be a parallel road just a bit further West. What I didn't take into account was the fact that this little detour would also increase the amount of climbing quite a bit--something absolutely not appreciated by the accomplice's legs. Thus, we ended up walking most of the way up Harvey Hill which was annoying and, more importantly, cost us quite a bit of time. The part of the ride to Montour Falls was very pleasant (I had ridden parts of it during my epic December 100k) and the pace was good. Nonetheless, there was still a big climb coming up out of Montour Falls, and it was already 3:30! At the bottom of the hill we therefore separated and I rode up the hill in a pace that was much higher than was good for me. I made it to the registration tent at 3:45 and was ~~pretty exhausted~~well warmed-up. Fortunately, the race was postponed to 4:30, giving me a bit time to rehydrate and "eat" some gel and giving the accomplice a chance to make it in time for the race start.

Warm-up

About 25 minutes prior to the start we were allowed to get on the actual track for warm-up. The track was really great! Smooth asphalt, wide lanes, and wide turns--I guess just what you'd expect from a race track. Unfortunately, the course also included two short but kind of steep climbs, which would later turn out to be my doom. The warm up lap took me about 12 minutes, and the race organizers later announced that the Cat 5s would race a total of three laps. In the meantime, the accomplice had also made it to The Glen and I quickly did the obligatory pre-race bathroom run.

Race!

The Cat 4s started at 4:30 sharp, exactly one minute ahead of us. Since the track was a slight downhill, the field picked up pace pretty quickly. Because the track was so wide, the peloton was less compact than in your usual road race, making me feel rather safe. The downhill right turn was followed by the steep uphill bump, getting most people out of the saddle and hurting my legs significantly. I hung on with the field through the mostly flat parts and the long downhill halfway in the course. What goes down, must come up, and the less steep but longer uphill hurt me good and transported me to back of the field. I held on for a little longer but before the first lap was finished I had fallen behind. I assumed there would be a couple people behind me and in the course of lap 2 I was passed by a couple of them, making me think I was last. I made brief attempts to hang on with the people passing me but my legs didn't comply. During the final lap I saw someone maybe 300 m ahead of me and he seemed to be going at a pace similar to mine. This gave me glimmer of hope and tried to gradually come closer to him. By the time we were at the last turn before the finish line I was fairly close and I thought I might be able to take him by surprise in a final effort. I dropped some gears, got down in the bars and just pushed as hard as I could. The finish line came closer and closer and I was still behind him, but within meters of the line I finally passed him (I think, at least). Much to my chagrin, I then saw the guy's number and realized that he wasn't even in my category and maybe not even in Cat 4 but only doing an (illegal) warm-up. While my exhausted self was a bit annoyed by that and the conclusion that I probably came in last, I didn't care too much. I had achieved 3 out of 4 goals (no DNF, no crash, no crash) and riding the race track had been a blast.

The Way Back

After a much needed cool down and chugging like three bottles of water, it was 5:30 and we had to get going in order to make it back home before dusk. I (as it later turned out: incorrectly) thought the ride back would be a little less than 40 km, including one major climb out of Montour Falls. Well, major it was, but even though both the accomplice and I were fairly tired we made it up all the way. The road was a really nice back road with almost no traffic and great pavement. After 20 km we turned onto NY-13 and the accomplice, getting increasingly tired, spotted a sign claiming that it was another 17 miles to Ithaca. This obviously was pretty demotivating and we took a quick Gatorade break at the Dandy Mart. Fortunately, NY-13 was mostly flat all the way back to Newfield, but the accomplice suffered nonetheless. Once we were in Newfield all was good though and we thoroughly enjoyed the downhill into Ithaca. The 100k of race day were concluded with a big serving of poutine.

Aftermath

We're currently internetless at home and, thus, I could only look up the race results this morning. And, much to my surprise, I hadn't been last! Place 28 out 35 and therefore fulfillment of all of my goals. Even better.
Unfortunately, there are no more races in biking distance this season.

First Race Tomorrow!

2010-06-25T09:58:00.000-07:00

My identity as a cyclist is definitely not that of a racer. Yeah, I like going fast and pushing myself, but

I'm not competitive;
I dislike the idea of depending on other people's riding (and potentially crashing);
I dislike the kind of macho crap that is very prevalent in the road cycling section of bikeforums.net;
I don't want to drive to a ride.

But nonetheless I have registered for the Corning Circuit Race tomorrow. Why? Well, for a couple of reasons. First, the race will take place on the Watkins Glen International Speedway, a Nascar track. Aside from it being a closed course and therefore presumably being safer for racing, I have a longstanding connection to Nascar racing. I love car games like Need for Speed, Colin McRae Rally, the Lotus series -- and I played the 1994 NASCAR Racing extensively. I distinctly remember not liking the Watkins Glen track very much, as it was the most difficult one, with all those crazy turns. When I moved to Ithaca the first time and saw that the town of Watkins Glen was very close to it, it took me a while to realize that it was that Watkins Glen. After all, the race tracks in the video games are very much disembodied places for a German teenager who had never been to the US. Long story short: I really like the idea of racing the Speedway. The second reason for racing is that Watkins Glen is in biking distance. I can take the bus to Enfield, and from there it's only 35 km (unfortunately including a bunch of climbing) to the Glen. The race starts at 4:30, giving me a comfortable window to get there and back. The way back after the race might be painful, but whatevs.
I have four goals for the race:

no DNF due to mechanical problems
no crash
no crash
not finishing last

As preparation for the race there is a bunch of things:

map out the ride and write a cuesheet (I left my GPS in a friend's car in California)
adjust rear derailleur
switch seat posts, so that the racing saddle is at the correct height
maybe buy a cycling cap to prevent annoying sweat-in-eye problems
go for a short ride to shake out the legs
study turn-by-turn guide of the track (just kidding)
maybe shave legs, in case I fail to achieve goals 2 and 3...

Keep your thumbs pressed (as the Germans say) -- race report will be posted soon.

May Summary

2010-06-25T08:41:00.000-07:00

It's been ages since I've posted -- too many papers to be written, too much riding, too much traveling. Well, I'll try to catch up a bit in the next few days. First things first, here is the summary of my May riding:

Wolfgang was ridden for 392 km, Gunnar for 504 km, making a total of 896 km or 28.9 km per day. A clear record month! This makes my accumulated annual riding 2578 km. We'll see if I can top my May riding in any of the remaining months. Neither June nor July are likely candidates, as I just have too much other stuff going on.

Lizard juice...

2010-05-18T17:15:00.000-07:00

A bit of a hit over the head, but a pretty funny and insightful comment anyway:

Found on Streetsblog.

Hollenbeck's video footage

2010-05-05T19:35:00.000-07:00

As mentioned in my previous post, I shot some footage at the Hollenbeck race and now I've uploaded it to youtube (note to self: get a Vimeo account). Please excuse the shakiness and mediocre editing. I'm still new to this video thing.

A whole lotta bike

2010-05-05T11:28:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday was a day full of various kinds of bike-related events: I volunteered at the Hollenbecks Spring Classic race, organized by the FLCC, and I did a lot of riding. Leaving the house at 7 am, I rode Gunnar out about 30 km to the start of the race, Hollenbeck's Cider Mill in Virgil. It hadn't cooled down much during the night and the forecast predicted a hot and potentially thunderstormy day. I coated myself in a thick layer of sunscreen and hopped on the bike in just shorts and a short-sleeve jersey. Because it was early Sunday morning, I took the most direct route, following NY-366 and 13 to Dryden, and then 392 to Virgil. As expected, there wasn't much traffic and the only thing I was struggling with was the fact that I can't eat that early in the morning and was therefore pacing along on an empty stomach. Nonetheless, I got to Virgil well before the scheduled pre-race meeting for the corner marshals.

