Category Archives: Racing

One word short of a great headline

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Specialized are still sponsoring Ned Overend. He’s only been with the company since 1987. How cool is that? Ned has just won the World Masters cyclocross championship. Just seems like an opportunity missed in the headline there.

If it’s not already obvious Ned Overend is an inspiration to me (and many others). Check out this interview from a couple of years ago, which includes this exchange:

Q: What gets you more fired up, dirt or road?

A: A combination of the two, actually. This is what keeps me fresh. I really enjoy cyclo-cross as well. Mountain biking on singletrack is always an amazing experience for me.

Yes. Me too, Ned.

And last year, the toughest hill climb race in the US, Mt Washington. Ned Overend (56 years old) 1st, Tinker Juarez (50 years old) 2nd.

Ned and Tinker racing NORBA, back in the 90s.

Tinker races for Cannondale, maybe for as long as Ned’s been on a Specialized. I know these are commercial arrangements, but I like what it says about both the companies involved and the racers themselves.

The Trickle-down Theory of Bicycle Economics, or How To Get Around N+1

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So I didn’t race the Great Escape Gravity Enduro, and I am bummed about that. Several lovely friends said encouraging things to me during the week, but you don’t have to be ‘deficit-focused’ to realise when you have massively stuffed up. Maybe I’ve learned something out of this, who knows.

But life goes on. And my happy news is that my oldest bike has had a make-over, and is once again a star member of the briztreadley stable.

I bought the Shogun Alpine GT sometime in the mid-late 90s. It was a touring bike in its original spec: drop bars, triple crank, Shimano STX components, cantilever brakes (that were never any good), TIG-welded steel frame made in Taiwan.

Touring bikes were hard to find at the time … the legendary Gemini World Randonneur had just stopped production a year before, and this is well before the release of the Surly Long Haul Trucker that is so popular these days. Cannondale and Trek both made tourers that were well beyond my budget at the time, but weren’t much better specced. St Kilda Cycles was the only place to buy the Shogun Alpine GT, so I ordered one over the phone/fax, and it was sent up to Flashing Pedals to be built up.

This was my main bike for about seven years, until I got the Frezoni (for my 40th).  And it covered all duties. Mostly commuting, some touring, three Sydney-to-Surfers rides and eventually some bunch rides (Bruce got me into that).

But when faster road bikes such as the Frezoni and later the Enigma came along, the Shogun was pushed to the back of the queue. For a while it was kept in repair so that Adrian could ride it on the weekly Wednesday morning kids ride that finished at McDonalds. Adrian stopped going on that ride when he was in year 10, I think, and he’s just about to turn 22.

So to save it from sitting in the shed, I had it turned into a flat-bar single speed, and it lived at the BQ office, for rides around the city.

But the turning point for the remake of the Shogun came early this year, when I picked up a set of Shimano XTR v-brakes from a bloke on the MTB Dirt forum. And put them on the Shogun.

All of a sudden I liked riding the Shogun. But I have never got hold of the single-speed thing. So I wondered how I could resurrect the Shogun without spending much money.

Inspiration came a couple of months ago, courtesy of Handsome Bicycles’ release of the XOXO.

And the resulting rebuild finally came together yesterday.

Thanks Dean for helping me with the build.

The new spec includes:

  • 1 x 9 gearing, with Campag Veloce bits, left over after the Frezoni went to 10-speed recently. Downtube shifter scavenged from The Bicycle Revolution, operating in friction mode (that’s right, no indexed gears!!)
  • Soma Moustache handlebar (thanks Epic Cycles), Tektro brake levers that pull the right amount of cable for v-brakes (thanks Mark Grulke)
  • 700 x 32 Specialized ‘cross’ tyres. I like the feel of them so far, but I haven’t been for a long ride yet. The wheels were once on my Frezoni, they are Velocity Deep V rims (legendary tough), teamed with Campag Veloce hubs.
  • Those marvellous Shimano XTR v-brakes. I know I go on about them, but they are the best brakes I’ve ever had on a road machine.

So that’s a urban-warrior, dirt-road-demon, go-anywhere-anytime, sort of bike. It’s the opposite of ‘specialised’. I am going to have fun on this machine, wherever it goes.

Busy being reborn, or maybe dying

Oh yeah, just briefly ...

Not much (good) news at the moment. Fell off the mountain bike on Monday, attempting a jump that was beyond my ability. Not my cleverest moment.

Busted shoulder. Participation now very doubtful for the Great Escape Gravity Enduro.

[Insert sad face icon here]

But the Brizzy Bike Fest is going to be fun, and I will be attending as much of it as possible. Eleanor’s doing the inviting over on her blog, how could you resist an offer like that?

Muddy, grey, rude or late

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Maybe Eleanor got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning, but when it gets onto the positive bit, this expresses really well what I was trying to say a couple of weeks ago.

For every time I have been one of you, I apologise. I will try to ride better each day. I will acknowledge your presence on the path. I will give way to pedestrians. I will wear lights. I will not blind you with my unnecessary head lamp lights. I will use hand signals. I will act like traffic so that you can treat me like traffic. I will pass nervous newbies with a cheery “passing” and cede to faster riders with a courteous acknowledgement. I will wait for the lights to change. If I am running late, I will remember that running rude – or worse running injured/dead – is way worse.

