Maddie Gets a Makeover

Last week during the trip to the mountains, I noticed that the stock bar tape on Maddie was a little loose and would occasionally slide around exposing the bare aluminum bars. This was a convenient excuse to add a little more color to the bike instead of the boring black that came stock. When I saw that Speedgoat was having a sale on trainers last week, I decided to take advantage of the savings and get some new tape while the shipping was free. I had a hard time deciding which color to pick, with my favorites being white and pink. I thought that the white would go well with the frame and compliment the white cages well. On the other hand, I do seem to like ugly bikes and putting pink tape on a bike with red accents definitely fits the bill. I ended up getting the white despite the undeniable fact that pink bike parts are awesome. The UPS man showed up today with my order so Madeline is now all dolled up with her new look.



I haven't really ridden the trainer much but it seems to be a quality item. I may end up getting some kind of mat to help dampen some of the vibrations so I don't disturb the neighbors.

I went on a ride with Mikey last week and came to a pretty scary realization. I couldn't be happier with my current bikes. I like them so much that I don't think that I really need another bike. In fact, I could get rid of the Ziggurat and never miss it. Both of my main bikes, Michaelangelo and Madeline, are really sweet rides and a ton of fun. I used to be able to spend hours dreaming over my next bike but why bother anymore. Even when I came up with this weeks bad idea that I will never follow through with, trying a cross race, I couldn't come close to justifying a new cross bike. The 1x1 will take 700c wheels with tons of room to spare so why not just throw some drops on that. Sure it will have to be a singlespeed but that isn't really a problem. Hopefully I will be able to talk myself into a custom frame or something sometime down the road. For now, I will just ride what I have.

Disco Anson in 1.5 weeks. If you are riding, bring your A game. Maddie and I will be arriving in style for the 50 mile ride. Sorry Ethan, no mountains on this ride so it will be ruled by the king of the valleys. Unfortunately, I have no idea who or what that is.

Naming Names

So the Madone needs a good name. The only good one I can think of is Madeline, which plays off of Madone nicely. Any suggestions?

"I've Made A Huge Mistake"

After closer inspection of the Madone I decided that the chip on the frame is purely cosmetic and not worth worrying about for the moment. I probably should have waited a little while before posting instead of writing about it in panic mode. I guess that I just expect the worse now since I seem to break all things bike that I touch, although there are people out there who break way more than I do. For those of you who didn't realize that the title for the previous post was a quote from Arrested Development, I apologize for misleading you. I was not trying to insinuate that the bike was definitely going to be returned. The only way I am going to go through Trek's warranty process again this soon is if they offered me a 2008 Madone 6.9 with Lance's autograph etched into the top tube using one of the syringes from his historic 7th Tour de France victory. If you also didn't realize that the title for this post was a quote from Arrested Development, then shame on you. You should watch more good TV.

The weather here has been really good lately. Yesterday morning I took out the 1x1 (this is a SS blog, right) and went to Garner for a ride. It was actually fairly cool when I left with temperatures in the mid sixties. That may not seem like a big deal to some of my west coast readers, but it is a welcome break from the heat around here. That cool fall weather is great for mountain biking and I look forward to the upcoming autumn months for more of these rides.

Ethan came to town on Saturday and showed me around some of his old road routes around North Raleigh. I was happy that I was able to keep up with him since he has been riding road for so much longer than me. I think that I surprised him a little bit with my climbing abilities, which I attribute to riding single on the trails. I think if I really try he may be my first SS convert..

Speaking of singlespeed induced climbing ability, Alta bikes has a series of pictures on their website showing the effects of riding their urban singlespeed bikes. Since I've got this fancy Mac, I decided to do some photo editing and show everyone that hasn't seen me in a while a glimpse of my current build.

Taking this recent photo of myself...

...and this Alta ad...

...gives you me after riding SS for a month and a half.
Also, I apparently got a tattoo and moved into an apartment with no funiture.

