my toy bike

One has to wonder if I would descend with more confidence on a mtn bike that actually fit. Surely...

But whatever. I've had more fun on this bike...it's only during races that I begin to question its suitability.

Kurt Vonnegut

Two striking sentences from Cat's Cradle:

My soul seemed as foul as smoke from burning cat fur.

Her smile was glassy, and she was ransacking her mind for something to say, finding nothing in it but used Kleenex and costume jewelry.

the ride...

...is really nice.

Really. Nice.

And I wasn't prepared to say that. With my dilly-dallying around it seemed ok, but I was honestly second guessing all the $ and time putting this thing together. But this morning I got to ride it fast and THAT is where it rides nice. Really. Nice.

It's hard for me to explain without relying on trite phases like "front end stability" and "stiff, but comfortable," but all that explains it well. It's right around 400 watts where I can really tell the difference between this ride and my last one. It just feels fast. Stable. Stiff. All that.

Yeah.

Buy a Tarmac.

From In-Gear.

...

Too bad I don't have the same positive feelings for my mtn bike. Yesterday I drove the 45 minutes from Philly to Granogoe and beat a little more crap out of that red bike of mine. The headset has had it. Maybe after replacing that I'll like the bike a little more. Maybe just a little.

Race report: Two flats--one for each of the two laps I completed (I was supposed to do three). Awesome.

Lessons learned: (1) I go up good. (2) I go down slow. (3) Forty psi is too much for that course.

After the race I tooled around on Moats' new race 29-er a little. The difference between my bike and his was disturbing.

raw

Building this bike has been a headache...not the bike's fault, but mine, because I'm a moron:

(1) I still haven't settled on a permanent stem. Specialized gives nasty warnings about using stems with large cutouts on their carbon forks. The easy solution is to use a Specialized stem, but they only make them compatible with oversize handlebars, which I'm not fond of. I found a suitable stem (in a drawer of misc. stems at Merv's), but it's a heavy sucker. A good 1/4 lb heavier than a Ritchey 4-Axis.

(2) You'll notice in this last pic how short (too short) my cables are. I tried to recycle old housing--it wasn't that old--but it didn't work out. After I had the bars wrapped the front brake cable was pulled so tight that I couldn't keep the brake from rubbing the rim. Ended up having to cut new housing...and throwing out the new cable. Had to do the same thing with the front dérailleur cable.

(3) I screwed around with the chain too much (installed it without feeding it through the dérailleur and, rather than taking the dérailleur apart, which is what I should have done, I tried to break the chain and put it back together Shimano style...SRAM chains don't like that) and ended up snapping it right on that link that I was messing with one mile into my first test ride.

(4) And I haven't got my hands on any of that special non-slip stuff for carbon posts yet...so the post won't hold me and I still haven't had a decent ride on my new bike.

But...as you can see, it looks beautiful...

...

I've almost got the other bike completely TT-ized. I'm just missing bar end shifters. Then I can run all the cables and I'm all set.

i pulled the trigger

And out shot this:
The boys in Hummelstown are taking care of me.

I'm very excited.