Thread: Did you ride today?

Some epic rides are getting posted Congrats to all. It's been raining for a week. In all honestly it's kind of tough on the spirit. Suited up this morning for the normal Sunday ride a nice paced 60 miler in the country . Forecast called for no rain but started pouring . Relief is in sight.

Doh! Well, you have a nice house to look forward to when it's all over. And if you do decide to retire when you get up to Portland, think of all the riding and listening you'll be able to do!!

Originally Posted by Etunes

Some epic rides are getting posted Congrats to all. It's been raining for a week. In all honestly it's kind of tough on the spirit. Suited up this morning for the normal Sunday ride a nice paced 60 miler in the country . Forecast called for no rain but started pouring . Relief is in sight.

It's been dry up here in JerseyLand. My friend/neighbor took up cycling so he and I are riding buddies now. Nice to have company while putting in miles...

Originally Posted by dlb2

Allen, you are so right about the decline. It takes no time at all!

I did get out on Friday for another 25. I did some exploring on some roads never ridden and it was a nice time just cruising along.

I can't remember if it was this thread or another that we were talking about hydration but my views have changed since I was able to get out so much this summer. I tried a new drink mix called Skratch. It was developed by a nutritionist that worked with team Garmin. It's all natural and uses real fruit for flavoring. It's not sugary or sickly sweet like others I've tried. I bit more pricey but I don't use a lot. Apparently this guy realized that he finally got the formula right when the riders stopped complaining about it!

So anyway, I use one bottle of this and one bottle of just plain water on my rides now. I'm hydrated and feel really good afterwards instead of being a bit sluggish an ready for a nap!


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Doug, I saw this post earlier but forgot to reply back until I saw a Skratch ad today! I've been wondering about Skratch. Glad it works for you and you like it. I use to use Hammer Nutrition for my electrolyte drink, now I just bring two plain water bottles. I may try Skratch though as it does seem like a good product.

Thanks for the post and feedback!

Originally Posted by socfan12

Doug, I saw this post earlier but forgot to reply back until I saw a Skratch ad today! I've been wondering about Skratch. Glad it works for you and you like it. I use to use Hammer Nutrition for my electrolyte drink, now I just bring two plain water bottles. I may try Skratch though as it does seem like a good product.

Thanks for the post and feedback!

We think that all of this scientifically engineered hydration/protein drink mix is so much better for us in aiding in recovery but it's amazing what plain old water can do.

Originally Posted by socfan12

It's been dry up here in JerseyLand. My friend/neighbor took up cycling so he and I are riding buddies now. Nice to have company while putting in miles...

It's been raining here for days now. Look like it might be possible to get out this weekend. I agree with how nice it is to have someone to ride with. It will make you a stronger rider for sure just by having someone push you along...

Getting chilly out there nowadays. Mid-30s when I started, not sure what it was when I finished. Stupidly I did some hills, so hot and sweaty going up the hills, cold and chilly on the long declines. I'm just going to do some flat pace rides for the winter...

Ride on, gentlemen.

Allen, it's a tough time of the year to be conquering hills! These days you just have to put some miles in on the flats and be happy that you can get out there before it gets way too cold or there's too much snow to deal with. I'm hoping to get out tomorrow. Today was a nice sunny 55 degree day. Too bad the wind is gusting at about 50 miles per hour! I kid you not!!!

Originally Posted by Bobvin

Warm here in Seattle area today too, turned out about 60°. But instead of sneaking in a ride I grabbed the paintbrush and touched up a few spots after a realtor was here showing our house.

I'm so looking forward to getting on my bike, even for winter miles. When I'm thinking 'bout riding but not able to, my mind conjures up the following image, and I think all is fine in the world.
Attachment 3629

I know there are some strong teams in the Portland area, hopefully I'll meet some folks who push me hard and keep me honest. Still longing to hear the words "damn, that old guy can really drop the hammer". And after my time trial event late this summer, I realize I can hammer reasonably well, but I've got some serious training to do so next summer I can "represent".

And hopefully, just maybe, there will be some cute riders in Portland. I swear, with the exception of my wife of course, Seattle, in general, has the frumpiest looking women in the country. If I have to suck the wheel of some younger, fitter jock, can it please be someone like in the photo?

Ride on my brothers, ride on!

Liz Hatch is her name and no they are not OEM's

It was 42 degrees when I went out this morning at 10:30. It was a beautiful sunny day, finally, and I did just a quick out-and-back of 35 miles. It was good to be on the bike as it had been about three weeks since my last ride. It's tough to get out this time of year with all the rain and otherwise just crummy weather.

