Thursday, October 31, 2013

Fatty in the house for real

I got my fat bike today, its more than a little embarrassing just how much I have been looking forward to this.

I got it unpacked and built pretty quickly and soon after that I got the parts swapped over - I bought some "diet pill" parts for it, they probably took 3 pounds off its weight. As it sits now my bathroom scale says its around 35 pounds, which is pretty good for a fatty bike.

It looks great and the quick ride around the yard was cool. I can't wait to get it in the woods, but that probably won't happen until Saturday based on the rain forecast for tomorrow (even though I have the day off!).

I'll get some shots in the wild and a ride impression up once I get a few miles on it. 


Monday, October 28, 2013

Sunday ride

I joined Hasenmesch's group ride on Sunday at Nassahegon in Burlington. I've ridden there a few times in the past, but always solo trying to pick my way through. Which means I spent a lot of time on fireroads and frustrated. I got a proper tour yesterday riding almost 18 miles.

I pulled into the parking lot and there were six very fit looking guys in spandex with an average body fat percentage in the single digits. I thought I was going to be sucking wind big time. It turned out they were mostly road riders who dabbled in mountain biking, so the pace was pretty reasonable throughout. Though they didn't seem to slow down at all, same speed beginning to end.

I was the most technically proficient rider on that ride (rare occurrence), I gotta say it was good for my psyche to be the only one who made a few sections. When I'm gasping for breath on some of these fast rides I just don't have anything in the tank to tackle the harder stuff. 

All in all a great ride and apres beer session was pretty good too, I got to taste Ghandi-Bot beer, which apparently is one of the top rated beers in the world - at the risk of sounding like a beer newbie, it was too hoppy for me. I like a little hop, but...

It was a really good ride with the majority of the riding on smooth, curvy trails with a few smallish hills. We hit a few technical bits that were a lot of fun too, I suspect there is more techy out there that we didn't hit.

On Lou Reed's passing

Lou Reed passed away this past week, its always a reflective moment when someone who has helped mold me passes. I am far from a Lou Reed fanatic, frankly there's some of his stuff I just can't listen to.

I listened to a lot of Velvet Underground in college, but two of Lou Reed's solo albums really hit me at certain times in my life.

Rock and Roll Animal. Yeah I know everyone knows the version of Sweet Jane from this album (and it is a great version), but that whole album was really formative for me. I owned this as an LP and I'm fairly certain I wore it out. I suppose in the grand scheme of every album ever produced its not exactly ground breaking, but it was the first time I really understood the power of music and words. How you could create a song that had a message and the music was part of the conveyance of that message. "Heroin" off that album is one of those songs that combines in an amazing way. "Its my wife and its my life", man, what a powerful statement.

New York. There are a lot of concept albums out there, but this one is both so personal and descriptive. You really get the feeling of a gritty New York City, where "normal" people struggle to make things work. I remember someone asking me one time what my favorite song off that album was, I thought what a ridiculous question that is. You can't take any song out of that album, it would be like looking at a Picasso and saying "which color on that painting is your favorite?". The Statue of Bigotry indeed.

Generally speaking I like the way Lou Reed was able make not just a sad song, there's thousands of those, but make a depressing song, that's a lot harder. 


Saturday, October 26, 2013

Fatty on the way

I got the call on Friday that my new fatty is on the way. According to UPS it will be delivered on Thursday. Pretty excited to get not only a new bike, but a new type of bike. I guess that's how I look at this bike. While my hardtail is just like my RIP9, but less comfortable, this is an entirely new type of bike, no comparisons to other bikes. Its sort of like how my road bike doesn't compete with my mountain bike, two completely different animals.

Of course there will be pictures and a build post in the blog. Now I have to try and take Friday off, hmmm.

Friday, October 18, 2013

On aging, playing music and riding fast

I had the opportunity to ride with the Bikerag guys this week. I used to ride with them just about every week, but due to schedules I just have not been able to meet up with them. They are fast, very fast riders. I have never truly been in front on that group, it has always been a struggle to keep up. I don't mind a struggle, its good to push yourself. On this week's ride I did ok, I was very definitely last in line and the other two guys had to wait for me at intersections.

As I was pushing to keep up I had this simple thought go through my head "why?". Why am I pushing myself like this? I really enjoy riding, but do I need to push this hard, ever? I think I've lost some of that edge, that desire to ride at my upper limit. I am in pretty good shape right now, so its not a matter of being slow because I'm carrying extra weight or not riding. Maybe I'm gaining wisdom. HA!

I am going to push myself to go out on a few more Bikerag rides to investigate this further. I want to know if this was just a fleeting thought or if I'm really done with riding super fast. Time will tell I guess.

This kind of brings me to another moment of thought in band the last few practices. I really enjoy singing knowing full well I am not a good singer. I've noticed that the more I focus on my concerns around not being very good the worse my singing gets, its a vicious cycle. In those moments when I'm just playing and singing not thinking about anything, and in the moment, my singing is not that bad. We've been doing some recording and scrutinizing my playing and singing over and over probably is not doing me any favors.

