Spooky Cross Day 1...Dead Fucking Last, also day 2

Didn't go quite as a I planned. My plan was to make it an hour early for the 4 race to get an idea of the course and to get some warm up laps in, kick ass in the 4 race, and enjoy the rest of the races. What actually happened was that I got there at 1:15 as the 4 race was starting. I got to enjoy the 4 and womens race and for whatever reason decided to sign up for the 1/2/3 race, very very fun(?) idea. Still not sure what to think of my decision.

In the race, I got dropped from the start and from there it was an exploration into the pain cave. This time, the cave was very muddy and had lots of climbing. By the time it was over, I had collected a PayDay candy bar from a hand up from the announcer, a dollar bill on heckler hill and lots of mud and an overwhelming sense of regret. The regret is long gone, as is the mud thanks to an hour and a half of my time, 5 rags and a garden hose. I still have the dollar to show for my efforts though.

now for a pic of the bike:


Day 2 wasn't too noteworthy besides the fact that I got there in got lapped at with 2 laps left by only 1 person, as apposed to getting lapped on lap 3 of day 1 in the 1/2/3 race.

Mtb/cross tire help.

So does anyone know who's bike that is? I'm lookin for wider tires for when the masi cross goes ss. Since he is local I was hoping to be able test fit to see if the tires would fit on the masi.

Any help would be appreciated. I want moar tire for snow/mtb this winter.

MacAskill delivers once again...wow!

VW - Passat from Fantefilm on Vimeo.

Also wanted to post this because it's just ridiculous

Brakeless Two / Chris Akrigg from chris akrigg on Vimeo.

Also (hopefully) see you guys at Spooky Cross.

Every family wagon should be this fast

Just Sayin. Also needs more roof rack to get to bike races real fuckin quick.

I had a revelation last night...

...That I should give up on keeping my bike clean. Saturday, it got muddy from Cattle Cross. Monday from some denmonds(?) and Hillside. It was mudddy (not a problem) but it was covered with leaves most of the time (problem) so there were more 2 wheel power slides than I was used to, but the feeling of being out of control felt good. That feeling was good at ~10 mph, haven't had such a feeling at speeds of 15+ so I'll post results if that happens.

Anyway, tonight was the last Renegade Cyclocross. It was at Good Park again. It proved that Good Park is good once again. Good hills and really appreciated not having back to back sand pits, though still had the uphill barriers.



I need that lighted shit on my bike naow! There's no way in hell you're going to get me to ride down the side of a fucking building. Still not sure if that's real or not.

Cattle Cross

This was by far my best race, ended up 4th of the 4's.

The course was really fun, lots of mud. I really dug the long mud pit and the switchbacks on the second half of the course. Going in the barn was fun to because of the change in terrain from dirt to sand.

As for the race, I smarted up and started on the first row. when I got to the long mud pit on the second lap or so, I was 4th, but a handlebar x cattle gate colabo brought me down to 7th or so. I was eventually able to make it back up to 4th after a couple of laps of hard work. I battled with a few people along the way, but i made it to forth. With about 3 laps left a caught that 15(or so) year old shit. and had a really fun battle with him until he decided to break away with about a quarter lap left. Those last 3 laps were probably the most fun i've had in cross so far this season! Would've been more fun if i would've ended up on the winning side of it, but he's in a different cat, so it didn't hurt me in the end.

Pics to come tomorrow

Cantilever set up help requested

Put a cantilever back on the front of my masi cross. I set the straddle carrier as low as I could go while still having good tire clearance. Am I doing it right? Riding around my 'hood my steel fork shuddered. Is that the cycling gods telling me to get modern and put a carbon fork on there or should I deal with it?

I'm doing Cattle cross so I'm going to check how well i tuned the brakes there, and if I'm lucky, i'll fix it if there's a problem with it.

How to keep bike talk among non-cycling friends to a minumum. Pt. 1

Annoying and easily amazed are words that come to mind. Those words are a result of years of field research. I've been cycling for years and until recently when I picked up a cyclocross habit (cross fucking rules ATMO), 90% of my friends were of the non cycling variety. The following techniques to keep bike to talk with friends and strangers who know very little to nothing to a minimum are scientifically proven* and guaranteed to work**.