I was under the impression that singlespeeding is not that uncommon anymore but I may be a little off on that one. As I was leaving the parking lot for a ride a few weeks ago the guy parked next to me struck up a conversation about me riding single and rigid. Besides the usual chit chat, he asked if I knew Team Dicky, who is apparently a bit of a SS celebrity hailing from Charlotte. I have seen the name a couple of places around the internet but I have never met the guy and don't know of any reason that I should. The question just seemed a little weird to me;

That Guy: Hey, you're riding single and rigid.
Me: Yep
That Guy: I know another guy in this state that does that. Do you know him?
Me: Umm, what?

Maybe it is uncommon enough that we should all know each other or it could be that I am just missing out on the awesomeness of this guy and he was just trying to clue me in. Maybe he mistook me for someone who was actually a good rider and would have met all the other singlespeeders at various rides and races. I don't know but I definitely left the conversation a little confused.

Going to the Darkside

So after a couple of years of riding nothing but mountain bikes I am finally going to pull the trigger on a new road bike (It is debatable whether or not Ann is actually a bike and you don't really ride her, just get on and survive). I am looking to get the Trek Madone 5.0 that I spotted in CSH last week. I went and test rode it this past weekend and it is a pretty sweet ride and a killer deal. I think that the original MSRP is about $2700 and it is currently selling for an even 2k. I know that the rest of the family rides Specialized but I want something a little more unusual and unique, so I am going to go with the Trek. Another big plus is that they have a 62cm in stock so I can be riding by this weekend. I ordered a pair of road shoes yesterday from Specialized and I am going to wait until those come in before I go get the bike. I want to have them when I get the bike so I can get the cleats set up correctly when they fit me to the bike. My current Specialized mtb shoes fit nicely so I am going to stick with the big S for my road shoes because I hate trying to find shoes that fit my wide feet. Fortunately, they only make one model of road shoes in my size (49) so it was an easy decision. They should be here in the next day or two and then I will be off to get the bike.

Once I get this bike I should have a pretty sweet set up and will be able to sit back and actually save some of my money. I had three big purchases in mind when I graduated that I was going to use to purge the student life from my system. After all, why waste away my youth in a cubicle if I can't at least buy the happiness that I deserve? This should be the final addition of those three things, which were a SS mountain bike, new computer, and a road bike. I have actually been able to stay right on my predicted budget for these purchases so I feel pretty good about that. There was some slight worry from others that I may have inherited the QVC gene and continue this spending spree but I don't foresee that being a problem.

The addition of a new bike also means that my other bikes will not get to be ridden as often. The 1x1 is way too much fun to just sit around all of the time and I will definately still ride that one a lot. It looks like the odd man out right now is the Fisher. I don't really have a desire to go back to gears on the trails and the 1x1 is going to be my go to mountain bike for a long time. I have been thinking that instead of leaving it sitting around that I should turn it into my commuter. The ride to work is a fairly easy 11 miles with no real climbs and a good bit of it being on nice quiet roads. I hope to try it out sometime in the next week or so and start making it a habit if it isn't too unbearable. I am not worried about the ride being tough but it will add at least 30 minutes to my commute each way and I already struggle to get in at 7:30. If I can manage to get up and going that early in the morning then it should be a pretty pleasant change from dealing with the traffic on the beltline.

A new road bike also means that I am almost guaranteed to ride this years Discover Anson ride back in the old stomping grounds. It is on November 3rd so save the date. Now I just need to decide whether to do the 30, 50, or 70 mile ride. I am game for whatever but I will see what everyone else wants to do. It is only twenty bucks if you register before mid October so let me know if you want to ride.

