Following the Races

Up until this year, I have not really followed any racing except for the Tour de France.  That's not so much because I don't like bicycle racing, I just haven't had the time to really follow it,  you know?  This year, though, Comcast gave me a gift.  I still think that they are evil incarnate--particularly for what they charge for cable internet--but they made some changes in the basic, basic cable line up and as a concequence I now get Versus at no additional cost.  This marks the first time I'll be able to watch bicycle racing as it unfolds rather than waiting for a friend to record it for me.  I'm rather excited.  I enjoyed the bits of the Tour of California that was able to catch, and Versus is advertising racing every Sunday from now until the Tour in July.

Watching the racing, though, has got me hankering for more ways to follow the Pros.  I already check out VeloNews and Cyclingnews.com for information on their gear--it's the next best thing to being there, and blogging doesn't exactly include plane tickets to all of the big races here and abroad.  Their live updates are pretty good, too, for those times that I'm stuck at work... um... working.  Really.  

Jon, however, put me onto another way to follow the racers: Twitter.  As  you may know, we did the Twitter thing during Interbike last year and it was fun.  We still use it from time to time, but not so much.  There are some rather big names in cycling though, who use it regularly.  And by regularly I mean, if you use the text message update feature of Twitter, you better have an unlimited plan.  Seriously.

Here's a rundown of the racers and other cycling people that I've found and/or follow:

The Lance

George Hincapie

Johann Bruyneel

Levi Leipheimer

Dave Zabriskie

Taylor Phinney

SRAM Road Diaries

Axel Merckx

Ivan Basso

Michael Rogers

Christian Vandevelde

Tom Danielson

I'm sure that there are more, but that'll get you started. 

Why is this cool?  Because sometimes they post little insights into life as a pro cyclist that you don't get any other way.  Stuff like this from Hincapie:

pretty funny moment at toc stage to pasadena. http://tinyurl.com/da3jye At the time not that funny..

Followed up by:

PS, he did not do it on purpose, was just not paying attention i guess. He's a good guy, and a buddy of mine.

Or, from The Lance:

Heading out on a ride with my training partner. I suspect today's pace will be slower than last week's... http://twitpic.com/1ni6a

I mean, that's just cool.  Not only is it fun, but during the race Johan was updating when he wasn't driving, giving us a glimpse like:

10 riders broke away and have now 1min45 on the main pack. Rock Racing is setting the pace #atoc #toc

Is it all cool?  Nah, there are plenty of "I just got up and am eating breakfast" type of posts, but I found that it did add an additional depth to the racing, comments that were unfiltered by an interviewer or a word count.

Oh, and I've never enjoyed following mountain bike racing, that's just something I'd rather do than watch.  

My New Ultimate Training Room (plans)

Here's what I want for the winter training months.

Let's start with the room. This room would be good for working on and storing bikes. The floor would be soft, but resistant to corrosion due to sweat, grease and/or solvents. More importantly, this room would be sound-isolated from the rest of the house. I want to be able to hammer hard at 1 am without waking a fitfully sleeping baby.

When I walk into the room, it has a pre-programmed thermostat. The room would start out around 75 (since I'm going to be cold with only shorts and a jersey on). But, about five minutes after I've entered the room, it should have dropped the temperature to about 65 degrees. The longer I ride, the cooler it'd get (but stop around 60). And there will be airflow. Direct airflow to help me stay cool, and room airflow to keep the temperature down (and whisk the stink away).

There'd be towels readily available, as well as a sink. I'd use the sink mostly for filling up water bottles, but it'd be there incase I feel the urge to work on my bike(s). Besides water, I might need some food, so there'd be a pantry stocked with various energy products: gels, bars, and drinks.

Directly in front of the rollers would be a large HDTV (37-42", but not larger). Instead of a DVD player, all my movies and music would be on some sort of media center computer. I need to be able to swap movies or music with a simple remote. And, because my room is sound-proof, I'm not using headphones to listen, either. I'm talking 5.1 channel surround sound.

I'm thinking that I could dig out my back yard and make an underground bunker that'd be perfect for it.

Where Are They Now?

No, this post isn't about washed up actors/actresses from the '80's, nor will it have mugshots of the same.  Sorry.  

Rather, Jon and I were talking the other day about bikes--what else?--and the topic turned to tubeless tires.  It's no secret we like them.  We both use them off road, and I run tubeless tires on my road bike as well.  I have mentioned before why I like tubeless on and off the road, so I won't do it here.  Last year, however, it looked like road tubeless was going to go mainstream.  More manufacturers were coming on board--I mentioned this Cyclingnews.com article from last March before, too, and see HERE for a press release from last July.  Yessiree, the tube was going away at long last.  

What happened?  Where are the tires?  Where are the wheels?  Is there something at the bottom of Loch Ness?

Lets start with the announcements.  Who was to have come on board?

Wheels:

Campagnolo

Tires:

Specialized

Hutchinson (more than one tire)

IRC

A quick search shows that of the above, Campagnolo does in fact have a tubeless tire compatible wheelset: the Eurus 2-Way Fit wheelset.  Additionally, since Campy owns Fulcrum, there aretwo other 2-Way Fit wheelsets from them, as well: the Racing Zero 2-Way Fit (pictured below) and the Racing 1 2-Way Fit.  Well done Campy.

