FSA Chain Rings

In this post - chain rings - I moaned about the cost of chain rings. This was in light of the fact that the 50T rings were worn badly on both the Scott and the Giant. They end up being at least £30+ each and seem to be rarely in stock at most of the major internet retailers.

For the Scott which is my best bike and hence the one I tend to fuss over, I ended up getting a new Shimano 5700 Compact chainset to replace the FSA Gossamer chainset as described in the post. This still left needing a new 50T ring for the Giant. I looked over a period of weeks to see when and what was available and recently found a reasonably proved supply in stock on eBay here: sprocketsuk

To be fair it arrived very quickly and was as advertised. I think the teeth are less complex that the original FSA or Shimano teeth - they look much more regular and more like the plain teeth on the inner (34T) ring. Only time will tell if this affects the shifting quality. The design is similar to the original FSA rings but slightly different in the area of the webs.

It took about 30 minutes to fit, mostly because I struggled to hold the back of the chainring bolt still whilst undoing with an Allen key. I had to resort to using the very large socket screwdriver bit from my impact driver to hold the back still whilst using the Allen key as I had no other suitable tool. However once I had rigged up something for this it all came apart easily enough. I applied a small smear of Copaslip (other brands and suppliers are avilable) to the threads before reassembly.

All was OK with the shifting once it was all back together. 

Closer inspection of the removed item showed how worn it was (its done about 10-12,000 miles in about 3 years or so, through all seasons):

The original ring

Shark Teeth

With teeth this worn it was going to start chewing through chains at an accelerated rate so this is why I spent £30. It was going to be of the order of £60-70 to replace it.

The FSA Vero is a square taper chainset - the bottom bracket it uses is discussed here and the square taper crank sets are getting less common now. I briefly considered fitting a new ring to the FSA Gossamer that came off the Scott together with the Mega Exo BB and considering it as an "upgrade", but given the short life of the Mega EXO BB compared the the original Truvative BB-06-SQ-LE-108/68 BB on the Giant (now replaced with a Shimano UN55) I decided that the durability would be compromised. I was also unsure whether the BB faces on the Giant might need facing off I fitted an external BB like the Mega EXO compared the to cartridge type it is currently running

I saw this recently - pretty relevant I think:

The Rules - Revisted

As a cyclist you may be aware of "the rules". My personal favourites are 5, 9 and 12. And for my son number 42

However they are somewhat controversial. 

Here are a stripped down no s**t set that are much better: "no s**t rules":

Team JLR - STRAVA - Part 3

A big effort in cycling during the week together with a 60 mile run with Noel on Sunday meant I managed a 3rd in the distance Team JLR - Strava Club weekly rankings for 7-14 April 2014:

and 4th in the elevation gain:
 

Pretty chuffed as there are some serious mile munchers at JLR. I won't deny that the last few miles home of the extended commute on Friday were pretty tough.

The start of the Sunday run with Noel felt like I might struggle but after about 10 miles I was felling pretty strong. Noel was OK but is not really very bike fit at the moment so we had a pretty low pace for the 60 miles (16.1mph) and was pretty well blown by the end. However the gentler pace (compared to if I had gone out alone) was pleasant and I got home feeling pretty good and comfortable.

I am trying to do as many mile as possible as part of the Ride London preparation. On this rides basis I am confidant I'd feel pretty good if I did it next week and kept the pace low. I am aiming for around 5½hours so about 18mph, I'm not ready for this pace yet but feeling quietly confident at the moment. I have got the Dynamic Rides 100 in July as preparation and expect this to be a lot hillier and hence slower - but good timing 1 month before the Ride London event.

Veloviewer Velobici Spring Classics Challenge 2014 and BikeRadar Challenges

I signed up for this. My best position was 25th on 9 March 2014:

Needless to say I have been dropping down the rankings since then! I might just be able to complete the challenge (basically to cycle 1098 miles in 50 days) but it will be tough. I might just have done almost enough miles in March but its going to be very hard to maintain this rate.

You can sign up to the challenge here: http://blog.veloviewer.com/velobici-spring-classics-challenge-2014/

As well as this challenge  I also sign up for the monthly BikeRadar challenges. Last year I won a T Shirt:

 

This was followed this February by another T Shirt (picture to follow). 

Given that typical entries are 100-120 people the chances of a win are pretty good. Recently the prizes include a draw for £100 of e-vouchers so its well worth entering. The recent 2 month challenge (1 Mar-30 Apr) is the "Spring Sportive Challenge" and at one point I was very high and improbable 3rd place:

I am down to 10th as of 6 April.

The April challenge is The Classics Challenge and again, albeit early in the month, I am highly placed:

Needless to say I won't be staying here for long either.

