Sidelined

I'm pretty sure that the last post I wrote was a whole pile of moaning about how I've not been comfortable riding the bike.

Little did I realise how much more that was to become.

I never thought I'd be an athlete, doing those things that athletes do, like stretching, and eating exercise food, drinking protein powder - and I certainly never thought I'd be seeing a sports doctor to get steroid injections to address physical injuries arising from the stress of what I've been putting myself through.

Around 300 days ago (not that I'm counting) I had a... mishap.

I was commuting home, just got back on the bike after moving house (and a bunch of kms further away from work), and was in the process of indicating to cross the highway to take the turn off to my suburb - because in New Zealand we put street lights along our motorways rather than these fancy 'interchange' things that are only just starting to catch on.

I'm not sure exactly what happened after that - I had my arm out and checked behind me to see if there was any traffic coming, then I hit the ground. I don't know if it was a catseye, or a slippery white line - perhaps I just lost my balance, or maybe one of these things happened and my arm couldn't take the strain of only having one hand on the bars...

Whatever did happen I hit the ground with my left elbow at around 40km/h.

I felt like I'd been dropped on my head - having actually been dropped on my head once I can testify that it was a very similar feeling. I kinda blanked out, and then came to in absolute terror as I realised I was laying in the middle of the motorway, which I will be eternally thankful was void of traffic.

The initially obvious mess was all the superficial stuff - the expected stuff like torn sleeves on my long cycling shirt, gravel firmly embedded in the bloody mess that was my elbow and knee, and the less expected like the holes in the top of my gloves (imagine you are holding a cup - the area on the base of your thumb which is facing towards the ceiling) and the scuffs on the face-plates for my shifters. Apparently I'd forgotten to let go of the bars when I fell off.

But it appeared that I was ok, and I was mostly concerned about the bike - had I cracked the frame on my new carbon steed? Would I ever live it down if I had, let alone be able to replace it? What ammunition had I handed my esteemed workmates for their humourous scathing comments?

I rode the last couple of kms home with a sore arm, a bit of a dripping bloody mess, left arm refusing to function correctly, and made the painful grind up my, thankfully short, 10+% driveway. I reported my injuries to my beloved, and based on my current position amongst the living and considerable inability to remember exactly what happened I'm guessing the berating and flogging weren't fatal.

It was sure sore (the injury, not the marital justice), but it wasn't Emergency Room urgent - it just seemed to be a good old dose of road rash and a mild case of bruised pride. I took a concrete pill along with a handful of anti-inflammatories, cleaned up, and got some rest.

The next few days were train days as I couldn't move my left shoulder properly. I saw my physio the next day and it was assessed that I'd done some pretty good damage, but not broken anything... I was under the assumption that it would go away, and a few weeks later it seemed to settle itself down and I was away laughing.

Or so I thought.

A few months later I decided to do Taupo, and started riding more intensely. Instead of riding to town and back I was putting in long efforts and hill climbs, sprints and max efforts here and there... pretty much doubling the amount of riding I'd been doing. I started to notice that my shoulder would complain after the long weeks, and then occasionally - usually when I had to put in quick reactions to keep balance on the bike, like correcting for a bump in the road - I would get huge pains.

This continued for a few weeks as winter started, until one week I had a few separate incidents in the work car-park, which is notoriously slippery-when-wet, where I was left with pain in my shoulder for the rest of the day, so I figured it was time to get some more physio.

I got a new physio at the recommendation of The Engineer, and started on those rubber band exercises, the light weight lifting, and as the weeks went by I noticed an increase in strength, and a constant increase in pain levels, until two weeks ago when I got to the point where I simply couldn't ride.

And I've been off the bike for two weeks.

I guess should have been more diligent when I had the original accident - something that I now know and won't let pass me by again.

I got a referral from Mr Physio for x-ray and ultrasound and and appointment to see the Sports Doc, whom I saw today.

After a thorough examination and consultation of the pictures he and confirmed what we thought - that I'd torn a tendon, and my bursar was inflamed due to the darn thing rubbing against it - likely in part having been aggravated by the strengthening exercises that I've started doing.

The theory is that when I planted my elbow into the road at 40kmh that my shoulder got shocked upwards upwards, my bursa got a massive bash, and my subscapularis tendon tore near the rotator-cuff while taking the strain of the impact. The tear is currently around 6mm long - and that's after 9 months of theoretical healing.

