your daily bicycle log

I'd go for new lugs, If you tap them out there might not be enough metal to support the clamp force.

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now that i have daylight, the threads go quite deep, and engaged the bolt smoothly and securely. i really think its ok.

excellent scotchbrite technique: take 2.5 feet of 2" wide duct tape, affix piece of scotchbrite 2" x 10" to center, fold sticky tails of tape over themselves. loop over frame tube to be brushed. now use shoeshine buffing technique. you can get all of the major tubes done quickly and evenly this way. use small pad 1/2" x 4" for smaller bits. if you are inside, put down a drop cloth, there is some gray/black ti dust generated.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5129/5206931483_05f31940d0_z.jpg

riding on thanksgiving is amazing. absolutely no one out on the streets.

For reals. It was clear and cloudless here today too. Soooooo perfect.

f u cali

http://i55.tinypic.com/2uqbozr.jpg

did my usual thanksgiving ride-- 35 degrees, not a cloud. 2 hours on lots of singletrack around town, really really great. some kitted out guy buzzed my tire to pass me (i couldn't hear him because i was d-_-b). i then shadowed him up and down and around the loop for a really nice hard 15 minute interval.

Finally got my good bike back! Fixed again & it feels great!

Below zero this morning (celsius style obv) and I often find that saps my energy, which is never great in the mornings anyway. But it's sunny and beautiful and I really didn't mind being on my bike.

Last night I took my broken fixie apart entirely apart from the BB and headset so I can send it to Bob Jackson to be repaired and resprayed. I've never stripped (most of) a bike before, it felt, I don't know, manly.

Saw Bill Walton riding out on the road today! He was just entering Fiesta Island (A place in San Diego's Mission Bay that is a 4 mile totally-flat loop that lots of local riders use for training) while I was exiting. He was riding a freakishly tall Zinn bike and wearing a Flouro-Yellow fred jacket. Pretty rad.

SLP, I undergradded right over that bluff from that pic! memoriessssss....

Against better judgement, on Thanksgiving day i did a 13.4 mile, 4400ft. hill climb atop a snow shrouded mountain.

I thought my fitness was regaining but about an hour into the climb my HR did a strange 30bpm jump (to my max!)... was it the 30F degree temp? the appearance of snow on the sides of the road? the elevation/lack of oxygen? so weird... a steady grade, my pace was a consistently sluggish 9mph. after about 8mins it jumped back down to 155bpm but it scared the fuck out of me.

I found out I had a broken spoke on my rear wheel which, after a 52 minute descent back to the parking lot, I probably should have done something about. /stupid n00b

I've been dormant since the Hill Climb at the start of November: prior to today I'd only been on the bike once in the previous 20 days (and that was only a 16-mile ride). I thought I'd better get a ride in today just to keep myself in the habit, otherwise I might have drifted into the easy option of staying in until Spring.

Winter has arrived early. It was -5C (23F) at Heathrow last night, so probably a bit colder round here, and (according to the Met Office) while I was out this morning the temperature rose from -3C to a roaring -0.8C. My face and eyes were really stinging when I set off, but I managed to get going and forget the discomfort after about 15 minutes.

I was on my way home, an hour into the ride, in Epping Forest, when I realised my back wheel had punctured. I had to ride on the rim until I could find a bit of pavement to park up on and try to fix things. I was there for half an hour, getting colder and colder and colder. I could feel the shard of something poking through the tyre, but couldn't get it out - I needed some tweezers, but had to resort to gouging away with my keys. Then the valve on the spare tube somehow came apart, with the top trapped inside the dust cap. This took forever to sort out with my numb oily fingers. By the time I got going again I was shivering and the icy wind felt like someone was drilling into my bones.

I don't have a Garmin, just a normal Cateye computer, but I've just got myself an iPhone and downloaded this app: http://www.abvio.com/cyclemeter/

It plots my route and records my speed and climbing stats and stuff. I tried it out today, but somehow it turned itself off after ten seconds (which I only discovered when I stopped to fix the puncture), so I've only got data for the last 5-6 miles (ridden at low speed due to repeated traffic lights / icy roads / hypothermia).

I've worked out how to send this data from the phone to gmaps:
http://maps.google.com/?q=http://share.abvio.com/131f/8965/4cf1/9f67/Cyclemeter-Cycle-20101128-0942.kml

I've also managed to send myself a gpx file, which (I'm guessing) will contain the speed graph which I can view on my phone, but I don't have any software to open gpx files. What do I need to download?

pretty cool. still in search of perfect uploading log site.

Trying to decide if it is at all cycle-able out there tonight...

no way is it! remember you broke your elbow you maddie

After today, I think I'm going to give it a miss until the Arctic retreats back up north again. You two are in Scotland, aren't you? At least there's no snow down here yet.

it wasnt very cold today, like 42 deg, but with no sun and the wind, it felt ~icy~. i bailed on my intended route and headed home to watch football after 1.5 hrs.

scene out my window this morning
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cozen/5214977667/

I cycled!

