Going to the Show

I just got word that my new Opus Mountain Bike should be showing up within the next week. I'm very stoked to say the least. The road has been getting pretty boring around the valley, and its in the woods where the area really shines. When I was living in Cumberland(20 minutes from where I am now) on any given day I could ride from my back porch, and be in solid BC trail within 33.8 seconds.......in 3 different directions leaving the town. What else is crazy about this area is that while on that trail, you can easily ride for up to 8-10 hour straight, riding nothing but buttery single track, and not ride the same trail twice. Deadly

In preparation, I have collected a few goodies for the new cycette. The main thing is that I got my hands on a Ritchey WCS MTB stem. Now, this is important because Ritchey isn't making many of them anymore.....changing to newer fancy pants models.....so I had to get 2....just in case I can't get them ever again!

Also, other goodies include the newly released Mavic SLR wheels, complimented with the very shiny SPANKING new XTR crank. Shield your eyes folks...cause its shiny business.

Along with the bike comes my badly needed OPUS clothing for the year(thanks guys!), I all ready got many miles into my new helmet from Bell, but nothing is like a new pair of bibs.

Of course no new bike can be without $40 GOLD headset spacers from Chris King. Deadly

Getting my Rod and Reel

Andrew and I just arrived home from a very inclamite bicycle ride. Its been quite hostile in the Valley the past few days with pounding rains and about 50km hour winds. Never the less, we manged to ride to the local Tim's to pick up with the Sunday group ride. Only one other guy was waiting and we proceeded to push through the weather. After about a half hour of riding at an angle against the winds and rain, we decided to pack it in. I'll be the first to admit I'm not SuperMan, and seeing how its only February I would rather be able to ride constantly next week, than pound in a 3 hour ride, get sick, and not want to ride at all next month.

Many days last year when it was pouring rain I decided against riding only to hang out at the local cafe reading bike mags and killing my body with hot coffee. I would still consider last year being one of my better seasons, not because I was necessarily super fast, but because I was still riding tonnes in August/September. I think with days like these, its not only healthier physically to stay in, but mentally as well.

Loose and Limber

(Dont mess with the locals)

I started my first shift at Blacks Cycle yesterday. It went well, and I felt I earned my keep. As mentioned before it feels good to be turning wrenches again,and working in a bike shop atmosphere. There isn't many places I would rather work. The vibe at that place isn't as "fun" as other shops, but is more down to business. Its different, but not bad. Either way its good to have some cash flow again.

Its refreshing to be working in BC again. I dropped off 6 resumes and got 3 calls back a couple days later, all offering me jobs, and all within a 2-15 minute bike commute away. Not to mention a wage that a person can actually live off of without starving. On PEI your job opportunities are minimum wage or $7.15, no matter what training or skills you have. I wonder why people leave the Maritimes?

New Motivation

Meet Jack

Locked and Loaded

In The Rough Stuff

Its amazing how one good recovery day can make you feel. I felt great on yesterday's ride, and I had a need to take the Toccata on the back roads and do some old school exploring just to give the routine some spice.


Its easy to ride the paved roads around Van Isle, you can pretty much ride anywhere and easily find your way back to civilization. The problem is the back logging roads, most of which are dirt. Since most of the area is owned by logging companies.....you guessed it, there is hundreds of kilometers of logging roads that lead nowhere. You can ride for hours and hours and not see any signs, or people for that matter. The problem is that you could end up in a maze of roads that lead further into the woods, eventually ending in a town 100k away.

On one of these back road exploring adventures, I managed to find this abandoned ghost church. Pretty deadly, I figure if I ever get into Porn, I'll have to shoot an S&M scene here.





The new position works great! I felt 100% better and more efficient. I am getting some tendinitis in one knee, but I'm attributing that to the sudden change. I think taking it easy the next few rides to adjust is on the menu for the next few days.

On another note, I managed to tackle down a job in the Valley. I'll be now working for Black's Cycles. Its about a 3 minute ride from my house, and deals Norco and Rocky Mtn. bikes. Deadly. Working a bike shop is the ideal for me. The cycling crew are usually the only ones who understand that some days you can't work because you need to ride a bicycle for 5 hours.

