New Bike Stuff

I have added a few new upgrades to my bike and also just finished building my first ever set of wheels.
I put a new carbon fiber fork on my road bike to drop the weight and to make the ride quality better.

Also, here are some pictures of the wheels. I laced the front one radial, and the rear radial non-drive side and 3x drive side. I think that I have gotten them trued up pretty well, the real quesion is about the tension on the spokes. It feels like all the spokes are roughly the same tension, but I will have to take them to a bike shop to get them to check the tension.


I built them with the hubs that I won on ebay before and on some old Araya tubular rims that I had lying around, also I used double-butted Sapim spokes. Building wheels is something that I had always wanted to try, and it seemed to go a lot easier than I thought that it would, so either I got the knack of it early on, or these wheels will just explode when I put them on my bike and try to ride them.

I will keep you posted.

I saw this bike the other night and it reminded me of the good old days of mountain bikes.

Back on the River

These are just two quick pics from a 6 mile ride today, yes all of 6 miles (though I did spend 45 minutes on the trainer later -- you know, got races coming up).
But these are some of the usual Utica scenes. Got the river barges going by and the rock face of the old quarry here in town.

Heres Benny

Ben wanted everyone to see his Jonny Carson imdogisation

Michigan Winter

Kate and I went up to Cadillac for a few days this weekend as we wanted to experience some real winter again It seems that winter has rediscovered Cadillac after being absent for several years In the end we had to leave early as the weather was going to turn nasty But we got a go for at least one ski at the nature area on a beautiful winter day And we had fun watching the dogs go tearing through the snow

It was great to be back in Cadillac for a few days and it is always interesting to see how much it has changed since I moved away permanently nearly a decade ago Britta came up from GVSU and it was good to see her

My Return to Form? ...Hardly

I'm a wuss, I know. Don't bother commenting on that. I got on my bike today, on my road bike, for the first time this year and I was off again within half an hour. The winter wind just kicked my ass. In my defense it was actually dangerous for me to be riding, since the wind was blowing me off course and the roads around here are pretty narrow. The sky was beautiful, with big fluffy clouds soaring by against a sea of blue, but it's much better to enjoy a day like today from the warmth of one's own home. (Having said that I'm going out again in a second to get on my Bianchi and go a few kilometers to our favorite hamburger shop...)

Here's a shot from one of the more pleasant moments of my (mis)adventure.

Just a couple more photos

Here are a couple of other photos from the hike

Winter Hike

Kate was out and about all day, so that left the dogs and I to fend for ourselves. I spent a good part of the afternoon working on our addition. The good thing is that the all the trim is now done, and we just need to paint it and hook up the electical heater and we should be set.

Yesterday was another beautiful day, but alot warmer than today, and I just did not feel like bundling up in my cold weather riding cloths today. So, instead I decided to load the dogs up in the car (oh, they hate that) and go over to Charlestown State Park and go for a hike.

Poor Ben did puke just as we pulled into the parking lot, but quickly recovered when they got out of the car and realized that they were some new and exciting. I am not sure if I could really call what we did a hike, as it was mainly me being pulled around by two dogs who just had so many new smells and sights to experience.

The first part of the trail followed a little creek down to 14 Mile Creek. There were several small waterfalls along the way. At the bottom of creek run, the trail then started to meander along the side of 14 Mile, before the final long climb back up to the flat land where the parking lot was.

I have not spent as much time in the state park as I would like too, because there are some really pretty areas there and since it has remained unused for 60 years it still retains a touch of wildness.

Hey, 2 Posts in One Week

Since the weather was so warm this weekend (though nothing like it is today - 70 degrees), I managed to get two rides in outside this weekend.

Sunday's ride I did by myself and just rode around some backroads of Clark Co. Here are a couple of photos from it.

The first one is the cement plant in Sellersburg. At one time, there were about a hundred cement plants in the Sellersburg area, thanks to all the lime stone in the area. The second is just a tree out in a field all by itself.

Finally a new post

I know that it has kind of been quiet around here lately . . . . . . . crickets chirping.


But, hey it has either been too cold to ride outside or raining a lot here in the Ohio Valley. Not sure what the problem is out in Tsukuba, hem, hem.

Anyway, today was going to be a nice, sunny day, plus Kate was working, which meant I got to play :) (sorry, can't believe that I just made smiley face icon).

I ended up riding with one of my teammates out into Floyd County, which is the next county over from Clark. The ride went up into the Knobs (which is Indi-ucky speak for steep hills). However, the knobs we were climbing were preceded by several other climbs, so all in it turned out to be a lot of climbing today. But that was alright, cause I was riding in area that I have never ridden before. The first picture is from one of the valleys inbetween the knobs.
The second is what the back of my bike looked like at the end of the ride. While the weather was great riding, the roads were still wet in lots of places (actually there was quite a bit of mush and ice on the roads still). The ride ended up being about 2 hours and was probably around 35 miles total.


This last picture is of some hubs that I just purchased on ebay with the idea to build up a tubular wheelset for cyclocross. They are extremely light and nice and shiny (guess that is the magpie in me). Anyway, these hubs are unlike any that I have seen before, the center is titanium, while the flanges are aluminum. I figure that they should build up into a wheeleset that is around 1200 grams, which is almost a pound lighter than the lightest wheelset I have now.