After we had been assigned our corners, I had about 35 minutes left before the start of the race and so I decided to ride out to the corner instead of getting a ride. The distance was 9 miles and involved one large climb, meaning that I'd have to put in quite a bit of an effort to make it in time. The racers warming up on 392 at a more leisurely pace were probably wondering why that guy with a Carradice saddle bag and baggy shorts was passing them at maximum effort... Well, I got to my corner just before the other volunteers arrived by car and then had 3 hours of flag waving, videotaping, and waiting for the next pack of riders to come through. After the last rider had made past our corner, I rode back to the cider mill and after hanging around for the little ceremony for the winners, I decided to ride back immediately in an effort to avoid getting t-stormed upon.

On the way to Dryden I could really feel my legs and I decided that I definitely needed water, electrolytes, and calories. Well, what better way to get all these things at once than going to McD and having large fries and a large coke? And indeed, this made me feel much better! So I got going again and thought of ways of lengthening the way back to Ithaca in a way that would make my total kilometrage that day get over 100 (at the McD in Dryden I was at 70km). Initially I thought I'd just ride out to the airport and take NY-34 back into town instead of following Upper and Lower Creek Road into campus. However, as I was feeling really good and the weather had gotten better again, I decided to something a bit more crazy: ride out to the airport but then not return to Ithaca but instead follow the route of the FLCC "Almost Genoa" ride that I had done a couple of weeks ago. And that I did.

For the part of the route that heads north, I was doing fine. The strong winds were mostly coming from the side to back and the route is rather flat. The climbing along NY-90 made me feel my legs again but the prospect of getting to the gas station at the intersection NY-90 and -34 propelled me forward. At the gas station I took a quick break to down a bottle of Gatorade -- and made the mistake of not also topping up my water bottles. On the way back south, first following 34 and then Salmon Creek, I had to head into the wind (even though not as badly as I expected it to be) and my body got more and more complainy. My butt hurt, my legs and upper arms were tired, and overall I felt a bit bonked. The steep climb up Brickyard Rd certainly didn't make things better and I was also running out of water. Anyway, in the end I made it all the way home, having ridden almost exactly 150 km, at an average moving pace of 25 km/h. Pretty epic, I'd say.

Lessons for future long distance rides:

find a way to deal with the breakfast issue. Maybe I can force myself to have some liquid calories in the morning?
The Brooks did a good job but nonetheless my butt did hurt quite a bit. Not sure what to do about that.
Gunnar rode like a charm. I think running 700x23c tires works very well, even over long distances. I might raise the handlebars a little bit to put less stress on my arms.
Drink more. Eat more. As much as I know how important this is, on the ride I still keep on ignoring this knowledge.

As soon as I have the time, I'll try the 200k to Lake Ontario and back.

April summary

2010-05-01T18:37:00.000-07:00

Holy smokes, it's already May! Well, here comes the April summary. Wolfgang was moved around 330 km, Gunnar 176 km, making a montly total of 506 km. Both this and the daily distance of 16.9 km/d are record values for this year. Total accumulated mileage for this year is 1682 km. I'm pretty optimistic that May will be even better!

Odo Wolfgang: 4284 km
Odo Gunnar: 1224 km
Odo total: 5508 km

My first video, evar

2010-04-27T16:14:00.000-07:00

The accomplice bought me a great b-day present: A Kodak Zi6 mini video cam! So no longer I have to bore you merely with epic ride reports. No, now I can bore you even more with lengthy, shaky videos of NY back roads! Just kidding, of course. Anyway, last Saturday I did a first test on our ride to a BBQ at Treman State Park and this is the awesome result:

I still have to find a movie editor that is better than Windows Movie Maker.

Danby State Forest loop

2010-04-21T08:04:00.000-07:00

Just a quick ride report about an outing with Tim: we wanted to do a short, 1.5 to 2 hour ride with a bit of climbing. I thought a short variation of my January ride to Spencer would be good for this purpose -- and it was! We went out to Buttermilk Falls, up Sandbank Road, turning right on West King/Jersey Hill and right again onto Comfort Road. Comfort Road at some point turns into a dirt road but in dry conditions it's very ridable, even with 23 mm slicks. Comfort Road ends in the state forest and we turned right onto Bald Hill. Bald Hill Rd. is a very steep descent and where it becomes a "minimum maintenance road" you turn sharp right onto Station Rd, another steep and gravelly descent. Close to the bottom of the hill, the road becomes paved again and shortly after crossing the railroad tracks, you reach NY34. Riding on 34 from Ithaca into the Spencer direction is only medium. There's quite a bit of traffic, including trucks, and even though the road is never steep it nonetheless is basically a 15km uphill. On the other hand, going down on 34 is really neat. You can easily average 30 km/h and you don't have to brake at all. We considered punishing ourselves by turning right again onto Blakeslee Hill Rd (which is supposed to be a pretty mean hill), but for the sake of making it home in daylight we just continued into Ithaca on 34/96.

35 km, 420 m of climbing

Odo Wolfgang: 4158 km
Odo Gunnar: 1224 km
Odo total: 5382 km

BikesnobNYC book

2010-04-20T07:26:00.000-07:00

So I've just pre-ordered BikesnobNYC's book from Amazon. They say that it'll be available in early May but since the publisher, Chronicle Books, has it scheduled for tomorrow, I'm hoping I'll get it a bit earlier. I'm a big fan of BSNYC (one of my all-time favorite posts: Too much irony, too little time) and his various snarkways, so my expectations are high!

Lovely bike pr0n spoof

2010-04-20T06:24:00.000-07:00

If it hadn't been for the terminology that was decidedly too post-modern for 1980, I wouldn't have spooted to spoof. If you want some extra fun, turn on Google's automatic subtitles. Via Carlton Reid

New Front Wheel for Gunnar

2010-04-12T18:12:00.000-07:00

I don't really have a good excuse for doing this, but I've built a new front wheel for Gunnar. As you might remember, currently he's running Wolfgang's old Alex-DA16-on-Deore 36 spoke wheel. While this works just fine, the internal rim width of the DA16 is 16.3 mm (at least according to their website) and thus technically a teeny tiny bit to small for my 700x23 tires. But I admit: this is a lame excuse for my urge to build a new wheel. An additional boost to this urge actually came from a gift from my friend Löby, who gave me an old but functional dial indicator. The idea is to mount it to my truing stand, theoretically allowing me to true wheels down to 0.01mm. Well, I'm still working on the attachment to the stand which turns out to be a bit tricky.

But I've built up the wheel anyway. It's a 32 spoke Mavic Open Pro with DT Swiss Comp 2.0/1.8 spokes on an Shimano Ultegra HB-6600 front hub. After lacing the wheel the wrong way twice, three times was the charm and now it's all trued and tensioned. Figuring out the correct spoke tension was a little tricky because my Wheelsmith tensiometer's calibration table only gives values for their own double-butted spokes which are 2.0/1.7 and not 2.0/1.8. But since the absolute value for spoke tension is not that crucial anyway (Mavic recommends 1050-1100 N) it shouldn't matter too much.

