Thanks for the advice

Hi Everyone,

I completed a ride this past weekend for which I have been preparing
for months. Part of my preparation involved numerous posts to this
newsgroup with questions on various topics. I got lots of fine
responses, but I'd like to thank in particular:

Kjell Arne Olsen
Robert Chung
Paul Kopit

I consider the advice I got from these three to have been instrumental
in my being able to complete the ride as I did.

It was 540 km, the weather was nice the whole time, and at no point did
I feel miserable. The last 40km was hard on the steep sections, but it
went well. My finishing time was 21 hours 43 minutes. It was quite a
bit more than my arbitrarily chosen 19 hour goal, but during the ride I
felt like I was going faster with less effort than I had thought it
would take. I felt strong and comfortable almost all the way to the
end. I broke a spoke in my rear wheel (20 spokes it aparently not
enough for a 100+ kg rider) which had to be fixed because the wheel
jammed against the frame from being so out of true. The total time
spent not riding (eating, fixing the bike, filling water bottles, etc)
was almost 3 hours.

As I had expected, I was unable to find a disciplined group which
suited my style which is real slow up, fast flat. The groups I came
across were going moderatly slow up and moderately fast on the flats.
Long term the pace on the climbing bits (4,400 meters total according
to the arrangers of the event) would have fried me. I met another
somewhat large rider before the ride and we rode the whole ride
together essentially as a two man team time trial.

The winners set a new record this year, 13:28 which boggles my mind.

I'll be back next year to see how much I can improve, and I look
forward to the advice I'll get on the many questions yet to come.

Thanks.

Joseph

In article .com,
wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I completed a ride this past weekend for which I have been preparing
for months. Part of my preparation involved numerous posts to this
newsgroup with questions on various topics. I got lots of fine
responses, but I'd like to thank in particular:

Kjell Arne Olsen
Robert Chung
Paul Kopit

I consider the advice I got from these three to have been instrumental
in my being able to complete the ride as I did.

It was 540 km, the weather was nice the whole time, and at no point did
I feel miserable. The last 40km was hard on the steep sections, but it
went well. My finishing time was 21 hours 43 minutes. It was quite a
bit more than my arbitrarily chosen 19 hour goal, but during the ride I
felt like I was going faster with less effort than I had thought it
would take. I felt strong and comfortable almost all the way to the
end. I broke a spoke in my rear wheel (20 spokes it aparently not
enough for a 100+ kg rider) which had to be fixed because the wheel
jammed against the frame from being so out of true.

And that is why low spoke count wheels are so impractical. If one of 36
spokes breaks, the wheel is still rideable.

The total time
spent not riding (eating, fixing the bike, filling water bottles, etc)
was almost 3 hours.

As I had expected, I was unable to find a disciplined group which
suited my style which is real slow up, fast flat. The groups I came
across were going moderatly slow up and moderately fast on the flats.
Long term the pace on the climbing bits (4,400 meters total according
to the arrangers of the event) would have fried me. I met another
somewhat large rider before the ride and we rode the whole ride
together essentially as a two man team time trial.

The winners set a new record this year, 13:28 which boggles my mind.

I'll be back next year to see how much I can improve, and I look
forward to the advice I'll get on the many questions yet to come.

Thanks.

Joseph

--
Ted Bennett

Ted Bennett wrote:
And that is why low spoke count wheels are so impractical. If one of 36
spokes breaks, the wheel is still rideable.

This group is so predictable sometimes....

--
Dave
dvt at psu dot edu

wrote:
It was 540 km, the weather was nice the whole time, and at no point did
I feel miserable. The last 40km was hard on the steep sections, but it
went well. My finishing time was 21 hours 43 minutes.

I felt strong and comfortable almost all the way to the
end.

Fine work, Joseph. I rode for three hours on Saturday and I was toast. I
suppose the 30 C temps had something to do with that, but I can't
imagine doing nearly 22 hours at my current state of fitness. So my
hat's off to you.

--
Dave
dvt at psu dot edu

On Mon, 27 Jun 2005 17:14:54 -0400, dvt wrote:

Ted Bennett wrote:
And that is why low spoke count wheels are so impractical. If one of 36
spokes breaks, the wheel is still rideable.

This group is so predictable sometimes....

But, he's right.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | It is a scientifically proven fact that a mid life crisis can
_`\(,_ | only be cured by something racy and Italian. Bianchis and
(_)/ (_) | Colnagos are a lot cheaper than Maserattis and Ferraris. --
Glenn Davies

On Mon, 27 Jun 2005 20:48:54 GMT, Ted Bennett
wrote:

And that is why low spoke count wheels are so impractical. If one of 36
spokes breaks, the wheel is still rideable.

The rear wheel on my beater recently became almost-unrideable (but it has
a drum brake, so trueness doesn't affect braking) when a spoke snapped
that was right in between two other snapped ones. Riding it for a little
bit seemed to push the big excursion inwards a bit, though, simply from
the excursion trying to push me sideways and almost failing.

That was when I decided to build a new wheel on that hub.


Jasper