After talking to two bike shops yesterday, it was obvious that the fully wireless cadence and speed monitoring bike computers (or cyclometers, I’ve been seeing them referred to as) isn’t as fully baked as one would think. Quite frankly, I don’t see the challenge. It’s just little radios, and folks — R/C fans, etc. — have been doing little radios for a long time. Apparently the rub is that the signals aren’t quite strong enough to ensure transmission to the head unit, the data is way stale by the time it’s displayed on the head unit (as much as three seconds) and there’s a lot of cross chatter with other cyclists’ wireless units.

OK, so no wireless for me…. for now. 🙂

I decided to go with the Cateye Astrale 8. The web oozes over this thing, and I though the guy at Ghisallo was going to come undone talking about it. He had the admiration and enthusiasm for this device as though he’d built it himself. And, in the end, Ghisalo was about $11 cheaper than West County for it, so it was a sale.

As I would discover, plonking down $45 for the unit was the fun part. Installation was a bear.

First, for my bike, the cable is just a little short when configured in a typical fashion — spiraling the excess cable down one of the shifting or brake cables. There just wasn’t any excess to pull that off with. I mounted the speed sensor on the rear tire, which went pretty well, although finding a point where the sensor and magnet were separated by 5mm or less was a struggle. Then I mounted the cadence sensor near one of the cranks, and discovered just the opposite problem — finding someplace to mount the sensor where the crank wouldn’t clonk it everytime. Once mounted, I attached the magnet to the crank. Getting the magnet and sensor aligned here was incredibly critical, and took a couple of tries before I got data to the head unit.

It took 75 minutes to get it installed. Ugh. But it’s there, seems to be working, and is now ready to accompany me on the big rides this weekend. I also installed my gnome (pictures to come). If the Travelocity commercials have taught me anything, you can’t just go travelling anywhere without a gnome. 🙂

Locked, loaded and packed — next stop: Columbia!

20.2mi

Tonight’s regularly scheduled Wednesday ride was my last warmup ride before the MS150 this weekend. With this ride, that’s 70mi this week (31 on Sunday, 10 yesterday and 20 today), and a pretty good warmup for this weekend’s activities… I hope!

I practiced drafting a bit off Sue tonight — her pace and mine can be pretty close. I was really surprised how much of a difference that made in my ride. Being a foot or less off her back wheel seemed to make my ride noticeably easier. For the first few miles tonight I tried this, and will definitely remember it come the weekend!

I also worked on some pedalling. I’d been trying to push myself into 3-6 and 3-7 gears during my rides, but I’m finding I last a little longer pedalling at 3-5. It’s a faster pedal for the same (or greater) speed, but the bigger benefit is that it just feels better.

The only bad news…. I noticed some kind of tire abnormality on my rear tire. This is the same tire that burst on the trail a month or so ago. On the Katy, I don’t notice it, but when riding on the blacktop at the Family Arena, it was very noticeable. It almost appears that the tube/tire have shifted on the rim, but I’m not quite sure how that could happen. I’ll ride it up to West County Cycles tomorrow after work and let them diagnose it, assuming they have time. I’m sure there are tons of folks getting their bikes tuned up right now, so we’ll see if they can get to it. If not, I’ll just let the air out, try to shift the tire and tube manually and refill it. If I’ve still got a problem, I can change out the tube, and I could buy a spare tire while I’m at West County and change that out myself too. The bike mechanics can do that in about 15 minutes, where it takes me 45-60 minutes along with a noticeable shift in my language skills. My innocent eardrums would probably prefer them doing the work. 🙂

I’d also like to talk to them about some kind of pedal straps. Don has been telling me how much benefit he gets from being able to pull up against the strap on his upstroke, and I’d like to try that. I have no interest in shoes with clips — I like riding in my sandals — so the straps seem to be a good answer. Dunno if that means new pedals or if straps can be added, but if they can do the tire work, maybe they can do this too.