I guess a long winded way of saying you are who you think you are, the trick is in understanding who you think you are. Its so easy to allow negative thoughts to define you.

Monday, October 14, 2013

Fatty on a skinny

I have had to resist the urge to ride the loaner fat bike, I just don't want to wreck anything on it or wear anything out. This is great as it means I really like the bike and when I get mine it should see some use, unlike my hardtail which I have no desire to ride at all.

I took it out and rode the new log ride. Lots of fun.








More on Lyme

The symptoms I felt on Friday seemed to have completely subsided by late Saturday/Sunday. I talked to one of my friends and my brother both of whom have had a couple of bouts with Lyme about their experiences. I think after talking to them I think the symptoms could be surfacing due to my physical exhaustion. Both times I had the symptoms in the last month or so were days after I had done some pretty extreme physical exercise. So I guess for now I'm going with the idea that my body can fight off the Lyme until I get really tired then the symptoms appear. I'm taking the Doxy through its course and hope this will be the end of it.

Saturday, October 12, 2013

A little log ride action

We found a new log ride at the nearby riding spot. Its pretty wide and on the ground, so its one of the easier log rides I know of.

Still its fun to ride the log.









Lyme in the house

I found a deer tick embedded in my chest about a month and a half ago. 3 weeks ago I had a wicked fever and felt terrible, unfortunately those symptoms came on a Saturday, the day before I was going to Germany, I tried to go to a walk in clinic on Sunday morning, but the line was just too long to get me in before my flight.

I slowly felt better throughout the week in Germany and by the time I got home (and regained my sleep) I was pretty much back to 100%. This week I started feeling crappy again, same symptoms, fever, chills, headache and body aches.

I went to the doctor and they said I had enough of the symptoms to warrant a round of Doxy. I have no idea if I have Lyme or not, the doctor said the tests are so unreliable that its not worth getting the blood test.

Yesterday I laid on the couch all day, I can't recall the last time I was that sick. Hopefully this is it.

Kind of a crappy way to use a vacation day!

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

My first Fatty ride

MojoK from Bikerag was nice enough to loan my his Pugsley for a ride or two, my thoughts below:

The ride was really fun, was it as much fun as my FS? probably not, but it was way more fun than my HT. I can't wait for mine to get here. The bike is really heavy, pulling it out of the car was a little frightening, I was thinking this was going to ride like a pigsley, not a pugsley. Surprisingly that was not the case, once you get those tires spinning, it really doesn't ride like a heavy bike. I guess since most of the weight is in the wheels, once you get those spun up you have momentum on your side.

The good thing about riding at Crandalls is I know every turn and rock, so its a good place for me to try out a new bike. Rock crawling is very cool, maximum traction and enough cushion to keep it from being painful. Corners were very fun, its really surprising how responsive the bike is, you would think with that rotating mass it wouldn't respond well to input, not the case, it leaned into corners very nicely. I didn't quite trust the tires enough, but that will come with time. When you got the thing really moving the gyro effect of all that mass spinning was very noticeable. I can't really describe it, but when you are upright and cranking along at speed you can feel the gyro, kind of a weird feeling. On technical stuff it was a lot of fun, though its slow fun. If you charge into a rock garden you are quickly reminded that you're on a rigid bike (its easy to forget that).

All in all, a really excellent ride that confirmed my decision to buy the bike.

Sunday, October 6, 2013

Fat bikes, more than you want to know.

My back up bike is a Kona Big Unit, much as I like going around saying "I have a Big Unit", I rarely ride the bike, and by rarely I mean never. I was reminded of just how far I'll got to avoid riding it when I had to make a decision to replace my rear derailleur on the RIP (I ripped the XT off it last week). I could either ride the HT this weekend and wait for a mail order derailleur or pay LBS prices for a lower quality derailleur. The logical thing to do would be to order the part, but instead I bought the SLX at the LBS (acronym overload for non-bikers).

In a completely different stream of thought (though highly related, just wait for it) two of my riding friends have fat bikes that they ride as their "regular" mountain bikes, or at least ride them occasionally in the dirt. Every time I see them riding these things they have big smiles on their faces. I always say I ride for one reason - fun, and those fat bikes look like fun.

So I put those two things together and thought, why don't I sell the Big Unit and buy a fat bike to use as my spare bike. The added bonus of having a fat bike is that on those three or four days when there's too much snow to ride a regular bike, I can go out with the fat bike. How is that for justification for a new bike? I've almost got it to the "I'm stupid for not having done this already!" stage.