One final note about the wheel: the Open Pros don't come with a wear indicator. Therefore I've measured the thickness of the rim's sidewall. A trick to do this: attach a little magnetic ball to your caliper in order to get around the flange of the rim. My measurements came to almost exactly 1.5mm. This should give me a good point of reference for judging rim wear.

FLCC Sunday Ride, Attempt 2

2010-04-11T16:32:00.000-07:00

After our somewhat sucky experience with last week's FLCC Sunday Ride, I thought I'd give it another shot, this time not with the accomplice, but with my German riding buddy Tim. We met downtown at 9:45 and rode up the hill to the East Hill Plaza meeting place. There were about 8 people there already, once again all in Spandex and on road bikes. Well, this time I was prepared and had brought Gunnar (no spandex, though). We got going just a bit after ten and the pace was fairly fast, but not too fast for my (or Tim's) taste. We dropped a few people during the first part of the ride but re-congregated at the Warren Rd post office where we met another rider. From the airport on, we had to struggle with a fierce wind from the North and at some point I was feeling a little bonked. Well, fortunately the Clif Bar consumed during the stop at the post office kicked in quickly and I was feeling fine again. So fine that I actually did quite a bit of pulling and ended up in a breakaway group of three people. Our only other stop was at the gas station at the intersection of NY 90 and 34, where we waited for most of the other riders. From there on, the riding-into-the-wind was mostly over and we zoomed down Salmon Creek valley into Ludlowville, up the hill to Lansing and back to campus on Warren Road. After about 3.5 hours we were back at the East Hill Plaza parking lot. Verdict: great ride, awesome route! But don't come to a Sunday Ride if you're not well trained and want a truly relaxing ride on your non-road bike. Unless you don't mind being dropped quickly.

First FLCC Sunday Ride (well, kind of)

2010-04-05T14:21:00.000-07:00

The FLCC's Sunday Rides started this weekend and given the lovely weather and the announcement that the first ride would be taken "as a social occasion more than a serious ride" the accomplice and I decided to join the party. When we arrived at the meeting point, however, basically everyone on the parking lot looked pretty serious to us---lycra clad, road bike-equipped guys. Well, we joined the ride anyway but it became clear pretty quickly that we couldn't/wouldn't want to keep up with their pace. Thus we decided to let the other guys do their thing while we'd be doing our own. At a pace comfortable to us, we rode out on NY-89 to lovely Taughannock State Park, up to Trumansburg with a pastry stop at Gimme!, and back to Ithaca on nice, quiet back roads. It was a really nice ride, except for the fact that we had forgotten to put on sunscreen and the accomplice got burned quite a bit.

We might give the Sunday Ride another try, hoping that there will be more like-minded (and like-speeded) cyclists.

Odo Wolfgang: 4004 km
Odo Gunnar: 1048 km

Spring maintenance and upgrades

2010-04-03T14:43:00.000-07:00

The weather is lovely outside and tomorrow we'll be going on the first FLCC Sunday Ride of the year. Today (and a good deal of yesterday), however, I did a lot of work on Wolfgang. I installed a new granny gear, a new front derailleur, I checked and repacked the rear hub bearings; switched from Ritchey Cross Tires to the Conti Gatorskin slicks; and I wired my accomplice's BUMM Toplight Line Plus rear light.

Switching from double to triple clearly was the most laborious process and actually I wasn't able to complete it successfully. I had bought a Shimano XT FD-M773 front derailleur, a Salsa 26t chainring and a 118mm bottom bracket to adjust the chainline. Using the fabulous Park Tool instructions, the cranks came off, the bottom bracket was removed (required several attempts and a bunch of WD40), threads cleaned and regreased, and the new bottom bracket installed.

As I had to take off the chain anyway and the current chain had reached the .75 mark, I also switched the chain back to the old chain. What I immediately noticed was the difference in corrosion between the two. The old one was an Sram PC 971, the more current one to be switched out a PC 951. Despite mostly fenderless use during the 2008/2009 winter, the 971 was completely corrosion free; whereas the last winter had left significant traces on the 951. The difference between the two chains is just a couple of dollars--and the fact that the 971 is nickel-plated. I'll definitely keep this in mind when buying another chain.

Finally, I put on the third chainring and the new derailleur and started adjusting. This is where the trouble began. I couldn't get the derailleur to clear the small chainring, even when the L limit screw was set to the max. I initially thought I had done something wrong, maybe with the height adjustment. But after extensive consultation with my online friends, I've come to the conclusion that derailleur and bottom bracket just don't go together, even though the specifications and Glenn's expertise implied otherwise. What I'll try next is to re-install the old Tiagra derailleur and see if it's going to work -- apparently double front derailleurs often also work for triple.

Odo Wolfgang 3954 km
Odo Gunnar 1048 km

March Summary

2010-04-01T14:27:00.000-07:00

March has been the first month with a whole bunch of days of good weather. What does that translate into in terms of stats? Wolfgang rolled in at 305 km and Gunnar made 94 km in his first month of outdoor riding. In addition, I also rode about 60 km on my Dad's MTB in Germany. This leads to a total of 449 km (Feb: 398 km). March had 31 days, so the daily average was 14.5 km, just slightly more than February (14.2 km/day). Total annual kilometrage is 1176 km.

Odo Wolfgang: 3954 km
Odo Gunnar: 1048 km

Crash report

2010-03-30T02:00:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I'm on a short visit to Germany and what happens: I get hit by a car. The most important thing first: I'm fine, not even a scratch. The bad news: My Peugeot is in rather bad shape. I was riding through a traffic circle near Welzheim when a person in a Mercedes ignored my right-of-way, entered the circle, and hit me on my rear wheel. Because speed were relatively low, I somehow managed to not fall and hurt myself. But the rear wheel of my bike is definitely gone, as you can see on the picture. As I'm typing, the LBS is checking if anything else was damaged, but I think that's not very likely.

Badly Bent Bicycle

What's kinda interesting about the accident is the GPS log.

GPS-Log and Map

You can clearly see how I was approaching the traffic circle, slowed down, and then got hit, leading to a spike in the recorded speed.

Gunnar

2010-03-17T09:44:00.000-07:00

Finally the weather has been nice enough for me to take out Gunnar for a couple of rides. After a short loop through the city and a ride to the FLCC spring seminar two Sundays ago, yesterday I took Gunnar on a real test ride, out to Taughannock and back on Route 89. And Gunnar rides like a charm. I pushed it pretty hard and averaged at 30.7 km/h for the out-of-town portion of the ride. I think the geometry works pretty well for me, but I will keep tinkering with it: saddle height is maybe still a bit too low, but the current seat post is already at its max. And if I have to get a new seat post anyway, I might get one with a different set-back. Currently my KOPS (knee over pedal spindle) position is about 6 cm behind the spindle and my saddle is as far forward as possible. I'm well aware that several cycling gurus are rather skeptical of the KOPS method and their arguments are making a lot of sense to me. But given that my saddle is at the margin of adjustability, a zero-setback post would give me more options to tinker with my position. Probably I should just ask Glenn for advice. Handlebar height might get readjusted downwards, too. At the moment my posture is fairly aggressive, but I think I could drop a spacer or two and still be comfortable.

