North Boulder Crit: Success!

   Last weekend was a fun one of racing! First, Saturday morning was the Sunshine Hill Climb, an awesome 9 mile race up Sunshine Canyon. The next day was a criterium around North Boulder Park. Here's the action:

The end of men's Cat 4 35+:

Love to see a finish line fist pump

   Before the Pros, they had a great kids race. 2 laps of this was a long ways for some of these kids, and the little ones were on balance bikes!

  Now on tot he Pros... here they are all lined up:

Teeming with excitement!

   Short recap: This race was 1 hour and 10 minutes long. The previous day's hill climb times by this group was between 40 and 50 minutes, so this was longer than that. About halfway through, three guys took off the front and just kept adding distance every lap. A few individual riders and small groups tried to bridge the gap, but with no success. 

Main pack coming through

   At about 4 laps left, the lead out group lapped the main field, which was both awesome, and kind of anticlimactic. The leaders were lost in the group. But! is was a very exciting race none the less, and a great way to kick off the summer!

Stopping Grip Slip: MacGyver Edition

   I have been secretly building up a single speed mountain bike for the last couple months. Will it be fun? Keep reading to find out. But building it sure has been fun. When it came time for grips, I picked up a pair of Ergon grips at BSR for pretty cheap. 

   One problem was that the grip part was slipping from the bar end. This was a little frustrating, as you can imagine. Here's how I solved it:

   I have some old lock on grips laying around, and popped off the lock ring, with hopes of using it on the Ergon grips.

Ergon grips, with lock ring

   I trimmed back the grip material, as well as notching out the plastic underneath to match the old lock on grips:

The cut Ergon grips

   Here you can see the old lock on grips, on top, and the Ergon grips, on the bottom. The right one has been trimmed so that the lock ring would fit:

Comparing the Ergon and lock on grips

   The bastardized version of the two grips:

   How did it work? Fantastic actually! I have taken it for a couple rides on Marshal Mesa and it was solid. It's a good thing too, turns out you really crank on your bars when you only have one gear. 

Friday WTF: Bull Horns?

   Another Friday, another weird bike. This comes from the design world, and is somehow "...made from genuine deer antler and recycled materials." I assume it's an antler that has been hit with the resin treatment and a stem clamp added. 

The last thing some poor people might see

Side shot

   As you are of course aware, being the cycling enthusiast you are, forward facing handlebars are not allowed in mass start races.

   In a sanctioned road race, you must use standars drop handlebars. To quote the USA Cycling Racing Rules:

1J. Bicycles

1J1. Bicycles used in competition must be propelled solely by the rider's legs and shall have the following

characteristics:

. . .

(d) The handlebars ends shall be solidly plugged and attachments thereto shall be fashioned in such a way as to minimize danger without impairing steering. Handlebars used for steering with ends that point forward or upward or that provide support for the rider's forearms are permitted only in time trial and pursuit events (not in Olympic Sprint); however, attachments that point upward on the brakehoods of road bicycles are allowed if the distance between them is greater than 25 cm (9.8 inches). [disqualification]

   Unfortunately, you can only race with these bars in a individual start race format. 

Balance Bike for the Pro-To-Be

   If you are like me, your kid is looking for a balance bike. And not just any balance bike, the best most awesome balance bike they make. I give you the full suspension balance bike:

Kokua Balance Bike

   What's that? not serious enough? Check this shit out:

Chumba FS Balance Bike

   This bad boy is equipped with a Maverick upside down fork, a Fox Float shock, and a 4 bar link suspension system. This is the bike Calvin should have. 

Is it a Shelf? Is it a Table?

    With more time on the couch, we've started needing more tables! Confidence bolstered by the success of my last table project, I  decided to put one behind the couch. This way, if Calvin wants to set his G&T down, he doesn't have to reach all the way to the foot rest.
   Here's a mock up of what we were looking at:

The 'unfinished' look (read: lazy)

   This was a really straightforward build, 3 pieces of wood, 6 cuts, 6 screws.

   The table isn't fastened to the wall, it's just held in place by the couch. The moulding on the floor also had to be cut out of the legs. Since it's not really visible, I just chopped off enough so it wold fit against the wall.

   And that's it! Now we don't have to worry about the dog knocking over drinks, or ice cream being too far away to reach. 

Friday WTF: Dandy Horse Race

   Check out this race held in Germany - It's a good old fashioned Dandy Horse race! The Dandy Horse is the pre-drive train bicycle, originating in the early 1800's in, you guessed it, Germany:

This town was celebrating it's 300th anniversary with some fine racing action!

Sweet Mountain Bike Resource

   Thanks to a work colleague, I found a pretty great website for all you mountain bikers out there. This site is a sister site of a rock climbing site called mountainproject.com where users add information on rock climbing. The mountain bike version allows riders to add maps, GPS, rules and history of trails. Here's the site layout:

Site layout

   The site offers some really neat features:

• Length
• % Singletrack
• Elevation gain
• Altitude (high and low)
• Map and elevation profile
• Conditions
• Adjacent trails
• Pictures
• Social network stuff

   All in all, this site has a ton of information, all user submitted and vetted. Plan your next ride here!