Thanks Warch! Will update.

Our partners are all abandoning us on the Highlander but we are still locked in.

I rode Shindagin Hollow last weekend. I made some smart decisions about staying out of Area 51 a very scarey North Shore type place with all kinds of mtn bike playground toys. We actually showed some young guys-n-gals from Syracuse how to get in there and watched as a couple of the guys ran through some of the drops without even taking a peek. Very impressive physical stylings and I commend my fellow old farts for not succombing to the call of testosterone.

A bit of a sore Monday morning here. I took a hard loop on the road bike in the heat Saturday and a steamy mtn bike ride yesterday evening. Some doubts have recently been expressed about the Highlander but I really have a problem with chickening out so we'll see. My mtn bike partner finishes teaching for the year this week, meaning he will start running and lifting making my threat to kick his butt by the first week of July seem idle.

First, an introduction:

http://www.uoregon.edu/~gvidas/bike/modesty.jpg


Meet Modesty. She's a 23" Raleigh Technium, the brand they gave to their frames with a steel fork/triangle & aluminum top/down/seattube. I got her used; I don't really know how old she is. Parts remaining from when I first bought her: front brake calipers, handlebars, seat post (not seat), 1 crank, 1 chainring.

I built both of her wheels, the front one from a used rim & hub with new spokes, & the rear with entirely new components (Suzue fixed/free hub). She's rocking 38/13 with 170mm cranks, which gives a gain ratio of 5.7 (76.8 gear inches).

http://www.uoregon.edu/~gvidas/bike/frontwheel.jpg


Yesterday, I went for a 120 mile ride (round trip). It was a little grueling.

http://www.uoregon.edu/~gvidas/bike/florence/map.jpg

http://www.uoregon.edu/~gvidas/bike/florence/12_09.jpg

A nice day, though, & pretty out. (other photos.)

How are your knees this morning Mr crazy fixed gear man?:eek:

My knees are just fine. It's my butt that got most sore, and sometimes my thighs and calves were a little tight, but that's only because I kept forgetting to stretch enough.

I've gotten pretty used to the fixed gear pretty fast (picked it up maybe three or four weeks ago?), and all the "cool" points you get, particularly for trackstands at stoplights, are so totally worth it.

Holy cow! Push button before entering tunnel.....then what happens? :eek:

I was talking to a guy here who had done this with an old Motobecane frame. Does this movement have a name yet?

Yeah; "being a trendy youth." It's intrinsically tied to metropolitan bicycle messengers, who drew it from track racing, although in my case I drew most of the motivation from an aging Bostonian bicycle man (Sheldon Brown). See also: Fixed Gear Gallery


The button makes the set of lights above the tunnel flash, which is somehow supposed to suggest that drivers slow down (55mph to 30mph). Mostly it seemed to make them honk even more. (What the shit to honking in tunnels.)

As of this afternoon you have one more gear than I do. :sniff: I've now got an extremely dodgy derailler hanger and a broken derailler on my mtn bike. Where did you buy your hub etc.. I have an old Jamis frame that I wouldn't mind converting.

i would just like to say in all seriousness that you bike nerd, er, people impress the shit out of me.

I'm impressed too.
I'm also impressed by bed of nails sleepers, firewalkers and those muslims that pierce their cheeks with weedwhackers. :speechls:

LBS. In this town (I don't know if an endorsement of Eugene bike shops would really be helpful) it seems that every shop has some kind of a track hub. I just went for the cheapie. And any freewheel hub can be made into a quick ghetto play-around version; a standard threaded cog (of the sort that fits onto a BMX or track hub) will thread on fine, & then a bottom bracket lockring will sort of hold it on. Then it's just a matter of adjusting spacers on either side of the hub until the chainline is straight, then re-dishing the wheel to something close to centered.

Be aware that the cog in question is, through some fluke not entirely clear to me, only going to fit a BMX chain; the same chain will fit your old chainring, mostly just meaning that you need a new chain.

http://www.63xc.com/ -- has some good articles, particularly under 'howto.' Although I consider Sheldon to be the definitive.

Go for the Specialized Body Geometry saddle - I've just bought the BG2 model for the Raleigh Record Sprint and it's twice as comfortable as the mark 1 version that I have on my Trek 7.1FX.

Specialized claim that the saddle almost cancels out saddle soreness and they are just about spot on with that claim. I've always found that it's the backside that says how far you can go and so these saddles are a major plus.

See here and here

"fixies"
woof. knock yerself out, man.

My brother's really into fixed-gear. He's got two of them, one of which is painted to match the DC flag.