The remedy for this is more physio and an injection of cortisone as an anti-inflamatory to get the bursar to settle the heck down. I half expected the cortisone injection.

What I didn't expect was to get it while I was getting the consult done.

I hate needles at the best of times, and when Sports Doc bought out the needles I almost fainted. I started rambling like a crazed idiot and sweating like I was in a sauna. I did do Sports Doc the decency of explaining that this is how I, apparently, deal with panic and unexpected injections, and our combined laughing at my antics helped calm me so he could stick me with the darn thing. Thankfully he numbed the site with anesthetic as well so I didn't really feel anything as he did his thing, which seemed to take a long time, and then it turned out he was still waiting for me to stop rambling so he could stick me without being distracted.

And there was no topical anesthetic.

Ouch.

10 days off the bike then I should be good to go, and in 4 weeks I get another examination to determine if the steroids actually did what they were supposed to do.

Now it's one thing to have all this happening, but at the same time I've spent the last two weeks not riding, and when  you're doing upwards of 15 hours a week on the bike suddenly dropping to 0 hours has a surprisingly profound effect on your mood.

I'm still eating like I burn 4000 calories a day and I can actually see my stomach getting fatter. I've gone through mild depressive states bordering on deeper-than-mild, been irritable, slept really badly, and - of all things - started drinking coffee. I think the coffee gives me the adrenaline boost that I'm missing... or I hate myself, it's hard to tell. I've even considered taking up running - that's how desperate things are becoming.

The timeline for Taupo was also looking pretty shocking for a while there - originally it was looking like 6 weeks to see the sports doc, and after that another week to see the local outpatients for the injection - then 10 days on top of that, and rehabilitation on top of that... I was starting to get worried that I wouldn't be doing Taupo at all.

It also wasn't going to be helping matters that I have another bike fit this weekend to try to sort out problems I've been having with pain in my leg. There was one small point where I was almost... almost tempted, to throw the bike out the window and take up restoring antique siege weapons.

But all is not lost, and I've learnt two valuable things;

Don't wait on injuries, and don't give up on them either.

27 Jul 2016 No comments

Read More

Free your mind

I don't ride with others as often as I would like to think I should. My commute is fairly solitary with the occasional ad hoc bunch forming, although I've noticed that people are generally happy to go their own pace when commuting, probably because they are all going to different places so are burning fuel at different rates. As I am often adding in extra hills on the commute - a grand departure from my original fear of not riding straight to work - it makes it hard to organise anything with anyone.

Plus most of my friends are sensible enough to live closer to their chosen place of employment.

The way I have my training set up also means that I'm not really settled on the idea of doing bunch rides on the weekends with the local groups. It's probably something I can get over fairly easily by just turning up and doing them, but at the moment I'm really focussing on sticking to the Training Plan, especially for the the longer rides which are generally planned for the weekend. There's also the family factor; being able to get out at 6am is better than the moderately civilised time of 8am when the groups tend to meet. My earlier starts allow me to get more time in during the day with the family, even if that time is spent bemoaning my aching quads, or lying on the couch with my feet up hoping that someone else will do all the housework (and trying to stop the cat from kneading my aching quads with her claws - you'd almost think that could be therapeutic, but it isn't really).

One strange phenomenon that I've noticed from all this solo riding is what I call The Hunt, otherwise phrased as 'hunting them down'. I like giving things names. This is the act of seeing someone else riding somewhere far ahead of me; when I start to judge their speed relative to mine, as well as what type of bike they are on, their apparent ability etc. It's actually pretty amazing what you can tell about a cyclist from varying distances, even from behind them. Clothing and posture tell a lot, and combining that knowledge with speed can indicate their relative ability. Lights are a give-away sometimes as they can indicate whether it's an e-bike, or possibly a weight weenie... I dunno, It's not foolproof, and it certainly doesn't go any way to proving anything, but at some level, deep down in the psyche - it's a moving target.

And a moving target must be chased.

I see them, and, almost unconsciously, start to accelerate. There's a small but discernible increase in pace that slowly ramps up until I notice I'm running a heart rate that's usually higher than intended. There's nothing particularly competitive about this - any more than there is anything competitive about a dog chasing a car - once I catch up with them I run into another problem, which is whether I continue at my current pace and pass, or slow down and draft them...

But what are you supposed to do when you catch them?

