Quickly around the Channel

Sunday turned on perfect conditions for the Round the Channel Audax ride, a delightful trip down the Huon Valley and back up the d'Entrecasteaux Channel. It's a tad undulating, in 105km there's over 1,000m of climbing. After waiting for possible latercomers thrown by the daylight savings change, two of us pushed off from Longley 8.30am.

Fortunately Paul and I were pretty evenly matched so we chatted away as we zoomed through Huonville before stopping at Cygnet for a coffee, and in his case a smoke. Back on the bikes we made good time up the Channel before another smoko at Gordon. We parted ways at Margate, and with a hilly century starting to tell on my legs, I crawled back up the hill to Longely where my car was parked.

Pleasingly over the last six months my fitness has improved somewhat. I knocked a good 40 minutes off my previous best time for the trip to stop the clock a shade under five hours. A most enjoyable ride and a good confidence booster coming just two weeks before the Oppy. Mind you 360km in 24 hours is a slightly bigger ask. At least rural Victoria's a bit flat.

1,425km so far this year.

A reasonable request.

From the Surly blog.

1,291km so far this year.

OK, now I've seen everything

The current bike worldwide boom is a good thing, nay - a great thing- but like most things in life it's not an unalloyed joy.

Twenty-odd years ago we had to deal with the sudden appearance of triathletes - strapping meat puppets immune to pain but barely smart enough to to steer around corners. Then came the mountain bikers and they were mostly ok. Now come the fixed gear riders and I'm coping pretty well with that. Each group bought some cultural baggage with them to add to the rich mix that makes up the pasttime. But eventually matters must reach a point where even the most sanguine of us much cry: Enough! Ride the things, don't worship them as gods.

Without wanting to sound too much like Bike Snob NYC, have a bloody look at this: you can get paintings of bicycles from BicyclePaintings.com in New York. They even have gallery. WTF? WTFF?

For a mere $US600, you can buy a painting, oil on board, of Roberto's rain bike. Never mind that Roberto's rain bike is clearly a piece of shit you could buy for less than $US600 and still have enough money for some hooks to hang it on a wall at your place. (Also Roberto, get your brakes serviced, one of the calipers is badly bent.) For $US1500 you can buy Alana's Bike on paper. Look at it there, looking coquettishly over its shoulder at us. (Alana, baby, you need some brakes and some handlebar tape.) But hey, if that's too rich for your blood you can always buy a painting of a Tour de France water bottle for $300. Or you could buy 100 of the fuckers for real and have your own performance art party at home.

1,181km so far this year.

The shed as a goldmine.

I've been a bit short of cash of late, so I've been whacking some old bike bits on ebay. Cleaning out the shed has never been so profitable.

I have a fair few old bike parts I've had for 20 years or more which I'm unlikely to ever use again. It's mostly old Campagnolo stuff from when I was racing - I had expensive tastes even then. Some of it has some sentimental value, but it's hard to hang onto stuff when it's fetching good money online. The demand is amazing even for items I describe in great detail as worn or a bit rusty. There's nothing that hasn't sold. So far I've sold the old, worn 1983 Campagnolo Record pedals to the left for $60 and old pair of Suntour track pedals for $40 and a fairly ratty pair of Campagnolo non-aero brake levers for $40 as well.

This week I've unearthed a pair of Suntour Superbe road pedals. They're lovely smooth pedals, in good condition and they've already reached $50 ,which may well be more than I paid for them back in about 1985. I had no idea they would be such a good investment.

The best thing about it all is that this kit is going to people who will use and appreciate it. The downside is that the ebay fees take a decent bite and using their Paypal payment service means you lose even more - my total fees are running at slightly over 10%. But it's hard to complain too much when its turning stuff that was cluttering up the shed into dollars.

1,103km so far this year.

What's wrong with the Tour de France.

My cold and windy commute across the shoulder of Mt Wellington last night got me thinking about what the Tour de France really needs: a night stage. Forget that sissy day riding, any one can do that. Let's see how these tough guys go at night. Let's say a 350km mountain stage in the dark. Wouldn't that be a great prompt to see some breakthoughs in in the development of useful cycling gear, say for example bike lights?

1,005km so far this year.

Hobart Century Ride

I had a fine old time at the Hobart Century ride on Sunday. It's always a jolly outing. There seemed a few more riders than last year too, although I didn't end up seeing too many of them after the start. There was a fair bit of lycra and carbon and shaved legs in evidence.

Riding at a moderate pace, I finished a shade over five hours, one minute slower than my time for last year. (If that rate of deterioration holds I'll be riding sub-six hour centuries well into my eighties which suits me fine.) It was a fairly hot day and I stopped a couple of times, once for an ice cream and once for a cool drink, so maybe I shouldn't have been too surprised there wasn't anyone much still around when I eventually finished!