As I have been buying things the last couple of months, I have been getting things that end up leaving me with eggs on my face. After years of laughing at my Apple-fanboy friends and their Steve Jobs mancrushes I go out and buy a Mac. Then I decide to get a Trek after not really looking at them because everybody and their brother has one. Not only am I getting a Trek but I am getting it from the shop that I practically swore off just last week, although most of that was just frustration fueled ranting. I have been really pleased with the computer and most of the people at CSH are pretty cool so I am not disappointed with these decisions, it just leaves me looking like a bit of an idiot. Just in case the trend continues I have decided to put a few more things on record and hopefully the result will be the same. Here goes:

1) Pro cyclists are all spoiled cheaters and I would never accept large sums of money to travel the world and ride my ridiculously nice bike around.
2) The only occupation worse than pro cyclist would be designing the bikes for them. I would never move to California to accept a job with Specialized, especially if they gave me a significant pay increase.
3) Hills are boring and I will never make regular trips to the mountains just to go ride even if I get offered a free place to crash.
4) I love the cold. I sure do hope that this winter is long, cold, and rainy.

Wish me luck.

Mikeys New Home

With Ethan moving out a couple of weeks ago Mikey was able to move out of the living room and into his very own bedroom/bike shop. Ethan's old bedroom is now the home to Mikey, Ann, my repair stand, and a whole lot of worthless bike parts. It is a little light on decorations for the moment but there are a few old parts laying around to keep it from looking too bare. I may look into getting some cool bike posters or something to hang on the walls but for now it looks ok. I started using my workstand as a collector for all of the bike stickers that I have collected. A lot of parts will come with a sticker of the brand logo and over time these little stickers will start to pile up. I have a couple that I had sitting around so I decided to throw them on the stand as decorations since that bike is way to pretty to mess up with some manufacturers logo. Right now the room has plenty of space for the two bikes but things may get a little cramped when Gennies replacement gets here (more on that later). I have been thinking about getting one of these and keeping the bikes in a row instead of just leaning them against the walls. This will help to keep the walls clean and save some space. It will also make the room feel like more a real shop with the bikes displayed like this but it will probably take another bike for this to really take shape (I guess I have to buy a new '08 road bike now). Here are some pictures of the new digs.

The view from the entrance.

The stars of the show.

A wind chime that I made from an old freewheel.

Hopefully I will be able to add another bike to the stable in the next couple of days when my new Fisher is ready to go. After taking two months to get a new frame, the bike shop called me a couple of days ago and left a voicemail saying that the frame was in but that during the part swap the bottom bracket messed up. I have no idea what happened to it but I am guessing that one of their mechanics screwed something up and stripped the threads or something like that. The guy on the phone didn't say if it was something that they broke or was already broken and they just found. Considering the wait for the frame, I would expect a quality shop to at least cut me a deal on the labor costs, especially if they screwed something up in the process. I don't expect anything like this from Cycling Spoken Here but it would be nice and might restore a little of my faith in them. I want to like the shop and really do like a couple of the employees but it seems that a lot of my trips there end with me feeling like I am trying to be screwed over. If I have to wait two months for a new frame (not completely their fault), then wait another week for a part that they broke (not sure that this is even the case) and still get charged ~$85 then I will probably never considering going there again to buy something. They do have some rides that I may join in on occasionally but they will not get any of my business. Hopefully they are pretty generous with the bike when I finally do get the bike back so I can feel a little better about shopping there. I guess I will have to wait and see what the story is when the new BB comes in.

Branching Out

Mikey and I headed to Greensboro this weekend to celebrate our three week anniversary by visiting Ethan and scoping out some his local trails. It looks like Ethan has a pretty sweet set up with some quality trails just a few minutes away and a greenway system that goes to another park with more good trails. The first trails we hit were at Country Park and were a bunch of fun. They had a nice flow and weren't very technical. They definitely had a fair share of roots but nothing over the top. At one of the entrances to the trail there was a section for freeride and dirt jumping. We rolled through the jumps and decided that you would have to be a little insane to really ride that section, but it was cool to see. After riding Country Park we hopped on the greenway and road up to Brandt Lake where we rode a little bit of the trails at Bur Mill Park. The section that we rode was fun but not enough to give an accurate rating for the whole trail system. We also rode Owl's Roost trail which is also at Lake Brandt but not in Bur Mill Park. These trails were a ton of fun with more obstacles than Country Park. They had a bunch of log rolls and some really fun downhill sections. Towards the end of this trail there was a log roll that I thought I could ride over without much trouble. I was wrong. I went to ride over the log but instead my front wheel hit the first log and stopped. Unfortunately I didn't stop until shortly after hitting the logs that I thought I was going to roll over. I should have expected this since I haven't really wrecked in a while and was overdue for a good one. Luckily Mike came away unphased and I only have a couple of scratches. Overall, it was a really fun day of riding and a nice change of pace from the Raleigh area trails that I usually ride. I am looking forward to more visits to the Triad to try out more of their trails.

