Words about my new road bike

I mentioned a new road bike awhile ago, but didn't really go into detail. I've been riding it all year and figured it was time, since I want to get a little more into talking about equipment and different rides and routes instead of myself all the time. I guess posts about trail work and the zootown derailleurs would be good ideas too.

Yeah, about that new road bike. It's nice

Rolling Thunder Cyclocross 2017

Rolling Thunder tends to mark the end of the season, and not just for racing, because winter usually shows up not too long after. This year we got cold weather and a big snowstorm a few days later (although it's been nice since and I've been out riding a bunch).

Like last year, I made sure to get out and help Shaun with the course. Thunder takes quite a bit more work than the standard Wednesday night series. Mostly it just comes down to driving in stakes and running tape but there is some other stuff that needs to happen too. Without any help Shaun would end up doing all himself and I had free time, so really it was about the least I could do. There is also a really nice benefit of helping with the course and that is being able to get very familiar with it before the race.

Wednesday night cyclocross

Cross season is over for me, and there won't be much more outdoor riding this year, so I guess I could write about it. Once again we had a 6-race Wednesday night series plus Rolling Thunder. I went to all of those, but did miss all the out of town Wild West series races again. Partially because I never got around to buying a USAC license, and partly because it's a lot of time and expense to go travel every weekend to race. I was also afraid of getting burnt out by the time thunder came around.

New parts for the CX bike

Cyclocross season just started, and this will be my 4th season on the Orbea. Apparently that is a long time to have a bike now, and I've heard "you should get a new one" quite a few times. I guess that would be nice, but I already bought a bike this year, and the cx bike just needed a bit of maintenance. Until now, about all I've done is put on new tires when they wore out. And replaced the chain once. So, after all that time and a few wet and muddy events, the shifting quality was not like new. It still worked, but sometimes shifts on the rear cassette were slow or I'd have to overshift to get to a bigger cog. Of course fresh cables and housings would have fixed the issue, but where's the fun in that?

Summer in Canada

This summer, I wound up in Canada for awhile. Probably not a surprise, seeing how I'm a Canadian and all. This trip wound up taking a little longer than I'd planned due to a constriction project, and there were some comments as to "I didn't think you were coming back" upon my return. Thankfully I had anticipated being there more than just a week or two and brought some bikes with. Un-thankfully, Lethbridge, Alberta, sucks for riding.

Sram GX 1x11 MTB drivetrain 1000 mile review

This spring, I finally caught up with the rest of the world and got rid of the front derailleur on my mountain bike. Now I've got some good miles and a few races on it and thought I'd write some more words. I see way too many reviews of stuff that consists of "hey check out these new parts, looks cool, right?" Well, try it out for an extended period of time and get back to me. So that's what I've done, and the conclusion is that it's pretty good.

Mountain Bike Season

Road racing season came and went pretty quickly, and the summer has had me wondering about my choice to buy a new road bike this year as opposed to spending that money on MTB and CX stuff. A full suspension bike sure would be sweet and the cross bike could use a new drivetrain and some wider, tubeless-ready wheels. But no, not really, because I like road riding and it's an awesome bike.