I'll go for another ride with another German guy today and we'll see how Gunnar feels after 2 or 2.5 hours. I definitely expect my behind to hurt, as the Selle Italia Flite Gel Flow (I have the one without titanium rails) saddle is just too tiny. My knees might also be a trouble spot, as I messed them up a bit yesterday, courtesy of a downward sliding seat post...

I also shot some outside pictures of Gunnar. I hope you'll enjoy:

Odo Wolfgang: 3924 km
Odo Gunnar: 991 km (point zero is at 954 km)

More ride, less blog

2010-03-14T09:29:00.000-07:00

What's a good indicator of the coming spring? That my kilometrage is up and my blog-postage is down.

Just a quick maps-con-pics from last week's lovely ride to Taughannock Falls. If you want more details: I think the accomplice might blog about the ride soon.

Oh, and I've done the first couple short rides on Gunnar. Verdict: nice ride, but still needs some adjustments. More detailed account to follow sometime.

February Summary

2010-03-01T11:42:00.000-08:00

March is here, and hopefully that means that spring will arrive sometime soon, too. Well, in any case it's time for a February summary. Total kilometrage for the month was was 398 km, up from 329 km in January. This makes a total of 727 km for 2010 so far. Not bad, given the weather conditions and the fact that the month only had 28 days (average in Feb: 14.21 km/d vs. 10.61 km/d in January). Longest ride was the 58 km to Genoa and back -- anything longer was made impossible mostly by the weather conditions and one weekend lost to a conference. I guess I'll hit the first 1000 km sometime in March, but because I'll spend a third of the month in Germany, I might miss matching this month's mark. We''ll see. I hope that March will at least bring a couple of days that will be appropriate for Gunnar's maiden voyage.

Odo Wolfgang: 3659 km

Ride report: Genoa

2010-03-01T11:31:00.000-08:00

In a last-minute effort to increase my February mileage a bit and to figure out the road conditions for part of my planned ride to Lake Ontario, I went on a loop ride from campus to Genoa last Wednesday. Conditions were mediocre: around 0°C, cloudy, no precipitation, but a really gross film of dirt, salt, and water on the roads. A second pair of pants would definitely have been good.

My route led me straight north from Cornell campus, past the Lansing malls and up to the intersection with NY-34. There I turned left to follow 34B for a short portion (lots of trucks on there, going to and from the Cargill salt mine in Lansing) and then turned right onto Brickyard Hill Rd. This road leads you down into the Salmon Creek valley. Salmon Creek Rd is one of those great Upstate New York rural roads: good surface, mostly flat and almost no traffic.

Salmon Creek Road

The valley itself is not exceptionally a pretty, as it is a mix of farmland and more natural areas, but it's still a nice ride.

Deserted Mack in the forest

At the confluence of Little and Big Salmon Creek, the road name changes to Indian Fields Rd, and the road takes you straight north on the only major climb of the route.

Uphill on Indian Fields Road

Up on the hill, I turned right from Indian Fields Rd onto NY-90, which is an awesome, straight downhill into Genoa proper. There's a convenience store and a gas station in Genoafor getting food and water.

Zoooming down into Genoa. V_max > 70 km/h

From Genoa, I mostly followed NY-34 back into Cornell.

So what's the verdict on taking Salmon Creek/Indian Fields instead of 34 for getting to Auburn? The former is definitely the prettier alternative, but it comes at the cost of quite a bit of up and down. Traffic on 34 wasn't as bad as I thought, but that might be related to the time of day. All in all I think I would take the Salmon Creek route to take me north.

A short PS: I forgot to mention that after I was back from the ride, had gotten myself a cookie for refueling and came out of the Cornell Store, I saw that I had a flat. The changing of the tire was pretty gross, but at least it didn't happen during the ride itself. The Ritchey tires definitely are not very good in puncture protection. This is the second flat in probably less than 2000 km. I suppose I'll nonetheless keep them until the arrival of spring and maybe switch to something better next winter.

Bike fit workshop tomorrow

2010-02-27T12:03:00.000-08:00

As part of their annuyal sprin seminar series, the Finger Lakes Cycling Club will have a bike fit seminar tomorrow. I'm really excited and hope to be one of the people who will receive a fitting. As regular reader will know, I'm not totally satisfied with Wolfgang's fit and maybe the seminar will help me getting rid of issues like numb feet.

Here's the original announcement:

This Sunday, Feb 28 is the first seminar of the annual spring series. The topic will be BIKE FIT (and related mechanical issues).

We will provide some riders with free fitting, as we use them for demonstration purposes to illustrate the mechanics and physiology of bike fit. I can't guarantee that we will have time to provide everyone who attends with a personal bike fit, but if you attend and pay attention, you will be well on your way to being able to evaluate your own position and that of your fellow riders.

The seminar will run from 10:00AM until about Noon and will take place in the 1st floor lounge (room 128) of Olin Hall Chemical Engineering on the Cornell campus. This building is located across from Gannett Health Center, across from Carpenter Engineering Library, and nearly adjacent to the Campus Store.

All seminars are free and open to the public. All interested cyclists are welcome, so please spread the word to other lists or to friends and families.

Glenn Swan

V-Brakes and Drop Bars

2010-02-27T11:58:00.000-08:00

For the record: I exchanged brake pad inserts on Wolfgang, switching from the Tektro stock pads to Koolstop Dual Compound. So the original pads lasted about 4 months and maybe 1500 km (no record keeping yet back then, unfortunately). Given the adverse conditions of winter I guess that's a reasonable value.

The old pads on dirty, dirty Wolfgang

What remains of the pad...

New pads installed

While switching the pads, I also installed a new brake noodle with an integrated adjuster barrel.. This is a nifty way to deal with one downside of v-brakes on drop bars. With straight bars and the respective brake levers, you have an adjuster barrel integrated into the lever, allowing to compensate for the wear of the brake. With drop bar levers, on the other hand, you have to do this compensation by loosening and readjusting the brake wire. This is somewhat tricky/time-consuming, and, more importantly, it's not good for the longevity of the brake wire. The new noodle takes care of this issue and it was only 4 bucks.

© Rivendell Bicycles

One issue I'm still dealing with is brake squeal. The Koolstop instructions advise you to install the pads without toe-in because they're already curved themselves. My first attempt, however, lead to horrible brake squeal. I tried fixing it by adding toe-in but this didn't do anything. What did alleviate the problem was to increase the torque on the brake bosses (in combination with having the brake pads installed as advised by Koolstop). This doesn't entirely get rid of the squeal but it has definitely gotten better.

Odo Wolfgang: 3645 km (this is a late post; brake pads were actually installed at 3560 km)

Upgrade for Gunnar

2010-02-23T11:56:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of the yearly sale of German online bike shop Rose, I've ordered a little upgrade for Gunnar. As you might remember, currently I have the old Alex DA-16/Deore wheel from my Cross-Check installed. The upgrade will be a Shimano 32H Ultegra Hub with DT Competition spokes on a Mavic Open Pro hub. That should shave a couple grams off of Gunnar's weight, look nicer, and be more appropriate for running thin tires. But first I have to wait for my Germany visit in order to pick up the components.

Ride report: Trumansburg

2010-02-17T04:55:00.000-08:00

Quick ride report: Temperature only slightly below 0° C made me jump on Wolfgang and do my standard round to Trumansburg and back. When I started it was very grey and snowing, making the ride to Trumansburg not terribly pretty;.

I love those quiet country roads...

I was, however, rewarded with a nice view of the icy falls in Taughannock State Park.