I had some gear problems which meant I had to stop and manually move the chain down to use the small chainring, which was a minor inconvenience and a reminder of how it was done in the distant years before deraillieurs were invented. Gotta get that fixed before the Oppy. Well done to the crazy bugger who finished the course in 3:41 on a fixed gear. Well done that man indeed.

Suffering in the hills.

Riding hills are a bit of a test of truth for cyclists. Anyone can ride fast on the flat, that's why Beach Road in Melbourne is so popular, but there's no hiding any weaknesses when the road turns upwards. The steeper the hill the starker the effect. Being a larger person, the laws of physics conspire against me too. There are no top Tour de France climbers who weigh over 100kg.

And hills hurt. Always. The fitter you get the faster you go, but they still hurt the legs and the lungs. It's one of the reasons I've been avoiding some of the bigger climbs around home - of which there are plenty. But riding hills is a great way to toughen up.

I've hardly ridden at all in the last month. Driving to work makes a man fat, comfortable, weak and lazy. The short commutes I've been doing aren't enough to build much strength or endurance , so I've come up with a more challenging 40km round trip form Sandfly to Hobart via Ferntree. As a commute, it's almost perfect -scenic and low traffic. It has two climbs too, one one the way in of 7km and one of 12km on the way home. Over 20km there's more than 500m of climbing.

I rode it for the first time this morning and it's a test alright. Heaps less traffic than the

It's time to tackle my biggest weakness head on and harden up for the Oppy.

960km so far this year.

There was a Mass of us.

Critical Mass came to Hobart last Friday. It was a lovely outing, though sadly I forgot my camera. There was around 250 riders, which is a good turnout for a first time event in my opinion and everyone was very well behaved.

Check out this editorial from the Mercury. (I actually missed it first time around, thanks to Tim for pointing it out.) It's nicely at odds with the sort of thing that appears in the Herald-Sun for example, but the ride was also different the mainland Critical Mass rides I've been in. Some extracts...

If Hobartians were expecting chaos at 5.51pm they would have been pleasantly surprised. It was no more objectionable than the Christmas Pageant, or the fun run or a forest protest march.
...
Apart from a couple of grumpy couriers for whom time is money and apparently more important that the life and limb of a cyclist or two, it was an uneventful exercise in civic protest.
...
Until drivers get the message that bikes have equal rights on the road, and that a few seconds of tolerance is all it takes the share the space, we will not have a bike friendly city.

Why does it feel ever so slightly odd? And a little proud.

A slow month.

February was a bit of a disaster for me. The Surly is off the road because I broke the shift lever on the way to the Alpine Classic, so I haven't been riding much. So not much blogging either. 105km for the month - my worst month since 2005. But two days into March I've passed that total already.

Still the break was nice and the last few days getting back onto the old red racer has been terrific. For some reason I decided to put some slightly wider handlebars on the bike and it's really transformed it from a far too twitchy racer to a much better behaved bike. Funny how the little things can make a difference. So many modern bikes have handlebars that are too wide, making them handle like barges.
My problem with this bike was the opposite, the bars were ideal for criteriums or for cutting through traffic but I don't do much of either of those these days.

Just over six weeks until the Oppy. It will take a bit more riding to get my fitness up to a level where I can do 360km in 24 hours I suspect. But even so I'm looking forward to it immensely.

763km so far this year.

Goodbye Sheldon

The world is a poorer place for the passing of Sheldon Brown this week, from a heart attack at age 63. Widely considered the cycling world's foremost mechanical guru, he maintained a sprawling and encyclopedic website on all things bike that is far and away the best such resource on the internet. If you don't know the site, do yourself a favour and check it out. It's the sort of place that makes for hours of pleasurable diversion.

Despite his enyclopedic knowledge Sheldon Brown was not a know-it-all, in contrast to so many who infect the byways of the internet. His writings were infused with his love of cycling, a self-deprecating sense of humour and more than a touch of happy eccentricity. But if you wanted to know whether a 27 inch tyre would fit a 700c wheel, or the gear ratios of an old Sturmey Archer hub or any of the other arcania of cycling, the answer was likely to be on Sheldon's website. And if it wasn't - a post on any of a number of bicycle forums often brought an insightful reply from the man himself.

He said Igor, the eagle on his helment, symbolised how he viewed himself and how he wanted the world to view him: independent minded, original, a person with a sense of humor and somebody who doesn't take himself too seriously.

Sheldon Brown was all that and more. He will be missed.

