Wish List Continued...

A Rohloff Tourer

I have come to the conclusion that i need a touring bike. Something i can hook fenders, low-riders and a rear rack to. Going for longer rides, bringing stuff to eat and sleep and a change of clothes is out of the questions with my current bikes.

For maintenance free riding a Rolhoff Speed Hub seems like a really good thing. A bit pricy up front, but i guess if you compare it with buying a regular deraillure system and changing chains, cassette etc. at regular intervals you will perhaps land on the same price/kilometer in the end.

I have glanced at my Kona Dr. Dew, my flat-bar speed bike, from time to time wondering if it could do the trick. But i feel that a tourer should have drop bars and I'm uncertain if i could fit drop bars to the Dr. Dew. If anybody has experiences in doing this on a Dr. Dew or another flat bar bike please drop me a comment to this post.

Another alternative is to keep my Dr. Dew slim and fit and buy a new frame. Sheldon Brown's shop Harri's Cyclery has put together a bike based on Surly's Karate Monkey frame and a Rohloff Speed Hub that looks really crazy. But if you can imagine it with only drop bars (not both drop and flat) i think it looks really cool.

Harri's bike got disc brakes, an another thing i like with my Dr. Dew. My future touring bike will definitely have disc brakes since they are good in practically any weather and require very little maintenance. There is a problem though with the Karate Monkey frame. If you want to use disc brakes you cant use the eyelets and drops for fenders and racks which leaves you with using clip on fenders and a seat post mounted rack. If anyone out there knows of a good alternative that will fit both disc brakes, fenders and racks in a more robust way, please drop me a comment.

Read more about the Rolhoff Speed Hub over at Sheldon Brown.

Former wishes...

Thursday Club Ride

Good but somewhat painful ride. I have a stingy sensation in the tendons above my left calf. I think i got it because I've been riding the big ring to much for a while. During the Thursday ride i concentrated on keeping my cadence high (>100) and kept the chain on the small ring almost all the ride. The stingy sensation comes on the upstroke and i still feel it a little now when i lift my left leg up. Hope it's not going to bother me next week.

Concentrating on small ring riding however gave me a whole different workout than i usually get on Thursdays and my butt and legs have felt a bit sore up until today (Sunday). I had no problems keeping up with the group on the "free-speed" sections although i had to pedal like a mad man :)

The new shorts was very good and i had no problem with them feeling to small during the ride. They fit like a glove and felt much more comfortable than my old ones.

Stats:
Total ride time: 2:45
Total distance: 80 km
Avg speed: 29.2 km/h
Max speed: 62.4 km/h

Keeping it Tight

Learned something new yesterday when i was shopping for Lycra. I have been using Gores Classic Windstopper 3/4-length Bib-Tights, size XL, because they are good when taking early spring and late fall rides. I also used them last summer but some days they are just to hot and they also give you a funny looking sun tan.

Went to my LBS to check out their stock and found a pair of Spanish Spiuk bib-shorts called Top-Ten. They looked good and comfy so i tried the Large size. I found them a bit short since the bib felt like it was carving into my shoulders. I asked the manager for a bigger size but he refused and said that they should be uncomfortable when standing up since when you sit on your bike your position will loosen up the bib. Being of the same length but a bit slimmer the manager said that he used Medium size himself.

Being a bit skeptic i asked if i could mount one of his bikes and try it. He was right so i bought a pair. Took a short spin yesterday and they felt good. I noticed that they fit better than my old tights specially in the back where the padding was flapping when not sitting on the bike. With the new bib-shorts, the whole padding had contact with the body all the time.

Tonight we do a distance ride and I'll get back with a mini-review on how it felt.

Lesson learned(if not proven wrong tonight):

Buy the tightest lycra you can fit in that feels comfortable when sitting on the bike. Don't buy it by the feel when standing up or walking around, then you'll get a pair that are to large.

Ignorant?

BikeBiz reports of 288 pages of cure found in one of the latest addition to the "-FOR DUMMIES" series, The Tour De France Edition.

I'm preordering it now :)

Tuesday club ride

Tuesdays are hill intervalls day but today our leader didn't show up so we did a distance ride instead with some hilly but not to hilly sections. 4 riders gathered this time and we had a good ride. One of the guys is a ex-elite racer and he really got our legs moving on the return trip where we, one some sections, averaged round 40 km/h and peaked at 54 km/h. It's fun to go fast.

Stats:

Total distance: 48 km
Ride time: 1h 44 min
Average speed: 27.5 km/h
Max speed: 54.7 km/h

Cramp Based Training

AshwinEarl over at Team MWC, FTJ, NGT has come up with some new training ideas on how to measure effort.