And, I’ve been looking at a new cycle computer. I’d like one that does the normal speed functions (including average speed — my current one doesn’t do that), along with cadence and perhaps even heart rate monitoring. The cadence functionality would measure the pedalstrokes in RPM, and as I mentioned above, I’m discovering that’s probably more important than measuring the speed. Getting into a good rhythm and staying there is really critical, and I’ve seen that lately with the riding I’ve been doing. Keep the bike in 3-5 gear instead of 3-6, pedal faster but not as hard, and go faster with less fatigue — it makes sense. So, I’d like to figure out what RPM I’m comfortable with, and try to shoot for that with this new piece of gear. This functionality can be cheapish in a wired configuration — maybe $30 for a Cateye that’s not wireless. That’s probably the Astrale 8. There’s a wireless model too, the CC-CD300DW, but I’m finding that the wireless models are easily a C-note. Vetta also makes some good ones from what I read. The wireless model is the VL110HR T2X, and looks like it’d do everything I want, including heart rate monitoring. The HR monitoring is merely a toy for me right now, but as I get more serious, that becomes a bigger deal…. at least that’s what I read. Without the HR functionality, the VL110 T2X is the better choice, still wireless, with the cadence features I’m looking for. We’ll see what I end up with, and if I even pick up one before the ride.

I’ve also got to put the other bags back on the bike — the underseat and handlebar bags. The underseat can be used to store one of my replacement tubes, along with other emergency gear, rather than stowing those in my bike trunk. I’d like to reserve the trunk for my camera, and maybe another lens. The handlebar bag can be used for nibblies for the ride — fruit cups and whatever else sounds good. I’ve been finding that I’m much more fresh with a fruit cup about every 7-8 miles. I’m sure that much fruit over a 75mi course will be interesting, so I’ll need to watch that this weekend. I’ve not played with any of the energy bars or gels, and I’m a little unsure of them until I’ve had a chance to use them in a little more controlled environment than the MS150. There’s tons of folks that swear by them though.

So that’s it. Next cycling stop is Columbia Friday night, and off to the course on Saturday and Sunday!

5.8mi

Beck, Sio and I decided to take Beck’s maiden voyage on her new bike today. She’d been hearing about the Al Foster Trail down near the little kids railroad, and we decided to take it on.

It was a great ride, and a very nice trail. It’s a bit narrow in places, but it’s close to the house — maybe five miles away — and appears to link up to some other trails, like the Stinging Nettle Trail. These all follow the Meramec River, which makes for a beautiful backdrop on the ride.

Becky did very, very well with her new ride, with only a little soreness in her knee afterward. She was able to keep a decent pace on the gradual inclines, and that was nice to see.

The coolest thing on the ride really had nothing to do with the ride at all. I’d stopped in a clearing to take some photos of Darla riding, when all of a sudden — whoosh! — a B-1B flew overhead! This was part of the air show at Spirit of St. Louis airport I’m sure. This guy was so close, it seemed like you could jump on board!

Anyway, a nice ride, and what I hope will be the first of many!

Tonight, Becky finally did it. She bought a bike.

She’d been struggling between the Giant Suede and the Raleigh Gruv. West County Cycle had called just before her knee surgery and said that the Gruv was in. Tonight she said she wanted to go check it out. She compared both the Gruv and the Suede, and landed on the Suede. I’m thrilled!

Now, I know she won’t be riding in a big way anytime soon — healing her knee is job one. But, once it heals, she’ll be able to join me on some fun rides through the parks and the neighborhood, and that is a wonderful thing!

Her bike is actually very cool, with a flat black finish and all black hardware. She has nicknamed it “The BatBike”. Somehow seems very appropriate!

17.6mi

Jeff brought his photos to tonight’s ride, and I had just enough time to get them searched through before going to bed tonight.

So… below are some photos of your humble author on the Indy Speedway:

And, here’s a photo of the Big Guy, just before I got to shake his hand.

28.3mi

Given the great weather last night, I couldn’t resist a ride. I really needed it too. August 15 is always a tough day for me, and I needed to exorcise some angst from my soul.

I started at the Weldon Trailhead, my typical jumping off point, and rode north (or east — kinda depends on which way the trail has turned). Once again, the first few miles were trouble, and I entertained turning around at the I-64 bridge, which would’ve been only five miles.

I did get to the bridge, stopped and had some water, and watched some birds of prey as they circled high above me. They’re always circling at the bridge — I guess there’s good hunting there — and today I saw three or four of these guys riding the currents and updrafts, far above my head. Just beautiful. After marvelling at them for a few minutes, I decided to plow ahead up the trail.

And it was like that the whole ride. I’d get to a good turnaround point — Pitman Hill Road, Caulks Hill Road, the Greens Bottom Trailhead — and just continue riding. I ended up at the Page Extension bridge, about 14mi from where I started. Of course, since I was there, I had to ride up the switchbacks, and take on the 75′ vertical climb. It actually wasn’t that bad, which was surprising since I had already ridden so many miles.

