Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

DavidS wrote:
Except now Colin has logged a huge number of KMs he's way in front of me again. I don't think I'll ever catch his wheel.

DS

The target I set at years start was considerably less than what I am heading to. However my "temporary" move to Vic Park has given my riding numbers an unexpected boost this year, not any deliberate intent. A week in the goldfields didn't hurt either.

The good/bad news however is that I may be moving back to the CBD in the near future. But I am experienced in the meaning of "temporary" when applied to work so it's really anyone's guess atm.

Well, I had a decent month and completed the JuneDoggle yesterday, so shall up my target to 9k and see where that takes me for the year. We've definitely been blessed with the weather down here thus far, but I suspect the rain is yet to come.

Hope all are well and putting in the miles.

cheers

You can have Southeast Queensland's rain if you want.

Terrible weather in these parts for the last 7 days. I haven't been out on the bike since last Saturday and am looking towards a very low monthly total for June. I'm hoping July gets a bit drier.

grantw wrote:Terrible weather in these parts for the last 7 days. I haven't been out on the bike since last Saturday and am looking towards a very low monthly total for June. I'm hoping July gets a bit drier.

Tell me about it. 290mm of rain since last Sunday. I hope to get out for a bit tomorrow and Sunday to make 400kms for June.

Only 290mm? And still it comes...

While I spent the last half a June battling the return of the persistant cold/virus thingy (is that round 4 now?) and our wild weather I was happy to achieve all but one of my June goals.

Yesterday's commute got me past the 6999m climbed for the month and both annual climbing and distance targets saw the halfway mark reached during the month. The first of the GCC mini-challenges, the beat your best challenge was completed in style by not only setting my PB for the overall step count but making the challenge more worthwhile personally I set out for a PB Triple Play. The before breakfast ride being my longest day of riding since the start of the GCC, walking to the shops with the family helped me towards my highest actual steps for any day so far and getting to the pool for a swim meant I set a GCC PB for each of the cycling, walking and swimming components.

The goal I missed out on was the 6 hour target for the Husky 100 which was to be attempted today. WIth the weather of this week the call was made to postpone the event (and along with it my sub 6 hour goal) until October 27. That's going to make things interesting being the day before I set of on the Tour da Country so I feel my training is really going to have to step up to be able to achieve both.

Keeping up with commuting this week meant for some seriously wet rides. None more so than Tuesday afternoon. After getting held up at work and running late I had no choice but to take the short cut through Croome on the way home. I knew there was a bridge along the cycleway that would be under water but figured all would be ok. It would be the first serious river crossing for my road bike with a serious flow covering the bridge. The muddy flow meant no visibility though the water and on the approach I managed to loose the cycleway and be riding on the grass. Thankfully the markers on the bridge gave me something to aim for to get back on. The flow of water made the front end a little skittish as I eased my way accross the roughest flowing section and found the water a little deeper than I'd hoped. I think the bottom bracket may have gone under.

Continuing on and there was another river crossing to be made at the next bridge on the road out of Croome. This one was much wider but I was thinking it probably wouldn't be as deep, I was sure in the past this area had been fine when the previous bridge was under water. I quickly found how wrong I was as the water was quickly above the axles and beyond! Deepest river crossing I've ever done and I'm on the road bike!

Checking the bike out later and so far it appears the bearing seals have done their job and all still appear nice and smooth with no unusual noises. I did however need to remove the tyres and valve stems to give the water from within the V of the rims a way to flow back out rather than keep swishing around inside the rim,

In other news I also added a new ride to my stable. Decided it was time to get an old clunker for riding to the shops etc and found myself an old shogun touring bike on ebay. Probably turned out to be a little nicer than I'd originally planned and will take some self control to resist fixing it up to something nicer than it's intended purpose. I'll get some picks up when I get a chance to take them but it's a lugged Tange 900 CrMo frame with canti brakes and a very interesting touring groupset on it. Downtube shifters are normal enough but with some interesting ratios. The cassette is more akin to a MTB with a 13-32 range while the triple on the front is a 50-45-30. Good range but not sure why the 45 isn't more centred in the range and may replace it with a 39 or 40 in the future. Other than that initial plans are to fit a longer stem so it fits me properly and add some guards and a rack.