How do I know I am training as hard as I am racing. Power? Heartrate? Perceived Exertion? Average Speed? Those are all passe', old technology. For me the new metric is cramping. Lock up muscle leg cramps.

read on...

[OT] A Next Button for Blogger

Since i started blogging with Blogger i have looked for a way to navigate with "Previous" and "Next" links on the item pages. There seems to be no built in support for this but i found the snippet below on the Blogger-Templates blog on a template named Kubrik.

Although only solving half of the problem, Previous seems to involve to much manual labour and java-scripts, I'm pretty satisfied with only the next-button.

</Blogger><div class="center">&laquo; <a href="<$BlogURL$>">Home</a><BloggerPreviousItems> | <a href="<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>">Next</a> &raquo;</div><div style="display:none"></BloggerPreviousItems></div><Blogger>

If you want to try this on your own Blog, be warned that some browsers might render this in a way that was not your intention. A key feature is the CSS attribute "display:none". If your browser doesn't support this your post will turn out pretty ugly.

I have tested it on IE 6 and FireFox 1.0.3 and it looks alright there.

Google Blog: Tomorrow, work that bike

Google pushes for more bike commuters by celebrating Bike to Work Day and offering monthly onsite bicycle tune-ups and classes on different aspects of bicycling.

The author of the post at Google's blog, Joe Gross is this years reciever of the San Francisco County's Bike Commuter of the Year.

Go Google, Go

Thursday Club Ride

Hard ride for me this time. I got behind on some of the "free speed" sections and had to do parts of them solo. Don't know why but i guess i was not really well prepared this time. However the ride was good. Riding solo means you work harder and I sure did.

Stats:
Total ride time: 3 hours
Total distance: 80 km

SKF Bottom Brackets

Another Sweden related news item.

SKF (Svenska Kullagerfabriken) has released a new product range of bottom brackets aimed for practically every type of bike out there.

Lots of details over at SKF's site (check the left menu for more than the intro).

Surly + Crescent = true?

No not really, but the Swede in me instantly connected Skip Bernet's personal Surly Pacer paint job modification with an old Swedish Bicycle Brand, Crescent "The world championship bike". When i grew up in the 70's every other bike was an orange colored Crescent.

See the similarity?

Read some more about the Crescent brand over at Classic Rendezvous

Tuesday Hill Intervals

Just three of us tonight but the weather was good and so was the company. Felt much better this time but i guess it's because now i know the slopes, how long and how much effort they require. We did five climbs of the long hill (500m) and 3 of the shorter but steeper one(200m). I felt like doing some more runs but we decided to quit for the evening. Next time i think i stay a bit longer adding some more runs.

Stats:
Total distance: 30 km
Time 1h 18min
Avg 23 km/h
Max speed 44 km/h

New Cannondale Six13 Site Launched

www.fusionofgreatness.com

The alchemists at Cannondale just finished their latest concoction, a merge between the CAAD8 and Six13 frames. Beholde the results over at www.fusionofgreatness.com.

In contrast with the Synapse this frame can bear the famous "Handmade in USA" sticker on the top tube and chainstays.

In my opinion they use far to much stickers on the models shown on the site. Hopefully there will be some "less is more"-versions that i can pick up on the used-market a couple of years from now :-)

Pix of Cannondales New Six-13 and Synapse

If you like me, still wait for Cannondale to launch it's promised minisite for The New Six-13 model, you can somewhat lessen your hunger over att Planet Cycle who has some exclusive pics the new models online. Warning the site is slow as syrup, but it's worth the wait.

Commuting tips from Santa Cruz

A couple of weeks ago Columbus commuters evangelized about their thing. Today i found this article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel.

So, if still in doubt about bicycle commuting, head over and read some tips and testimonials.

Trek's gifts added to the records

Trek's gifts to Bush are officially disclosed

As posted before, President Bush is not only a maniac but also a bicycle maniac.

According to BikeBiz Treks 2700$ gift in the form of a Trek Fuel mountain bike is now officially disclosed.

Cartographed by the Devil

Here From There - Blogroute.net - Bicycle Blogs

VeloDiablo over at the blog Even The Devil Rides has started the Blog Route Project putting bicycle blogger all over the world on the map.

Read his post about the project and sign yourself up for a spot on his map.

Aside from getting a spot on the map you'll get a really cool old-school-looking sign to put on your blog.