This problem is exacerbated when riding with bunches of people I know, especially when it's 'the guys' from work. This game of one-upmanship becomes slightly more serious than that of your average commute. For me it's mostly about keeping up, but also about pushing just a tiny bit harder. Taking turns, but not being the one that never takes the front, or ends up never getting off the front. It's generally amicable - we're not smack talking each other... much... and most of the time we're still riding within our own personal limits - and if we're joining someone else who is doing some specific training we'll often discuss the plan before, and then insert moderate amounts of smack on the road.

I'm one of the slower riders in the group of people I know. I could probably give the others a run for their money in the 'how far did you go' sweepstakes, but my outright speed is on the slow side, and my climbing ability is limited by a combination of strength, and all the pizza and beer I enjoyed last year - I have to work harder to maintain the same speed; especially up hills.

I like to think that when the weight drops I'll be faster, pound for pound, or more so because of my current built-in resistance training - but I'm not holding out hope; I'll probably just get smaller and not be able to catch as much of a tailwind.

Thanks to some strange ritual that I still don't fully understand - being the slow one on the climbs means I get the honour of seeing my riding buddies coming back down the hill looking for me. We have an unwritten rule that if you get to the top first you have to go back looking for the slower rider and then ride up again - repeat until they either die of embarrassment or get to the top themselves. It's good for morale though, keeps the fitter guys quiet because they're wearing themselves out, and slowly - slowly - I get faster at the climbs until there's not much point in them turning around to look for me. Once day I'll get to the top first - if I play my cards right.

Unlike I did on a recent commute commute home.

We decided to do a quick run up Ngaio Gorge on our ways home - a detour for me and and alternate route for others. Something that adds in a bit of extra elevation for me as I generally don't do climbs on the way home.

It started off innocently enough. We're riding up a hill, there are three of us and another cyclist who looked like he knew his stuff. We all hit the bottom of the incline and start to spread ourselves out for the climb. Now I'm not sure exactly what happened in my head, but I decided to make a break for it. I was having trouble keeping pace because The Engineer was going a tiny bit slow for my enthusiasm - probably due to differences in the way we accelerate/decelerate more than an actual difference in speed - so I passed him. Doing this on a road with a small shoulder and cars passing wasn't pleasant and by the time I'd passed him he was up to my speed - but I was going too fast for my pace. To fix this I decided to get some distance, and basically put the hammer down.

I smashed it. I went hard - the other cyclists melted into the background - unable to keep up. I passed the pro-looking dude who was ahead of us and kept on going. They gave chase, but I was going strong.

And my heart-rate was too. I had exceeded any concept of a sensible pace and was now pushing it into the red - and beyond. I was gasping. I started seeing stars. Then, as I reached the last corner near the top of the incline, I realised my heart rate was at my, theoretical, max.

And they all passed me.

It wasn't a gradual thing - they all shot past like I was standing still. I was straining, I was giving it everything I had and my heart was aching - and I was doing all of 9kmh... and I was unable to breathe.

So I did what any sensible person would do, and got up and gave it one last sprint. My skin started to burn, I actually stopped breathing for a time, and after about 7 seconds my legs gave up. I ground the last 50 meters to the top, dizzy, light-headed gasping like a drowning man; my stomach rising in my throat, skin steaming and legs on fire.

I had to rest for 10 minutes when I got to the top - all of which was spent just trying to stay upright. I managed not to throw up, I may have managed to have a conversation with another rider... it's all a blurry mess of a memory.

Then I had to ride home.

Ngaio Gorge is at the beginning of my commute - about 5 km from work, and proceeded to ride the hardest ride home. I had nothing left, and it showed. Every step of the way was at maximum effort just to keep the bike upright.

It took me about 2 days to fully recover and my lungs felt raw for days afterwards.

What this seems to boil down to is a continuation of The Mental Game - where a lot of the work done to ride effectively is really in the helmet area; I really just need to calm the heck down and think about what I'm doing.

So, armed with some humility after my recent crisis of faith, and some learnings from my field-research in cauldron of Cat-6 Racing, I've been focussing on what each ride is about. It is about an average speed, a min/max perceived level of effort, or just about getting around? Is the goal just to get home after a long day, or to break myself so I feel like my upcoming rest-day is well earned? Perhaps it doesn't even matter for some rides and I just go out and have a good time.

Knowing roughly what the rides are about has really helped - it helps keep the eyes on the prize and not be led astray. Not that I always stick to the plan; there has to be room to improvise, but that probably doesn't mean smashing out a breakaway that ruins you for 2 days just so you can say you got the top of your local climb before the rest of the commuters - especially when you don't even get to the top first!