It was fine.

easy 55k yesterday afternoon, trying to work on keeping cadence 80+. weather had been wet and windy earlier in day, but tights and overshoes was probably overdressing a tad in retrospect.

rode w/a friend over to the marin headlands today. beautiful day. in the 50s, low wind. i flagged a kitted out couple down to ask them how much further the road we were on went and after answering, he looked down at my feet, smirked and said "keep those things white, k?" i just whispered to myself, "i got them free w/the bike" :(

fucc da haters jax, i got my shoes primarily because they're white

I thought white was pro

that's what shasta told me to make me feel ok about them. maybe i looked like a dirt in my cut off shorts and other noncycling clothes

bingo

ya, comments in this article pretty much sum it up. if you wear white, you're claiming you're 733t

http://www.6yearsinaraincape.com/2009/12/21/i-have-always-personally-loved-the-black-shoes-on-the-bike-black-socks-too-but-as-of-late-the-euro-cool-thing-of-course-is-white-only-i-just-dont-like-it-havent-adopted-it-and-probably-w/

That site has the most retarded background colour scheme ever.

My shoes are grey, what does this say about me?

it says that you are a euro livin in America.

get some shoe covers for the winter months to prevent those white shoes from turning beige/gray.

also if you dress like a Fred prepare to get called out lol.

just be fast, the rest is commentary

mmmm spanish beef...

sent by my cousin, clemente buterol? did someone pop?

totes realize not a big deal for the weather hardmen, but for us californians this is pretty novel:
http://lh5.ggpht.com/_bkV80B63wT8/TO8HSawMRrI/AAAAAAAADQs/c9GonS6YrUc/100_6247.JPG

that's cute, shasta. here's a shot of my bike the ~day before~

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4147/5205910328_111e867a5c_z.jpg

whoa retro timestamp. what climb is that, hamilton?

13 deg F at the start of todays commute. it warmed up to 20 by the time i hit the office, but my feets feel like blocks of ice.
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singletrack from my thxgiving ride

http://i486.photobucket.com/albums/rr222/Chass3ur/thxgivin.jpg

Had the Golden Gate almost to myself riding back from Marin after sunset yesterday. Deluxe.

Gotta figure out more efficient routes, though, so I spend more time pushing myself and less time worrying about traffic and pedestrians.

yep, mt. hamilton:
http://lh3.ggpht.com/_bkV80B63wT8/TO8HeNs7tiI/AAAAAAAADRk/rL2X37_ILAg/100_6260.JPG

gbx, that can't be good for the bike!

dont worry it has fenders.

ha, no, it isn't. but all that piled up in the two hours i spent in a coffee shop!

lukas, i know this is corny, but i have friends that park at sports basement in the marina and just ride over to marin from there. once you're on the bridge, it's pretty much paths or less driven roads.

nah that sounds legit, i just need to buy a car eventually.

i have 3 equally travelled ways to get over there (i live in soma).

1. folsom down to embarcadero, through fisherman's warf (usually up north point), up and over fort mason to chrissy field. home free
2. market. wiggle. pan handle, gg park. arguello. presidio
3. polk to fisherman's warf. follow 1

oh man how many times have I ridden through that stupid wharf unaware of north point. thanks.

long and fast(er) today. tomorrow unemployment ends and i find out how motivated i really am.

while riding uphill on a section of singletrack on cx bike, i heard a new creak. "that's weird," i thought. i figured i could address it once home. very shortly thereafter, i gave a few hard pedal strokes and *crunch*, no further pedaling possible. the chainrings were a mess. the inner was egg shaped and collapsed inwards, chain tangled. so, i had been riding with one chainring bolt. at least, that's all that was holding this clump of allow together.

i undid the one bolt, removed both rings, then reinstalled the big ring. because the bolt was too long w/out an inner it was ~wobbly~. i hiked back to the top of the hill, and began coasting downhill toward home-- luckily it was about 600 ft elevation loss towards home. i was able to soft pedal the flat sections on my one chainring bolt, even rode about 100 ft uphill near finish. what a mess. ONE CHAINRING BOLT!

"alloy"

The snow and ice melted yesterday, so I went out for a gentle 25 miles this morning. I tried out that app again (this time managing to record the whole ride) and uploaded the gpx file to http://www.ridewithgps.com. I've compared the data from the app with the data on my cycle computer and it's in the same ballpark, but not identical: my computer says I went 24.41 miles with a maximum speed of 30.5mph, the app says 24.35 miles with a max of 29.8mph. It records a significantly slower average speed (15.9mph instead of 16.7mph), presumably because it has a ride time more than six minutes longer (the cycle computer only records data when you're moving - I guess the app keeps going when I'm stuck at traffic lights and also after I've finished until I press the 'stop' button).