Post New Year Riding

I started this post in February and things just cropped up so its been massively delayed. I have done a review and got it to a start to publish

It's now the middle of February so at least 6 weeks of 2014 have passed already and I wanted to summarise what I managed to achieve in January, and review what getting in Ride London might mean.

Firstly despite the news reporting the coming of the second global flood, the weather in the midlands had actually been quite benign. There were some cold days, and wet and windy days but there has always been one of the days at the weekend when the weather has been very good for January and I have managed to get out once each weekend and twice on one weekend. I started looking at weather and work commitments for a commute once per week although all the pieces did not come together until 13 Feb when I was able to commute for the first time this year. This was a reasonable day between high winds and rain, although it was a lot colder than I expected in the morning and there was a pretty strong and persistent headwind all the way home

However despite the reasonable weather there were a couple of icy days in January and on one of those I had "An Off". This happened one Sunday - I knew from the forecast it was due to be cold and it certainly was when I got up. I had a few moments of dithering thinking it might be too icy but countered this by knowing that the Bus Routes (and the number 11 in particular) would be OK so all I had to do was get just over ½ mile from my house and then I'd be OK. I managed about 95% of the ½mile but as I caressed the from brake to slow for the T-Junction to turn left the next thing I knew I was on the ground.

An adrenalin fueled moment later and I was up and on the path. Fortunately no cars were coming and despite being a bit winded I felt OK. My first thoughts when lying on the road were actually: "where is my Garmin and is my bike OK"! I got up and gave the bike and check and all seemed OK, felt myself and also seemed OK - a bit winded and full of adrenalin I so decided that it was nothing more than being a bit winded, so decided to carry on. I was very tense for the next few miles about the ice but felt OK and my confidence was restored as the miles and increased and the day warmed up. My side (right) felt a bit sore and after a few times when I stood up on the pedals up some small climbs and it hurt a bit more than I wanted. I decided that I was sore enough to remain seated for the rest of the ride. I got home OK and had a better look whilst I got changed, and could not see anything amiss - no bruising or discolouration.

However as the days went on my ribs ached more and more - sleeping was painful and any stretching hurt. I'd clearly bruised my ribs but wow, did it hurt. It took over 4 weeks for the pain to completely go but it was unpleasant for almost 3 weeks. What it must hurt like if you actually break a rib I have no idea but the pain must be intense.

The Number 11 bus routes (both A & C) that I created are good Sunday morning rides and I have done them a few more times. I am the KOM on both routes needless to say. I would not do them any other time than an early Sunday morning though given the traffic.

As I have posted before I got in to the Ride London so I am keen to get in some long rides as soon as possible, I'll try to post some news about these longer rides as I manage to get them in.

The Rawlinson Bracket 2014

I rode the Rawlinson Bracket last year and wrote a short article here: The Rawlinson Bracket. Last year it was miserable - the temperature was barely above freezing and I felt tired almost from the off. The last 5 miles or so was incredibly hard and luckily Noel towed me from Kineton back to the Heritage Centre.

This year was dry, reasonably warm but very windy. I started the ride again with Noel and the first 2-3 miles were very easy - we sailed along at over 25mph until a right turn when we were slap back into a headwind. I took the lead from Noel and thought he was behind but looked back and he'd fallen quite a way back. I slowed for him and he just about caught me but I then pushed on and dropped him again (unintentionally). My bike was squeaking away a bit and I spotted that the pre-load bolt for the crank set was loose so I stopped to fix it, and Noel caught me again, although this time we were just at the bottom of the Burton Dasset climb. Nobly Noel said he was feeling rubbish and said it was OK to gp on without him. I didn't really want to but could see Noel was struggling so pushed on alone.

I could bore you with a long and detailed mile by mile account, but I won't. The ride for me was much better than last year. The temperature was OK and I even unzipped my jacket on a number of occasions. The wind however was very very strong. It seemed the most of the time it was a headwind and on a few occasions I was on the 34T inner ring on the straight. However when there was a tailwind it was awesome - cruising effortlessly at 20-25mph in a big gear is tremendous fun and very rewarding. I made very short stop for more water but otherwise rode non-stop. Sunrising was as hard as ever made more so by the surface, but after the top it was pretty much a tailwind all the way to the finish.

I completed in 3:14:11 this year (average speed 16mph over 51.7 miles) compared to 3:22:15 last year (average speed 14.5 over 48.9 miles). More importantly I actually enjoyed it this year!

Steve Jefferies and the team did a really good job, and made a lot of improvements to the event this year including chip timing. Well done Steve.

Here's a couple of photos that some people took and uploaded to Flickr.

About 1/2 way up Edge Hill - just before the Right turn at the junction

At the top of Sunrising Hill