Revisited: twenty nine inches.

Saturday (May 2nd) marked my new bike's virgin race. The race was a part of Winona Lake's annual Fat and Skinny Tire Fest. As usual they put on a great event. I signed up for the Cat 1 event along with Gene, my teammate.

Before the race I get about 20 minutes of warmup in to check out the trail and re-familiarize myself with my ever-evolving setup. After weeks of watching the weather I was concerned about how muddy the course might be, but to my delight the trail was in perfect condition. The course is mostly singletrack with some rolling hills and occasionally opens up to a field section or two. The fast guys usually post laps somewhere around the 35 minute mark so I'm expecting a sub-two hour race for sure.

I'm a bit late in setting up my feeding area so I get a bad spot in line. 3rd row, yuck. Luckily I make my way into the 2nd row when we roll forward to the line. Our race is a full 31 riders strong and the first few miles of trail are pretty tight with no room to pass. The start to a race like this is crucial and a bad start can ruin a race, so I'm getting a bit nervous. The official gives us the 10 second warning and eventually the gun fires. I get a good jump and weasel my way into 3rd before the first corner. I don't know how I managed that from my position. Perhaps everyone else is a little nervous with the season's first race too?

Mountain bike races always start out HARD. Everyone's intensity is capped when trying to put time into the rider(s) behind them. Luckily I get into a good group and quickly become reasonably comfortable sitting in third place. About 5-10 minutes into the race, the three of us had put about 10-12 seconds into 4th place, which is pretty good for the start of the race. Soon, however, I notice a rider bridging up to us and I want to go faster. I let the lead rider know that there was a rider incoming, but he was already pegged so I looked for a spot to pass. I found a nice little hill and attacked up the left side into first place. I hammered for about a minute and quickly got a comfortable lead. At this point I'm pretty toasted, so perhaps I went a little too hard? :P

In this situation there's only one thing you can do in a mountainbike race: settle into a rhythm and be as fast and efficient as you can. Now that I'm all alone, I can start thinking about my riding and not worry so much about other riders. As far as the bike goes, so far, so good. It's done everything I've asked of it. As with my initial ride, I definately still feel planted in corners and traction has never been a problem. I'm also getting more accustomed to the handling and don't really think about making the bike turn anymore, which is probably a good thing. However, a bad thing is the rider that was bridging is now in 2nd place and catching me fast.

At this point I'm nearing the field section, which is very similar to the kickapoo field section. It is somewhat rutted, with a smooth, main line about 6 inches wide and rough grass on either side. The surface is a mixture of dirt and pea gravel and traction is somewhat limited. The speeds are relatively high in this section so control and precision are key. I did this same race last year and distinctly remember having trouble keeping up with the leaders in it. The 2nd place rider catches me on a short uphill that I only tempoed up. I could have climbed it faster, but in a 2 hour races efficiency is key. I gambled and decided to save the energy. At the top of the hill he's obviously more gassed from bridging and climbing than I am, so I keep the heat on. We ride together for about 5 minutes and then I make a little test-acceleration. Gone. Cool.

Right after the field section is a long downhill followed by a series of the harder climbs in the lap. At the top of the hill my gap is up to about 15 seconds or so. My guess is the other guy cracked pretty hard; after all, the bottom of a hill is the last place you want to be in the red at. All alone again, I re-set the cruise control and race against the clock. Half of a lap in the books.

The next 20 minutes was mostly uneventful. I made a small mistake in a switchback downhill and had to unclip, but otherwise the lap went rather smoothly. I started seeing some Pro/Elite stragglers, so that gives me something to chase. Coming up to the finish line, I hear the announcer call my name (which is cool.) I check my time (39:23) and it's slower than I expected, but not by much. I grab a new bottle and prepare myself for (hopefully) a lonely 80 minutes of defending my position.

CHAPTER TWO: Disaster


Long story short, about halfway thorugh the lap I break my right pedal and am unable to clip in. *insert expletive assortment here.* Race Over. Last. DFL. Sitting on the side of the trail it's about 60 seconds before the next riders pass me. Double bummer.

I make the walk of shame up the officals booth and give them my number. Looking at the times I had a 53 second advantage over second place when I crossed the line. Results Here. After going back to the car I ended up being able to fix my cleat and acutally ended up riding two more laps, so at least I got my money's worth. Really, I couldn't have asked for a much of a better day. The weather was perfect, festival was fun and I got to eat some awesome food. As you can see, it doesnt take too much to keep me happy. Gene and I stayed in town and enjoyed ourselves for a few hours before making the trip home to Chambana. We even switched bikes for a full lap and I got to try the 29er vs. 26er back to back.

