It has been said that it's not the bike it's the rider. Recognizing the difference in ride quality from bike to bike (or in wheel size, or differences in componentry, or etc) is self evident. I have heard that there be "horses for courses" from one side of the mouth, while "run what you brung" drips out the other. Certain bicycle goods companies (almost all of them) will tell you that new is improved.
I can sweat the small things with the worst of them, but I prefer to not. The best bike? The one bike to have? Undeniably better than all the others?
that can is well seasoned
The one you are actually riding.
Today I rolled around on my rad townie (shitty is in the eye of the beholder). I can come up with any # of things to make this bike better. Especially when I am distracting myself from the hot and sweaty climb. None of those upgrades make any difference if they are unridden.
Get in the saddle for some time away from ____(s). Away is where it is at. It is the ride.
Of interest: where there's smoke there's fire, and the valley is full up from this ride cancelling Big Sur Fire. What a kick in the teeth. Ride? Modified/maybe cancelled.
And as far as lots of smoke and mirrors- here is the Sinyard "apology" if you are into such things. I will comment this far: bullshit. If this were a sincere mistake, then it were required for the big red S to retroactively unfuck the other little people they've legalistically ramrodded. Closest to my heart being Revelate Designs, nee Epic Bags, one dude in Alaska making bags in his garage who (as far as I can tell) started the frame-bag phenomenon. And it is a phenomenon. And if Sinyard actually cared, he'd cease and desist the corporate Grinchyness. Stink, Stank, Stunk.
And, if you have the issues with the hip:
He's using a lacrosse ball, and I'd recommend (starting, anyways) using a tennis ball as it is softer and easier on your tender beginner self. You can roll over onto the affected side and weight the ball further around to the front into your Tensor Fasciae Latae muscle also. Play with it, noticing the tender spots and focus on them. It gets easier and less painful with repetition. Get a foam roller and roll that IT band and Vastus Lateralis. Or else.
I suppose a broken hip does give you a lot of time to kill. And, I must say, _odd killed the hell out of it with his researchemont concerning the riding options in the Death Valley. Emails flew back and forth in a flurry of schedules and maybes and reschedules and folks were in and folks were out and it went on for some time that way, the way things of that sort will. Everbody wants some.
Ultimately, 6 of us committed really and for real. Then the flurry was one involving increasingly frantic swapping of gear and racks and drive trains (for some). To the point that I settled on my "final" configuration of my tour bike the afternoon before leaving. To the point that as I rolled that final configuration down the driveway the morning of, I felt a vibration that I shouldn't feel and knew something was loose. What is there to do but turn around and figure it out? It was the cones in the rear hub. I tightened them and the wheel was sound, but my mind was blown- monkey wrench in the brain.
I said nothing to the fearless crew with whom I bike toured. The "check engine" light came on in the race van as _ick and I dropped the other side of HWY17 and I said not a word. All through Yosemite I feared the worst and kept it all quiet. What good could come of what ifs? For hours I wavered between intense concentration on the engine's feel or "fuck it", and the possibles troubled me.
We made it to the staging area without a hitch.
Each day I told myself to stop worrying about my too-light rear wheel crapping out under load while imagining what I would do when it did. I'd put a couple hose clamps on the bike in case of ____ failure(s), and thought about tying the cassette to the spokes with those and how I could (possibly) limp out in that way if it came to it. Etc. I said nothing about any of this, because what good could come of it. Even when _ick's own rear hub loosened up on his incredible cargo sled, I said nothing about my own concerns, because why jinx it further.
And each of the 5 days, in spite of the horrible washboarded ass-pounding climbs through miles of gravel or sand or sandy gravel, nothing went wrong. Our motto, quickly established, was "pretend you like it". It was appropriate. In spite of excellent route working out (planning, sure, but the map is never the territory...) Death Valley is some real hard work. Only 30ish miles a day had us in our sleeping bags and out by 8pm each night.
