awful warm! WAH wah
Was another scorcher today. Sun is getting really intense and it is hot down by the lake so I decided to head into the foothills today to do some intervals. Was doing some tempo sprints, ride tempo for 4min then sprint for 1 min then back to tempo. Always a good time trying to bring the HR from 185 back down to 160 when you are on an 18% gradient. Stayed with my intervals all the way up to the base of the Wig-monster (Wiggington Rd.) and decided I might as well giv'r for the mile to the top. Legs felt good going up but I was spent at the top and it was hard to finish my next 2 sets but I plugged along anyway and got them done. Up in the mountains was nice and cool with a cool breeze but it quickly got hot again as I descended into Walhalla. Couldn't get out of my bike shorts and into my swimsuit fast enough so I could have my pbj and chocolate milk while I cooled the legs in the lake.
House is clearing out and I'm getting ready for the next batch. I hear there is snow and rain forecast for Ontario this weekend. Isn't there a race there on Sunday? Pretty typical of the Ontario weather to do that. Looks like it is cooling off to 20-25 degrees here the next couple days too, good mtbking temp.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Thursday, April 15, 2010
The best thing about A/C
is still being able to take hot showers!
Rode with Fabs and Gareth yesterday. Took them on one of my new favourite rides, Black Mountain with an extra Coontree Loop back to the car. Had a nice random pedal un-clip at the top of a gnarly rockpile and had to ride the X-Ben like a raging bull to keep the face from getting intimate with mother earth. It's a great ride with about 1000m of climbing and a couple good really long descents (not to mention some very tiring technical uphills). Here is what that looked like.
Took today off the bike. Got some errands done and changed the battery in my Polar RS800CX. Much to my frustration all of my settings were deleted so now I have to re-program everything......bike wheel sizes, heart rate zones, all of my menu preferences when I start a workout. Good times. Polar do frustration really well. Hilariously illustrated by going to their website and checking out the forums and all of the angry people. Not that it's all bad, I have generally been pretty happy with this Polar despite some of its shortcomings.
That's about all that has been going on around here. I am looking into some North Carolina rental houses to potentially run the Tour out of next year. That way the group would need to do a little less driving to get to the trail heads. Message me if you are interested in next years Tour. If I come down to SC next spring it will be the same arrangement as the past 2 years with the house I am in now and pricing should be about the same. The NC house would be in addition to the house near Seneca. I would get the NC house for maybe 2 weeks and still have the Seneca one for 9 weeks. Just checking out my options....
Rode with Fabs and Gareth yesterday. Took them on one of my new favourite rides, Black Mountain with an extra Coontree Loop back to the car. Had a nice random pedal un-clip at the top of a gnarly rockpile and had to ride the X-Ben like a raging bull to keep the face from getting intimate with mother earth. It's a great ride with about 1000m of climbing and a couple good really long descents (not to mention some very tiring technical uphills). Here is what that looked like.
Took today off the bike. Got some errands done and changed the battery in my Polar RS800CX. Much to my frustration all of my settings were deleted so now I have to re-program everything......bike wheel sizes, heart rate zones, all of my menu preferences when I start a workout. Good times. Polar do frustration really well. Hilariously illustrated by going to their website and checking out the forums and all of the angry people. Not that it's all bad, I have generally been pretty happy with this Polar despite some of its shortcomings.
That's about all that has been going on around here. I am looking into some North Carolina rental houses to potentially run the Tour out of next year. That way the group would need to do a little less driving to get to the trail heads. Message me if you are interested in next years Tour. If I come down to SC next spring it will be the same arrangement as the past 2 years with the house I am in now and pricing should be about the same. The NC house would be in addition to the house near Seneca. I would get the NC house for maybe 2 weeks and still have the Seneca one for 9 weeks. Just checking out my options....
Monday, April 12, 2010
Nice to have big hills
Rolled over to the Oconee Foothills trail system today. About 40min on beautiful back roads in the sun. The main climb is nice twisty singletrack and takes about 13min to get to the top. Did 3 rounds of that at high tempo then headed home for some chocolate milk, pbj, and a dip in the lake. Looks like nothing but sunny skies and hot temps for the next week or so and everything is turning green pretty fast.
Also spotted this guy a couple days ago. Had to go on a rescue mission due to a locked freehub. Dave was stuck up on the Whitewater climb so I drove down with the part and some tools.
Also spotted this guy a couple days ago. Had to go on a rescue mission due to a locked freehub. Dave was stuck up on the Whitewater climb so I drove down with the part and some tools.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Ride singletrack faster
There are a good amount of tricks to help you ride faster in singletrack. I know a lot of them but that will only get you so far. My singletrack riding is passable, nothing spectacular. To increase speed in the twisty stuff I might suggest some sustained intervals on the mountain bike in the trail. Today I got in a good 4 hour interval workout on the mountain bike and felt really good for the first time since I've been down here. It was either the flu or a bum knee that held me back until 2 weeks ago. I wanted to ease into it with some more base miles before doing workouts like I did today. It has been frustrating not being able to push the legs so I am relieved to finally be able to do so. Here's what today looked like.