Since the fated day of trying to tear myself a new lung, I've been working on my climbing a lot.

I love climbing - whether it's on the mountain bike or road bike; hitting the hills and climbing to the top of ridiculous looking pieces of road or trail just pushes all my buttons. I've started adding in extra climbs on my way home, and when I plan my own rides I'm looking for as many ways to appreciate gravity as possible. I can't say that descents do the same thing for me - probably only because it is harder to get road-rash when you're going uphill - but going up... there's something in that.

The key, really, has been to pace myself.

Not pace as in go slow, more like 'keeping it at this level, thanks' - and it's paying off slowly. Putting more sensible gear-ratios on the bike has helped me spin up hills, and my skill has professed from grinding up the hills in bottom gear to spinning up the hills in a lower bottom gear instead. It isn't always faster, in fact it's often slower, but it's smoother, instead of being an all-out effort just to keep the bike upright. The same thing applies on the flat, but no-one is ever impressed by how flat your ride was.

But the key thing here is the mental effort required to keep that pace - to go slow, or to go fast - to know when I need to stand up and give my legs a rest - to know when I need to just keep pushing even though my ham strings are burning. To keep the cadence up and the gears low and to push through the pain - or to drop down a gear and spin it out.

Being able to spin up Korokoro climb recently, was an achievement - one that Strava didn't - possibly couldn't - pick up on. It wasn't a record speed; it was the first time I got to the top of one of my regular climbs just spinning. My cadence never dropped into 'grind', I managed to keep it around 75rpm the whole way up.

That's actually progress - now I just need to do it in a harder gear.

Chasing people down is also further down my priorities, unless I'm riding with the crew. Knowing how much effort I want to put out - in essence having a general plan and sticking to it. It's still hard to watch someone sail past on an e-bike, or be overtaken by a Mountain Bike when commuting... and watching a road-rider tear past always leaves me feeling that I should be jumping on his wheel - but a quick check of Strava when I finish up inevitably shows that they were commuting straight to work - not via the crazy hills that I've somehow managed to rope myself into climbing on the way in. So there; road rider!

So I guess what this comes down to, overall, is something resembling discipline. My parents would no-doubt be the first to comment that this would be something that I'd struggle with (thanks Mum and Dad) but from what I can see - and from some anecdotal research on what other long distance riders have said - long distance riding is really about what goes on in your head. You do need a good set of legs, and there are many things that go into the planning and execution - but if you can't keep your focus and you end up getting your thinking swept up with what other people around you are doing or thinking, then you'll burn yourself out chasing them - or potentially cool yourself off by not breaking off - and the long term game plans all go out the window.

Thankfully the Velominati have already thought of a rule for this;

Rule #6 - Free your mind and your legs will follow

29 May 2016 No comments

Read More

You just go faster

The challenges I've been facing so far in my preparation for Taupo have been physical and, to a point, intellectual. Hills that never end. Headwinds that suck your soul and then demand more. Fridges that never hold enough food. Things that can be solved by observing our honourable Rule 5. I've also had to research into everything from bike fits, to components, to nutrition; filtering through endless opinions, points of views, advertising and, when it comes to nutrition; pop-science - debunked or otherwise. It's relatively hard gaff, can be frustrating, but it's doable - you can kinda train yourself for this type of thing and bite it off in chunks; plus it doesn't matter too much if you get it wrong because unless you are doing something really really wrong it's hard not to get a second shot at what you have for breakfast.

All this is pretty normal now, but recently I've been blind-sided by the Mental Game.

When I started on this crazy journey I was all of the opinion that 'it's only 320km' - it's a couple of long rides thrown together - I've got plenty of time to train and all the support I need to do everything necessary. It didn't seem that hard, certainly not on paper, and that fire burnt hot for a long time, slowly getting me into this whole fine mess.

But in the last few weeks my optimism started to slip.

It wasn't anything in particular - it just slowly ebbed away, piece by piece, until half way up Sweetacres Drive in Belmont the other day and I found myself lagging, grinding, hurting everywhere. I felt like I wasn't moving, and I was so frustrated I got to the point where I was considering just tossing my bike over the fence, and walking home.