From Trumansburg ride

The reason for riding to Trumansburg (aside from it being a nice ride) is that it allows me to work for a couple of hours at the Gimme!Coffee there.

Wolfgang parked in downtonw T-Burg

On the way back, I made a quick stop at the lower Taughannock Park (the Gorge trail is open, btw) and at Allen Treman Park in Ithaca to shoot some pictures of the lake.

It was pretty windy

From Trumansburg ride

Not the right time of year for a BBQ

The Cayuga inlet is completely frozen

Ride stats: 48.6 km, 588 m elevation gain, average moving speed 21 km/h

Wolfgang with the new Brooks

2010-02-16T07:31:00.000-08:00

I just remembered that I still haven't posted any pictures of Wolfgang with the new Brooks saddle. Well, here it is. As noted previously, so far it has been pretty comfortable but it's definitely not broken in yet. From looking at the picture, I'll probably change the angle of the saddle by a bit and put the nose further down. Common knowledge has it that Brooks saddles need to be angled up a little, but my current set-up might be a bit too much.

Snowshoe fun

2010-02-16T06:57:00.000-08:00

From Snowshoe Hike

Surprise, surprise: winter is still not over and another weekend without significant riding went by. So as an alternative, the accomplice and I went to Glenn Swan's Monday night showshoe outing. As always, it was lots of fun and the weather was exceptionally good, too. Around 0° C and clear skies made for a nice sunset and a great 4.5 km walk.

Odo Wolfgang: 3411 km

Is it spring yet?

2010-02-10T10:22:00.000-08:00

Just a quick update:

It's still winter. Today the snow has reached us and I might go on a little adventure on the South Hill Recreation Way on my way home from campus.
Forecast for next weekend looks comparatively good (high of -1°C), so maybe I'll be able to go for a ride.
The new Brooks feels pretty good so far, but due to the weather I haven't had a chance to test it on a longer ride.
in terms on working on the stable: I installed an Avid Single Digit 7 V-brake on the accomplice's bike in order to increase stopping power and allow installing the BUMM Cyo headlight
upgrade plans: On Wolfgang, I'm going to install a triple front crank as part of a general spring overhaul. In terms of parts and work, this will require something between the ideal of only switching the front derailleur to a triple and the worst case scenario of a new bottom bracket, new front derailleur, new (longer cage) rear derailleur. Most people who have done this conversion on a Cross-Check seem to be switching their bottom bracket from 113mm to 118mm, but maybe it'll work without that. Certainly worth a try.
My ebaying efforts haven't been terribly successful: The two Oryx brakes were sold for a whopping total of 2.50$ and two of the saddles didn't sell at all. At least the SDG saddle sold for 19.50$ but I'm still awaiting payment. But whatever -- at least I got rid of some stuff.
Another potential upgrade: I might try buying a used Zzing USB charger for running my GPS and charging cell phones via the hub generator. There's a good DIY solution out there, but if I get a used Zzing it wouldn't save me much money and my soldering skills are a bit rusty.
As you can see on the accomplice's blog, we've signed up for a biking Memorial Day weekend in the High Peaks Region of the Adirondacks! It's still far away, but I'm really looking forward to it.

High Peaks of the Adirondacks

Shameless self-promotion

2010-02-04T07:16:00.000-08:00

Need new brakes? A new saddle or two? Then check out my current e-bay auctions. You'll get a 5 % discount (shipping not included) if you mention that you found the auction through this blog.

SDG Comp Road Bike Saddle

WTB Speed She Comp Women's Saddle

Velo Plush Road Bike Cyclocross Saddle

Tektro Oryx Cantilever Brake 992AG Cyclocross

Tektro Oryx Cantilever Brake 992AG Cyclocross

January summary

2010-02-01T12:00:00.000-08:00

No good cycling month. The temperatures were just too low for much outdoor riding and in addition, I had to do some travel. Longest ride was around 70 km and the rest was mostly everyday riding. Overall outdoor riding: 329 km
February is probably not going to be much better but we'll see.

Odo Wolfgang: 3261 km

Auburn, maybe?

2010-01-27T15:33:00.000-08:00

I'm running out of time for my "metric century a month" plan. Last Saturday's ride was only about 70 km long and it's already the 27th! The forecast for the weekend is very cold, though, so I'm not quite sure if I can pull off a 100k with temperatures well below freezing. The plan would be to ride to Auburn and back, about 120 km. Part of the plan is to get an idea if my ride to Lake Ontario and back is feasible/fun -- Auburn is almost exactly halfway between Ithaca and the lake. The elevation profile is relatively flat and I'd be on back roads almost all of the time. So a rolling average of 23 km/h shouldn't be too much of a problem, which results in 5 1/4 hours riding time. Sunrise is 7:22, so if I get going at 6, I could be in Auburn for a nice little breakfast and back home for lunch. Well, I'll think about it during the next couple of days and see if the forecast gets any warmer.

Brooks got here!

2010-01-26T08:55:00.000-08:00

Okay, my Brooks Imperial B17 finally got here. Of course, I couldn't wait even until after grocery shopping to install it on Wolfgang. Very first impression: it has a very defined seating position. In contrast to my other saddles where you switch between different position without them feeling clearly wrong, with the Brooks you really feel where you're supposed to sit. This position is, obviously, still a bit hard at the moment, but I'm optimistic that I'll indeed like the saddle once it's broken in. Pictures will follow shortly.

Odo Wolfgang: 3232 km

Sunny, nice, but with a Google Maps fail

2010-01-24T08:58:00.000-08:00

The weather forecast for Saturday looked good -- 4° C and sunny -- and after a foggy early AM, Saturday delivered on its promise. I decided to ride out to Spencer and back, using a backroad alternative on the way there and NY34 on the way back. As Spencer is 180 m above Ithaca, this puts almost all of the climbing into the first half of the ride. The advantage of this: your legs are still fresh and, more importantly, the climbing is on scenic backroads, away from traffic. While NY34 isn't the most busy road and has relatively decent shoulders, it still has a good amount of traffic. Going Spencer to Ithaca, I probably had an average speed of around 30 km/h, making the traffic much more pleasant to deal with.

General ride notes: I left Ithaca on Spencer Road, going parallel to the busy NY13. There is a little foot trail connector between Spencer Road and Buttermilk Falls State Park. If you have a road bike with skinny tires, you'd probably have to walk your bike there, but it's only 50 meters or so. From the state park parking lot you again have to go on little foot trails to get to Sandbank Road. Sandbank Road is the first major climb with a pretty steep grade. Fortunately, the climb is not too long, and once you've reached the intersection with W King Rd, the route continues to go up, but rather gently.

Up on Jersey Hill Road

The next intersection is with Comfort Road, and a few kilometers in from there, you hit the first dirt road parts. The road condition is fairly okay, but I'd recommend at least 28 mm tires and possibly more if it's really wet. (For my ride, the ground was still mostly frozen.)

Comfort Rd, shortly before it turns into a dirt road

Around km 15 you enter Danby State Forest and soon get to an intersection with Bald Hill Rd. Well, actually this turned out to be a T-intersection, with Comfort Road ending. I was rather surprised, since my original plan, made on the basis of Google Maps, was to just continue through the intersection on Comfort Rd. However, that part of Comfort Road does not exist or, at best, it exists as a hiking trail.

This is supposed to be Comfort Road. I see neither "comfort" nor "road."

I've had that problem with Google Maps before. Just compare the following two maps.