1 hour warm up ride over to the trails
x4
20min race pace (threshold zone 4)
10min active recovery (mid zone 3)
1 hour ride home
Went through 4 large 750mL bottles during the 4 hour ride which is a big help for recovery. Also went into the lake at the house after the ride while I ate my pbj and chocolate milk.
1 hour warm up ride over to the trails
x4
20min race pace (threshold zone 4)
10min active recovery (mid zone 3)
1 hour ride home
Went through 4 large 750mL bottles during the 4 hour ride which is a big help for recovery. Also went into the lake at the house after the ride while I ate my pbj and chocolate milk.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Back Online
After a seemingly endless 20 days or so without internet it seems to have maybe returned to stay. Seems someone erased all of the wireless settings on the router so will still be a few days before we can go wireless again but at least we have something!
Just finished up the mountain bike tour week. Everyone got along really well and seemed to enjoy it a lot, I know I did. Only had 1 day of rain on Thursday so we rescheduled that ride for Friday and with all of the sun we've had the trails were still dry despite the deluge. I can definitely see the tour happening again next year if I do this whole South Carolina house thing again.
Since we last spoke I'd had that knee thing going on. Well I can say that I have been completely liberated from that hindrance and can start training again. I have been travelling around a ton in the past 2 weeks getting my routes ready for the tour so I will be skipping the first race that I was going to do down here. Need to rest up a little bit and can get some good intervals in on the mountain bike across the lake at Issaqueena.
Still some room left for the next couple weeks if anyone is interested in a little Southern living. Many of us fill our days with....
Bike washing
Icecream eating
Mountain biking
Boat riding
Sunblock applying (a la robot viking style)
And epic trail touring
Looks like 25+ degrees and sun for the foreseeable future and the lake is warm. Pretty much the best time to be down here so if we don't get a summer in Ontario at least I have my time here.
Just finished up the mountain bike tour week. Everyone got along really well and seemed to enjoy it a lot, I know I did. Only had 1 day of rain on Thursday so we rescheduled that ride for Friday and with all of the sun we've had the trails were still dry despite the deluge. I can definitely see the tour happening again next year if I do this whole South Carolina house thing again.
Since we last spoke I'd had that knee thing going on. Well I can say that I have been completely liberated from that hindrance and can start training again. I have been travelling around a ton in the past 2 weeks getting my routes ready for the tour so I will be skipping the first race that I was going to do down here. Need to rest up a little bit and can get some good intervals in on the mountain bike across the lake at Issaqueena.
Still some room left for the next couple weeks if anyone is interested in a little Southern living. Many of us fill our days with....
Car washing
Bike washing
Icecream eating
Mountain biking
Boat riding
Sunblock applying (a la robot viking style)
And epic trail touring
Looks like 25+ degrees and sun for the foreseeable future and the lake is warm. Pretty much the best time to be down here so if we don't get a summer in Ontario at least I have my time here. Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Sun is back. Serious business.
After a couple days of rain and boredom the sun came back on Sunday. Did my first road ride in the mountains that day and it was really awesome. Knee hurt really bad for the 1st hour and I thought I might have to turn back. After doing the first climb however it felt fine and I was good to go until about the last 30min when it started to hurt again. Took yesterday off and iced it a little bit and took some Aleve. Seems to be feeling better today but still hurts to walk, have to do a little gimp shuffle. Going to try it out on the mountain bike trails today as well as my new rear derailleur I installed on the X-Ben. I was unhappy with my rear shifting because my XTR Shadow derailleur didn't come in close enough the road cassette I installed on the bike. I had heard that you could use a 7900 DuraAce derailleur with no problems, I had also heard that there were problems and that it wouldn't mesh with 9 speed. Well my friend brought it down to me and I installed it last night and it seems to be shifting great. Sits much closer to the cassette and the shorter cage keeps better tension on the chain. I am looking forward to trying it out on the trails today, oh yeah I'm also looking forward to just riding the trails today because mountain biking is awesome.
New DA
Old Shadow
Due to the rain we found our selves getting quite restless. We have had the idea to build a bike rack in the garage for some time now. Me and Derek made a quick stop at Home Depot and started to formulate a plan. We decided to simplify and just make it out of 2x4's as opposed to the steel bar we first had our eye on. Andrew, Derek, and I made an afternoon of it with the handsaw and some screws. It made us feel really manly.
As I was uploading the pictures from my camera I found some funny ones. One particularly warm afternoon the young lady next door decided to put on a show for us and it looks like it was captured on my camera, don't know how it got there? Honest. The funniest part is mom standing in the door, hands on hips.