In other bike news, I have started thinking about another dream bike that I will never be able to afford. I don't really have a use for this bike but I just think that they are super cool. It is one of these bamboo bikes. I think that these bikes are really sexy and would be really cool to ride around town on. They are supposedly more plush and comfortable than carbon fiber, although a little heavier. Unfortunately, I don't have an extra 3k to spend on a wooden frame but maybe I will when I find that duffel bag filled with money that I am looking for. Although not very practical for me, Calfee is working with African farmers to teach them how to make their own bamboo bikes for transportation uses. Even though I can't afford one of those nice pretty frames right now I may look into building my own. I think I may be able to cut off the tubes and use the joints from Ann and bond them with some sort of epoxy. Here is a guy that built his own bamboo frame and how he did it. He is a much more experienced builder than I am but I may look into it the next time I get really bored and want a project to work on.

One Week Later

Saturday marks the one week anniversary of my first ride with Girl Michaelangelo so I decided to go out riding the past couple of days to celebrate. I rode Harris Lake after work yesterday and felt really good on the bike. I took the hills easier than last week and have shaken off some of the rust. I am starting to feel pretty comfortable on the bike but I am still not completely back to where I was before the Gennie tragedy. I still make a lot of little mistakes, the most common being that I try to keep pedaling on my way over obstacles and end up hitting them with my pedal. It is possible that these crankarms are longer than the ones on the Fisher but I suspect that it is just bad technique. I also didn't wreck yesterday which is an improvement over last weeks ride. There was one point where I tried to go over a log and hit my chainring on the log pretty badly but I don't consider this a wreck because I never hit the ground. I thought that I would be able to clear it as I approached but the log was on a slight downhill and the lower ground on the other side skewed my judgment a bit. As I went over the ring hit and stopped the bike completely as I went over the bars and running down the hill. I was impressed that the collision didn't seem to phase the ring or the chain. Excellent work Salsa and Sram respectively. At the end of the day I had done about 14.5 miles, a pretty good day considering the heat.

Today I went out to Crabtree to ride the trails out there. I did one loop around Crabtree and although I felt good on the bike, the trails were pretty boring. I was hoping that since I haven't ridden these trails regularly in six months or more that they would be more fun on the new bike but I am already bored with them on my second trip out there. I will still ride them occasionally and go out there with group rides but I probably will not go out there on a regular basis. One exciting moment on these trails came when I passed the 50 mile mark for this bike on my computer. I figured that this was a small mile stone so when the odometer rolled over to 50.0 I stopped to collect a small nearby stone to keep as the 50 mile milestone stone. Please note that this stone is purely ceremonial and that there have been several other miles on the bike not recorded on the computer. I decided that since I came out here and went through the trouble of getting ready to ride that I should go spin through Umstead for a while to get some miles in for fitness. I ended up riding all of the trails in Umstead that are open to bikes for a total of about 24.5 miles of fireroads and roughly 5.5 miles of trail, for a grand total 30 miles worth of riding today. I really enjoyed the ride through Umstead and it was a good way to show off the new bike. When people see someone as goofy looking as I am come riding down the trail on a bike that just rolled out of a Ninja Turtles movie with a giant Reeses Cup jersey, they know that I mean serious business. The bike handled the fireroads of Umstead pretty well. I was worried about some of the longer hills on a singlespeed but I was able to make them all. There were some sections that tested out my climbing abilites and I may use this as a training route before my next attempt at Old La Honda. The bike tops out at about 15 mph on flat ground with the current gearing but I was able to test out the top speed on a long straight downhill. I think the bike topped out at around 34 mph or so with me doing my best Linus-Gerdemann-descending-Col-de-la-Colombière impression on the way down.