I had ambitions for riding 750 km for June - with all this rain I have made only 542 km - somehow I don't think I will be going out to ride 210 km tomorrow

find_bruce wrote: - somehow I don't think I will be going out to ride 210 km tomorrow

Well, not with that attitude...

Lovely morning for a ride, thick fog and no wind. Apart from the safety aspect, I really don't mind mornings like this. 50km this morning with a bunch of two.

A total of 544km for June with 5303m of climbing; 2999km and 28,278m of climbing YTD. OK... if I had of known, I would have ridden around the block

That leaves me 40km in front (but 1800m behind for climbing) as I turn for home.

sblack wrote:While I spent the last half a June battling the return of the persistant cold/virus thingy (is that round 4 now?) and our wild weather I was happy to achieve all but one of my June goals.

Yesterday's commute got me past the 6999m climbed for the month and both annual climbing and distance targets saw the halfway mark reached during the month. The first of the GCC mini-challenges, the beat your best challenge was completed in style by not only setting my PB for the overall step count but making the challenge more worthwhile personally I set out for a PB Triple Play. The before breakfast ride being my longest day of riding since the start of the GCC, walking to the shops with the family helped me towards my highest actual steps for any day so far and getting to the pool for a swim meant I set a GCC PB for each of the cycling, walking and swimming components.

The goal I missed out on was the 6 hour target for the Husky 100 which was to be attempted today. WIth the weather of this week the call was made to postpone the event (and along with it my sub 6 hour goal) until October 27. That's going to make things interesting being the day before I set of on the Tour da Country so I feel my training is really going to have to step up to be able to achieve both.

Keeping up with commuting this week meant for some seriously wet rides. None more so than Tuesday afternoon. After getting held up at work and running late I had no choice but to take the short cut through Croome on the way home. I knew there was a bridge along the cycleway that would be under water but figured all would be ok. It would be the first serious river crossing for my road bike with a serious flow covering the bridge. The muddy flow meant no visibility though the water and on the approach I managed to loose the cycleway and be riding on the grass. Thankfully the markers on the bridge gave me something to aim for to get back on. The flow of water made the front end a little skittish as I eased my way accross the roughest flowing section and found the water a little deeper than I'd hoped. I think the bottom bracket may have gone under.

Continuing on and there was another river crossing to be made at the next bridge on the road out of Croome. This one was much wider but I was thinking it probably wouldn't be as deep, I was sure in the past this area had been fine when the previous bridge was under water. I quickly found how wrong I was as the water was quickly above the axles and beyond! Deepest river crossing I've ever done and I'm on the road bike!

Checking the bike out later and so far it appears the bearing seals have done their job and all still appear nice and smooth with no unusual noises. I did however need to remove the tyres and valve stems to give the water from within the V of the rims a way to flow back out rather than keep swishing around inside the rim,

In other news I also added a new ride to my stable. Decided it was time to get an old clunker for riding to the shops etc and found myself an old shogun touring bike on ebay. Probably turned out to be a little nicer than I'd originally planned and will take some self control to resist fixing it up to something nicer than it's intended purpose. I'll get some picks up when I get a chance to take them but it's a lugged Tange 900 CrMo frame with canti brakes and a very interesting touring groupset on it. Downtube shifters are normal enough but with some interesting ratios. The cassette is more akin to a MTB with a 13-32 range while the triple on the front is a 50-45-30. Good range but not sure why the 45 isn't more centred in the range and may replace it with a 39 or 40 in the future. Other than that initial plans are to fit a longer stem so it fits me properly and add some guards and a rack.

If my roadie took a dunking like that is be stripping it down. Sealed bearings are not water proof bearings. I would be removing the seals. Squirting some WD40 in there and packing them with some marine grease.