A tale of two rides.

Two great rides - two totally different results.

I'd been looking forward to the Audax Alpine Classic for ages but it clearly wasn't to be from the outset. I packed my bike in a bit of a hurry before heading to the airport and unfortunately the rear gear shifter broke in transit. Thanks to the wonderful efforts of Peter Moore from Abbotsford Cycles - easily Melbourne's best bike shop - I was mechanically right to go, but a late night drinking session with an old journo mate in Melbourne on Friday night meant I wasn't in much of a state Saturday and still decidedly sub-optimal Sunday.

In truth, probably a few things came together to stuff me. Hangover, unfit, overweight. But so it goes. I made it up the grueling climbs of Towonga Gap and Falls Creek but at the top after just 70km my heart rate was stuck at 110 beats per minute 40 minutes after I stopped so I reluctantly decided to take the sag wagon back to Bright. Disappointing, but so it goes.

Still, the Alpine Classic remains one of the best organised and run rides I've ever taken part in and the atmosphere in Bright over the entire weekend was fabulous with a celebration of French food, music and culture. I'll be back next year - thin and tough and ready. If I can lose 20kg I'll buy myself a flash new bike. Maybe something plastic like Glo's stunning new Shogun.

Well done to Steve, who managed to finish the 200km despite his bad case of jangled nerves and despite narrowly cheating death by waking us all up at 4.45am and also to Ken who also went the full distance in his usual fine style.

Today was my first attempt at the Tahune MTB Marathon. There's two choices - a 100km and a 50km and I sensibly opted for the 50. The course was a stunning mix of ride trails, scary technical sections and single track and I rode my heart out to finish in 4 hours. Despite a small stack on a relatively easy bit (grabbing a handful of front brake didn't help) which left me with a bloody knee, I had a fantastic time and can't wait for the next event. No trouble from the heart - so I guess the experiment has proven heavy drinking and riding doesn't mix. Who'd have thunk it?

593km so far this year.

Putting my foot in it.

So here's me celebrating no punctures for a year, knowing full well I was tempting fate. Fate has a way of getting the last laugh. With a little bit of help from my own clumsiness. Let the following be a valuable lesson to you all.

Now I've had some dumb prangs in my time, I've hit things in the dark while riding without lights and clipped parked cars riding home from the pub and crashed while trying to hit a can off the road with a broom. Every perfect ride is somewhat the same, each act of stupidity has its own unique flavour. And this one's no different.

On Saturday morning, Mrs S and I set out for a brisk 50km ride. About 10km in, I threw my chain off the top chainring (again) and the rear deraillieur arched backwards under the pull of the chain. Naturally, I tried to fix this by unclipping my foot and tapping it back into place with my toe as I rolled downhill. What could possibly go wrong?

As it turns out, quite a bit.

Being a bit tired and a little hungover probably didn't help. My foot missed the derailleur and became slightly - um, entangled in the back wheel. Fortunately after about half a rotation it jammed against the seat stay and the wheel stopped turning. So there I was, skidding merrily down the road with my foot caught in the back wheel thinking - ``Isn't this just peachy?". Then the tyre blew. As I skidded to a stop on the rim and pulled my foot from the wheel I watched Mrs S disappear over a hill in the distance, oblivious. Curiosity got the better of her in the end and she returned about ten minutes later.

The tyre was on its way out anyway, so that's not too bad, but I've also pulled a spoke through the rim, which is bad. Oddly my foot wasn't hurt at all.

One of the good things about being married is that your spouse also performs the role of Critical Incident Debriefer and Imparter of Valuable Lessons. For free. For those of you who haven't had the benefit of a Mrs Surly Dave debrief, apparently putting your foot in the back wheel of a moving bicycle is a really stupid thing to do. Should I forget this, fortunately I have her to to remind me that once or twice each time we ride together for the next few years. The rest of you will have to make do with this warning alone.

225km so far this year.

The family that rides together...

As far as pleasant surprises go, it's not a bad one. Mrs Surly Dave wants to do longer road rides. She says the 30km rides we've been doing aren't long enough. I can cope with that - we'll try a hilly 60km tomorrow. At this rate I'll have her doing 200's in no time!

102km so far this year.

A whole lot of numbers.

I'm happy with 2007. I rode 6,002km in 128 rides over 287 hours - which is just shy of 12 days in the saddle. My average ride was 46km and my average speed was 21.62km/h. My last flat tyre was on January 17. It was a bit down on 2006 which saw 6,441km in 136 rides over 300 hours in the saddle with an average of 22.14km/h.