View Larger Map

View Larger Map

Lesson learned: if riding on minor roads, also cross-check the existence of roads. My Garmin Topo map had it right (while Openstreetmaps has it wrong, just like Google).

Anyways, instead of taking Comfort Road, I turned left on Bald Hill Rd, which leads you down into Danby. Turn right on NY 96B and take the next right onto Michigan Hollow Rd. Michigan Hollow is maybe the nicest part of the ride. You're following the stream into the state forest on a wide dirt road with almost no traffic. Once again, in wet conditions and with skinny tires you might run into problems. Around km 23 you could turn left on Smiley Hill Rd but this is a "minimum maintenance road" which is not ridable in winter.

Minimum maintenance indeed.

Thus, I just kept going on Michigan Hollow all the way through the state forest. If you keep going further on Michigan Hollow you will eventually reach NY 34. If you don't care about going into Spencer, this would provide a slightly shorter alternative. Instead, I turned left at km 28 onto Signore Hill Road. This, again, is a dirt road and the first part is short but very steep, making my wheels lose traction a couple of times.

Signore Hill will slow you down all by itself

After you've reached the high point, the road follows another stream, providing another very nice part of the ride.

Back in Danby State Forest

Signore Hill eventually connects with Irish Hill and Fisher Settlement Road, leading you right into Spencer.

The valley opening up on Fisher Settlement Road

In Spencer you can re-fuel at the local inn, the gas station, or a supermarket, before taking the speedy downhill route back into Ithaca.

Downtown Spencer

Buttermilk Falls

Odo Wolfgang: 3217 km

Shake it, baby!

2010-01-23T04:41:00.000-08:00

Short ride report for a short ride.

I had to go up to campus to get a couple of books and I didn't feel like taking the direct route. So I went up South Hill and hit the trailhead for the South Hill Recreation Way. I was worried that it might be all ice, but actually it was a very rough, frozen snow surface. Traction was okay (I couldn't go much faster than 10 km/h anyway) but it was as bumpy as a washboard. I had never taken the trail before and it was completely dark, and thus I missed an intersection and was led back to Coddington Road instead of taking the trail all the way up to Burns Road.

Notable events: I used my Toasti Toes foot warmers in my normal cycling shoes for the first time. Result: Numb feet after the uphill part, but got back to normal much faster than usual. And on the short descent into Ithaca they kept my feet surprisingly warm.

Multi-modal transport

2010-01-21T14:36:00.000-08:00

When you mention multi-modal transport, most people would think of commuting to the train station by bike and then taking the train; or driving your car to a park & ride and then taking the train. (Well, what most people would actually is think is something like "Multi-what?") This post, however, is about combining cycling and flying.

I had some research business to do in North Carolina, and because NC is too far to drive and flights were cheap, I flew from Ithaca to Durham this Wednesday. The Ithaca airport is about 10 km away from and 220 m above downtown and while a bus connection does exist, it's useless for both the early morning and the evening departures and arrivals. The alternative is to take a cab but that's pretty expensive, and thus I usually end up taking the bike. Well, to be precise: I don't fly out of Ithaca that frequently, and so this was the second time that I did the bike-and-fly combo.

The first time, I had actually contacted the airport's customer service in order to figure out if they provided any secure and dry bike parking. Perhaps unsurprisingly, this wasn't the case. The only bike parking they have for the whole airport is a measly wavy bike rack (no idea what they're actually called, something like this) that, at best, accommodates four bikes and of course doesn't have a roof or is covered by the airport's many CCTV cameras. Now I don't care too much about Wolfgang getting wet and Ithaca isn't exactly a bike theft hot spot. But still -- there's plenty of space for a couple of staple rack under the roof in front of the entrance.

Oh well, I'm perfectly aware of the fact that I'm probably the only nutcase cycling to the airport. But examples of more bike-friendly airports do exist.

Maintenance and Upgrade

2010-01-21T13:59:00.000-08:00

Temperatures have gone up slightly (i. e. it's slightly above freezing and sunny), getting me motivated to work on Wolfgang a bit. Operation 1 was switching the front brake lever, operation 2 just maintenance.

Last October, after getting more and more annoyed by mediocre stopping power and horrible screeching, I had switched Wolfgang's stock Tektro Oryx cantis to Avid Single Digit 7 V-brakes. Because of the different mechanical advantage required by V-brakes, I installed a Problemsolvers travel agent, a small roll that gets installed in place of the brake noodle and that changes the amount of cable travel. This worked reasonably well (one issue: the holder for my headlight was in the way of the travel agent, probably reducing stopping power a little bit); but because it doesn't look as clean and I was in search of something to put on my Christmas wish list, I decided to switch from the Tektro R200 to the V-brake compatible RL520. Installation was pretty easy, I didn't even have to re-wrap the handlebars. Will they deliver more stopping power? -- We'll see. Probably not as much as replacing the pads with Kool Stops would, but I want to run down this set of pads first. With the current weather conditions this shouldn't take long anyway...

The other thing to do was some maintenance. I've complained about salt damage before, and thus I decided to give Wolfgang a little TLC and clean his drivetrain. The good news: all the rust and grime comes off no problem. It takes several rounds of cleaning with citrus degreaser and the Park Tool CM-5 chain scrubber (no, not the Performance/Spin Doctor lookalike), but after that treatment the chain and cogs look pretty neat again. Until the next ride, of course.

Other maintenance: re-adjust rear fender to avoid rubbing.

Odo Wolfgang: 3117 km

How to: Embedding maps with a GPS track and geotagged photos

2010-01-17T12:15:00.000-08:00

On my other, mostly inactive blog I've posted a tutorial for creating embedded maps with GPS tracks and geotagged images. Not quite sure why I didn't post this here, and thus I at least wanted to link to the post.

Salt's bad for Wolfgang's health

2010-01-13T14:56:00.000-08:00

One of the annoying side effects of riding your bike in the winter is the havoc wreaked by salt. I have full fenders, a mud flap, I'm relatively good in rinsing down Wolfgang more or less every day, but nonetheless the mix of salt, dirt, and grime gets everywhere on the bike and causes various kinds of problem. My chain, even though lubed frequently looks pretty rusty and a couple days ago I noticed that the right arm of my rear cantis no longer properly sprung back after braking and thus rubbed on the rim all the time. My initial repair attempts, involving no disassembly but a bunch of WD-40, were unsuccessful and so I had to take off the brake yesterday. I couldn't find instructions for completely taking apart the Tektro Oryx but I managed to disassemble the arm enough to get a bunch of oil into the right places. I would have preferred to take it apart completely and re-grease it, but at least for now the brake is functional again. I think in April I'll take a day or so and completely overhaul Wolfgang. So far I haven't noticed any permanent damage from the salt, but I'm sure cleaning everything and re-greasing the bottom bracket or hubs wouldn't be a bad idea after several months of calcium chloride showers.

On a completely unrelated note: I finally drank the Kool-Aid and ordered a Brooks B17 Imperial saddle. I don't really like the idea of riding on a dead cow's skin, but if the saddle is really as fantastic as almost everyone believes, I suppose I (and my butt) can live with it.

And on another unrelated note: my accomplice has a blog now, too. And I think it's supposed to be somewhat bike-related. So go check it out, non-existent reader!