As for the 45t on the touring rig don't chuck it till you try it. It's designed so that you spend most of your time on it without having to resort to chainring changes. Just using the wide range cassette for most of your riding.

Just when I thought I was going to tone it down slightly for July, a few mates told me I'd be weak if I didn't give the Powerbar challenge a crack....here we go!!!

The weather relented a bit today so I managed to get out for a few kilometers to finish off June with 619km and 6628m of up. Lowest monthly total so far of the year and it's taken a large chunk out of my buffer. Oh well, just have to ride more next month

Made it to 3500 for the 6 months! Well on track for my 6k goal. Just gotta keep getting up for the 5am rides...

Btw Shane, nice score with that shogun, had my eye on it but I'm holding out for a Dawes super galaxy. Don't change the 45t, it's the main drive when the bike is loaded and surprisingly useful when it's not.

Only 380kms for me for June but I am happy with that as they were all single speed MTB kms.

I wasn't too upset at the Husky100 being called off as it gives me a chance to put in some training.

Now to increase my kms for July.

rolled through 3500km for the YTD last night with 51700km done already - weather has been crap the past 2 weeks which hasnt helped! time to start aiming for the fitz 165km challenge!!

singlespeedscott wrote:If my roadie took a dunking like that is be stripping it down. Sealed bearings are not water proof bearings. I would be removing the seals. Squirting some WD40 in there and packing them with some marine grease.

I'm aware that sealed bearings still aren't meant to be submerged like that however I'm not confident that I'd be able to pull them apart and get them back together without doing more damage than what water ingress may have occurred. If they where cup and cone I'd have done it already but really have no idea when it comes to pulling apart bearings that aren't meant to be user serviceable.

singlespeedscott wrote:As for the 45t on the touring rig don't chuck it till you try it. It's designed so that you spend most of your time on it without having to resort to chainring changes. Just using the wide range cassette for most of your riding.

grantw wrote:Btw Shane, nice score with that shogun, had my eye on it but I'm holding out for a Dawes super galaxy. Don't change the 45t, it's the main drive when the bike is loaded and surprisingly useful when it's not.

Thanks for the feedback guys. That answers my question of why the 45 and I must admit I hadn't got around to working out just what gearing that gave with the 13-32 on the back. After making some quick calculations I can see that it could easily cover the majority of the riding the bike is likely to see.

Well, cracked 6k Km this morning and can honestly say that I've had a ball since my return to cycling last October. Joining my local club and dipping the toe in races, participating in bunch rides in my home town and having a few work colleagues to ride with at other times, as well as doing 355Km over two days in the Murray to Moyne, have all combined to improve the experience.

Well done macca33

Sent from my C6603 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

I'm losing track of monthly totals... but, ytd at June 30, I have:

3647km
58678 metres climbed
99 rides

I was having a look at the summary page on veloviewer. Comparing gradients of ride plots from this year and last year, distance and time on bike have the same relationship but metres gained is much steeper. So.. roughly the same speed but heaps more climbing. . Still get toasted in Computer Cup though..

Nice work guys and oldnewby, nice of you to pop up, i was beginning to worry .

I got home from work and after a couple of stiff drinks have signed on to the Audax Sydney Melbourne 1200 (there's a sag wagon apparently) - starts November 17 at the Opera House and ends 4 excruciating days later in Albert Park. Time to up them kays.

grantw wrote:Nice work guys and oldnewby, nice of you to pop up, i was beginning to worry .

I got home from work and after a couple of stiff drinks have signed on to the Audax Sydney Melbourne 1200 (there's a sag wagon apparently) - starts November 17 at the Opera House and ends 4 excruciating days later in Albert Park. Time to up them kays.

Awesome!

oldnewby wrote:I'm losing track of monthly totals... but, ytd at June 30, I have:

3647km
58678 metres climbed
99 rides

Nice work OldNewby, that is a hell of a lot of climbing!