It's been lots of little things chipping away at my gleeful bike riding. Some of these I might be giving more weight to than they're worth, and some which I might not have fully realised the importance of - this in itself, knowing what is upsetting my game, is something of an art-form that I'm still learning - just in life in general.

My woes are endless... let me tell you of them...

My bike still hurts to ride - I went through the process of getting a fit done and I've ended up with a severe pain in one leg that is fleeting but almost debilitating when it strikes. I can't tell if it is a fit thing or something else I've done and broken, but with my fitter based in Christchurch, and my fit measurements having been written down seemingly incorrectly after the last fit, it's proving hard for us to work out what the problem could be - if it is even specifically related to my bike fit. Moral of this story is probably to use someone local...

My overall enthusiasm isn't helped by a few unsavoury experiences I've had on the road with other road users behaving badly. It's to be expected to a point - especially if you're doing several hundred kms on the road each week - that you'll run into something less than ordinary at some point. New Zealand is slowly evolving to be cycling friendly, and for the most part people are good regardless, but when they're not it's positively perilous. I followed this one up with a post on Facebook after I had about 6 run-ins in one night, but it feels like I'm pissing in the wind a bit - and it's effectively impossible to avoid traffic if you're a road rider.

It is also the onset of winter at the moment, so it's dark and cold /all the the time/, and the weather for the last few weeks has been simply /breathtaking/; solid headwinds in every direction; cold damp and slippery on all the riads; crazy windy rain... thunderstorms and lightening - the lightening was so frequent I actually thought I'd get fried if I took myself out on that day. Some mornings I just want to stay in bed rather than get up and go for that 80km hill ride, even though I do go for the ride in the end.

My weight is annoying me - basically because it isn't going down, which means I'm carrying all this extra... stuff... around everywhere I go. When I think about myself from a logical perspective and compare myself to other people I know - I'm think I'm doing all right, and size isn't everything, really. 300km and up to 15 hours each week on the bike, decent average speeds, lots of hill climbing... I'm mostly able to keep up with The Tester and The Engineer; and the measurements say that I'm loosing fat and theoretically gaining muscle even though my weight isn't changing all that much.

I was decently overweight when I started riding - around 100kgs - and had managed to get back to that weight when I came out of a tasty pie and wine-laden Christmas. Upon deciding I was going to do this enduro event I wasn't the lightest cookie. More specifically, though, my belly gets in the way when I'm riding. I have trouble physically getting into the drops because of my 'spare tyre', and combining that with a bikefit that doesn't seem right... it's antagonising. It's not just a physical problem - logically I know that will go away - especially if I keep up this madness - but this is barrier that I can't get around. If it was a hill I could climb it, if it was cold fingers I could get some new gloves - losing fat isn't anywhere as easy to quantify or control, so I'm relegated to watching the scales get slowly lower and the pants get slowly looser. I did have to buy new shorts recently, but on the other hand my next-size-down jeans don't fit because my thighs are too bloody big.

This is what it is like in my head - it's like listening to a big constant despairing whinge, and I have to say that I'm not terribly proud of it, but it is something that is, well... happening. These things play on my mind and affect my performance simply because my mind isn't able to cope. A bike fit that doesn't work is a disincentive to ride simply because it is going to hurt - bad drivers are a reason to avoid being on the road... or at least a distraction from putting in effort because I'm too busy looking over my shoulder, and the weather... can't do anything about winter but it has an effect on people, and even if those people aren't me it can still have an impact - if the kids are under the weather I'm not about to dump them on B and leave them to it while I go out for the day.

It all contributes to the Mental Game, and the largest part of that, for me is the perception of something resembling progress.

This is a classic in cycling, and luckily there's plenty of commentary about it. It is quite simply the problem that resulted in the following quote:

"It never gets easier, you just go faster" - Greg Lemond

Damnit Mr Lemond, you're right.

When I'm riding, the level of effort I'm putting out is - usually - directly proportional to how long I think I will ride for. In the case of hills it's usually the minimum possible effort required to go up the damn thing and not fall off the bike - but it amounts to the same thing; that I'm outputting as much as I have at any given point in time. Because I'm always going flat-stick and going as hard as I can, I'm always giving it everything I have, and it always feels the same to me, regardless of what the actual speeds are - and so it never gets easier.

So how does one track improvement? Personal records are about the only tool I have to hand to see how well I am doing, and they are based on time, and therefore speed, alone - the amount of time it takes to smash out that climb, or how long it takes me to get to work in the morning - but these records are fickle beasts as they don't take into account fitness, freshness, adverse weather (including those pesky headwinds).