The 50 mile milestone stone.

Todays ride also brought about the first casualty of the new bike. I noticed at one point during the ride that one of my water bottles was shaking a lot and upon further inspection I discovered that the cage has broken on one side. A lot of times I will use a broken part as an excuse to replace it with something better. This is not one of those cases. I tried to zip tie the cage back together but it looks like the other side is close to breaking as well. I am not sure if I will be able to salvage this one. This is a little disappointing because these were the only orange cages that I could find anywhere but I can always get some in another color and paint them myself.

The broken cage

I am starting to think that I may be the only one who really likes the green and orange color scheme. I took the bike to work with me Friday and while chatting with a coworker who saw my helmet sitting at my cube, I mentioned that I brought my bike with me and was planning on riding after work. His only response was "Its not the green one is it?". I guess its ok as long as I like it.

More Riding

I have been out on a few more rides at various trails and I am starting to really like this bike. Here are some random thoughts on the riding.


The singlespeed thing is pretty challenging on the hills but I expect after a while I will be able to power over most of them. If you listen to the people on the singlespeed board at MTBR, riding with just one gear will greatly increase your power in a matter of weeks. I am not totally convinced of this and I'm sure that just like any miracle diet pill, results may vary. Right now my average speeds have been comparable to when I was riding a hardtail so it doesn't look like riding single will slow me down much, if any at all.

The rigid fork is still fairly comfortable most of the time and the ride isn't any worse than Gennie over the small stuff. The only time I really feel it is over the bigger obstacles, taking the bike of off drops, and on fast descents. Even at these times the ride isn't terrible and I will definitely keep it rigid for the time being.

Yesterday I went out to Crabtree and had a really good ride. Most of the hills out there can be powered over without much trouble and the bike flies through the flat flowing sections of the trail. The bike really handles nicely and takes turns really well. I think this is at least partly because of the tire upgrade over the stock Bontragers on Gennie.

At one point during yesterdays ride I came up behind another rider as he was trying to go up a short but fairly steep section of trail. As I approached he tried to downshift and ended up dropping the chain, forcing him to get off of the bike and hurry out of my way as I stood up to ride past him and inflate my ego. I usually don't like to watch people fail but it feels good to see someone on a full suspension bike with all of the bells and whistles move over for a bike with one gear and no suspension.

The only bad thing about the riding lately is that the heat has been brutal. For the out of towners, it has been up in the low hundreds the last few days around here with a heat index of around 110 most days (All temperatures are in degrees Fahrenheit). I have been carrying just the two bottles for water and putting all of my gear in my jersey pockets. This is a little less convenient than the camelbak but it is nice to not have that extra weight hanging on my shoulders and to be able to let my back breathe a little. Most of the trails that I ride around here are fairly short and keep you within a few minutes of riding from a water fountain when refills are needed.

The Maiden Voyage

Well I finally got out for a ride today on the new bike. Overall, it went pretty well. I went to Harris Lake to ride and did all of the trails once plus an extra trip through the beginner and intermediate trails for a photo op. In the end I did 11.33 miles with an average speed of 8.7 mph. The photo op ride was a pretty casual pace and I also had to do szome backtracking at one point to recover a water bottle that I dropped, which dropped my speed some. All things considered, it was just as fast as I would have been on a geared bike. Here are some observations from the ride.

The Good
The Feel of the Bike - I was worried that the rigid fork might be a little harsh on the trail but it turns out that it really wasn't any worse than Gennie. The steel frame and carbon bars did a good job of dampening out trail buzz and making for a pretty smooth ride. There were a couple of bigger roots that were a jolt but the cheap fork on the Fisher wasn't that much smoother than this rigid setup. I didn't take the bike off of any drops or sweet jumps, which is probable where I will really feel the lack of suspension.