Injured Cyclist Suffers Seven-Week Erection | News from the Field | OutsideOnline.com

Originally Posted by socfan12

Injured Cyclist Suffers Seven-Week Erection | News from the Field | OutsideOnline.com

Gotta' love the photo on the page!

That's a hard post to comment on Allen...

Originally Posted by dlb2

Gotta' love the photo on the page!

That's a hard post to comment on Allen...

Originally Posted by Bobvin

Already I am faster than this group, but they ride on rural roads like I prefer. We rode around some in the Willamette River valley, mostly on farm-to-market roads. Wow, I haven't done a mostly flat ride in years. It all felt so easy. Even though it was only my second ride outdoors this year, I felt I could have added another 20 miles without too much fatigue.

I'm going to have to find a faster group for a couple nights per week, but this group will be fun when I ride with wifey.

Makes me think of my friend's father, who's 71 years old, he often comes with us on the less strenuous rides. He can still grab a wheel at 35-38 kph if there are no hills so he's pretty fast. Anyways buddies his own age were asking him to go ride with them and he would always make excuses not to go. So his son one day asked him why he wouldn't go and the old man answers stoically "they are too old and they don't go fast enough for me".

Originally Posted by Bobvin

Check this out... integrated carbon fiber fenders (on a carbon/ti frame by Cyfac). I bet they won't rattle.

Bob, do you think this would be too much for a nice Beach Cruiser/Grocery store bike?

Originally Posted by Bobvin

...Ride on my brothers, ride on.

I'm glad you're able to go out and enjoy some time in the saddle. Keeps your mind off of other things, such as insurance BS. It is amazing how quickly our bodies can get back into the rhythm of exercise after a few months of being couch potatoes. I started doing rollers inside along with running every other day back in Feb. and I feel pretty strong. If all goes well I'm hoping to beat my 1K mile record of last summer.

Enjoy the ride my friends...

Ride on, gents!

Me? Still have saddle pains. The winter hibernation did not heal my sit bones but rather just made me soft. I can only do I ride during the weekend (thus far). If I ride on Saturday I can't even get on the saddle on Sundays. Need to see the Drs and see what's up...

Originally Posted by socfan12

Ride on, gents!

Me? Still have saddle pains. The winter hibernation did not heal my sit bones but rather just made me soft. I can only do I ride during the weekend (thus far). If I ride on Saturday I can't even get on the saddle on Sundays. Need to see the Drs and see what's up...

Allen, saddle sore or pain? Currently dealing with jock itch but also dealt with saddle sore previously, neither of which are fun but at the same time are manageable. Suspect if you don't have any outside symptoms you just don't have the right saddle, what do you have as a saddle and where does it hurt? If you have a good bike shop local they can loan you different saddle so you can try for longer ride. Will help you get rid of your pain in the butt.

Hey Dan,


It's pain. Like a black and blue pain when pressed. On the sit bones, inside of the thighs. Surfing the forums it seems others get it there too. And your right, a new saddle generally does the trick. Oddly, I've had my old saddle for 1500-2000 miles and no issues. Then some time last fall when I started to put on some miles, it started hurting.:-(

I've tried about 4 or 5 saddles thus far. The current Fizik Antares seems to be pretty decent thus far. Any suggestions?

Thx

Originally Posted by socfan12

Hey Dan,


It's pain. Like a black and blue pain when pressed. On the sit bones, inside of the thighs. Surfing the forums it seems others get it there too. And your right, a new saddle generally does the trick. Oddly, I've had my old saddle for 1500-2000 miles and no issues. Then some time last fall when I started to put on some miles, it started hurting.:-(

I've tried about 4 or 5 saddles thus far. The current Fizik Antares seems to be pretty decent thus far. Any suggestions?

Thx

Did you try the Selle Italia SLR? About the same width as as the Fizik but not as stiff, the saddle is smoother mostly in the Flow version (flow has a hole in the middle to relieve the tender section) . I can live with the Antares but my preference goes for the SLR. Specifically I am fond of the SLR Kit Carbonio Flow or the discontinued SLR Gel Flow. BTW more than ever YMMV.

Originally Posted by Bobvin

My current saddle is a WTB Laser V. Shorter than most road saddles.

A Mtn. bike saddle on a road bike? Blasphemy! When you're putting in massive amounts of time on a small piece of leather it sure helps to have something that's comfy.

Allen, I don't know what all saddles you've tried. I use a Fizik (Arione) and find them to be pretty unforgiving until you get them just right. It sure seems like your saddle has just worn out for you to start having this problem. I'll second Dan's thought about getting a saddle with a cut-out in it. Sometimes if the saddle isn't positioned just right you can put a lot more weight on the soft tissue which may not be helping you. Keep trying different ones out, you'll get there eventually.

