Nice Rack (and a taco)

Blur of activity yesterday. Quick set of emails to the CITA mailing list resulted in the first Taco Ride of the year. Four of us (Jim, Jim, Sam and myself) left Rasmussen's at 5:30 PM for a solid 90 minutes of dirt riding on the Center Trails. They are MUCH faster without a foot of snow on them. Even after the rain last weekend they were in good shape. We picked up a few riders here and there on the trail, and ended the ride with five of us sitting at Griff's in Valley Junction drinking a couple of beers and eating a couple of tacos. My legs felt really good yesterday. It appears that the Denman's beatdowns that Cam and Pete gave me this winter have paid off. Every one else was ready t go for tacos, and I was ready for more riding since the weather was good and it was still light outside. I still need to work on my bike handling obstacle jumping skills a bit more. Tight turns on the 29er still feel a bit sluggish.

My Arkel pannier order arrived yesterday. I picked up a set of their GT-54 touring panniers, along with a small handlebar bag, and a Tailrider. I have had good luck with their (now discontinued) Samurai bags when I had my trike, so it was easy to go to them again for additional bags for the Long Haul Trucker. The quality and attention to detail on the bags is exceptional. If you need panniers, I highly recommend looking at their lineup. They are not the cheapest panniers available, but they are top notch and they come with a great warranty as well. To get the handlebar bag to fit, I think I'm going to need one of these. I wish it came in silver to match the rest of the bike hardware, but I'll deal with that when the time comes.

My Surly front Nice Rack arrived at Rassy's yesterday as well. Took a look at it and started the install after getting back home from the Taco ride. I quickly decided that I needed to wait until I was a bit less tired to keep working on it. It took a bit of time, and some reworking of my front fender mounts, but it's mounted, and not moving anywhere for the forseeable future. The rack comes with a dizzying array of mounting hardware. For my install, I used 4 offset brackets, some 3 mm and 2 mm spacers, and the appropriate bolts. I used two longer bolts to remount the brackets for the front fender stays since the rack used the same moubnts. I can definitely feel the extra 3 lbs of weight moving the bike around the garage. Once the back rack arrives, I can get it installed and then load up the panniers and take it out for a good test ride. I also took the time to make some more adjustments to my Brooks B17 saddle. Feels much better now that I'm not sliding down onto the horn so much.

Busy week ahead. Mayor's Annual Ride for Trails on Saturday morning. Fun Hater's Ride Saturday afternoon April's Dirty Century on Sunday. Fit session with DQ on Friday morning and then help with TransIowa through Sunday. Gonna need to keep the coffee pot well stocked this week.

Easy day

Rode to work today, guiding the Long Haul Trucker south into today's endless 25 mph wind. I wore street clothes again, because I could, and I wanted to. Took my share of the lane, because it's my right, and I wanted to. Left the office, rode to Barr and picked up a chainring bolt tool, and two new chainring bolts. Headed west (young man) on the Clive Greenbelt trail, turned north onto NW 142nd, rode north on NW 128th street and then home. The tailwind allowed me to spin out the LHT while in street shoes. Solid steel feels great rocketing along smooth pavement. The brakes are not quite up to slowing down, so it's time to look into some Koolstop pads before calipers are harder to get to.

Legs feel pretty good after Sylvan Island, but I can tell that the race worked them over good. Still not happy with how I feel, so I called DQ and arranged a fit session with him next Friday morning, before I leave to help out with TransIowa.

IMBCS #1 - Sylvan Stampede

Despite all of the rain that the area had received in the last 3 days, the 4th Annual Sylvan Stampede went off as scheduled yesterday. A large number of riders showed up from all over to participate in the event. I arrived at the event around 8 AM so that I could get my bike reassembled and get some laps in before the racing started. As I did this I was reminded of three common rules: Make a list. Pack well before the event. Double check your bike before you leave. Arriving at the race site, I realized that I had forgotten to pack a set of bike shorts in my bag. Not good. Thankfully, Rick from QFORC was willing to run home, and loan me a pair of shorts so that I could race. I owe him a drink or two if they are in town for our events later this year. Looking my bike over before heading on the course, I also realized that I was missing a chain ring bolt. The mechanic that was set up did not have any with him, so I tightened the other three the best that I could, and raced with them. I'l be picking up a proper tool and some loctite this week to make sure that doesn't happen again.

After all of the crap that Cam Kirkpatrick and Pete Basso fed me all winter, I decided to go ahead and race in the sport class. It seemed like a waste of time to enter a race and only ride for 7 miles. I had decided to start in the back and lay low so I wouldn't hold anyone up. However, adrenaline got the better of me at the start and I made a reasonably hard charge out of the starting area towards the funnel at the end. After the first lap, I could tell that I had gone out too hard and I backed down for the second lap so that I had a reasonable chance of finishing the race. Racing at the site of an old steel mill makes for some unique terrain. There were a large number of roots, hunks of concrete, and other things challenging you at every turn. I really started to feel my lack of conditioning around lap 4. I have been riding 60 and 100 mile gravel grinders a lot more than I have been 17 mile off road sprints. I'll have to start riding the center trails a lot more (and a lot harder) if I plan on getting any better. I also noticed that I was having issues keeping my speed and momentum up on the tighter sections of the course. I may have to check with some local 29er riders for some hints on how to improve my performance there.

