The Redline Cyclocross bike's last ride.

Here she is. The Scandium Redline Conquest Pro CX bike looking fresh as hell after the latest re-haul. Which included new decals, carbon tubular Velosmith.com wheels and Challenge tubs. Weighing in at an amazing 17.1lbs.

Redline Conquest Scandium in all its glory. I miss this thing.

About a week after this picture was taken, i found a crack in the head tube/down tube welds :( and had to retire the old champion. 

Now she rests alongside the US National Champ jersey she won back in 2006. New replacement frame to follow.

The CX Season comes to an end..

Before i start i must explain the lack of posts over the past few weeks. Basically, i was a bit slow to report one race, then i missed another report, then before i knew it, i realised i hadnt done anything at all. Ill summarise them by saying i did alright and gained good points for the season.

Ill now move on to the most recent race.

The SouthWest Cyclocross series came home to Plymouth for the Certini Central Park final round of the season - Sunday the 16th.
Coming into this race, i was leading the overall by a couple points followed very closely by James Davey (MDCC) and Dexter Hurlock (Certini). I hadnt won a race the whole season, but i have got fairly decent results and i attended everyrace. So i had this advantage, wheas Dexter has only raced a few and won nearly all of them. All i had to do was finish 3rd senior if Dexter comes 1st. or 4th if he came 2nd. At this stage of the season following on from my recent races, this shouldnt have been too much of a problem. But it also meant that any mistake or mechanical made by me would have resulted in a definate loss of the series. So it was all to play for.

Knowing that i needed every advantage i could take, i got a bit of a pit team together and a spare bike.
The team consisted of my dad (pit man-bike cleaner), matt newman (coach man & bike holder, before and after the race), will amery (photoman & kit holder) and steve holmes (eyes on the everypart of the track). It felt pretty nice having this support.

After riding the course in practice, i was very happy i had a spare bike.The course was wet, muddy and fairly fast. This was going to be a problem with mud clogging up, especially on my redline as it doesnt have the best mud clearance. Having a fresh, mud free bike to jump on to each lap was re assuring.

I havent yet mentioned but, i had been ill with tonsilitus for nearly 2 weeks, 4 days prior to the race and had been bed bound for most of it. I had got out on my bike twice, since feeling better, but i knew my fitness wasnt quite there and the race was going to be tough.


At the start line waiting for the get go was a bit of a laugh, with people chanting USA USA at my comical skinsuit. But as soon as the race starter said 'you will be started by a gun within the next 30 secs', it went dead silent, nerves kicked in, pedal foot and legs tensed waiting for that gun. Until bang!

Me getting a great start

Every time i hear this i react like im bmx racing. I stomped hard on the pedals, spinning my legs up firing off the start line. As i turned the first corner this was very apparent, due to the gap, how hard i went off the line, probably too hard. I carried on trying to keep a strong pace up but i found my self not being able to keep the pace up. Not even close. Whilst i sat there trying to turn my legs with some force, watching people over take me, one by one, I started thinking to myself, 'shit this sucks, i have nothing in me to give, i didn't realise being ill had effected me this much, and uh oh, that's the end of being overall Champ'. As i passed half a lap, i heard coachman, Matt, telling me to chill out and compose myself. This was a bit hard to do cus i was certainly chilled already, so chilled i could barely move.
Still, this was only the first lap and i wasn't even close to reaching my lowest point.

Over the next few laps, i got slower and slower. Not because my bike was clogging up, i had a fresh bike every lap, but because i was like a car with a broken gearbox stuck in 1st, and not being able to find any other gears. I was warm, but it wasn't reaching my legs. My lungs were burning, i was urging and i was tasting blood. It got to the point of just stopping. I started walking up the hills and started feeling quite depressed. A bunch of about 5 passed me and i tried to hold on but they slipped away as well. I dropped to about 18th.
This was not fun.

All of a sudden, maybe 40-45mins in i found myself powering hard. Riding up every bank and cranking along the straights. I felt like my usual self, I found 2nd gear and was slamming through the gears. It wasn't long before i caught and left the 5 man group, and i found my self picking off riders one after the other.

The cheering from the crowds, friends and family started to make a noted difference. it gave me extra energy that i really needed to keep this going. My eyes on the track, Steve, ran along side me at this point shouting im in a great position and i will catch a few more if i keep it up. I stayed on the Redline for an extra lap because i found it was a faster bike than the spare Dolan. This was probably because of the Rocket Ron tyres that gripped really well in these conditions.