I cannot change your behavior, and I’m conscious my own record is muddy and grey, but I am seriously prepared to work on mine.

Preach it, sister.

Oof! Zap! J-Pow!

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I’m really enjoying the Behind The Barriers videos that follow the adventures of cyclocross racer Jeremy Powers, also known as J-Pow. The only way to improve them would be the occasional fight scene …

The whole Behind The Barriers series (we’re up to Season 2, number six at present) can be found here.

Cos it’s this much fun

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Why do I like mountain biking?

Because you’re either smiling or saying ‘holy sh*t!’. In this pic, maybe Emma’s doing both.

At Mt Joyce today, for a reconnaissance before the Great Escape Gravity Enduro (click the link to enter … I have!).

We (Em, JP, me) rode all the downhills that will be used in that event. And scared ourselves silly (well I did on Sargeants, anyway).

Here’s JP, pinning that same corner on Bovine Groove … concentrate John!

What’s blue and doesn’t fit?

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OK, let’s take for granted that there are various levels of interest in cycling. Some people are right into every tiny technical detail of both the machine and how you ride, some people go for the occasional ride on the weekend.

All cyclists, right?

If we take the general population of cyclists, I am obviously towards the nerdy, obsessive end of the spectrum. And I know, even from my limited experiences of competitive cycling, that there are no short-cuts to getting fast. Improving fitness and technique both take much effort and practice.

But if you can find the most efficient position for you on the bike, the one that means you’re not wasting energy because of positional or pedalling inefficiency, then that must be the closest thing to a “free” improvement.

It was with that thought in mind that I went along to Epic Cycles recently for a Specialized BG Fit. And the question that was rattling around in my head during the BG Fit process … Isn’t this a bit too cycling-obsessive? A bit too nerdy for the average cyclist?

The process of a BG (Body Geometry) Fit is very thorough, one might almost say painstaking. It includes:

  • pre-fit interview, to ascertain your goals in cycling, pretty much finding out what you want to get out of the bike fit
  • pre-fit measurement of your current bike setup
  • exceedingly thorough measurement of all aspects of you, including how (not) flexible you are in various body joints. This goes to the extent of measuring the angles you can reach in flexing your hip, whether you can put your ankles behind your ears, that sort of thing. Ankles behind ears is a slight exaggeration, but there were lots of different things measured that I didn’t expect … especially to do with feet. And of course you sit on the famous Specialized arse-o-meter to get the right width saddle.

Once all the measuring is done, its onto your bike (on a stationary trainer), and into the actual fitting process. Your correct saddle height is ascertained, and the cleat position on your bike shoes is looked at.

A truly specialised piece of equipment comes into play at this point, the totally adjustable stem, which with the saddle height properly adjusted, can now go through quite a range of reach and height adjustability of the handlebars, the final key to finding the right position.

And this is where the expertise of the Specialized BG Fit technical guru expert person (SBGFTGEP), or as we will call her in this case, ‘Emma’, really comes to the fore.

The SBGFTGEP spends quite a long time watching you pedal on the stationary bike, and making small adjustments from time to time. Maybe she was entranced by my graceful pedalling action, maybe she was just trying to ensure that I worked up a bit of a sweat, but eventually we reached a position that both the SBGFTGEP and I were happy with.

I was surprised to find that the new position of my handlebars was closer to me, but lower down. ‘Emma’ explained that my old position had been slightly too stretched out, but that by coming closer to the bars, we could make better use of the flexibility I do have to get a little bit lower.

The BG Fit took near enough to three hours from start to finish, although it should be noted that my particular SBGFTGEP was using me as a Bike Fit Test Dummy, wisely ensuring that recent training from Specialized Australia was reinforced by practice, before being unleashed on paying customers.

And there is no doubting both the solid science behind the process, and the thoroughness of the assessment. Amongst the things I will change as a result of this will be:

  • The footbeds of my cycling shoes
  • A new stem, with both a different reach and different angle
  • Quite probably a new saddle

So, depending on how much I spend on a saddle, that could be $300-ish. And that’s without taking into account the cost of the BG Fit itself. At Epic Cycles, I understand a BG Fit will cost you $350.

So is it for super-athletes and bike-obsessives only? I don’t think so. Many people I know ride bicycles that they have paid upwards of $5000 for. In that context, $350 to get more efficient on your bike is pretty cheap.

My thanks to my SBGFTGEP, who explained every step of the process, and who answered all my questions patiently, waited while I finished my sandwich, didn’t protest too much when I took the camera out, and despite prodding me many many times in hip, knee, thigh etc during the measuring process, left no visible marks.

There will be follow-up on this post, cos the process isn’t quite over yet.

keeping track of emerging forms, styles in journalism

Oh yeah, just briefly ...

Just to note that Eleanor’s long-awaited interview series with gold medal Australian track queen legend & Rocky girl Anna Meares is featuring at the moment on Helmets Are Hot. And it’s good stuff, of course.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4*, Part 5.

* warning: impossible analogy attempted in this post. not suitable for men on cholesterol-lowering medication or women with low iron counts.