The Ride - There wasn't anything really special about the feel of the bike or the geometry except that it rides like a bike. It isn't anything revolutionary, but the bike went where I wanted when I wanted it to. The handling isn't sluggish or twitchy, just fun.

The Gears - I was worried that 34-18 might be a little steep to start out with but I cleared almost every hill out there. The only time I had to get off and walk was the big hill in the double black diamond section, which I would rarely clean on a geared bike. The big whoop-de-doo just after this hill almost stopped me but I was able to power through it, just not very gracefully. The rest of the time I made it up the climbs without much trouble. I didn't miss the gears at all.

The Weight - The front end of the bike is really light and easy to lift over logs and obstacles. Overall the bike is about 5 or 6 pounds lighter than Gennie was, which makes it a lot easier to take up the hills. The rigid fork helps out there too due to the lighter weight and efficiency compared to suspension.

It Worked - I must not of screwed anything up too badly during the build because I was able to get through the whole ride without breaking anything.

I Didn't Get Hurt - My last trip to Harris Lake ended up with me getting stitches. No such trouble today.

The Saddle - I was a little worried that the saddle wouldn't be very comfortable on the trails seeing as it came off of a road bike but I didn't have any problems. The WTB saddle on the Fisher was really comfortable in regular clothes but was a little too cushy once I started wearing cycling shorts. This saddle doesn't have as much padding as that one but is still plenty comfortable with the chamois in the shorts, at least on this length of ride. It is also very easy to get behind on the downhills, which inspired some confidence.

The Bad
Creaking Bottom Bracket - There is some sort of creaking noise coming from the bottom bracket area. I checked the chainring bolts and they are good and tight so I don't know what is causing it. I think it might just be a crappy BB but those are cheap if I want to replace it sometime.

Snake on a Trail - There was a snake on the trail that I almost ran over. It was just a black snake but I am like a little girl when it comes to snakes. I didn't see it in time to stop so I just rode right past him. He never moved that I saw but I still hammered up that hill as hard as I could.

Chipped Paint - Towards the end of the ride I decided to go ahead and meet the minimum requirement of one wreck per ride. The back wheel washed out from under me while I was going through a turn and when I fell the handlebars swung around and the brake lever hit the top tube leaving a nice scratch in the paint. Oh well, I guess it can't be pretty forever.

Where Was Everyone At - Surprisingly, I only saw a few other people on the trail. Usually I try to avoid the crowds but there should have been more people there to gawk at the beauty of this bike.

I Am Out of Shape - No surprise there.


I am hoping to get back out tomorrow and ride some more, but for now here are some photos of todays ride.

Mikey relaxing by the lake.

From the front.

Close up of the front.


Disc brakes work good.


Pretty good chainline.

The saddle.


The view from the rear.

It's done... for now.

I got the bike built up tonight but it was dark by the time I got finished so the only riding I got was a quick spin around the parking lot. The bike looks really good, even with the red tires that I don't like too much. Not much to tell from the ride today except that I am more upright than my old bike and that the nicer housing makes a huge difference in the stopping power of the brakes. Hopefully I can get a good ride in tomorrow but I may end up seeing the new Bourne movie instead. Either way it should be awesome. Here are some pics of the bike being built and the finished product. I'll give a ride report sometime in the next couple of days.

Just home from the shop.



The King headset looks great.



The complete bike.


From the front. (Pardon the messy room)


The cockpit.

Starting to Build

Unfortuneatly the UPS guy came yesterday when no one was home so I had to wait until today to get the rest of my parts. Everything looks really good, especially the mango colored King headset. The only disappointment of the bike so far is that the tires have a red strip around the bead and I am not sure how good that is going to look with all of the orange accessories, but this is only a minor detail. I may end up getting some larger volume tires as well cushion the ride some anyway so if I do that I can just throw these on the geared bike, which needs new tires as well. Now that everything is here I am starting to build up the bike. I started earlier this evening by spraying the frame down with Framesaver and I am now waiting on it to dry. I already have the water bottle cages mounted on the frame and am hoping to get a couple of more parts on later tonight. The frame needs to sit and dry for a couple of hours but after that I am hoping to get the bottom bracket installed on the frame and get a few of the other parts ready to go on. Then I can throw the rest of the bike together fairly quickly tomorrow and sneak in a test ride before it gets dark. Here is a picture of this thing of beauty waiting to dry.