Coming home was a quiet trip, and I decided to try it in one long ride — with just one quick stop to take a couple of photos. By the time was done, I’d put 28mi behind me in just about 2hrs 15min. Not too shabby I think.

So, did I purge myself of anything significant? I dunno. I do know that I felt much better after my ride than before it, and that’s probably the best measure of all. I also crossed 600mi for this season, which is a real accomplishment to me. Certainly, that’s a good thing!

5.5mi

What a day. What an amazing day.

I picked Jeff up at his hotel around 7am, and we headed to the track. The sun was just beginning to rise on Speedway, and the clouds made for a beautiful view of the new day upon this city of speed.

We pulled in to the registration area, and picked up our participant packets. It was obvious from what we saw inside that the cap of 20,000 folks on the Lap with Lance was not exactly needed — it didn’t appear that there were anywhere near 20,000 packets there.

We continued to the parking area and were greeted by a parking attendant who asked if we were racers, lappers or “just” spectators. With some pride, we said we were lappers — participants in the Lap with Lance — and were shown to our very nice, close, parking slots. 🙂

After walking to the entrance to the raceway seating, we entered into the bowl that makes up the very heart of racing. We walked up into the stands, and watched the first heat, already in progress for those 50 and older.

What was fun to see was that every racer that went by received a cheer from the hundreds in the stands. That was inspiring, I’m sure, to the cyclists on the track.

We watched the heats, one by one. We didn’t realize it, but we saw the eventual winner of the Race2Replace (or Race To Replace — not sure which was the official name!) event win the 25-34 age group, taking the 10 laps (25mi) at just under 53 minutes. The guy that won that race came from out of nowhere, and passed the guys that had been leading the whole race. That was an exciting finish, and certainly worthy of an Indy race.

When the 18-24 group was on the track, I started talking with a family behind me whose son was in the race. I came to find out that he’d just turned 18 in time to make his bid in the race, and that they’d offered him a Mini Cooper if he won his age bracket. I believe he did lead a lap or two, but faded a bit in the end, and finished about tenth. I gave them one of my cards, and asked them to send me an email with their son’s race number and their address, and I would see about getting my shots of their son to them. They were incredibly thankful for that, and I felt good for helping someone enjoy their dreams. That’s one of the things photography is all about, after all.

One of the really impressive things I noticed about the races was that no matter how slow someone was, the crowd cheered, and they were allowed to finish their race. Some of the folks were 30-45 minutes behind the winner, but every last one of them was allowed to finish. That’s an amazing statement of sportsmanship coming from a group of hard core racers.

We watched the beginning of the 35-49 age group — the largest group — and were expecting some kind of wreck as there were over 150 of them on the track. There was no calamity in this race or any other, and that was good news. It was getting close to our staging time, so we packed up, and started making our way out of the stands.

We walked over to the parking lot, got our bikes, and headed to the staging area for the lappers, and waited, and waited and waited. We met a guy by the name of Pat from Atlanta, and talked with him at length during the long hot wait. His daughter works for The Discovery Channel (who was sponsoring this event) and got him hooked into this event. He was a baseball fan, and we talked for a long time about the Braves, Cards, Bonds and the state of the game. Wonderful, wonderful conversation.

During our wait, the race assistants told us over and over again that this was going to be a leisurely ride, taking about fifteen to twenty minutes to make the lap — the race laps were around 5-6 minutes. They reminded us that there were kids in the pack, and that we all needed to be careful, with no speeding or jockeying for position.

We heard the Get Ready! charge and mounted up. Slowly the throng of bikes began to take the track — probably only a thousand or two of us, but still a sizable group nonetheless. We got to the track’s edge, and started to grind the pedals and gears, coming up to speed on the track.

This was the track of Andretti, Earnhardt, Gordon, Unser, Foyt, and so many others, and I was churning along at less than 10% of any of their speeds. I might as well have been moving along at 500mph — it was so amazing. The history started to hit me, and with every pedal stroke, I was more and more overwhelmed with the enormity of what I was being allowed to do.

We pedalled around the track, slowed by a group of pace trucks whose job it was to keep us at a reasonable speed around the track. And then we hit the front stretch, and I was taken with the cavernous beauty of the track. To my right, there were enormous grandstands, and to the left, a smaller set. And in front of me was the scoring pylon, the giant pagoda and several hundred screaming fans in the stands, cheering as we went by. And it was then that we crossed the stripe of bricks, triumphant heroes of our slow lap around the track.