Odo Wolfgang: 3016 km
Odo Gunnar: 45 minutes on the trainer

Cycling and sexism

2010-01-12T10:58:00.000-08:00

Good observations about cycling and sexism by Elly Blue on BikePortland. I definitely won't read the comments that will certainly soon start popping up there. Not good for my blood pressure.

Hate sexism, love cycling!

----
Edit: Okay, of course I couldn't resist reading the comments. And I'll take everything back: the vast majority of them is not as bad as I expected. A lot of them are actually very insightful.

Ride canceled

2010-01-09T05:58:00.000-08:00

Plan for today: ride to Auburn and back (about 115 km). Not so much:

©Accuweather

New dynamo front wheel

2010-01-08T12:56:00.000-08:00

As a Christmas present for my accomplice, I wanted to build up a generator front wheel for her Fuji Touring. I bought the Shimano LX generator hub from Germany for a pretty good price and got a Mavic A319 front wheel and DT Swiss Champion 2.0 290 mm spokes from my LBS. Last night I finally built up the wheel and it went pretty well. It's definitely easier the second time, and my tensiometer helped a lot, too. Once I find a cheap Ultegra hub on ebay, I'll build a new front wheel for Gunnar...

Gunnar's weight

2010-01-06T12:58:00.000-08:00

I ain't no weight weenie but I nonetheless wanted to add the weight the previous post about Gunnar. With the addition of Shimano PD-M520 pedals, two bottle cages, and changing the tires to 23mm Michelin Krylions I ended up at about 10.3 kg (measured with bathroom scale). I had hoped to reach the 10 kg mark, but I suppose with a 62cm steel frame that's not easy.

Snow, cold

2010-01-06T12:52:00.000-08:00

Surprise, surprise! It's still friggin' cold here. Nonetheless, I decided to ride out to Glenn's in order to get the spokes for my accomplice's generator front wheel and some parts for Gunnar. As usual on Monday, Glenn had invited people for a snowshoe outing and I thought I'd give it a try. Usually it takes me about 30 minutes to ride out there, and I estimated that the bad weather would maybe slow me down by 10 minutes max. Well, not so much. While in downtown all roads were cleared, up on the hill the roads got more and more snowy. Mt. Pleasant Road, low traffic and very steep, was completely covered in fresh snow and I had to walk a good deal of it. Just not enough traction with my Ritchey 'cross tires. In the end it took me 50 minutes to ascend to the heights of Mt. Pleasant, and I arrived half an hour late for snowshoeing.

The ride back was a bit faster, but actually much less pleasant. On the way up, my body had produced copious amounts of heat but on the way back I was freezing. My new MEC lobster gloves did not really cut it, probably exacerbated by the fact that I had to brake hard constantly while going down Mt. Pleasant.

Purchased items:

DT Champion 2.0 spokes and nipples
2 Velocity VeloCage bottle cages
Shimano PD-M424 pedals (to allow both clipless and normal riding for the winter)
2 700cx23 tubes

Odo Wolfgang:2956 km

Wanna go for a ride today?

2010-01-03T06:11:00.000-08:00

Most definitely not:

©Accuweather

Gunnar is ready for a ride

2010-01-02T17:07:00.000-08:00

Okay, I've finally finished building up Gunnar and have had a chance to take some pictures for your (and my) enjoyment. Isn't he a beauty? Due to poor weather and salty roads I haven't had a chance to take him for a ride but hopefully it'll get better soon.

Now the nerd facts:

Gunnar Roadie 2002 62 cm frame
Shimano 105 ST-5600 brifters
Shimano Dura-Ace BR-7700 brakes
Shimano 105 RD-5600 rear derailleur
Shimano Ultegra FD-6500 front derailleur, clamp-on
SRAM PG-1070 12-27 10 speed cassette
SRAM 1050 chain
Selle Italia Flite Gel Flow saddle
Bontrager Select 27.2mm seat post
Powerdrive BC1.37x24t 68mm shell bottom bracket
FSA Gossamer 50/34 compact cranks
3T Forgie stem, aluminum, 120mm
3T Forgie bar, aluminum, 44cm
Cane Creek S2 headset
Mavic Cosmos 28 spoke rear wheel
Alex DA-16/Shimano Deore front wheel

Some of the components, like the front wheel will probably be replaced in the near future and I still need pedals, but my main goal was to get to a functional and affordable quality build ASAP. And in that I've certainly succeeded.

Ideas for 2010

2010-01-02T15:15:00.000-08:00

New Year's resolutions are silly, ideas for the new year aren't. So here they are:

a 200k
a metric century a month
2-day tour Ithaca-Lake Ontario-Ithaca (could also be done as a 200k)

7 or more day bike tour, location to be determined (Pacific coast? around Lake Ontario? Italian Alps?)
higher annual kilometrage than last year (i.e. >3500 km)
make into the second round at the 2010 Cascadilla Hill Climb (no, I'm not competitive at all!!)
go on Sunday Rides with the FLCC
find a way to prevent my numbness problems

Odo Wolfgang: 2932 km
Odo Gunnar: 10 m on the trainer (more details will follow shortly)

Shortest and longest ride

2009-12-25T15:51:00.000-08:00

Two ride reports in one: As announced previously, there was the Tour de Solstice, the "shortest ride on the shortest day." It was cold, but not insanely so, the roads were mostly clear, and it was great fun to ride around Ithaca with 30 or so other cyclists. BikeIt, the co-organizers have posted a ride report with a bunch of pictures.

The next day my accomplice and her sister went to the spa and I thought I'd dial in a couple more kilometers for December. Following the Finger Lakes Cycling Club's Newfield/Odessa sunday ride with some modifications, I went on a 105 km ride. It was really cold (about -5 C and windy), but my outfit more or less worked in keeping me warm. I wore wool socks and a plastic bag in my cycling shoes and neoprene booties on my feet, bib tights, old men thrift store wool pants, bike jersey, hooded sweater, rain jacket, and a balaclava. As expected, my feet and the freezing water bottles were the weak spots. I had pre-warmed the water bottles and they lasted for about 1.5 hours before becoming all slushy and finally freezing after 2 hours or so. At my first rest stop, the Alpine Junction Dandy Mini Mart, I refilled them with warm water and some coffee. Second rest stop was at the Trumansburg Gimme!Coffee, with a tasty coffee and a vegan date bar. Total ride time was about 6.5 hours, moving time 5 hours, moving average 21.2 km/h, overall distance 106 km.

Last year, after a long and really miserable ride I had promised myself that I'd never do it again. But now, with improved equipment, I actually enjoyed the ride and would do it again.

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Tour de Solstice

2009-12-13T16:14:00.000-08:00

Seems like I mounted my winter tires just in time. Next Sunday Ithaca's Tour de Solstice, the "Shortest Ride on the Shortest Day, a celebration of cycling and friendship, an affirmation that every day is a good day for a ride" will take place. I'll see y'all there!

I guess it's winter

2009-12-13T09:25:00.000-08:00

We had quite a bit of snow during the last couple of days. This was a strong encouragement for me to finally replace Wolfgang's 700x28c Conti Gatorskin slicks with my 700x32c 'cross tires. I put them on yesterday (front) and today (back) and now should be ready for the coming snows of this season.

A related side note: This summer I had ordered the Crank Brothers Speed Lever. I tend to misplace traditional tire levers and my disappointing experience with the Quik Stik led me to test a new solution. I must say that I'm really happy with the Speed Lever. Only one piece instead of three and it does indeed work fast. The downside: for really tight tire-rim combinations you'll still need an additional lever to get the tire on and off.