Allen, what seat do you have? I suspect an Arione or the likes which are not very wide. If your sit bone is wider on that kind of seat it will hurt on the inside of the bone, it feels as if your bones want to separate while riding.

Hey guys, thanks for the suggestions, really appreciate it! I had the Arione which is long and somewhat narrow, but like I said, I put on a few K miles with it. I guess Bob may be right, the saddle may not be as supportive as before.

I've tried several different Selle Italia Flow seats: Flow Gel, Flow Max, etc, some Specialized Toupe's which I heard were good. None seem to work well for me. I'm now on a Fizik Anatares, a bit wider and shorter than the Arione, with a bit more padding on the nose. This one seems to work best so far, but I still have too much pain to ride the next day.

Bob, re: mountain bike seat: I was thinking of giving up being roadie altogether and just ride my mountain bike through some local trails. Still an option that I haven't tossed out yet.

If Arione was fine before just get another one and be done with it. If your seat is old it's just shot, do yourself a favor and test ride a new one and report back on a long ride. Use the old one on a cyclocross bike

I use a Selle SMP saddle similar to this one-

Pro

I find them very comfortable and cool on long rides. The most comfortable seat that I had was an old very broken in Brooks Professional.


Is anyone using Michelin Pro 4 tires? I put the 23c's on my bike last year and I find them almost too sticky with the dual compound. They are supposed to be a fast, low rolling resistance tire with excellent cornering grip but they feel slow to me compared to my previous Conti's and Bontrager Race tires.

They are comfortable tires though and the ride reminds me of my sew ups (tubulars) that I ran on my old Peugot PX10 years ago (I rode that bike for almost 30 years). Those old tires were great but a pain to glue to the rims.

Originally Posted by Mechnutt

I use a Selle SMP saddle similar to this one-

Pro

I find them very comfortable and cool on long rides. The most comfortable seat that I had was an old very broken in Brooks Professional.

+1 on the Brooks. Can't help you on the tires. I use Conti GP 4-seasons. That SMP is an interesting saddle...

I ride tubs (tubulars) and would not go without, they roll that much better and are lighter in acceleration and climbing. A 23mm tub feels like a 25-27 clincher. The only problem is the price when you puncture. Replacing a tub takes about 5 minutes when you flat. Most flats can be avoided as pinch flats are almost non existent and using products like Stan's Notube or the likes reduces them significantly. Anyways I ride Conti's Sprinter Gatorskin and GP4000, grippy, fast and long thread life. Have used Vittoria in the past but wear and puncture resistance wasn't great, riding them was smooth as butter though. Never tried the Michelin 4 but used the 3 before, lots of grip at the price of extreme wear, ouldn't get them to do more than 3,000k's. The one I really liked in clincher but can't find here in tubular is the Schwalbes, these thing did not wear, puncture resistance galore and very grippy, the only caveat was that they were pretty stiff so the ride could be rough.

Ok time to go glue a tub on a rim, then off for a ride!

When I was a teenager I learned to sew by repairing the flats in my tubulars. I would cut the stitching and pull the punctured part of the tube out and repair it. $20-$25 for a new tire was a lot of money for a 15 year old back in my day.

I use to ride Clemente's and Wolbers. The Wolbers were great for flat resistance as the model I bought had a steel belt.

I bought my current Micheline Pro 4's based on reviews of the older Pro 3's which were proven to have very low rolling resistance and needing less joules to go a certain distance over the best Conti's and a few others. I will ride them till they wear out or give them to my son. They do corner great and ride like a tubular though.

Here is an interesting link with a graph showing watts used for different tires, scroll down to the bottom of the page. It looks like I will be going back to the Conti GP4000's-

http://www.slowtwitch.com/Products/T...view_3748.html

Back to saddles. I would buy another Brooks if someone could break it in with a couple of thousand miles.

A friend of mine told me about the SMP, but I can't seem to find it in stock anywhere. Maybe I'm not looking at the right places. Will try to locate one.

I'm a big fan of the Gatorskin tires. I'm no racer so I don't need the fastest tire out there. I used to get flats here and there, but never had any since using the Gatorskins.

Originally Posted by Bobvin

Try BikeTiresDirect.com, probably my favorite online source for much stuff bicycle.

I totally forgot about them. Thank Bob!


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I have ordered from bike tires direct before. I scooped up a pair of Conti GP4000's for $36 each earlier. Next time around I will try the Vittoria's.