When I break it down, at the end of the day; it is always just as hard as it was last time. And so I get to the point where I was at the top of Sweetacres Drive; driving into an unforgiving headwind, in complete dispair and ready to throw the bike into the sea...

And it turns out I'd actually set a Personal Record that was nearly 12.5% faster than my previous record, which I set back in 2014, and over 20% better than anything I've set this year.

You just go faster

In the time since this fateful ride I've had to think about this more than anything else. I know I am getting fitter, and I can see that I'm getting faster. My bibs don't fit like they used to... Getting to know these signs and heavily reading between the lines, and remembering that I'm here for the endurance game - this isn't always about going fast; it's also about how long I can go for.

I also have to give big ups to The Tester, The Colleague, The Engineer, and B; for listening to me talk through it and giving me all the support. Thanks for dragging me up the hills guys.

My next long ride will be my longest since I started 'officially' training this year - 120km. Not long by any stretch of the imagination; but still the longest so far. And the proof of me actually progressing?

It isn't going to seem that far.

80kms is practically nothing now - I get back from an 80km ride feeling refreshed and ready to get on with the day, 120 will just be a bit longer - like 80kms used to be. This month, so far, I've ridden 1250 kms, and I've still got a few days to go. This is by far the longest month I've ever ridden. Now, some of this will be the good grace of the weather, health, and family - but I reckon it's still a pretty decent distance for a guy who still has a relatively normal life.

Again, 1250kms isn't a lot if you measure me up against any number of other riders out there, but it's progress. I can almost imagine upcoming months where I'll be doing nearly 2000kms, and the same rule will apply...

It won't get easier!

26 May 2016 No comments

Read More

Squeaky Noises

In the middle of the country there is very little noise. The wind in the trees, a babbling brook, the occasional farm-related animal sound far in the distance, and the peace only being broken by farming equipment trundling along. Cars occasionally whoosh by, but for the most part it's just the sound of heavy breathing, and rubber on tarmac.

I love this landscape of sounds. It's peaceful. It's one of the reasons I am here.

The sounds I am not expecting are from something on the bike going 'plink', 'plink'. Creaking noises. rattles. The resulting thoughts start to flow... What is it? Where is it? Then it goes away - whew. Possibly a stone?  5 minutes later; 'plink plink, tinkle'.

It could be a creaking stem that you only find out about on that hard climb, or it could be a slightly under-oiled chain. A misaligned dérailleur in the wrong gear perhaps, or a cable rattling against the frame.

Some noises are to be expected, the general sounds of a bike working aren't exactly silent - there are a lot of moving parts and other parts bolted to those parts.
But there are some noises that scream 'broken', and to an inexperienced and slightly paranoid bike mechanic such as myself these noises can bring all sorts of concerns to mind.
Is a spoke about to break? Is the frame cracked? Is this something normal and to be expected, or is something about to go hideously wrong?

Over the past couple of months I've had a few noises on the bike that have turned out to be pretty simple things - the cable for my front light banging against the stem and a slightly misaligned dérailleur were two that were simple to fix and made riding a pleasure again. But there were two things that went rather wrong and were pretty horrible to deal with.

First the bottom bracket decided to go. It started with a tinkling noise that pretty quickly evolved into a noise that sounded like a couple of metal walnuts being ground against each other in a bag of sand. Whenever I took to a hill or applied any pressure to the pedals I was met with this crunching noise. Turns out this type of thing is pretty simple to fix - you just replace the bottom bracket! I have a lot of respect for the mechanics at Capital Cycles who spent a good deal of time trying to figure out where the noise was actually coming from, then fitting my ride in to lovingly replace the BB before something terrible happened. The final theory is that it wasn't put in properly by the factory - slightly off-centre and eventually ground itself out.

I rode home from that really happy and took to a big hill to try it out, and it was silky and smooth, and best of all quiet... except for that bloody tinkling noise!

The rear wheel.

I'm led to believe that the wheel-sets that come on bikes are pretty low-end, but I've never really thought that hard about it until now. Perhaps it saves cost, perhaps they are simply provided as fillers as you are expected to bring your own... I'm not sure. This was a set of Shimano RS-11 wheels, which for all the reviews had as solid, heavy and 'bulletproof'; a common technical term for wheels it would seem, and the rear wheel was actually responsible for the tinkling noise. (This wheelset is so awesome , in fact, that I had to link to Wiggle; because Shimano don't actually list RS11s on their own website).