Matt Zietz powering his way to Victory

Half a lap left i started to get a fair bit of chain suck on the Redline because of the mud build up. Luckily this happened just before the pit so was able to jump on the spare for the remaining 4 mins or so. I had caught and passed 5th place Roy Wyle-Smith (Elite Velo) but he was not going down without a fight for the 2nd time this season. Coming off the mud onto the path, 3 corners before the finish, i thought i had created a comfortable gap between us but the next thing i knew was that he was turning underneath me! He must have put one hell of a charge down to catch me back like that! Coming down the ally before the 2nd to last corner, it was a good old battle trying to get to the corner first, whilst dodging a lapped rider. I was able to get half a bike length on him into the corner and carried the momentum covering my line in the last corner. He was right on my wheel which left it to a sprint finish! Thankfully i held the position, putting me in 5th.

At this point, i hadn't realised how much i had manged to claw back. So i was a massively relieved i hadn't done that bad. In fact, i was 4th senior. Which, as mentioned before, Dexter had to finish 2nd for me to grab the Overall! The Gods were on my side that Day. Pearson Cycles and Plymouth CX rider Matt Zietz had a brilliant race and managed to stay ahead of Dexter.

Thus making me SouthWest CX Champ by 2 Points! Awesome!

I would really like to thank first my girlfriend for putting up with me, the bike and mud being everywhere all season. Thanks to my friends and family for the support and encouraging words to keep me going all season. Thanks to my dad for cleaning my bike each lap with one bucket of water and a brush. Thanks to my family Mark & Chance out in LA supplying me with frames, components and kit that have made it possible to train in these cold winter mornings. Thanks to Cogs for directing enthusiastic Cross riders to me and each other, creating a training group which in turn, created Plymouth CX. Thanks to my mum and Daniel groves for the photos used. Thanks for Certini for putting on a great Final race with nearly 90 riders racing throughout the day.

And finally, thanks to the South West Cyclo Cross and all the volunteers who have put in hours of there life planning, organizing, setting up the races & for putting on a flawless series. Sunday being no exception.

Heres the top 10 from the Central Cross Race:
1 Matt Zietz Pearson Cycles S 0h 59m 59s
2 Dexter Hurlock Certini S +0h 0m 55s
3 Luke Eggar South Fork Racing S +0h 2m 26s
4 Jay Horton Certini V +0h 2m 31s
5 Matt Noble Plymouth Cx S +0h 4m 43s
6 Roy Wyle-Smith EliteVelo S +0h 4m 45s
7 Mike Mulroy VC VeloCake V +0h 6m 13s
8 Maddie Horton Certini W +0h 6m 30s
9 Richard Taylor Exeter CC V +0h 6m 48s
10 Rich Long Certini S +0h 8m 13s

more results here at British Cycling

I imagine this will be the last Cross post untill next august maybe. But if anything exciting or interesting comes up in the mean time, i will put it into black and white! 

                                                             See you all in the New Year

Team Plymouth CX having an awesome and successful first year.

Video: Koo Bikes Video

Sometime late last year Koo-bikes were approached by a couple of Film students looking to add to their portfolio of work and wanting to do a sort of 'profile' video of the up and coming online retailer Koo-bikes. Its basically an about us, what we're all about and who we are video. Koo-Bikes.com wouldn't be what it is today, either without its bricks and mortar shop Cogs-Bikes, so this was worth talking about as well, as Koo is the evolution of Cogs and a progression in retail. Anyways enough of the boring chat..
Here's the video!

Battle: Cannonade super six vs Redline CX

So I'm guessing that you are all aware that I have been riding the Redline cyclocross bike now for the past few months. This happens to be the only road/cross bike that I have ever really ridden. I have done plenty of miles of riding on this bike and however good i think it is, i cant help but feel if i had a new and up to date carbon bike, it will make a difference and i will be blown away by how far the technology has come on. i find myself forever looking at different bikes and mainly Carbon deep section wheels. I, and I'm sure many other people, always have a whole list of dream kit that they wish they had, just for the never ending struggle to be faster. I would say that number 1 on my wish list is the Zipp 303 firecest wheels. I look at them and dream of me out on my bike, just flying past people and laughing at them completely exhausting themselves, just to get near the speed I was cruising at....

Clearly I am deluded, and the marketing world has won the battle making me believe the hype with some cleaver sounding words. But even magazine, online and personal reviews rave about them. I couldn't help but think that I needed to try them out for my self. 

Cannondale super six...also super quick

One of the duDes 'Matt Newman' at my local bike shop, 'Cogs-bikes' in plymouth, happens to have a set of zipp 404 firecrest wheels. These aren't the ones I would personally have but apparently, they have very similar aero properties but a touch faster than the 303s. I thought it would be a long shot asking if I could have a go on his wheels sometime because they are soo expensive. But luckily enough for me, he agreed and said I should have a go on his bike at the same time. I thought this was very cool of him and really appreciate it! Would never have got the opportunity any other way, unless I bought them. The idea of being able to ride them got me a bit excited.. So of course, I thought up of test to see how fast they really are and do a versus battle with the Redline.

