Memorial Weekend Ride

Virginia Beach is flat. Seriously. I took the fixed gear 29er to Va Beach and had fun ride. Total distance around 50 miles. I don't know. I have no electronics whatsoever on board. I am enjoying the ride more, the less I am a slave to the digits and statistics. One lesson is that I want a new Tomicog in 16 or maybe 15 teeth for future road rides at the Beach. Current gearing is 44x18 which works well for me on the 6-8% grade mountain roads I like to ride but had me spun too high this weekend. Even so, I nearly caught several roadies on Shore drive heading to the beach and I passed 4 road biker babes on General Booth Blvd. Except for the occasional wind more gear would be welcome. The idea of passing multigear bikes with my fixie makes me happy.

Smashed a PR!

I did a repeat of last month's fixed gear ride on Skyline Drive and saw a huge improvement.

Like last month I went to Hogback overlook and back to Front Royal on the fixie in 44x18 gearing. Last month it took me 29 min to do the intro 4 mile-1200 foot climb which is my person hill TT. My fastest time was from last year on my lighter road bike at 26 min. Today I bagged it in 24:48. Sweet! ~250W average on Analytic Cycling's calculator. That was just under 10mph avg. 400W would be 15mph. Seems impossible. Thought about running the freewheel but decided to man up and run fixed the whole 42 miles again. Didn't ride the brakes as much either, can almost get by resisting. There was a gaggle of roadies out too and I had much fun passing over a dozen of them huffing and puffing with their weenie girly gears to their dismay when they saw the Tomicog. Honking my silly bike horn to add insult on top with a happy "good mornin".

Damn, it hurt, especially when the HR exceeds 190BPM.

Back home

We all, my posse(wife and boys), went to Va Beach to visit our moms and I brought the
rigid-fixed El Mar for the purpose of riding what was to me the best place to ride in that corner of Virginia, Freedom Park. They have seriously expanded and improved, hat tip to Kirk of EVMA who showed me the newest loop. It was a little too new and lumpy for a rigid ride but I suffered it anyways. Nice vigorous trail. Amazed at how much climbing they managed to get out of the place. Silly uphill switchbacks that kill your momentum then turn uphill severely for just a few yards but I really had to mash the pedals to keep moving.
Managed to get my oldest bike buddy, Brent, who sold me my 1st mtb and showed me all the trails down that way, managed to get him out to ride after not trail riding for a couple of years.
Ahhhh, my turn to dish out the hurt. He and the crew from work, who called me tubby, used to kill me. They'd wait, resting at the top of the "climbs", and as soon as I huffed up there, they'd be off again. Played cat and mouse. Couldn't keep up on the downhill sections cause he's got like
a fully geared 4-5" of suspension to my 0" and 32mm tires and 32x18 fixed/rigid 29er gear
but what went down assuredly came back up, where I repeated caught his back tire and honked my comical bike horn loudly to proclaim I had reeled 'em in again. Jolly good fun.
Not jolly was the effin traffic I just suffered to get back home in Manassas.
Williamsburg to I-295 was bumper 2 bumper. I bailed out hoping it was an accident. 20 miles later back on I64 b2b again. I295 was fine, then around Kings Dominion it was...B..2..B AGAIN!
Every time I was about to bail out of I95 things opened up and just beyond my bail exit it was...B..2..B!
My 3.5 hour drive turned into 5 freaking hours.
Anyhoo, moms were happy to be recognised and the legs got tenderized.
"No coastin, Mo roastin"

Smoked! Fixed gear on Skyline Drive

Got a late start. Funny thing about a relatively big gear (44x18), seemed like I was moving slowly, but my hillclimb TT (4 miles 1200 feet elev) was only 3.5 min behind my PR on my road bike, and my heart rate was lower. But the legs were a hurtin. Back too. Always like this early on whenI am over weight with under fitness. And it was really windy, made me glad for the super wide bars. Made it to Hogback and out all on the 18T Tomicog but I think I will run the 20T freewheel next time. 44x18 was a little too much and I ended up riding the front brake alot on the downhills because I can't resist enough. Saw 30 mph on one downhill for a calculated cadence of155. I tried to resist and felt like I was gonna get launched. Glad for the 185mm disc up front. Clilly but nice. No cramps. It was a good day.

Got my fix on

Thanks for the bike articles Sheldon, RIP.

Steel El Mariachi converted to fixed gear.

No rear brake, 185 mm bb7 in front. Old 44T ring from garage pile and Tomi-cog 18T cog.

Not light but I climb faster on this than I do on my Ellsworth Truth. My 1st dirt ride was with Kenda Kwicker 32mm tyres at 60 psi. Damn I like this bike. May sell the Ellsworth frame to fund parts upgrades.

decisions on sm100

Last night I started considering which bike set up to run in Stokesville this year.
I got a new El Mariachi 29er recently and have been riding fixed gear no rear brake for training rides. But 100 miles mostly off road in steep hills would be rough. Maybe freewheelin would work. Then what gear ratio? And then there is my soooory state of fitness. Sounds like my 1st sm100 in 2007 when I started training after new years day at almost 200 lbs. And I am only 5'6" soo 200# is hefty. I lost 40 lbs and finished the 100. This year should be esaier, right?
Too much beer. Too much pizza. yadda. 175# now. This is doable.
Back to set up question. Bike came as a 1x9. Probably my best bet but I so love to suffer and single speedin would serve it up. Can't decide.
Tires: bike came with huge 2.55" donuts. But they are heavy. On my no suspension rigid bike they are my suspension. But if I run my 32mm cross tires I will save mucho peso.
In my sicko thinking it will be SS with the 32mm tread.
Better see if I can do this. Looking for a fixed gear training ride on Skyline Drive this coming weekend with my 5.0m rollout gearing. 44x18. Gear is good arounfd Manassas and my training loop has 2 steep out of the saddle stomps, one is especially heinous where I must lift the forward pedal and pull hard on the bars. hmmm, we will see.

Fixie Suffering-fun

So today I did my second consecutive apres travail, hard, for my current state of (un) fitness, ride on my recently fixed 29er and I gotta give kudos to Sheldon Brown for getting be to try it.
A little slower than my road bike, expected, and a bit harder, expected. But more fun, as I had read. Stopping without using the front brake is now a challenge...instead of blowing through stop signs to conserve momentum. Rear brake is in the basement. Don't know if my knees can take it. We will see. I expect the fixie will improve the leg much as I have read. Look forward to riding geared rigs in the future to see.