The first problem that arises is mileage ridden. It seems that if you say you rode a reasonable distance, their first reaction is one three: looking at you like you just rode the tour, telling you how they haven't ridden in years or can't ride more than a mile at at time, or they just say 'Oh cool'. The last reaction is the most desirable ATMO(and that's my opinion) because you can just move on to something else. A general formula you should use to gage if they ask for specific mileage is as follows:

CD=AD/2/2

CD meaning claimed distance and AD meaning actual distance. Let's do some real world application of the formula with a 30 miles ride.

7.5=30/2/2

So for a 30 mile ride you will tell your non-cycling friends that you rode 7.5 miles. They will likely still be amazed but not enough to continue to ask you questions about the ride. One last note on the formula, for your cycling friends change the division to multiplication. Seen below:

CD=AD*2*2

To apply our real life situation to this variation of the formula:

120=30*2*2

Your meager 30 mile ride becomes an epic century and with a little fudging it can be an epic double metric century.

*Completely false

**More of an exaggeration than a lie

All 9 Yards Cross

Ended up doing only saturday for multiple reasons, mainly to make up for all the studying I gave up to do all the cross/mtb rides locally. Also...I don't have job so i couldn't afford to, that'll be fixed soon enough. Hopefully.

Now onto the race. I ended up gettig 12th. When the race started out, I just missed out on the main breakaway group that probably had the top 10. If I could've stuck with that group, I probably would've been able to break the top 10 but i'm way out of the reach of getting a decent points position at this point so i'm not too concerned with that. Once the main breakaway group was out of site, I settled into a pace and was getting along good. On every hill, I mashed up it dancing on the pedals with my fresh Mud2 cross tire helping me along. I was eventually able to get comfortable enough to not need to use the brakes on most of the corners, though that wasn't doing much for my overall position just felt good to getting more comfortable on the bike and being able to trust my tires more. Mounting and remounting over the barriers is also getting much smoother, getting closer to getting the 'leap of faith' down.

As far as the hecklers go, I was a little disappointed. I did get cheered on and complimented on my Masi, but durig the race I ant to be broken down mentally so the pain of the race doesn't seem so bad and I can push it harder. However, I took some heckling lessons by the single barrier at the very top of the hill during the Cat 1/2 race and saw some proper heckling and took notes for future races.

Overall, my overal grade for the course is B+, hecklers C, my performance A+ (cos self confidence) and last but not least, free fat tire A+++

Shit, this is intense. If I tried this, i'd imagine it involving lots of heckling, broken bones, swearing and only last about 30 seconds. My youthful enthusiasm might keep the broken bones to a minimum.

Now for more bad ass, this time more fix/ss pr0n

Needs more 8/9/10 speed freehub. atmo

This Just has to be shared

A utility bike from hell. The bike front and rear canti's along with front and rear drum brakes. The gearing is 4x9 (yes, 4 front chainrings!)

Here's the link, if you don't check it out you are missing out a significant concentration of epic.
http://velospace.org/node/23991

Bike pr0n of the week

Velo Cult in the Eastern Sierras from Velo Cult on Vimeo.

some ss/fix love

Step 1 on the road to road racing next summer. (pun sorta intended)

You can tell it's good because the bike on the cover has campagnolo.

I've discovered yet another case of wrong tool for the job.

So I've ridden my masi on roller coaster, science center and denmends(probably spelled wrong ayhsmb). It's not too bad, but definately not the right tool for the job. Went Riding with the masi on some banner lake trails...35mm cross tires are not made for muddy off camber climbs or near vertical down hills.

A couple of pictures of me from the Dirty Wooden Shoe

Decided to hop back on the wagen

So an update on the Masi CX, I cannibalized the front derailer and put a slightly larger ring on the outside of my gear to keep the chain on. After multiple renegades cyclocross practices, cross races, and mtb rides the chain has not come off, so it appears I've done something right. Anyway, pics. These are post Dirty Wooden Shoe pics.



Yes, that's a flat tire. Happened on the first lap, and after that I decided to use that race as a throw away race and used post race beers as the motivator to finish.

One last picture to add.


The red road bike is mine an will probably propel me to some cat 5 criterium wins next sumer. The tan bmx bike is mine awaiting me getting a job so I can replace the headset I broke on it. The rest belongs to my dad.

One last note I'd like to add is that the pink Bianchi funny bike is a smidgen to small for me.