Plucking the Grey Hair

When I walked into Ed Schums house today, I noticed it was almost like a ski lodge in the Alps. He has wooden figurine carvings on the walls mated with old faded pictures of he and friends skiing in the Alps and mountain ranges I'll probably never see.
I also noticed what I had been secretly looking for to confirm my thoughts on those pesky Germans.....a huge beer stein.

I wanted to see Ed because he knows about bike fit and is from the old school of cycling. He knows his shit. I was surprised when he fitted me on the compu-trainor to help me get into position. We did a few tests before he took any measurements and I found out that each of my legs are equal in force...meaning they pedal 50/50 within 1%...which is really good. The problem was that my leg efficiency sucks the big one!

I was pedalling at about 65% efficiency. Ed says hes seen worse, but it can still be improved quite a bit. Mountain biking is terrible(I'm told) for developing cadience efficency, I figured SS riding would be even worse, so I didnt tell him about my past.

To put it in perspective, Ed hopped on MY bike...and pedalled his 60 year old legs with MY saddle height and angles....with old man slippers no less and got 75% efficiency. Crazy German.
So, he took about 20 measurements, and we changed some angles and moved my seat fore ward 2 cm, and moved it down 1 cm, and it felt quite a bit better. Only by adjusting it by a few centimeters it improved my pedalling efficiency 5-8% which puts it at respectable.
These little adjustments may not seem like much, but if my saddle was 1cm too far back, and causing 1mm of damage to a muscle every rotation of the pedals, then think about 90 revolutions of the pedals in one minute......times 210 minutes(4 hour ride). That equals 18900 pedal strokes in that ride alone. That's a lot of damage to your main muscles.

I went on a recovery ride after the fitting, and although the bike now feels new and weird again, I think it'll be much more efficient.

(Note: I found out later that Ed doesnt drink)

Putting in the Time

I just completed my first micro-bloc of training today, and also finished my first 4 hour+ ride of the year. I've been riding a minimum of 3 hours everyday since I arrived and looking forward to a couple days of rest in the old legs.

I'm still having some bike fit problems, but it is getting better as I get more flex able. That's more of a patch rather than a correction though. .so...tomorrow I'm going to see Ed Shum about it. He's a National Jr. team coach in the area and hopefully he can see what I'm doing wrong.

I've been riding the past few days with the Masters in the area who rip it in the big ring all day long in Febuary(AB). Not really what I'm looking for the first week into my training but its good to get social being I'm the newbie. Next week I'm looking fore ward to putting in some time alone(if the rain holds off) and just work on going slow and long, instead of ripping at the front, chasing down the Masters.

Getting a Rythem

Bonk 2

(Ahhhhh Cumberland, still in me heart)

I've managed to sneek in a couple rides in my old stomping grounds the past few days. Yesterday was more-so a couple hours of spin to get the blood flowing after a day of getting very messed up. Today I wanted to start putting in some solid miles. It was beautiful in the Valley, I could have easily worn just knee warmers instead of my full on winter tights.

This is my third year coming to the Valley, and every year the first ride I've done has always been one particular loop. Not for any real reason, its just how I've been starting off my seasons.
Today was no exception, I woke up with the intention of the 'ol 3 hour loop, but I was feeling confident so I threw in an extra 20 minute climb into the process, just to jeep it spicy.

The first few hours went well, I'm still having some troubles with my bike fit, but that should short itself out with some adjustments. The real problem happened within the last hour where I BONKED the hardest I ever have. Being this early in the season I forget I have to wait for my body to become efficient at processing carbs...so of course I didn't bring enough food.
Well, it was a hard day in the saddle to say the least, I was at the point where I pulled over to the side of the road and almost fell asleep with a heart rate of 110!

Anyway, I managed to make it home with some help of 2 stolen apples, which I'm not going to divulge where I acquired them from, but they did the trick...and then some! After 5 minutes I was feeling great and climbing more aggressively than when I started the ride!
After some peanut butter, a hot bath and a little rub down on the old legs, I'm feeling great. I'm sure I wont forget to bring a little extra food for tomorrows ride.