Here is mine:

Women on Wheels - Riding the Freedom Machine

After reading and posting about the interview with 102 year old Jack Visco. A bike-racing pioneer still going strong although not on his bike. I got interested in the fact that the invention of the bicycle was of great importance to the women's movement in the late 19th and beginning of the 20th century.

Turning to Google i found this article by Nancy Botkin published in the online news service Tubular Times hosted on San Francisco Bicycle Coalition's site that digs deeper into the subject.

The appeal of the bicycle turned millions of women into rebels. In the 1890s, bicycle manufacturers discovered they could literally double their sales by marketing to women. Women's magazines contained images of bloomer-clad women hauling bicycles across streams, women coasting downhill with their feet up, and pages of fashions for the woman cyclist. Article after article appeared in women's magazines discussing the physical, spiritual, and societal benefits of bicycling.

go read...

Interview with a 102-year-old bike-racing pioneer

Florida Today has an interesting interview with 102-year-old bike-racing pioneer Jack Visco.

An interesting angle I have never realized before was the importance of bicycling for the women's movement in the early days.

... the women's movement was gaining momentum behind leaders like Susan B. Anthony, who said, "The bicycle has done more for the emancipation of women than anything else in the world" because it was their first means of independent travel. (And because they had to throw away those blasted corsets to ride one.)

Get more bicycling history straight from the horses mouth.

Thursday Club Ride

Rode with the 30km/h group today. Good weather but a troublesome start with lots of waiting, slowriding due to people having mechanical problems and such. After 10km we got rolling and had a really fast and nice ride. Some of the licensed riders who usually ride with the fast group rode with us today because they wanted to take it easy since they had a race on Friday. They really whipped up the speed and provided good drafting.

Overall good riding, my legs felt great. I was a bit concerned that they would hurt and feel sluggish after the Tuesday hill intervals but on the contrary i felt stronger than on my previous rides. Good to know that pain pays off :)

Stats:

Total distance: 74 km
Ride time: 2h 38 min
Average speed: 29 km/h
Max speed: 63.7 km/h

Kona Stinky 2006

kona.dk has got their hands on a picture and some specs regarding the Kona Stinky 2006 pre-release model. Check out the specs.

Read more about kona.dk in my past post.

Tuesday Hill Intervals

Did my first Hill intervals Training Session with the club tonight. The Stockholm area is kind of flat so we don't have to much hills to ascend/descend here. But the club frequently use a section in a suburban area with really steep slopes. We did 8 loops through this hilly area and it was really tough and painful. But, no pain, no gain and it really felt good after.

So if family life permits it, I hope to attend these Tuesday rides on a regular basis to improve my overall strength and stamina.

Stats:

Total distance: 31 km
Total time: 1 hour and 30 min
Max speed: 40 km/h
Avg speed: 21 km/h

Thursday Club Ride

Went out to the summer house on Ekerö Wednesday morning for the holidays and I had planned to bring my bike since the apex of the club ride loop is just 1 km from the house. The plan was to go solo down to the gathering point and the ride back to the apex with the club.

Got my thinking straight though and remembered that, at the cabin we just have an outside lake-water shower and that the ice disappeared from the lake just two weeks ago. According to my neighbor the temperature of the water was 5c. So i took the coffin back home and started from there instead. Got to work on my near freezing point shower endurance :)

Rode with the medium speed group again (30 km/h avg). The speed was ok but it wasn't as smooth as last time. The speed sections failed because half of the group didn't understand how the 'chain' was supposed to rotate and this lead to some irritation. We had another leader this time and he rotated the chain so that the outside line was the faster and the inner slower. The ride before we did this but then the outside line was the slower. I think this added to the confusion. However I have improved my pack-skills and no longer need to concentrate on closing gaps and braking all the time. Nice to notice some progress.

Stats:

Total distance: 74 km
Ride time: 2h 38 min
Average speed: 29 km/h
Max speed: 59.7 km/h

Cannondale Synapse - Now Online

SYNAPSE - Cannondale Bicycle Corp.

Cannondale has launched it's Synapse site. The Synapse is their new All Carbon Road Bike Series.

Check it out and dream of smooth tarmac and a fat wallet...

fixedgear: How to teach a kid (or adult) to ride a bike

Check out Fixedgear's excellent guide for how to teach your kids to ride a bike. I will try this on my youngest daughter as soon as she is old enough for riding a bike.

Fixedgears article...

Commuter Testimonials from Columbus

Not convinced yet? Pushing the desicion forward?

Business First's Columbus edition has interviewed a couple of white collar Columbus citizens that commute by bike to work.

Check out thier arguments and get inspired. (three paged article)