Things aren't going so swimmingly in the tire realm, though.  

The only mention of an IRC tire--supposedly the Formula Pro--I could find were on Japanese only pages.  I can't read Japanese, so I'm a bit stuck here.  The previews from early last year looked good, though.  One--and by 'one' I mean 'me'--can only guess as to why they aren't available on the open market.  

Next up Specialized.  There website is fully available in English, so I was able to peruse the deepest corners of the online presence.  I found nothing.  It was supposed to have been called a Turbo Tubeless, but they seemed to have dropped the Turbo moniker altogether. 

Finally, we come to Hutchinson.  Hutchinson is the main driving force behind road tubeless, so I expected them to have followed through.  They've even got a site--Roadtubeless.com--to keep the excitement going.  They do, in fact, show off some new tires.  The Atom, announced last year but not available, is a race tire.  The Fusion2 carries on--that's the tire I'm using and I like it.  They've also introduces a more pedestrian tire, the Intensive.  This tire is slightly heavier than the Fusion2, but should be a longer lasting tire.  

So, all hope is not lost.  With Shimano and Campy behind it, road tubeless should be here to stay.  I'd like to see them trickle down the technology to their mid-level wheelsets rather than keep it in the higher end alone.  

Oddly enough, what does seem to be making a comeback are tubular wheels and tires.  I blaim the carbon fiber rim market for this.  I know that I can't think of anything more exciting that scraping old glue off of a rim just to change tires.  

And what about ol' Nelly?  Well, I don't know if there is anything at the bottom of Loch Ness, monster or otherwise, but you can watch their live streaming webcam and see for yourself if anything pops up.

Movies: Hell on Wheels

Hell on Wheels (Höllentour) is a German movie. That is, most of the dialog is in German with English subtitles. If you can't stand reading subtitles, then you might avoid this movie altogether. To do so, however, would be a mistake.

Hell on Wheels follows team Telekom throughout the 2003 Tour de France. It isn't a documentary of that race. It doesn't follow Lance on his way to victory.

What Hell on Wheels does well, is show you the inside of the Tour. There are no winners interviews here, but it shows the reactions from riders winning and losing as they talk over their day in the hotel room. It show the suffering as a crash victim tries to limp through two more weeks of riding. It even shows a group of fans camped out on the side of the road and follows their waiting and anticipating the briefest glimpse of their hero zooming by.

Emotions are high in this movie and I find myself each time cheering for Eric Zabel as he sprints to the line. Each time trial (TT)--including the team TT--is high-paced and full of action. I find these TTs perfect for throwing an interval or two in my workout. Of course, as I see the cyclists suffering their way up a hill, it inspires me to dig a little deeper and stay on that terrible torture device (rollers) a little longer.

Hell on Wheels is over two hours long--making it perfect for a long training session or a bunch of smaller ones.

1. How well it distracts me so I don't feel the pain. *****
2. How well it motivates me so I don't mind the pain--heck I might even enjoy it. *****
3. How often I can watch it without getting bored. ****
4. How well the tempo of the movie (and its soundtrack) is suited for a good workout. *****
5. Is it good enough to look forward to a roller session just so I can ride it? ****

Overall score: **** 1/2 (4.5 stars)

If you ride indoors, you need this movie.

Incompatibility

Reading & rollers
I love to read (though, not as much as my wife) and we have tons and tons of books in my house (enough that I'll never move--I'll bulldoze my house and rebuild it first!). The problem is I can't seem to find any time to read except late at night, when I'm about to go to bed. This invariably leads to me staying up late to read. Which leads to no time on the rollers (or riding, if the weather is nice) the next day. My will power is so low in the mornings.

Home improvement & long training rides
Redoing the basement this year. Although I'm happy to be getting some much-needed improvement in the house, I know the real cost to me is Saturdays. I just said goodbye to any thoughts of long training rides.

Shimano & Campagnolo
I know, who cares, right? Well, invariably, whenever I see a cassette go on sale, or a sweet wheelset discounted heavily, it's Campy. I mean, c'mon! Also, being a Shimano/SRAM user, I've always been jealous of the superior way that Campy cassettes interface with the freehub body. Shimano cassettes just destroy light-weight freehub bodies.

Handlebars & Stems
Actually, if you get the right ones, you're fine, but I was always bothered by the whole mtn (25.4mm) and road (26mm). I mean, they're so close! Not close enough, though. Even Cinelli had to buck the trend and go with something else: 26.4mm. I wasn't very excited about the 31.8 handlebar trend when it first started showing up. I really didn't think there was a need for the larger diameter. Once seeing that now road and mtn. use the same standard, though, I've converted over. Now I'm a believer.

Aero bars & group rides
Don't do this. Please. I don't care how well a group is working together on a ride, if there's a guy with aero bars on his bike (or worse, a full TT/Tri bike), I'll drop off the back. That's just scary (and wrong). If they have a number painted on their shoulder and are wearing a half shirt (men), that's even worse.

End note
I just thought of an exception to the reading vs. rollers: The Rider (Tim Krabbe). If I'm reading The Rider, I get on the rollers more often--and often push myself harder while doing it.