SocFan12, I went through a lot of saddles before settling on the SMP. They have various versions. My old A$$ needed a little more padding so I went with a version that had a little more comfort in mind. I had to email the company to find out who locally sold the SMP's here in the Twin Cities.

Bob, that was a grueling ride last week. That's easily a mid to late season ride for me! Kudos on doing it on ride #3 of the season! 32mph winds, yikes! I hate riding when the wind is 15+mph, let along 32mph!

Have you recovered fully now? Going riding this weekend?

Originally Posted by socfan12

Bob, that was a grueling ride last week. That's easily a mid to late season ride for me! Kudos on doing it on ride #3 of the season! 32mph winds, yikes! I hate riding when the wind is 15+mph, let along 32mph!

Have you recovered fully now? Going riding this weekend?

wow guys its truley incredible that you guys ride so far. im impressed, i rode my bike to the liquor store the other day im still tired. and there are no hills by the beach. lol. of course i ride a 1 speed girls 70's schwinn hollywood, w rusty rims. lmao!!!
glad you guys are in such good shape, i should take a lesson from you and maybe lose a few pounds.
great job!!!

Originally Posted by Bobvin

Several days after my epic last Saturday, I'm still a little under the weather. The last 20+ miles into that wind made the ride more like a century, or like adding another 10,000 ft of climbing. One of those rides I was not trained up enough for, and this mid-fifties body has had a rough few days recovering. Ugh!

Every time I do one of those rides I remind myself "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger".

"It doesn't get easier you just go faster" as the only American TDF winner once said.

Nice ride by the way!

Originally Posted by Petro85

wow guys its truley incredible that you guys ride so far. im impressed, i rode my bike to the liquor store the other day im still tired. and there are no hills by the beach. lol. of course i ride a 1 speed girls 70's schwinn hollywood, w rusty rims. lmao!!!
glad you guys are in such good shape, i should take a lesson from you and maybe lose a few pounds.
great job!!!

Steve, Dan and Bob are in a class by themselves. Yesterday I went out on my 3rd or 4th ride of the season: 24 miles, 1,000+ feet of climbing, 13mph winds. And I'm sure Bob was still faster and stronger on his ride!

Originally Posted by RedSectorA

Every time I do one of those rides I remind myself "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger".

"It doesn't get easier you just go faster" as the only American TDF winner once said.

Nice ride by the way!

Originally Posted by Petro85
wow guys its truley incredible that you guys ride so far. im impressed, i rode my bike to the liquor store the other day im still tired. and there are no hills by the beach. lol. of course i ride a 1 speed girls 70's schwinn hollywood, w rusty rims. lmao!!!
glad you guys are in such good shape, i should take a lesson from you and maybe lose a few pounds.
great job!!!



Steve, Dan and Bob are in a class by themselves. Yesterday I went out on my 3rd or 4th ride of the season: 24 miles, 1,000+ feet of climbing, 13mph winds. And I'm sure Bob was still faster and stronger on his ride!

1,000 in 40km is no easy ride by any mean Allen, keep it up.


Originally Posted by RedSectorA
Every time I do one of those rides I remind myself "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger".

"It doesn't get easier you just go faster" as the only American TDF winner once said.

Nice ride by the way!






The comment about Lemond was to have a reaction, I guess it worked .

It's nice to hear about your rides, guys. Just when I get some time to go out this week we're scheduled for rain the next six days. Looks like the trainer will be my friend.

Allen, how are things going with your rides? Is the saddle issue going away? Hopefully it becomes a thing of the past.

Steve, I can't speak for the other guys but as I get older I'm less concerned with going faster than going farther. With no kids around anymore, and a job that allows me great flexibility I have more time on my hands to do a 2-3 hour ride instead of an hour to stuff a ride into after work before getting back home to all of the family commitments. It's nice to be able to explore backroads that you never knew existed and become more familiar with the area you live in.

Originally Posted by dlb2

Steve, I can't speak for the other guys but as I get older I'm less concerned with going faster than going farther. With no kids around anymore, and a job that allows me great flexibility I have more time on my hands to do a 2-3 hour ride instead of an hour to stuff a ride into after work before getting back home to all of the family commitments. It's nice to be able to explore backroads that you never knew existed and become more familiar with the area you live in.

Same for me, children are out of the house and I chose a job that gave me flexibility so I have time to ride. Still like to go faster and farther though, it's part of my DNA.

Dan, here's a link to that ride/race I brought up after you did the Tour of Battenkill. It's on my bucket list.

Dirty Kanza 200 » World's Premiere Gravel Grinder

You're absolutely right about the faster and farther comment. Whenever I think I'm going to do a nice little leisurely ride I find myself trying to go faster and faster as the ride progresses.