My first thought when i warmed up on the bike was the riding position, i'm used to a cyclocross position, so it felt a bit weird at first, but then i quickly noticed how easy it was to get up to speed and how it just kept going. Whilst out on the battle, i thought up many differences of the ride position and the way it rode compared to the Redline. 

Here's those thoughts......

- It was real nice and stiff and felt like the power transferred straight through the cranks,chain, wheel and to the floor with absolutely no loss. 

- It felt like it cut through the wind like a hot knife through butter.. 

- side wind hitting the wheels was a first and bit scary but i got used to it. 

- It was surprisingly quick uphills, thought it was going to be a bit sluggish but it was quite the opposite.

- Ultegra shifters felt weird. 

- The position whilst stood up felt really nicely balanced and controlled. 

- I have never gone for a ride where i felt soo fast with as much effort. 

- how is this going soo fast?

- not sure i would feel the same benefits of the wheel in CX

- why is going this fast, soo easy.

- haha lolol rofl at the cyclists i flew by..

So that's just a few things i could remember.  In conclusion, i liked it, it was fast!

Now for the geek tech stats bit..

About a month ago I did a strong ride on my redline. Setup was:

- Rolf vector 20mm deep wheels

- 46t front chain ring

- 27-12 cassette

And obviously a frame where aerodynamics were never thought of whilst designing. 

It was a 20mile loop and I pushed hard to see how fast I could do it. I can't remember the weather or traffic conditions, but I have a feeling that both were good. 

Here's the stats straight off the Garmin

- time 1.02.58

- dist.  20.17miles

- avg speed. 19.22

- max speed 37.22

Today I did the same route but on the Cannondale equipped with the 404s

I was hoping that I was going to smash the times above to justify me saving and spending lots of pennies..

Lets note that the previous results were over a month ago, and I'm probably a lot fitter than I was then. Weather today was fairly windy with a noticeable headwind but nothing drastic. Traffic on the other hand was a bit of a nightmare with bad timing at traffic lights...I probably need to find a better route to do tests. 

Setup was:

Zipp 404 carbon clincher 58mm deep section

52t front

25-11t rear

This gearing instantly means I can hit higher speeds and therefore be able to hold a higher avg. 

Stats:

- time 59.22

- dist 20.10

- avg 20.31mph

- max 38.84

I really don't think that these result show a fair result. I was 2 mins quicker on the Cannondale but I felt held up by the traffic a lot and I think that if I rode the Redline in the wind from today, it would have been a very different story. Only 1mph higher top speed which shows the gearing was not a big factor. One major thing to note is how much more energy i had left in me. I definitely felt a lot less exhausted.

Thanks for reading, and hope you found it interesting.

On a side note, this bike is actually up for sale... 

£1800 for the bike with mavic Ksyriums

£1300 for the zipps which will come with brand new Decals

orr £3000 FOR THE WHOLE LOT.. (frame size is 56)

i aint got the money but it sems like a good deal. If your in the area Pop into cogs bikes shop to have a look at it or speak to the guys. alternatively, here is their facebook

Wednesday Bikes: Vol 2 - Vanilla Bicycles

This week is Vanilla Bicycles.

This company, straight out of Portland, Oregan, hand builds and crafts every frame. And this really shows in the detail. This also explains why the SpeedVagen from last edition of Wednesday bikes were made with such detail, as Vanilla cycles actually create them.

I dint realize this then..but now i do. Im getting so wise!

So ill start off with two single speed CX bikes.
1 Frame, 2 very different looks!

OLD Skool:

Sweet looking crank-set on this. Have no idea what it is though.. (update, they are Paul ENO cranks)

 NEW Skewl:

50mm deep carbons and boom!! you got yourself fast as f**k looking race bike.

If i had the choice, i honestly don't know which to go for. It's so easy to make a frame look like a classic, just slap on some square box rims, matched with a lot of silver parts. I like the idea of the simplicity of a single speed. just something you dont have to worry about, and take too much care for, which is what you will get from the classic build. But as soon as you drop some carbon wheels in, it instantly defies the point of a singlespeed. You have to check and clean the pads and rims after every ride, or else before you know it, youv torn through a set of wheels that you had to re-mortgage your house to get hold of.

Dont get me wrong, if i had the money, i would have 100 sets of carbon wheels just because they look so pimp! But, being an average, struggle to pay the bills, kind of guy, a single speed should be plain, simple, reliable, and good enough to get the job done. Everything the first first bike is, just without the tubular tyres/rims. Especially not Dugast tyres as, apparantly they need more care and attention than other tub's because of the very supple, high performing, Cotton Casing.