As with anything bike related, the options and prices for fat bikes are practically unlimited, which is the complete opposite of what is stocked at the LBS. I've spent limited time on a fat bike, so this is a decision that will need to be made virtually rather than through test rides. I spent some time looking at what's out there and came up with this list of bikes (sorted by price):

Bike                          Price   Tires    Brakes                 Comments
Motobecane            $1000 4”     Shimano M445L  Ship date unknown
On One                    $1449 4”     Avid Elixir 1     Single ring in front
Surly pugsley          $1650 4”     Avid BB7             Narrower rim than ops
Surly Pugsley Ops   $1650 4”     Avid BB7            Ops has wider rim
Salsa Mukluk 3       $1750 4”     Avid BB7            Stock? can't find any on line    
Specialized Fatboy $2000 5”     Tektro Draco 2    December ship date (lightest?)
Surly Moonlander  $2350 5”     Avid BB7            More upright, long chainstays

There are obviously a lot of other differences between these bikes besides tires and brakes, but I feel like most of the rest of the tech choices are fairly benign. Derailleurs, cranksets and wheels are not going to make or break the bike for me. There is this concept of being able to run 29er wheels on a fat bike frame, some fat bikes have the correct rear wheel spacing to allow for that, it's interesting, but not part of my criteria

Also there are a lot more fat bikes out there, these are the reasonably priced ones. There's a brand called Fatback that puts together a sub-30lb fat bike, but the pricing, whew - $3250! There's also a Salsa Beargrease - carbon fiber frame, another Yikes! inducing price.

I particularly hate a bad set of brakes, so that gives me pause with almost any of the bikes above that don't have BB7's. I prefer hydraulic brakes over mechanicals, but I'll take BB7s over crappy hydros any day, to my eyes all those hydros above are of the crap variety. I do have a set of BB7s in the parts bin, so I guess I can always slap those on if I don't like the ones that come with the bike.

Tire width comes into the picture perhaps as one of those bigger is always better kind of things. 4" tires were kind of the standard for a few years, but now a few bikes have started showing up with the ability to handle 5" tires. I've read mixed things about the wider tires - most have to do with handling, I'm on the fence there.

Weight is certainly a consideration, but I think we're talking pretty close to 35lbs for any of these machines, so I'm not really worried about a few pounds here or there.

I guess right now the On One is looking pretty good, with the Fatboy in a close second. The pricing on the On One seems reasonable - yeah the Motobecane is cheaper, but that's not in stock and no delivery dates are being floated, so I don't even know if that's a realistic choice. The Fatboy is supposed to be shipping in December, which would give me some time to raise the funds, assuming my LBS can actually get one. The single ring in front on the On One gives me pause though, with the terrain around here I think having a granny would be a be plus.

So there you have it, I say brakes are important and then pick two bikes with crap hydros.

I'll spend a few days ruminating and reading some more, maybe I'll call the LBS about that Fatboy. I hate to feel like I'm jumping on a bandwagon and this feels more than a little bit like that, oh well.

Friday, October 4, 2013

Expensive ride

I didn't plan well yesterday so I headed out for a solo crank at Crandalls. I've been concentrating a bit on that place, just to make sure the trails get enough usage to keep them in play over the winter. Some of those trails see a LOT of use, others not so much.

I had a good ride and was just about done when I came across the Thursday night Hale group doing their own crank. I rode with them for a bit until I sucked in a stick and broke my derailleur off. I thought I broke my hanger, but upon looking at it today I see that the $90 derailleur saved the day and protected that $18 hanger. Whew.


I am now faced with a weekend (or more) of riding my HT or forking over $90 for an SLX derailleur locally. I can get an XT on line for the same price. I guess I'll take the SLX and stick with the FS bike.

I have been seriously thinking about selling the HT and picking up a fat bike. I'll see how things go, I guess. I never ride the HT, I think I would get more use out of a fat bike, even if its just on the occasional winter ride, I don't even get that on my HT.





Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Slacking on the blog

Wow, I have been slacking on the blog posts! All six of you who read this must be disappointed!

I'll blame work, I had two trips in the last two weeks, these trips not only made my weeks hectic, they also made me cram in weekend activities, leaving little time for blogging apparently.

I have to really work to get rides in when I travel, but I've been keeping up pretty well. 

A quick summary of events:
  • Did a great ride with the NEMBA advanced group on Sunday. I would say by the end of the 17 mile ride everyone was pretty well whipped. 
  • Spent a week in Germany for work, sounds exciting, but it was pretty much a standard work trip, I saw a lot of the inside of hotels and conference rooms, not much else
  • Visited my uncle on a trip to Atlanta few weeks ago, haven't seen him in probably a dozen years, great to catch up with him and his family.
  • Finished stacking my firewood for the year, always a great day when that's done. The weather has been warm and dry, hopefully it will dry out some of that wet stuff the guy dropped off.
  • Broke the axle in my Hope hub, I'm no engineer, but its a pretty poor design and I don't expect the replacement axle to last much longer than the one that broke.
  • Found a spare wheel at Cutting Edge in Berlin, what a great bike shop, it felt like old times going in there and talking bikes at a bike shop, what a concept
  • Anger Buddy started a new recording project with two songs, we have all the base tracks done for one of the songs, we're using Reaper to mix this time around - tons of fun.