Conclusions:
-29'ers are still not slow
-26'ers are not dead.
-I still need to get a new saddle
-I am going back to foam grips
-Riding a hardtail requires a lot more standing
-I'm not as out of shape as I thought
-I am investing in race tires. The stock tires on the bike offer unlimited traction it seems, but I want something a little lighter and with a little less rolling resistance. I'm looking at the NoTubes Raven currently.
-The handling woes of a 29er can be overcome once you get used to it.
-My back currently misses my full suspension bike, but that will likely go away later in the season.
-My blogs entries are too long.

Hopefully I'll be back in full force in two weeks for a rematch. That's if I survive finals, though.

Holy 29er batman!

This past Sunday I finally got out my new moutain bike, a 2009 Gary Fisher Paragon. I was previously riding/racing a 26" full suspension bike so this was a big change for me. I rode at the bike at the Kickapoo state park mountain bike trails, a trail system with which I am intimately familiar. I was generally pleased with how the bike performed and definately came away with a few surprises, both good and bad.

First thing that I noticed was that the position of the bike was pleasantly familiar to what I have been racing the past 4 years. Although the bike is physically longer due to the larger wheels, the wheelbase is actually the same as most 26" bikes which I confirmed by meauring when I got mine. Once rolling, it is easy to see what everyone talks about with 29ers. Rolling resistance over rough surfaces is very noticibly reduced. So far so good.

Getting further into the singletrack, my initial excitement begins to tame down a bit. It becomes apparent that this bike definitely handles differently than my old race rig. Acceleration is admittedly not as snappy as my other bikes, espeially not my SS hardtail. Also the cornering is a bit more labored. I wouldn't say the bike corners slower (in fact the just opposite as I'll discuss shortly) but changing directions definately takes more rider input and during the first 30 minutes of riding I consistently found myself overcooking corners. As such, I would say the bike "feels" slow, if that makes any sense. Also the really tight switchbacks require more concentration to negotiate with the bigger wheels.

As I got more familiar with the handling of the bike I started pushing its limits a bit more. Now I'm having fun. For whatever reason this bike can corner HARD. There really is a traction increase over my old setup. I quickly found that the harder I rode the bike the better it responded. I simply cannot get over how planted it feels in the corners and the bike inspiress confidence to go even faster. If I can corner faster I have to accelerate less at the corner exit and will save energy and go faster. Cool.

Climbing was amazing with the new bike. I made it up all the climbs, including the new in the new downhill section (which is looking great. Good job KMBC!) I attribute this solely to the size of the wheels. In no other place is the benefit of the larger diamter of the wheels more apparent than on the slow, bumpy uphills. I'm not even in good shape and I climbed all these more effortlessly than I can remember in recent times. Double cool.

I don't have much saddle time yet, but I think this bike has the potential to be faster than my previous machine. Hopefully the handling woes go away as I get more experience with the new characteristics. I'm pretty sure I can save over a pound in wheel weight with a new set of wheels/tires which I'll want for racing anyway. This should help make it a bit snappier.

CONCLUSIONS:
-29ers are not slow.
-29ers are not superbikes, you still have to ride hard to go fast.
-I want lighter wheels/tires to make the bike snappier.
-I want a new saddle to make my butt happier.
-The benefit of a 29er will depend on the type of course and the skill/fitness of the rider.
-I'm still working out the bugs on my bike.
-I need to buy lots of tires and experiment with them.
-I need to ride more (out of shape).
-I don't think I'll miss my full suspension bike.
-I need to lube my chain.
-I need to help with a KMBC trail maintenance day. I was blown away at the effot put into the new section and I think they did a really good job with it.

If all goes to plan I'll be heading out to my first mtb race this saturday. I haven't decided if I'll do the DINO race or head down to Missouri. I'll follow up with my post-race impressions of the bike. -Nick

BIKE SETUP
19" stock paragon except:
-1x9 Shimano XT drivetrain 32t /11-34
-wheels setup tubeless.
-24psi front / 26 psi rear
-23.7 lbs w/o pedals

First!