Last Derek is showing his appreciating for the GTS-t I hope to have as my daily driver by the end of this year.
As you can see it's serious business here in SC. I'm outta here for now, getting ready for my ride. Usually takes me a good 90minutes to do that.
Ben
Friday, March 12, 2010
How-To: Service 2009 SID Team open bath
Strap yourself in for another How-To. This time we are working with the 2009 RockShox SID Team suspension fork. The purpose to a basic open bath service is to check for any irregular wear on internal bushings, inspect lower leg assembly for dirt contamination, and to top up the oil bath that helps lubricate the stanchion tubes and foam dirt wipers.
Tools required.
-Socket wrench with extension
-deep 10mm socket
-5mm Allen key driver bit
-fork oil (15wt)
-syringe
-plyers
-mallet
Step #1 – Remove the fork from the bike. Not 100% necessary but makes it much easier to work with. If you don't know how to do this turn back now, you're going the wrong way!
Step #2 – Remove all of the air from the negative air chamber on the bottom of the fork.
Step #3 – Remove all of the air from the positive air chamber on the top of the fork.
Step #4 – Firmly grab the rebound adjustment knob with your plyers and pull it out of the fork.
Rebound adjustment knob is really just a glorified 2.5mm Allen key.
Step #5 – In the bottom of the same rebound leg, insert the 5mm Allen key socket attachment and extender (so that it can reach). Loosen counter clockwise a few turns and then tap lightly with your mallet to unseat the chamber from the fork lowers. Unscrew the red bolt the rest of the way.
Tap lightly to unseat
Rebound chamber fixing bolt
Step #6 – Use your deep 10mm socket on the negative air side of the fork and loosen the nut a few turns. Again tap it a few times to unseat the negative air chamber from the lowers. Unscrew the aluminum nut the rest of the way.
Tap to unseat
Negative air fixing nut
Step #7 – You’re pretty much done the hard parts now. If you unseated the chambers properly by tapping them loose with the mallet then the lowers should now slide easily off the uppers. Some oil will come out, that is the old open bath fluid. At this point do not attempt to disassemble the uppers in any way. Do not remove the top caps, ever, and leave the snap rings alone. The internals of the cartridges are unserviceable by you or me.
Step #8 – Now is a good time to clean out your foam wipers. They get dirty and contaminated so you can gently pry them out with a small screwdriver. Rinse them with isopropyl alcohol to clean out the old oil/dirt. I was glad I checked mine since the one wiper had been installed incorrectly from the factory and was pinched under the rubber wiper. To remove the rubber wipers from the lowers just use a large bladed screwdriver to gently pry it out, they should be easy to remove. To get them back in just a tap with the rubber mallet.
Removing the rubber wipers
Oops Rockshox pinched my foam wiper
Yikes, was still able to salvage
Step #9 – Clean everything up. It is easy to get in the nooks and crannies now that it is disassembled. Make sure not to let any dirt find its way into the lowers. Unless there is already dirt and contamination in them you don’t need to flush them out. There are also nylon spacers that sit in the bottom like 1” thick little donuts. Mine stayed in there but make sure they don’t rattle out and also they are oriented correctly when you go to re-install the uppers.
Set your cleaned parts on a clean surface to get it ready for re-assembly.
Step #10 – If you removed the rubber wipers then put them back now. Light tap with the mallet to make sure they are seated down in the lowers correctly. Now saturate the foam wiper with your fork oil, I used 5wt. Install saturated foam wiper back into its channel in the rubber wiper making sure it is flush and seated properly.
Step #11 – Now you are ready to add the new open bath fluid. I used 5mL of 15wt fork oil. Lay your fork on a slight angle so that the fluid migrates to the bottom of the lowers but not on such an angle to let the fluid run out the bolt holes in the bottom. Both sides get the same treatment.
Step #12 – Slide the correctly oriented uppers into the lowers making sure to keep it at such an angle to not let the fluid run out either end. Do this slowly or the rush of air created from sliding the uppers in will blast the new open bath fluid out the bottom of the fork.
Slide the uppers in slowly
Step #13 – When lined up correctly the aluminum bolt from the negative chamber will protrude through the lowers and allow you to tighten the aluminum nut back on. Make sure the little rubber o-ring is seated at the end of the alloy nut as pictured. Don’t torque the nut down yet, just tighten gently.
Don't forget about the o-ring
Finger tighten
Step #14 – Grab your 5mm Allen extension and finger tighten the red bolt back into place on the rebound side of the fork.
Step #15 – Torque both sides down. Probably 4N-m is sufficient or if you don’t have a torque wrench it would be like a 5 out of 10 on the tightness scale. It is not that easy to strip these guys out but they are alloy on alloy so err on the side of caution.