Here's a Geared version..

Got this image from here.. worth a look as there's loads cool pics in there

This one being one of my favourites..

That's a serious gap to clear..

Video: Central Park Cross Course

I decided to GoPro a lap of my Cross course up Central Park last night. Its a pretty long track so i edited out the boring uphill bits. Watch out for me getting attacked by the tiniest dog ever...

The only thing i can bunny hop on the course. Ideally i would have more (another thing to hop right after this one) but im having to rely on the natural things. If i put anything up, it would get taken down.

Race Report: SW CX Rd 4, Stover

Race Report: SW XC Rd 4, Stover

            Today was the 4^th round of the South West Cyclo Cross series at Stover School just outside Newton Abbot. We have had a 2 week break from the series, well the majority had but I decided to do the Hell of the West to fill the gap of racing in the series. The hell of the west was an 80Km ‘CX sportive’ across Dartmoor. I won’t go into details of this, but I will say it was probably the hardest cycling thing I have ever done. It sucked and I probably wouldn’t do it again, especially on a cross bike. The majority of people had cross country mountain bikes and oh maan I was jealous of their suspension, disk brakes and fat tyres.

           Anyway, back to today’s events. Stover school grounds created a pretty damn good venue for a cross race. The start/ finish area sat amongst the well manicured sports fields. These fields were rolled so flat there was barely a bump or lump in sight. To the best of my belief, the ground men had also rolled flat 40% of the course especially for the race. However easy this sounds, it was a totally different story due to the fairly high amount of surface water that quickly got churned up at one end of the fields. Despite that, these sections made for good flat-out racing.

       The other 60% on the other hand made use of the not so well kept part of the school. Once you had come of the sports fields, you were met by quick, steep banks and tight turns that led out to a flat out rough, un-kept downhill section. This was a good place to have a bit of a rest and a lot of fun getting loose. But as we all know, what goes down must go up, and this wasn’t the nicest of ups. It was slow going and energy sapping. Even at the top of this climb it didn’t let off. We had to get off, run up some steps then navigate the best way to tackle a couple more short steep grass banks. This would have been ‘moderately’ easy if it wasn’t for large curb sized grass ledges that u needed to hop up and lose a bit of momentum. Not long after this section it was back onto the sports fields. A lap was about 6min 30secs and ended up doing about ten of these.

           My race went pretty well for me today; I got the best finish of the season. Whether it was the extra enthusiasm from my dad coming up and me wanting to show off, or the sibling rivalry of my half brother, Nick, racing and wanting to show him how us Cyclo cross boys do it, I don’t know. But today it helped.

        It was a good turn-out with nearly 60 riders in the main event. I was glad to be near the front at the start. I got off to a pretty good start from the 2^nd row on the grid. At the first hedge line there was a big ol’ puddle, with two small lines around it. I figured people were going to slow up to take these lines. So I made the most of this hopped the big puddle. This put me right at the front with 5 others. Throughout the first lap I worked my way to 2^nd and put up a big gap behind to 3^rd. 1^st position had also started to make a gap. I was able to keep this position for the next 2 laps but 3^rd was catching up. I dropped back to 5 over the next few laps. I held this position for a while. I took on an energy gel about 35-40 mins in to give me the boost to try and not lose 5^th, 6^th was slowly but surely catching me up.

The thick consistency of this made it very difficult
to swallow under race conditions.

I used a Zip Fit Energy gel today, different than the usual Torq gels. It didn’t go down very well. The Zipfit, banana flavour, was way too thick to consume when you’re at your limit and really doesn’t go down very well. The Torq gels are a lot thinner in consistency. For this reason alone, I will be using Torq for the rest of the season.

I would definitely recommend these energy gels. Thin, tasty,
easily swallowed and good energy supply.

With 2 laps to go, 6^th was right on my tail. But 4^th was in my sights; maybe 30secs ahead. The energy started to kick in along with fear of losing position. I stepped my game up and started to leave him on the downhill section. At the turn I kicked hard up the hill to drop him, which I did. I kept this momentum going and caught 4^th not long after the bell for last lap. As I passed him he jumped onto my wheel and could see he wasn’t going down without a fight. Again, I used the momentum gained from the downhill and just stood up and sprinted up the long, lung busting hill. 

He couldn’t match my effort and I rolled home safely in 4^th position, 10 secs clear of 5^th. I was still 3mins back from the winner; he put in a good ride.  I have some more work to do to start challenging for the lead but I’m sure it will come. It’s Just a matter of time.

Thanks for reading again. It’s you guys that comment on my work that keeps me going out there, just so I have something decent to write about.