I'm still trying to figure out where I finished in the pack. I know times of people behind me, and I know times of some people that were pulled. However, I can't find my name on the results page, nor can I remember what my chip number was so I could look my time up by that. Hopefully the folks at FORC can get it all straightened out. Overall, I'm happy with how my first race went. It's obvious that I'm not 23 any more, and that I have a lot of learning to do about how to race a mountain bike, but I finished the entire race, I only crashed once (damn tree), and I didn't get lapped by the winner. My family had a good time watching me race as well, and it was certainly nice hearing them cheer for me as I passed the spectator area. Unfortunately, our crack media crew left the camera in the car, so I don't have any photos to post. Hopefully I can track some down, as there were a number of still and digital cameras on the course during the race. Next race is Camp Inagawanis near Waverly on May 4th. I'm looking forward to it.

Hump Day

Finished up the fender install on the Surly last night. I think I have about 3.5 hours into installing the fenders. Not that I couldn't have finished them sooner, but I wanted the installation performed properly, so I took the time to do it. Getting a longer bolt for the fork crown and spacers for the rear fenders took a bit of time (and an extra bike ride) as well. However, I'm happy with the results. The rear fender was definitely harder to get lined up since it covers more of the wheel, there were more attachments to deal with, and I had to think about how I wanted to deal with the rear fender stays and their interaction with the quick release and derailer. I ended up using the rack stays and eliminating all of my issues. In the spirit of the internet, I tracked down excellent installation instructions and photos from both the Velo Orange Blog and from SconnyBoy's blog.

Rode the bike into work this morning and I'm pleased with the results. The only noise I heard was when a rock was kicked up into the fender. We'll see how they hold up long term. If I run into issues with the bolts getting loose, I'll add a bit of loctite to the recipe. Speaking of commuting, for the first time ever, I rode into work with "normal" clothes. No lycra, no performance fabrics. Just jeans, a t-shirt, light coat, street shoes, gloves and a helmet with a hat underneath. It was definitely a different experience, and the weather was perfect for it this morning at 28F or so to start. I kept the jacket unzipped a bit, and rode at a fairly sedate pace. It was an interesting experience. I think I'll be doing more of that, or just changing shirts when I get to work . It's quicker, and a lot less hassle once I get to the office.

I'll likely spend tomorrow going over the Karate Monkey in preparation for the Sylvan Stampede this weekend in the Quad Cities. Looking at the forecast, it's going be wet through Saturday evening. Chances of the race happening don't look too good.

Excitement with a capital "Blah"

Read the race recaps from Altoona and Big Creek this weekend. Looks like it was a lot of fun for all involved. Wish I could have made it out to watch and cheer people on, but plans are plans. Rode to the hardware store to get some longer bolts to mount fenders on the LHT. Got all Type-A on the fender alignment and managed to finish up the front fender this evening. Decided to call it a night and work on the rear fender tomorrow and Wednesday. Looks to be wet tomorrow, so no TNWC for me. First IMBCS race is this weekend in the Quad Cities. It appears that I should race sport just so I can get more laps in exchange for my entry fee, even if it means taking a pounding. Oh well, we'll ease into things.

Mojo JoJo

A old rider once mentioned that you cannot chose your mojo, your mojo chooses you. I found this little dromedary camel in the street riding around this morning. I initially passed him up, but something told me to turn around and pick him up. Looking up some facts about camels I'm finding a lot of reasons to believe that this is an appropriate mojo. My height (6'1") is about the same height as a camel at the shoulder. Dromedaries are warmer climate camels, and I'm definitely more a fan of the heat than the cold. I tend to be able to ride quite a while without drinking a lot. Dromedaries are able to maintain speeds of 8-9 mph for hours at a time. As I tend to like endurance riding events, I also tend to maintain a steady speed for hours at a time as well. Taking all of this into account, this small camel is now my mojo. His name is JoJo.

Trail work day

Rode the Monkey with the Bob trailer in tow to do some trail work at Denman's Woods today. There were some problem areas that needed addressing, and with the bodies that showed up, it only took a couple of hours of effort to get things cleaned up, ridable and safe for everyone. Items addressed included bracing a log feature so that it didn't wiggle around, cleaning up an area that had developed too many alternate lines, removing a downed tree, and rerouting a section of trail around an eroded area. Photos I took are here

Got about 2 hours of riding time in today, all of it towing a 13 lb trailer with 30 - 40 lbs of tools in it.