Step #16 – Install the glorified 2.5mm rebound adjustment knob. Might need to wiggle it a little into place.
That’s it. Fill the fork back up with air and hopefully it won’t burst into flames if you’ve completed the steps correctly. Give it a final wipe down to remove your oily fingerprints and shake it up a little to get the fluid coating the lowers. Install it back onto your bike.
All done
Tools required.
-Socket wrench with extension
-deep 10mm socket
-5mm Allen key driver bit
-fork oil (15wt)
-syringe
-plyers
-mallet
Step #1 – Remove the fork from the bike. Not 100% necessary but makes it much easier to work with. If you don't know how to do this turn back now, you're going the wrong way!
Step #2 – Remove all of the air from the negative air chamber on the bottom of the fork.
Step #3 – Remove all of the air from the positive air chamber on the top of the fork.
Step #4 – Firmly grab the rebound adjustment knob with your plyers and pull it out of the fork.
Rebound adjustment knob is really just a glorified 2.5mm Allen key.
Step #5 – In the bottom of the same rebound leg, insert the 5mm Allen key socket attachment and extender (so that it can reach). Loosen counter clockwise a few turns and then tap lightly with your mallet to unseat the chamber from the fork lowers. Unscrew the red bolt the rest of the way.
Tap lightly to unseat
Rebound chamber fixing bolt
Step #6 – Use your deep 10mm socket on the negative air side of the fork and loosen the nut a few turns. Again tap it a few times to unseat the negative air chamber from the lowers. Unscrew the aluminum nut the rest of the way.
Tap to unseat
Negative air fixing nut
Step #7 – You’re pretty much done the hard parts now. If you unseated the chambers properly by tapping them loose with the mallet then the lowers should now slide easily off the uppers. Some oil will come out, that is the old open bath fluid. At this point do not attempt to disassemble the uppers in any way. Do not remove the top caps, ever, and leave the snap rings alone. The internals of the cartridges are unserviceable by you or me.
Step #8 – Now is a good time to clean out your foam wipers. They get dirty and contaminated so you can gently pry them out with a small screwdriver. Rinse them with isopropyl alcohol to clean out the old oil/dirt. I was glad I checked mine since the one wiper had been installed incorrectly from the factory and was pinched under the rubber wiper. To remove the rubber wipers from the lowers just use a large bladed screwdriver to gently pry it out, they should be easy to remove. To get them back in just a tap with the rubber mallet.
Removing the rubber wipers
Oops Rockshox pinched my foam wiper
Yikes, was still able to salvage
Step #9 – Clean everything up. It is easy to get in the nooks and crannies now that it is disassembled. Make sure not to let any dirt find its way into the lowers. Unless there is already dirt and contamination in them you don’t need to flush them out. There are also nylon spacers that sit in the bottom like 1” thick little donuts. Mine stayed in there but make sure they don’t rattle out and also they are oriented correctly when you go to re-install the uppers.
Set your cleaned parts on a clean surface to get it ready for re-assembly.
Step #10 – If you removed the rubber wipers then put them back now. Light tap with the mallet to make sure they are seated down in the lowers correctly. Now saturate the foam wiper with your fork oil, I used 5wt. Install saturated foam wiper back into its channel in the rubber wiper making sure it is flush and seated properly.
Step #11 – Now you are ready to add the new open bath fluid. I used 5mL of 15wt fork oil. Lay your fork on a slight angle so that the fluid migrates to the bottom of the lowers but not on such an angle to let the fluid run out the bolt holes in the bottom. Both sides get the same treatment.
Step #12 – Slide the correctly oriented uppers into the lowers making sure to keep it at such an angle to not let the fluid run out either end. Do this slowly or the rush of air created from sliding the uppers in will blast the new open bath fluid out the bottom of the fork.
Slide the uppers in slowly
Step #13 – When lined up correctly the aluminum bolt from the negative chamber will protrude through the lowers and allow you to tighten the aluminum nut back on. Make sure the little rubber o-ring is seated at the end of the alloy nut as pictured. Don’t torque the nut down yet, just tighten gently.
Don't forget about the o-ring
Finger tighten
Step #14 – Grab your 5mm Allen extension and finger tighten the red bolt back into place on the rebound side of the fork.
Step #15 – Torque both sides down. Probably 4N-m is sufficient or if you don’t have a torque wrench it would be like a 5 out of 10 on the tightness scale. It is not that easy to strip these guys out but they are alloy on alloy so err on the side of caution.
Step #16 – Install the glorified 2.5mm rebound adjustment knob. Might need to wiggle it a little into place.
That’s it. Fill the fork back up with air and hopefully it won’t burst into flames if you’ve completed the steps correctly. Give it a final wipe down to remove your oily fingerprints and shake it up a little to get the fluid coating the lowers. Install it back onto your bike.
All done
As always comments, suggestions, experiences welcome.
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