Pond Hopping

I managed to survive the haul across the country to the beautiful Van Isle. Anyone who knows me knows that I cant enter an airport and leave unharmed, or with some sort of bad thing happening. This trip was no exception.
The flight from Charlottetown at 5 am went well, Of course being on PEI my mom somehow knew the person at at the Air Canada desk so the $70 bike fee didn't apply that day. The problem came in Montreal to Calgary, somehow it took and extra hour and a half than expected. I then missed my connection and had to wait at the Calgary airport for a good 4 extra hours. All this extra time gave me the opportunity to read the same bike magazines over and over.....from 4 different airports all across the country. It made me wonder, who actually buys porno mags at an airport? I would feel really weird if I was sitting next to someone reading a porno for 5 hours. Maybe, its just me.
Then, the "new" flight was and hour late of as well, which made me barely make it to me re-directed flight to Van Isle, only with 10 minutes before the plane took off.
I finally made it to Comox, a mere 6 hours later than usual, but on the plus side, my luggage made, which makes it about 2/10 for me. Bonus.

My new home with the angriest man on the face of the earth Andrew B, and his lovely wife Mireille can only be described as the perfect training set up. I have my own room, bathroom, and have managed to steal 2 meals off Andrew so far. Sweet.

(to hell with cycling, I need to join the BC golf team)

A nice 10 degrees

Proaganada

http://www.theguardian.pe.ca/index.cfm?sid=9391&sc=104

coffee love

To pack or not to pack.......if you were the guy at the X-Ray machine who looks at the luggage, would you think this was a harmless Dildo, or a bomb?

Cornbread Love

As I mentioned before, I've been building bikes at Smooth Cycle for some credit money. Well, the final one was put together today. In 3 weeks I put together a total of 99 bikes. Deadly


(Number 99 right here)

Single Speed Liberation

While at the local neighborhood Smooth Cycle the other day, my old pal Spencer decided to make a life change going deicaticated SS. Good stuff.

Working for the man

I've been doing the grind at Smooth Cycle the past few weeks. Nothing major, just putting bikes together from the Spring booking order, and trying to make some cash before the big move across the country.

It feels really good to be working at a shop again. Its the only job where I can walk in, and on the first day, know what to do, and be comfortable. Wrenching is just like riding a bike, the first few days are pretty rusty and slow, but after you get in the motions, few things feel as good.

Off the beaten path

Our world today seems to get more complicated by the minute. Everything we own has a new feature, is faster, more sleek to the eye. Think about the last time you hooked up a new DVD player, or a new TV. I imagine it took a bit of time to simply figure out how to hook it up. Computers get faster and faster, and are constantly changing. This means of course, most things are outdated and most programs don't work with each other. This seems to be the trend with most things in our life now, automobiles, electronics, appliances, even our bikes.

Shimano just revamped most of they're component groupos, meaning.....its not compatible with anything else. SRAM is also changing everything they design so the new component you bough last year, is all ready old, and not compatible with the rest of the parts you've been riding. Everything is lighter, faster, smoother, and of course......less durable.

For these reasons, the humble Single Speed is making waves in the bicycle industry. Of all the forums on MTBR.com, the single speed forum, get the most visitors. A few years ago, no-one I knew had a single speed, and now....80% of my riding buddies, are riding them. Some rigid as well. This group isn't only from PEI, but California, and BC as well. When riding a SS, you don't have to worry about how to shift. How much more, or less air to put into your fork, how you could have saved time on that corner, or on that climb. On a single speed you are at the mercy of the bike.

I remember when I stared riding a geared mountain bike after riding my SS for awhile, I had to stop and get off my bike during a ride because a single blade of grass lodged itself in my cogs, and rendered them useless. Before, on a SS I would "find my own trail" by just powering through the woods, where there wasn't a trail. Over sticks and logs I would just bash my way though everything. I was exploring. And the SS, although beaten, loved it.

On a Single Speed, there are no variables other than your riding technique. When you don't have any control, its only then that you are free to simply ride. Simply to find flow with the trail.