It was a big trip- too big to quickly sum up. Things that stay with me: cooking communal dinners is the way; 29+ is a real interesting category for some camping by bicycle; my Kelly Kettle would have worked just fine out there in the desert as there was always enough twigs around for some boiling water and I felt like a ass standing around begging hot water in the mornings; MSR dromedary bags are good equipment; having our Safety K__k around on the moto was a source of hilarity and disappointment (no cooler of cold beers?!?!); there is a light and it never goes out; etc.
Whomever of my fellow Death Valley Ramblers reads this: thank you for a real good time.
P.S. There is a lot of you name it on this internet about bike builders etc. Much of that is all show, and it saddens me in the shop and on the computer to see so much misplaced value. Hunter Cycles and Black Cat Bicycles just spent the last week sleeping in the dirt and riding the shit out of their bikes. Just like you. Not for a PRO anything- not a PROmo or a look book or a sepia-toned poem. That is some Realness worth considering. Also, Surly Bikes' junk straps are the greatest single bit of bike camping equipment ever.
That is correct. Your eyes are seeing a plastic, electrified version of a street bicycle. That is the photo with which I announced to my friends that I am, variously: a "sell-out", a hypocrite, "thinking outside the box", and a f*g (disclaimer- c'mon. I know how this was intended, and by whom, and we love the gays. They have the best clubs and good senses of humor. No disrespect.)&that "I'm pretty sure [I] have to shave [my] b-sack now"...depending on who is talking. My own sweet wife said it looked ___. No one loves it.
You're all jealous losers.
That is a bicycle I would NEVER purchase, even if I could. It goes against every tenet of cycling and Life I hold dear save one- holy afterburners, Batman! that thing is going to be a _other_uckingrocket. So fast.
I am against child labor in foreign countries. I am dead against plastic. I am deader against electrified shiftiness. I am against radial lacing- ain't seeing even 175lbs ever again. I am against internal routing- seriously, what a pain in the ass. I am against glaringly silver chainrings on an otherwise matte ride.
Why do I "own" it? Well, because it rides so nice. At our shop, we have what's called a "dealer agreement" and are required by this to purchase a certain number of bicycles at certain price points. Our owner, who is not coming at this from a cycling background, is coming at this from a background of being a flexible and open-handed fellow. To satisfy part of this agreement , he has instituted the policy of employee leasing- whereby we agree to build a certain number (so lowball! if you could have been there for the late night drunken speculation at the New Stairs regarding what that number might turn out to be..) of bikes off the clock in exchange for the use of the bike (almost whatever one we wanted) for a year. Next model year, the bike will be sold at cost and we all win.
So now I have the perfect storm regarding this plastic, electrified street bike. I grudgingly concede that carbon fibre rides hella sweet. But that ish breaks and is breakable. This frame is made from the orphaned tears of tatterdemalion(!) 6 year old Taiwanese robotic orangutangs, not by one of my so-called "friends" down the road. I would never, ever purchase it for myself, even if I could afford it. If my frame is made from blood sweat and tears- they should be the blood, the sweat and (most of all) tears of someone I can heckle at the local cross race.
As for the electric, well- it's middle fingers up to all of you, and especially to me. Gimme some friction shifting barcons and all is well. Repairable. Unbreakable. But- hand it to me for a year? Why the efff not?
So. I'mma show up at the Makers Meet tomorrow in Santa Cruz and talk mad shit about how great this bike is...from the back.
I would. It would be quietly floral, and mildly overpowering.
One foot in front of the other. My quads were akilling me yesterday. Left over lactic acid from Monday's fiasco fixed ride. No stretching (like a eedjit) and no tennis ball rolling...got to wake up pre-tty early in the mornin to feel stiffer than this guy. And the quad soreness was a bad mojo on account of the plan for Wednesday.
Which involved a reet repeat of the large-ish cross loop in Santa Cruz, revised to include skipped portions and missed turns and such. Including but not limited to paying for water at the Summit Store?!? because the mid-store sink is "disconnected" and -NO. "Huh. Well, can y'all fill my bottles for me in the deli prep area?" NO "Is there a bathroom I can use?" NO there's port potties in the lot. "Is there a spigot outside?" NO the closest is at the school for which you need a key. "I guess I'm buying water then." grumble grumble Because apparently they have to haul the water up and nothing is free. All this in spite of the fact that I always purchase something there (typically at least 1 tallboy) and had, in fact, already spent money during that very visit.... NO
Just, you know, so YOU know. Make sure you bring money to pay The Man.