We rounded the corner at turn one, back to our mid-turn entry point where a Speedway police car waited to angle us back to the infield. Our throng of cyclists began chanting Two! Two! Two! and I saw the police car move off the track, and we began a second lap!

This time, I revelled in the track, taking on the headwind through the second turn, and just watched the people enjoying the track and this terrific experience. I took The Bandit high up on the bank, and zoomed down to the lowest line — what a rush that was! I saw recumbents, tandems, even a guy with his kid in a seat on his bike. There was even a guy riding along, drinking a Miller Lite on the track. That’s something I wouldn’t expect to see during a race! And once again, we were saluted by the crowd as we crossed the bricks, welcomed like heroes. I’ve never felt that kind of sensation before, and I’m so incredibly happy to have experienced it just this once.

We finished our second lap, and stopped. So many of us were still on the track, high fiving, flying so high from the experience we’d just had. And then there was a flurry of commotion — Lance! There’s Lance! And indeed he was there, pulling a Kulwicki at the track’s edge. The line he was taking was only about five feet from me, so I pedalled up the track, and shook his hand as he went by, thanking him for having us all out for this event.

The funniest thing about that encounter was a group of four 20-something girls, one of whom had shaken Lance’s hand. The whole group of them were jumping up and down, and screaming like little girls. A little too much hero-worship, I’m afraid!

Once we got to the infield, I heard a little kid say to his folks I shook Lance’s hand! That was the good kind of hero-worship, and I’m sure that’ll leave a big impression on that child for some time to come.

After a little shopping, Jeff and I loaded up, and pointed Smokey back toward St. Louis. After I got home, I realized I’d really gotten sunburned at the track. I headed to the next door neighbors, jumped in their pool to get some of the heat out of my skin, and revelled in what I’d just done at Indy.

Yeah, this was a silly thing. I drove 530 miles across two days, just so I could ride 5.5mi on an asphalt surface — certainly not the longest ride of the summer.

It was absolutely the best ride of the summer though, and one I’ll never forget.

After escaping St. Louis rush hour, Jeff and I made it to Indy safely. The drive was unremarkable, despite looking like rain for the last half of the trip.

We pulled in Jeff’s hotel just after sunset, and I arrived in Speedway IN just a few minutes after that.

Speedway. That name is just synonymous with the Indy 500. For 100 years, folks have come to Speedway to try their luck on the once-bricked yard. Tomorrow, my turn comes.

I’ve been cleaning my bike and lubing my chain tonight, trying to get those last details ready for tomorrow’s Lap with Lance. I can’t wait!

Tonight I head to Indianapolis for my trip around The Brickyard on my bike tomorrow afternoon.

(Reading that sentence, it sounds totally ludicrous, but that is indeed what I’m doing.)

It seems like I’ve packed everything known to man — camera gear, batteries, memory, camcorder, bike pump…. basically I’ve tried to plan for anything reasonable that could go wrong. I don’t want anything to get in the way of my little trip about the track.

I should be back tomorrow night, so I’m sure there will be pictures and video posted late into the night…..

With all the recent activity surrounding my photography exhibit, I haven’t been able to ride much. That hasn’t stopped me from engaging in cycling tomfoolery though!

Yesterday, one of my Wednesday cycling clutch participants got word to me of an event in Indianapolis. The Discovery Channel Pro Cycling team is looking for a replacement for Lance Armstrong, and they are holding a series of races on August 12th to find Lance’s replacement. The event is called The Race to Replace, and is an all-day event held at the Indy Speedway. Yup, the races will be held on the track itself. How cool is that?!

It’s one of the after-race events that interests me though. Up to 20,000 folks will be allowed to participate in the Lap with Lance — a fundraiser where you can take a lap around the track on your bike, with Lance Armstrong leading the crowd around. Holy cow!!!!

Needless to say, I signed up this morning, and am planning to head to Indy for this event. Since they happily took my money and registration, I’m assuming I made it under the 20,000 cap. Of course, I’ll be taking loads of photos of the race heats — eight heats of 10 laps around the track each — and of the events. But for me, the thrilling part will be taking my bike around the track at Indianapolis.

Yeah, yeah, it’s five hours of driving each way in order to ride 2.5 miles, but I think it’ll be the coolest 2.5 miles I’ve ever ridden!