It's Here

The UPS man stopped by this afternoon and delivered my frame and handlebars, but for some reason the rest of my parts aren't going to come until tomorrow. It looks like this may put me a day or two behind on the building process but I should still be riding by the weekend so it isn't a big deal. The frame looks great. The color is darker than it looked on the internet pictures but it looks really good. Although the frame isn't super light, it is light enough for a steel mountain bike. I expect the bike to be around 24 or 25 pounds when finished. I can't wait to get out on a ride with this thing. I'm going to be busy tomorrow night but hopefully I can find time to spray it down with Framesaver before going to bed. If I do, I should be finished building it by Thursday night and go on a nice long ride Friday afternoon. Here are some pictures for those of you not here, but I must warn you that good lighting and photography skills were absent from this photo shoot.

Anticipation

Sitting and waiting on my frame and parts to arrive is starting to wear on me. I am so anxious to get back on the bike that I find myself checking the UPS tracker several times a day even though I know that the stuff won't be here until Monday. On the good side, I know that everything is going to come in the next couple of days and that I should be riding by the end of the week at least. My Speedgoat order is scheduled to arrive on Monday afternoon so I am planning on treating it with Framesaver on Monday afternoon and letting it sit over night. Hopefully I can find some time on Tuesday afternoon to go by one of the shops and have the headset cups pressed in. It is tempting to do this myself with a cheap homemade press like this one but this headset isn't cheap and I don't want to screw it up. If I can get that done Tuesday then I should have time to assemble the rest of the bike on Wednesday afternoon. It is possible that I can get it built in time for a quick trip to the trail on Wednesday evening but even if I don't I should be back in the woods by Thursday afternoon. I went by the shop today and got Gennie for the afternoon so I could steal some parts. Now that I have those, all that I need are the handlebars and the stuff from the Speedgoat order. I can't wait to have this thing up and rolling. It has been almost six weeks since I have been on a mountain bike ride which is way to long to be off the bike. The guys at Cycling Spoken Here this morning said that Trek had lost my paperwork and that they had to resubmit the claim so who knows how long that is going to take. Fortunately, I don't have to wait on them any longer.

Once this project is complete, I guess I will have to start waiting on the '08 road bikes to come out. They had a new Madone at the shop this morning that was a really sexy bike. I haven't really been that interested in Trek but that bike definitely caught my interest. Then I saw the $3500 price tag. So it looks like a Specialized, Orbea, or maybe a Felt. Or it could be something totally different. Specialized and Orbea are my favorites right now. Specialized makes a good bike and they are definitely popular, but I am not a big fan of the giant corporation or having a bike just like everybody elses. Also, it looks like Specialized prices are going up in 2008. Then new Roubaix Comp is up to $2400 from $2200 last year. It looks like the only difference in the bikes is the paint color. I guess I will wait and see what they do with the Tarmacs. It is hard to beat the support of the smaller companies like Orbea where you can call them with a question have someone actually answer the phone and talk to you. Not that Orbea is that small but they are compared to Specialized. I am trying to support the small guys with this SS project and it is nice to not get lost in the crowd (see Treks warranty process). On the other hand, Orbea bikes are not as common and it is going to be hard to find one to test ride. The spesh is a relatively known commodity having ridden both Tarmacs and Roubaixs, although neither in my size. Hopefully one of the two will come out with a really sweet bike that blows the other out of the water so my decision will be easy.