So, as a fat washed up loser, I took it to the streets. The mean fire road of Nisene Marks to be precise. Looked full of people, like a bust type scenario, yo. So road it was and the road is good there. On the hill it was that delicious feeling of knowing the day is HOT out from under these refreshingly dank redwoods and if I weren't almost cold from the rush of my speed and the delightful shade...why then I'd be heavy sweating and seeing purple spots.
Then it was making the correct decision and staying ridgeline through Demo, although Tractor Trail is fairly steep and rocky and kitty littered it's ownself. Should I be taking Braille Trail? You know, with the cross bike and all? Whatever. It is fun and swoopy.
Familiar climbing gentle grades to the rip off spot, er, Summit Store. Then the climb on Summit, which I'd been thinking about/dreading since I'd first felt my crampable, twingey quads earlier...and which really wasn't so bad. Aside from the flat.
And what a flat curse I am under these days. My tube was pinholed at the base of the valve stem; figured I'd patch it just in case (in case such a screwball patch job could work) because that's always a Fair Idea and SOP. My spare was pinholed 6mm away from the valve stem, so of course I misplaced the first patch , and it leaked. Patch again, and it held. What a relief. Down to a prayer and one patch left.
On and on with no beers(!) and no stopping(!) to that one road,this shot has such a nice feel of leaving the sun and entering the shady one lanedness
Finally got some photos of the silo house. This place is so cool. ...then down to Bean Creek, Blue Bonnet, Lockewood, cross the street and make all the right moves following sinuously quick sandy (yet predictable) trails. Perfect alignment of pitch, rhthym, and pace. That feels good. Then my "knowledge" fell apart at the RR area, on account of there are several tracks, and which one is the right one? Found a way, found the way, and then it was time to cross 9 and head up UCON. At the top of it all there was a gathering of Wednseday Riders, and (strangely) some guy on a ladder in the middle of a field. Turns out the ladder guy was shooting a Giant catalog. So we hung around and drank beers while watching some 8year old lay down skids and ride back and forth in a beautifully lit golden field on a shiny shiny new bike. Hope he got to keep it. The more the beers that went down, the more the heckling volume and intensity that went up. A gentle mocking resulted finally in the foolish photogs allowing us to take the time trial bike for a brief spin on the singletrack. An amazingly poor decision on everyone's part which was fueled by feeding the Giant staff some beers. Denver( I just met him and liked him)'s Dad "couldn't" ride himself anymore, but just wanted to contribute how he could. How could he? By driving up an 18pack on ice. That's a nice contribution.
Finally, a little more downhill which we handled like tipsy Ewoks. Taqueria, streets, homeward bound. 50ish miles? Some climbing.
I'm going to have to find suitable doll, some feathers, a little barbed wire and several old inner tubes. Perhaps a small voodoo pyre will rid me of my flat curse. Hey! Maybe I should ride with one of y'all...see if it rubs off. *************************************************************************************
Maybe the Full Strawberry Moon should be ridden under on Saturday evening? Who has thoughts or hidden knowledge? Somebody. Anybody.
Several of y'all have seen this I am sure. For those who have not:
I rode my cross bike the other day. In Santa Cruz. Up a fireroad (some guy in a Specialized kit wanted to challenge me, and I whipped that ass! You know the deal- somebody comes up and tries their best to "win" the ride...I couldn't allow that to happen.) and then down this really fun trail. I did put a knobby on the front (returned to me at the Pinnacles ride, having been separated from it in the CountybadideaLine) but the slick remained on the rear since I am too lazy to swap. Made for some interesting slip while standing climbing and a thrilling sense of danger approaching turns downhill in the Redwood duff at speed.
Riding the bikes is fun. I think I will go do that today.
