WHAT TO DO WITH A FEW HOURS TO BURN....

View of Boulder below from Flagstaff Mountain

Fine Saturday morning with only one chore scheduled.  Drop off the black pony for a Colorado pothole sponsored front end alignment at Century Chevrolet in Broomfield.  Eight AM appointment so I won't bother the bride to pick me up. Weekends are not designed to sit around a waiting room even if there is free coffee.  This will be the last chance to road ride before spending a week in Florida with Mickey and Minnie.

Throw the Road Project in the back, check into the  dealership wearing Spandex and I'll figure it out from there. "Couple of hours at least".   Might be called anti-social in some circles but the beauty of riding on your own means no debates between different mindsets and no limitations other than your own.  Throwing the mental dart, it landed on the Flagstaff Mountain climb in Boulder.

About 20 miles of traffic riddled roadways through Louisviille, and Baseline road into Boulder and we're looking at the base of the popular City of Boulder Open Space. Freak'n wind had me in middle ring on the South Boulder Road descent just to stay upright and in the teens.

A collection of Boulder healthy people line up on the mile long entrance climb from Broadway.  I passed couples and guys older than me.  A  dozen  20's something riders dressed in Garmin Transitions jerseys that were sure they are the next Tyler Hamilton pass me.

Three quarters up the climb I pay for shifting to the cheater third front ring/granny combo with a major chain suck.   The rear wheel locked up skidding from the sickley 8mph pace to an abrupt stop.  Thanks to the 2 old guys I'd past for stopping and helping me wedge the final link from the Ritchey carbon wheel's bladed spokes.

Return trip wind fight was worse than the westward route and climb.  Battled crosswinds down US 287 back to Broomfield and was glad to roll in the dealership and get in the XM Radio and AC equipped cab.  Hot bath, beer and nap.  Greek dinner in Golden tonight. 
Beat the parking fees on Flagstaff by not driving.  Wonder if Mickey and Minnie have a tandem?

Cadence On a MTB Ride?

Riding the Yeti Road Project with a cadence computer set up allowed me to have a general idea of what the pedals were doing in the RPM department on extended road rides.  The spin class Nazis instructor always harped on 120 RPM + efforts.... but what does that mean for an endurance mountain biker?

After a medial meniscus tear surgery in 2007 and daily reminders of aging knees, I was curious about what the Topeak cadence ready computer could tell be about how I was treating the knees when ascending 8-15% grades on training rides and what methods I need to employ to stay ahead of the use vs. pain/damage game.

The 2010 Yeti 575 weighs in at 27.4 pounds with the Conroy approved Race package. While focusing on a respectable Firecracker 50 finish, rides center around continuous climbing and coaxing the quads and hamstrings to getting accustomed to pushing for up to 7 hours at a time.

Sunday's ride starting with a crankset punishing tour of Hall Ranch in Lyons via the "rock garden" and a lazy lap around the Hall homestead lollipop that was a 9 mile warm up.  Only 1 rock fight along the nasty trail.  Rock won. Knee, elbow and left ass cheek bear evidence of  the battle.  That will heal and I'm ready for some endurance training.

Returning back to the Hwy. 7 trail head allowed me to drop the empty Powerbar Sun Tea Endurance bottle and do a quick blood glucose level check. 130....good to go.  Out on the road to the short 2 mile trip along the Old St. Vrain Road to the Heil Ranch connector trail head and we're climbing single track for the next 45 minutes.  Fruita riding comes to mind as you wind through the conifer laden rocky landscapes with limited visibility on the tight turns and switchbacks.  Old farmstead and abandoned 1960's jalopy make the ride interesting.

After topping out on the Heil loop, we descend to the Lefthand Canyon trailhead and visit the bio-friendly outhouse, eat a Powerbar and head back up the 2.5-mile Wapiti Trail, the 2.6-mile Ponderosa Loop Trail, the 3.0-mile Wild Turkey Trail, and then on to the 5.2-mile Picture Rock Trail return.  Bottom line is that we were doing 4 1/2 hours pedal time and 34 miles of no rest 5,600 ft. elevation climbing. 