Pulled the Trigger

Another sweet addition to the bike came last night when I won a set of carbon handlebars. They are the Monkeylite SL model which are at the very top of Easton's lineup. They are unbelievably light at only 135g (4.75 oz). This was the last big thing that I was really looking for on Ebay so I decided that it was time to move on from the hunter gatherer phase of this bike build and ordered everything else that I needed for now. It looks like this entire project is going to end up only costing me a little over $1200, not bad considering that this includes a workstand and some tools in addition to a top notch bike. All I need left to buy is a new set of pedals, seatpost, and a couple of water bottles. Hopefully I can snag some pedals and a seatpost off of Ebay soon or I can just use the ones from the Fisher. I am going to need to have a little bit of the labor done at a shop so I can pick up some bottles then. Nothing to do now but sit and wait for the mailman.

One of the reasons I am so anxious to get this bike built is that I still haven't heard anything from the shop about my new GF frame. I saw a thread here about a guy that broke his GF Rig in the same spot as mine (great design their Gary) and was told that they are out of those frames for 07. I am afraid that the same thing might be happening with the Tassajara and I do not want to wait any longer to ride than I have to. It has already been a month since my last good ride which is way too long.

Pictures and a new part

Last night I bought one of the final Ebay parts for the new bike, the crankset. I ended up getting a great deal on a brand new FSA Afterburner triple crankset instead of the Truvativ SS specific crank that I was planning on. It retails for about $240 and I payed $108 plus shipping. That includes the bottom bracket as well because this crank has the integrated external bearings. I'm not sure if I like the silver arms on this one as much as the black arms of the other cranks that I was considering but the bearings should be more reliable than Truvativ or RaceFace. I'll have to wait and see how it looks on the bike. Hopefully I can get some brake levers and new carbon bars in the next couple of days. Once I get those it will be time to order the frame and remaining parts. I expect this bike to be built and ready to ride in two weeks or so. Per Steve's request, here are some pictures of the one I used to love.

It begins

So I have been thinking lately of building up a killer singlespeed to replace the geared bikes that seem to stay broken. It seems that when you get to my size that most bikes just don't seem to hold up. After breaking both of the wheels on my Fisher on consecutive rides I finally bit the bullet and upgraded to a more durable set. Unfortunately, I only got a handful of rides on these wheels until I cracked the frame. With the bike in the shop getting fixed under warranty for the past three weeks, I got so desperate that I set up Ethan's old road bike, Emaline, and went out for a road ride with him. That bike lasted me about 1.5 rides and 25 miles before I snapped the chain and was left stranded in Cary. So I am hoping that if I get a beefy steel frame and ditch all of the unnecessary components, like the shifters and derailleurs, that I can ride a bike for a full year without it completely blowing up. Anyway here are the planned specs for my new ride:

Frame/Fork: Surly 1x1 22" Lemon Lime Green
Headset: Chris King in mango
Stem: Easton EA70
Handlebars: Easton Monkeylite Carbon Risers
Grips: Oury in orange
Levers: Avid Speed Dial Ti
Cables/Housing: Jagwire Ripcord in Maxxis Orange
Brakes: Avid BB7
Crank: Truvativ Stylo SS
Front Wheel: Shimano XT disc hub mated to a Mavic XC717 rim
Rear Wheel: Surly New Disc Hub mated to a Salsa Delgado rim
Freewheel: 18t ACS Claws
Tires: Panaracer Fire XC Pro
Seatpost: Whatever I can get cheap
Saddle: Fizik Aliante
Pedals: Time Atac
Cages: Alloy cages in orange


This bike is going to sweet looking with the green frame and orange accessories. I have been searching Ebay for the last couple of weeks for some good parts for cheap and so far I have the rear wheel, stem, cages and saddle. The brakes and front wheel are definitely coming off of the current bike. I am planning on buying the frame/fork, headset, tires, and cranks new and I may get some of the smaller stuff new while I am at it (How much will I really save by getting grips off of Ebay?). If I steal some temporary parts from the Fisher the only thing I really need to get is a good set of carbon bars and maybe a seatpost. Hopefully I can get some pics up later of the things I already have but until then enjoy the riding.