The problem was small. Annoying, just sitting on the edge of hearing. It was as if there was a small piece of swarf stuck in the rim that moved around occasionally, or a spoke moving around; a light tinkling sound similar to someone dropping wet grains of sand into a metal can in a quiet room, and totally unnoticeable until I was riding in a quiet place. The problems' sheer lack of volume made it all the more challenging to diagnose - bike shops tend to play music, have other general noises, and are often positioned near roads - all of which were loud enough to drown out the tiny little tinkle.

Not that I wasn't taken seriously, but without a firm diagnosis it isn't really possible to target a solution to a problem so we went through a few attempts at fixing it - a wheel service to straighten out a slight kink in the rim, a general tension check, and a disassemble of the hub and associated magic to check for problems; but no luck. I had a bright idea one evening and put some oil on the hub-ends of the straight-pull spokes and thought I had solved the problem. About a week later the noise starts again. To be honest the noise was so quiet it could have been there the whole time.

We have a rather skilled Velominatus at work who was happy to take a look at the problem and gave the wheel another truing and a good going over, which was magic in itself as the tension made the wheels feel a whole lot better, but again within a week... tinkle tinkle.

It was at this point that the noise became something else. It wasn't a tinkle, it was a threat. It was a warning of impending doom, a sign that something was wrong. It was chasing me down the road during the day and starting to haunt my dreams. I couldn't ride them any more. What if they collapse when I'm going down a hill? What if a spoke breaks? What if the weld in the rim is imperfect, snaps, and I get the sharp end through my chest right before my face hits the ground at 40km/h?

I started to fear my bike, and something had to be done.

It became academic. It was a simple problem with a simple solution. The old wheels were going in the bin, the only obstacles bring my insatiable need to ride, and my No-Budget. How much money do I have, and how much wheel can I get for that price?

What do wheels even cost?

Living in Wellington I have the luck of having Wheelworks right on my doorstep; so I had a talk to the wonderful Tristan Thomas and got a very reasonable quote for something that would be perfect. I've watched these guys build wheels before and I am very pleased that someone regularly takes the care and attention to building wheels that I would take should I attempt to build my own. They are simply amazing.

Unfortunately though, with my No-Budget the Wheelworks wheels will have to be saved up for, so an interim solution was required, and came quite by surprise at Kiwivelo.

My Favourite Mechanic works at Kiwivelo, and I was in there one lunchtime with mate looking at some options to fix up a his bike, and being in a bike shop is always an excuse to have a look at the things I don't have that I probably don't actually need.

I was having a lustful look at a set of rims on the shelf - mentally checking them out so I had something to compare details later. The wheels were a set of Fulcrum Quattros. I had the Fulcrum 5s, Quattros, and 3s on my list of sets that were kind of within my price range, and kind of not, depending on whether I would have to pay import duty on them - then there of course is the ultimate question of whether to buy local or online, especially for something that might need servicing.

I was half-way through all these thoughts when my Favourite Mechanic waltzed up to me with a price that I quite simply could not ignore. It was marginally higher than the online cost, but it came with the sublime knowledge that I'd be able to complain if they made noise, and that someone I actually trust with my kit was there to be hassled; knowledge which is well worth paying for. So I pulled the trigger on them.

Boom. New wheelset, 25c tyres, tubes, installed on the spot and I rode home that night.

First, and by far the most important: Silence! No noise. No weird tinkling noise (thankfully it wasn't something else!). The sweet sound of wheels doing exactly what you'd expect, and nothing more.

The wheels are also smoother, stronger feeling, seemed to put the power into the road more, probably due to less flex? The road noise is muted - most likely due to the 25c tyres and lower pressures I would assume. I'm sure all the other things that are said about new wheels, wider rims, and 25c tyres are all applicable, but that isn't the point.

The difference I feel it has made to my ride is similar to the difference I noted going from a 2007 alloy bike to a 2014 carbon bike, again.

Now the hill-climbs sound like rubber being slowly torn from its bed on the tyres, the strain of the chain on the cogs, and the whirring of bearings. One can even imagine the sounds of heavy breathing, and sweat dripping on the top-tube. The reassuring sounds that everything is functioning perfectly, and nothing is out of place.

Exactly the sounds you'd want to hear.

14 Mar 2016 No comments

Read More