Odo Wolfgang: 2748 km

Brakes!

2009-12-06T16:58:00.000-08:00

Quick ebay update: I'm now proud owner of a set of Dura Ace BR-7700 brakes. Still missing: Brifters, cassette, front derailleur. Frame scheduled for delivery tomorrow.

Peugeot

2009-12-06T07:26:00.000-08:00

While browsing through my image library, I found this shot of yet another bike of mine, my Peugeot Ventoux. It's a nice, classic steel road bike from the early 90s and I keep it at my parents' place for whenever I'm in Germany. Not terribly light, a little small for me but I love my Peugeot anyway.

Mud Flap Pictures

2009-12-06T06:20:00.000-08:00

Okay, here are the promised pictures of my DIY mud flap. Required skill level: only slightly above 0. Tools and material: box cutter, steel ruler, zip ties. It's a bit tricky to get straight cuts on the curved shampoo bottle; thus my mud flap ended up a bit smaller than intended. But, as I've said: it does work and it makes a big difference when riding in the rain.

Shower Power

2009-12-05T12:56:00.000-08:00

Whereas US Mythbusters usually tend to blow up stuff or do alcohol-related experiments, the BBC's Bang goes the theory demonstrated how much energy an average British family consume per day by having 80 cyclists generate that energy. Unfortunately, you can't watch the whole program if you're not located in the UK, but here is a small snippet about one of the more evil devices, the electrically heated shower.

Stuuuff!

2009-12-04T12:45:00.000-08:00

As mentioned yesterday, a lot of boxes with bike parts arrived. One Ultegra crankset, one FSA crankset, 105 rear derailleur, stem and handlebar, Mavic Cosmos rear wheel, a couple of tires, and a Selle Italia Flite Gel Flow saddle. Still no luck with brifters or brakes. Frame is scheduled for delivery on the eighth.

It has begun

2009-12-03T13:05:00.000-08:00

According to my accomplice, ebayed bike parts have started to arrive at our place. Frame is scheduled for delivery on the eight! I'm quite excited.

Side note: Brifters are much more expensive than I imagined. Wolfgang, my Cross-Check, has bar-end shifters that I really like. But for Gunnar I think brifters are more appropriate (and bar-end shifters plus brake levers are somewhat pricey as well). I hope ebay will produce something affordable soon.

Odo Wolfgang: 2684 km

Mud flap

2009-11-30T11:40:00.000-08:00

I made and installed a DIY mudflap, made out of an old shampoo bottle, yesterday. Instructions (in German, but you don't really need them anyway) can be found here. Of course, today it was raining, and therefore I can say: they do work. They look a little goofy because they're Fructis-green but finding a black shampoo bottle is not exactly easy. Function over form.

Pictures will follow shortly.

I'm a Roadie now

2009-11-29T12:53:00.000-08:00

So I've already briefly mentioned my latest ebay purchase. Here are some more details: It's a 2002 62cm Gunnar Roadie frameset. The price was just under 400 dollars (including shipping) and this was as much as I was willing to pay. Right now--of course--I'm making plans on how to build it up. For lack of funds, I'll go the used-but-good route and have already spent a large part of the day on ebay. Some decisions have been made: SPD pedals to match my current shoes. Shimano 105 or better for the drivetrain. I already have a front wheel and will build up the rear wheel with a used hub on a new Mavic Open Pro rim. But the rest is pretty much unclear still. 9 or 10 speed? Compact or triple? Saddle? Handlebars? Brakes? Brake/shift levers?? Lots of choices to make. But I'll go slow as I definitely have more time than money.

Riding through the night

2009-11-29T07:25:00.000-08:00

I'm not a big fan of winter (especially of the kind of winter we have here in Upstate NY) but I must admit that riding in the winter does have its appeal. I went for a quick spin out to Trumansburg yesterday and worked for a while at Gimme. By the time I started my way, via Enfield, it was totally dark and riding through the night on quiet backroads is pretty cool. The experience is quite different from daytime riding because you focus almost exclusively on riding. Something I tested for the first time yesterday were chemical foot warmers. I have serious cold/numb foot problems and so I thought I'd try something new. The combo of wool socks, foot warmers, summer cycling shoes, and neoprene booties was pretty good. I still ended with numb feet but it was much better than usual. I might buy more.

On a different note: I bought a new frame on ebay! More on that later.

Odo bike 1: 2654 km

Flat tire, or rather: flat tires

2009-11-28T08:44:00.001-08:00

My first flat with the Conti GatorSkins. Last Tuesday I was riding to the Cornell Orchards and hit what probably was a little pebble. This was followed by a clearly audible hissing sound and to both me and a pedestrian standing nearby it was immediately clear what had happened. Pinch flat. Fortunately I always carry a spare tire and so this was not a big deal. I even made it to the orchards and back to a meeting in time.

Unfortunately, three days later I realized that my tire was somewhat flat again. I didn't have time to check it and just put in more air. So this morning I checked again, and yep: it was pretty flat. My immediate suspicion was that the first flat maybe hadn't been a pinch flat after all and that I had missed something in the tube. But the water test showed that this was not the case. Instead, the valve was slowly leaking air. This really sucks, as it was a brand new tube. I'm now down to no spare tube and will ride out to the LBS on Monday and see if they'll replace the tube and/or get new ones.

Odo bike 1: 2601 km

Starting anew: chain, lights, front wheel

2009-11-28T07:24:00.000-08:00

I had set up this blog a year ago or so, thinking I'd blog about my riding and other bike-related stuff. Well, obviously it didn't happen. So this is a new start, with a more limited goal: keep track of my maintenance, new acquisitions for my bike, kilometrage.

My total kilometrage count is somewhat off because I accidentally cut off the wire of my bike computer and it took me a while to get the spare part. But now all is good an running.

Latest maintenance:

new chain (SRAM with PowerLock): 18 $ The old chain was getting to 0.75% elongation and I thought I'd better change early and do the switching technique to keep my cassette alive for longer. So I'll keep the old chain and put it back on once the current one has reached .75%.
installed BUMM Toplight Line Plus rear light (about 30 $). This light just was introduced at the last Eurobike and so far it looks very good. There have been rumors about a recall of faulty lights but no definitive info on this yet. I'll be really pissed if I have to exchange them. The installation on my Jandd rear rack required some improvisation. The Toplight has two horizontal mounting bolts, spaced 50 mm, whereas the rack only has two vertical holes in the center. Solution: I cut a strip of metal out of a bean can and drilled three holes into it. I'm not sure how durable this solution is but for now it works great. I had checked the local Lowe's for appropriate pieces of metal but the metric spacing makes it difficult to find anything. Yeah DIY.
truing and tensioning: A while ago I built up a new generator hub front wheel. Shimano DH3N-80, Mavic Open Pro 32 hole, DT Swiss 14 gauge spokes. Initially I didn't have truing stand and only used zip ties for truing. This worked more or less but I still got a truing stand and re-trued the wheels. This made them more true but I could clearly see that the spoke tension was rather uneven. Thus I decided to also invest in a Wheelsmith tensiometer (50 $ at LBS). Using the combo of truing stand and tensiometer was an interesting experience that taught me some things about proper wheel truing. Achieving both perfectly true wheels and even spoke tensions isn't possible but I think I've achieved a good compromise. I'll test the wheels again in 500 km or so and will see how they held up.