Hmm… Just thought of something – the cirrus clouds today are an indicator of an apporaching weather front. I hope it doesn’t get all rainy and spoil the Sunday ride.
(0)Archive for the 'bike' Category
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Some jerseys and shots that I ordered from Chainlove came in today, so I rocked some new threads on my after work cruise ride. The weather was fair on the windward side in the morning, and exceptional midday when I passed through during work – all blue skies save for some high-altitude cirrus. The clouds had gathered near the mountains when I came through the Wilson tunnel, and there had been a light afternoon drizzle, but conditions were still prime for some saddle time. I did my laps to the nostalgic accompaniment of roar of the Marine F/A-18’s practice landing at MCBH.
D = 12.44 km (7.73-miles), Vavr = 18.2 km/h (11.3-mph), Vmax = 47.3 km/h (29.4-mph), T = 41-minutes
Chris and I have had a long running, “today I saw a Fixie doing [insert foolish act here],” tirade going for several years now. We gripe about them riding up alongside cars at a traffic signal only to be re-overtaken when the light changes because they can’t sprint off the start with their one gear. We rant about their freakish parts selection, like a carbon spoke wheel on the front but a traditionally laced wheel on the rear because the carbon wheel company doesn’t make a matching rear track version, but the bike owner just has to have those wheels. Most of the time the things that make us laugh are due to their slavish devotion to the fad just for the sake of being different, standing out, thumbing their noses at society, swimming upstream, or simply cutting off their noses to spite their own faces. Then there are those times when they transcend fashion and cross the line into stupidity. I saw something today that pretty much takes the cake for that – chainstay wrap. Huh? What? It’s a fixed-gear, single-speed bike with horizontal dropouts and no derailleur or tensioner. If his chain is so loose that he has chainslap issues, he has much larger issues to worry about! Time to put that bike on the rack and climb on board the short bus, dude!
Gee. Lucky I rode when I got home today. The sky just opened up and started dumping rain like a MF just now.
(0)I rode the ‘cross after work today to get some sprints in. All the bad drivers were out today. Along my training loop, I came face to face with a red Civic in my lane. The grunge-surfer dude was dropping off his granola girlfriend and came around a blind corner in the wrong lane. Seeing me, he made a vain attempt to move back into his lane, then slowly drifted back into my lane and stopped diagonally to let his passenger out, blocking my lane completely and forcing me to go around him in the oncoming lane. Ever heard of driving on your own side of the road? Effing idiot. Moments later after making the turn, I had to dodge a doddering senior lady in her new-ish Volvo who came into my lane far enough to clip the curb with her left front tire in order to make a right turn! I thought they only let the fools out on Friday and Sunday!
D = 19.78 km (12.29-miles), Vavr = 22.2 km/h (13.8-mph), Vmax = 50.0 km/h (30.1-mph), T = 53-minutes
A few months back, Jarrel at McBike got in an initial shipment of the Giro gloves. Since Hawaii always gets the stepchild treatment, the first ones received were the “less popular” colorways, the larger, more profitable accounts on the contiguous 48 getting all the good stuff first. For full-fingered MTB, there was the lighter Xen and the burlier Remedy. Root picked up a pair of the Xen gloves and reviewed them a couple of weeks back. There was only white in the Remedy, so although they were designed pretty well, I held out for either another color or for something nice to pop up on Chainlove. I had three sets of gloves, so didn’t really need another pair. On Tuesday when I happened to pass by the glove rack, lo, there were more gloves! Apparently, part of the fill-in order arrived and there were black Rampage gloves. They looked awesome – like something straight out of Mechanical Violator Hakaider. Continue reading ‘Giro Remedy MTB Gloves’
The sun was out when I got home today. I had neglected to bring my ride kit to work, thinking the rain that spoiled the weekend ride plans would continue today. That didn’t happen, but with Kevyn out recovering from surgery, Root with visiting relatives, and Ckucke at a business dinner, no ride plan materialized anyway. I quickly geared up and took the Moment out for a spin. The road was wet from a rainsquall that came down soon before I got home, but the residual ground warmth and bright summer sunlight were doing their best to dry it out. I rode my normal loop but stayed off the grass so as to not rip up the moist surface. I did a couple of sprints to failure to get my heart rate up, but for the most part, this was simply a fun, easy cruise to get out and feel the wind and sun.
D = 14.56 km (9.05-miles), Vavr = 17.2 km/h (10.7-mph), Vmax = 41.4 km/h (25.7-mph), T = 51-minutes
Ckucke called to check on how Kevyn’s shoulder reconstruction surgery went yesterday, and apparently all went well. He pretty much came home from the outpatient procedure and crashed out.
Hope everything heals up well so we can see him out on the trails again soon!
Monday came and went without a ride. Ckucke had a last-minute emergency, Root was burnt-out from Sunday, and I thought the weather was going to be inclement, so I didn’t bring my kit. JT was still itching for a ride when Tuesday came around, so after a few frantic phone calls, the ride was set. Not suspecting there would be a Tuesday ride, I didn’t have my kit, but I did have my helmet at work. Close enough. I drove up to St. Louis and hit the trail in my work clothes. I forgot that I had a pair of beat up TRD mechanic’s gloves at work also, but they were full of holes and were duct-taped together. After briefly talking to Chris Clark in the parking lot, I blew down the mainline to catch up to the guys at the jumps. I hit the jumps a few times with JT who was getting reacquainted with his Turner Burner. I didn’t want to stack without gloves, long sleeves, or shinguards, so I stopped before anything bad happened. We continued down the normal way to the bottom of the rock waterfall, then backtracked up to the second sortie. Continue reading ‘Pau Hana Panic’
Chris worked himself ragged on Friday and Saturday of the long Fourth of July weekend so he could have some free time left over on Sunday to hit the trails. We met up at the Pohakupu fountain after lunch to do the Luana Hills circuit. While we were waiting for Root to arrive a vaguely familiar green pickup pulled up. Jeff and Sara? Wow! They were going to ride part of the trail with us. They drove over to the Ditch end to meet us halfway. Root arrived, and we three little piggies headed out. After entering the Norfolk trail network, we took an early right to climb up to the concrete block hill. I thought at first it would make the whole process easier, but with two push-ups, it was much more heinous than the lower route to the big tree. All the extra climbing really took the “go power” out of my legs for the remainder of the ride. It didn’t help that I didn’t have lunch. Continue reading ‘This Little Piggy’