Mountain bike cadence and endurance.Studies have been done on the subject and Bio-mechanical expert Todd Carver offered the following words of wisdom. "We did a cadence study on Sugarloaf  Mtn Road in 1999 and had 15 roadies climb it with 2 different gearing options. 1st trial was with traditional road gearing. 2nd trial we swapped their rear cassette and rear der for a MTB setup. Results: on average, they were the same speed. But there was some variability and some of the larger riders were faster when using the MTB gearing. The climbers seemed to be unaffected.  Conclusion was that individual riders need to know their "RPM zones" that work best for them and use them. 

The Topeak Panorama V16 cadence indicator coached me to maintain my personal best climbing pace in middle chainring and granny at 90-95 RPMs. I can do this all day.

When asked about effects on knee stress at low RPMs while climbing, Carver said "Conventional wisdom says to spin. But sometimes I see some injuries just from really high cadences just due to the repetition.".  As a Quality Assurance professional, I know that you can not manage what you can not measure.  The Topeak cadence set-up on the MTB allows you to measure and manage your output for best performance. Cadence is courtesy of the swingarm mounted sensor and its relationship to the crankarm mounted magnet.

The V16 offers data on current speed, average speed, max speed, pace, current RPMs, average RPMs, max RPMs, ambient temperature, ride time, and accumulated ride time.  A clock, stopwatch, total distance reading review and the accumulated distance  data completes the package.  Your choice of metric or English units and a low battery indicator.

The massive 2 foot square instruction sheet gives details in several languages and provides a wheel circumfrence chart for setting the computer to your bike.  Always use the method "B" of rolling your wheel 360 degrees and multiplying by Pi to determine this dimension.  Wheel speed info is funneled from the wheel mounted magnet through the wireless transmitter.

WRENCHING FOR A CAUSE

Over the past few years I've found out it's almost as fun working on well built race bikes as it is riding them.  Using some really good tools and working on higher level components makes the job easier and usually ends up with better results.  Cat 1 team mate Evie had a grocery list of issues with her Race level  ASR and I offered to run through it piece by piece and let her concentrate on training (since I'm not).

Overall, the '07 or '08 ride was in good shape.  DT Swiss wheels were still running true with no bearing issues but the cassette engagement mechanism shows some hostility later while under big ring load.  Likewise the Fox fork and rear shock showed no signs of leakage, serious scratches or wear.  Just dropped a little air pressure based on the manufacturer's recommendations and confirmed topside Float Fluid.  Headset was well, -set. 

Here's what we ended up doing to smooth the ride.

BOTTOM BRACKET NOISES

Bottom bracket was replaced with a brand new XTR level bracket left out of a press in carbon frame build.  Teflon taped threads to insure good thread engagement.  Bearing adjustment and crankarm bolts set per Dr. Shimano.  Theory is the creaking left with the old BB.

SHIFTS LIKE SH&%

Bike shop trick is to buy miles of  5mm cable housing and use it for both brake and shifters.  New correctly sized Jagwire 4mm housings full-length coverage installed along with new cables and minor re-routing.  High/Low derailleur adjustments were good.  Slap on a new SRAM 991 nickel plated chain and we're back to actually having 27 usable gears!

BRAKES=FRICTION......FRICTION=WEAR

Stoppers got a DA sanding on the rotor surfaces, caliper re-centering, new pads and a couple of  un-needed inches of  front hose removed.  Shimano Rotor Locks torque down just like  the cassette lock ring and the Topeak D-Torque-DX torque wrench gives an audible "beep" when we hit 40 N/m.

ALL THINGS RUBBER

The DT Swiss XR 4.2D rims have tubeless tire rim strips and and valves installed.  Most of the tire sealant had evaporated or squirted out sandburr punctures.  A lightly used pair of Mountain King 2.2s were mounted along with a healthy dose of Stan's sealant. Thank god for compressors.

A Topeak bottle cage replaced the generic alloy holder and a new set of Ergon grips have been prescribed before Nathrop.  A pair of Crank Brothers SLs replaced the SPD pedals.

Go get'm Evie!!