It's a quiet day at work so I'm making some plans. This years goals are less ambitious than last year's. They're all within reach:

1. At least 7,200km on the bike. A 20% rise.
2. Finish the year in the top 1,000 riders on bikejournal.com
3. At least 366 hours in the saddle - one hour a day for the leap year. A 27% rise.
4. At least 183 rides - on the bike every second day. A 42% increase.
5. Lifting my average speed to at least 22.5km/h. A 4% increase!
6. Seeing how many days in a row I can ride at least 10km, starting on January 1.
7. Riding at least 400km in the Oppy (360km last year) and completing the 200km Alpine Classic within the time limit (130km last year).
8. Blog more!

I enjoy cycling and I enjoy setting challenges for myself, I wonder how many of these - if any I can knock off.

0km so far this year.

And so it comes to this...

At midnight tonight there is just one day left in the year. At bikejournal.com, where cyclists go to log their rides in the spirit of friendly competition the clock is ticking down. There's been a noticeable surge in the last few days as people ride that little bit extra to improve their year. I was touching the top 1,200 mark, but two days of the bike to got to a family wedding in Sydney has dropped me down a remarklable 80 places which I won't regain.

For mine, 2007 hasn't been my best year. I'm on 5,954km, which means I'm a certainty to try to crank out 45km tomorrow to cross the 6,000km barrier. I had been aiming for 10,000km, then 7,200km. As the year drew on and it became apparent I wasn't going to come close to either of those I decided to settle for 6,400km - which was my total last year. I'm not even going to make that. Never mind, every kilometre was fun, as I now recall, even the ones on icy roads in the winter rain.

A couple of other riders have had a stellar year though. I tend to disregard the blokes who claim more than 30,000km a year as overachievers and braggarts. But Husky65 has done 6,485km to date which puts him dead on for 6,500km and a newcomer called 3hills has pedalled his heart out for 6,735km. Emphatic!

I'll spend tomorrow thinking about goals for 2008. It's going to be a cracker! Watch out husky65 and 3hills.

5,954km so far this year.

Slow, fat Alleycat!

Hobart's first Alley Cat race was held on the weekend, starting out from Salamanca Place for a mad dash from pub to pub in Hobart's inner city. There was around a dozen riders, which is pretty good for a first event. Most rode fixies, although there was also mountain bikes and tourers and even someone sporting a top-tube baby seat. The route was a slowly unfolding secret - the first checkpoint revealed at the start, the second was revealed after drinking a beer at the first and so on. A most enjoyable day, even counting walking into a pub in West Hobart wearing a nightie over my cycling gear (race requirement between checkpoints three and four, I promise.)

I'm not that competitive and my backstreet knowledge of Hobart isn't that sharp so I've got a way to go as an Alleycat racer, but I learned some valuable lessons. You realise how hilly Hobart's is when you're a large man on a fixed gear. Racing on a full stomach also isn't the smartest thing to do. And it's not smart to wait at the last checkpoint for your mate who you think is behind you, because he might have found a shortcut along the way and you will certainly end up getting the ironic slow hand clap and cheers reserved for those who come DFL.

5,761km so far this year.

Still pedalling.

"It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle."

Ernest Hemingway.

5,558km so far this year.

More room please.

I've had a few close calls lately and have been thinking about what to do. I originally thought ot a rearward-facing video camera and a laser rangefinder to get an image and a distance readout on the fuckers so I can go to the cops. But an e-mail exchange wit the wonderful Dr Ian Walker of the bike helmet study fame, I've decided it's going to be far too much trouble.

My next thought was a metre-plus long length of scratchy aluminium on a spring, to keep people at bay, but I find the idea's been considered and soundly rejected.

Then then I find the photo to the left. If that's not exactly me message I'm wanting to send, I don't know what is. It might not be that practical for moving through traffic, but you can't have everything.

Thanks to Treadly for the link.

5,558km so far this year.

The great chain of being

I don't often rave on about things I like for a couple of reason: firstly I'm like to piss and moan and secondly there's not that much out there that really impresses me. But today, and maybe tomorrow will be an exception before I return to my normal surly self.

I had to buy a chain a couple of weeks ago, because my satanic front derailleur fed my chain into the gap between the right crank and the chainrings, bending it at the same time.

I wandered into one of Hobart's friendly bike shops to buy a replacement so I could get home. For $85, the Wipperman 10 speed chain is a bit pricey, but it has a cracking little connecting link which means you can take the chain off without any tools. Which is pretty handy when you think about it. I was able to clean my chain today with ease, slipped it off, soaked it in kero, relubed and put back on in about five minutes. Happy is me. I love Wipperman chains.

Coming up next: the best bicycle computer ever made.

5,460km so far this year.

Somehow it seems so right.