ride joe ride

I was going to make this an update in my tubular series, but I realized that today was actually my first real ride on what amounts to a completely reconfigured bike — today’s ride was more or less like riding a new bike. Things started inauspiciously when I came across a down rider 3 miles into my ride. She’d hit gravel on a sharp turn and come down hard on her elbow. It looked like it was probably broken. While I was talking with her companions/calling an ambulance a fellow UCVC rider came along. After we helped with the ambulance logistics, we decided to ride together. The ride ended up involving the lake front path, a cross town leg to Yojimbos for tire sealant and a cyclo-comp, and then returning along the lake path. Maybe 30 miles total.

Gears: What to say about my first real geared ride in years. As I suspected, I didn’t really feel the need to shift much. The ability to coast is amazing, and really helps when you’re riding for a couple of hours in ways you wouldn’t think of. You can drink while coasting, stand up and stretch while coasting etc. There is a rhythm when you’re riding with other geared riders that I think I was totally unaware of pre-gears. The sound of another freewheel is the cue to coast so you’re keeping the same speed. Finally my cadence is not in a completely different realm as the people I am riding with. There is a lot of talk about the connectedness you feel when you’re riding fixed. You and your bike are one machine etc etc. I find riding a geared bike is much more like riding a motorcycle or horse. That is, the agent which is moving you is something you are not in fact “one with.” Going down hills, this is particularly apparent: you’re riding this svelte thing and you’d better make sure it is pointing in the right direction. I found this to be lots of fun. I found myself spending almost all my time in 52 up front and 17 in the back. I got a good laugh when I just did the calculations: this is almost exactly the same gear length as the 49×16 that I have been running fixed for the past year. Not quite the gear ratio of champions, but the alps’ de 47th is somewhat shy of a category climb.

Tires: Simply put: all the hype about the ride quality of the tubulars is more or less accurate. The Vittoria CR’s at 22mm run smoother than my favorite Continental GP 4000s in 25cm. If you hunt around, you’ll see the ride of tubulars described as “cloud-like” and I now see where this is coming from. Small to medium sized road crap just gets sucked up by the tire in a way that makes me want to write these suckers poetry or something. Just beautiful, compelling, calming and just what you want when you’re going to be on them for many hours. I am running just shy of 7 bars front and rear which feels about perfect, but I may mess with pressure a bit.

In fitting celebration for a first geared ride, I just popped a cat-eye on Cupcake. Tomorrow: 70 miles.