Apparently someone is actually reading this blog--very happy news to the writers union, which had been threatening a strike. We enjoy having an outlet to discuss bikes, shop stuff, and cycling in general in a what we hope is a comfortable environment (e.g. your couch or big comfy desk chair). However, we would like to note that this is not actually a public forum, but an extension of the shop itself. We encourage comments, discussion, and critique (or criticism), but just as with the physical location, we will not allow content that we feel could be offensive, even if it was not intended to be. (The exception is for those who are offended by censorship, for whom the entire blog is now offensive.) Everybody cool with that? Ok, great. Moving on.

A young woman came in to purchase a pair of tubes last week, and while checking out at the front desk she chuckled at the 1(one)World2(two)Wheels pamphlets we have on display. What's funny about saving the world, you might ask. How about printing pamphlets about it. On 10(ten)% recycled paper at that. 2 (two) points to you for noticing that, madam. I'll give you a patch kit next time you're visit ;)

The Shower Test

Remember when "waterproof" meant "water shall not pass." Well wake up: it's 2009, and your contents may be hot after heating. Perhaps even "water proof" has been assigned a legal definition of which I am unaware. Anyway, a recent constructive comment regarding the water proofness of Axiom bags prompted a grammatical discussion that required three bike shop employees, a shower, and a cat to resolve (props to Michael for being on my side):

BTW, all reviews on the internet overstate how the Axiom Panniers are NOT water proof.

Since we handed down a split decision on the meaning of this sentence, we rented some time in the Shire Shower Test Facilities. This is the same test that Klaus was so kind to perform for me two winters ago when I was looking for a new messenger bag. (I bought a Bailey Works, and it changed my life.) It's simple: stuffed the bag with paper, put it in the shower for a few minutes (yes, with the water on), and inspect the contents. See photo documentation below:





























Results: After a nervous five minutes of spraying the bag from every, we ordered a cat scan, which came back negative for H2(two)O contamination in the main pocket. The small outer pocket, on the other hand, accumulated about 4 (four) cm of water (as shown), all of which entered through the zipper. Perhaps Axiom was trying to integrate a Camelbak for long distance desert touring. If so, excellent work. Regardless, don't put your wallet in there. Otherwise, Kitty says paws up.

Things we learned: don't believe anything you read online. Also, the Typhoon bags are waterproof (at least when like new...we'll see if that changes with use). Because they are made by Axiom, you cannot dispute this. Thank you, Axiom, for restoring a small, dry pocket of sanity to this wet and wild world.

Finally, Anona, Nick, and I had the day off, so we stopped by the shop to see if anyone showed up for the Tuesday night ride. Nobody did, but there was a full crew for the basic mechanical class. And the coolest thing was that 2 (two) people actually rode their bikes there! Good work, students. You're learnding!

I can feel my toes, eh?

Last week I updated the website with what I consider a rough guide to one of life's greatest mysteries: how to lock a bike. As usual, I proceeded to stumble across a plethora of lock related information on the internet. Begin stream of consciousness:

Watched a Dutch video on YouTube in which "reformed bike thief" broke all kinds of locks (in less than 30 seconds) in an effort to inform the public of the inferiority of inexpensive bike locks. I took notes. Found the blog Lock Your Bike, which is about as niche as it gets. Saw a link to Bike Snob. Got sick of reading archives and found a movie (video? film??) by the Neistat (nīs'-tat) Brothers, which reminded me of a video I'd seen linked from The Show with Zefrank. Buy a good lock, kids, and this won't happen to you:



Thought about the time I stole my bike from in front of the Inn. Looked at OnGuard locks online (no lead!) and contemplated life in the big city.

Anona and I just found out that it's difficult to say "wheel wreath." Try it.

A gent stopped by the shop with cards for goingslowly.com The website is basically a blog of sorts written by a couple riding their bikes around the world. They're in Britain right now, and I'm excited to see photos of them riding through the chunnel.

A few safety issues for biker types: make sure your helmet is on the right way. Provided to my left, your right, is an example of a helmet that is on backwards. The webbey type retainer thing goes to the back.

Secondly, LED's are fantastic. They're highly efficient, are almost impossible to break, and are very light. As such, they make for perfect bike lights. They're also very directional, which means the light shines where it's pointed, and not really anywhere else. If your taillight is pointed at your rear wheel, it's not going do much for your visibility, unless you're on a tallbike. With a well aimed light, you'll be visible from a mile.