Big Mike In Oz

Here was me thinking I was a cycling guru.  Then I’m wheezing and puffing up the slightest incline cursing all the surplus calories I’ve inhaled at the campus cafeteria.

And worse than all that is my habits.  All my good habits.  Riding habits.  Are gone.  I was 5 minutes down the road yesterday when I realised I didn’t have gloves or glasses.  I spent the whole miserable ride pondering the stupidity that caused me to have to squint into the glare and shaking the numbness out of alternating hands.

I hope I get smart again in a hurry.

It is with a ponderous hand that I write this.  It is with a shamed hand that I publicise this.  It is with a resolute hand that I move beyond this.

Found:
12kg I neither wanted nor asked for.

Lost:
All semblance of cardiovascular fitness.
2/3 of my legendary leg strength.

Something happened this January which I wasn’t prepared for.  I rode the track season hard.  I haven’t ridden a full track season since 1989.  It felt good.  I got some strong results.  One of my road trips even paid for itself.  But at the end of the track season there was no reason to drive 50km each way to the velodrome 3 times a week – especially with petrol prices where they are.  And there was university starting back.

The previous year, and the one before that, I’d used January as a big base for a good high (for me) mileage year.  And the weight curve showed it. 
Jan-May ‘06 14kg loss.  Jun-Dec ’06 10kg gain.
Jan-May ‘07 12kg loss.  Jun-Dec ’07 5kg gain.
Jan-May ‘08 9kg gain.  Jun-Dec ’08 who knows.

All I know is that I didn’t gain anywhere near as much over winter/spring last year as I did the previous year.  I’m going to aim to beat that plus take back some of what I didn’t do this summer/autumn.  Last Tuesday was my final ever university exam.  I’ve got half a dozen assignments to write in the next 10 days then I have 2 weeks of fulltime lectures followed by a 14 week practicum and that’s all she wrote.  A fully qualified high school physics teacher will pop out the other end.

It should be easy.  I’ve got all the confidence of my achievements from last track season and I’ll be starting very specific training in July after 2 weeks of just reacquainting my legs with the process of going around.  The best part is that my prac is 25km down the reasonably flat highway so if I get the babysitting details sorted out I can pedal up and down thus saving some $30 a week in petrol and putting in a reasonable base on the bike.  All that’s needed on top of that will be the regular Wednesday nights at the velodrome and probably a weekend visit as well.

After the escapades of Unholy-rouleur Jim last year, folding his chainring over doing intervals.  Twice.  I was given some hints (salt in the wound) by the mongrel who beat me out of the sprint bronze at the state titles that I should be doing standing starts with the sole aim of folding chainrings.  Hi Jim.  I wasn’t sure if it fell into the same category so I didn’t bother to tell him that I recently snapped my pedal axle on a standing start.

I also didn’t bother to tell him that all of my bikes have old crank sets on them.  Why.  Why would someone with limited time and money spend hours trawling eBay for 20 year old cranks.  Simple.  144mm PCD.  You can’t fold a chainwheel if the flimsy chainwheel doesn’t have to support itself.  144PCD means the big fat crank spider is taking all the strain and the chainwheel is just a circle.  All these new cranks with 130mm or even 110mm PCD means that the flimsy chainwheel must reach down to attach to the crank arm, exposing the victim – ahem, owner – to unnecessary flex.

2 things.

1. Don’t come around here trying to tell me it’s BCD because as my good friend Dave at Daromi Cycles told me PCD is engineering speak for Pitch Centre Diameter.  The fact that bike riders have claimed it and maimed it and twisted it to Bolt Centre Diameter doesn’t make it right.

2. If I can use 1800 watts to take almost 120kg from zero to 60km/h in 150 metres without folding a chainring, why would I spend money changing PCD to a less structurally sound item?  Don’t answer that, it’s rhetorical.  Plus I don’t want to hear you make a fool of yourself.

All I know is that today, day 168 of 2008, I rode only the ninth ride over 40km this year.  There’s already 98 days with a zero against the mileage for the year.  But my eyes are open now and I can smell the beginning of a good strong 9 month run to the state titles.  It has to be.  I’ll be in deep trouble at home if I’m not under 100kg and firing on all 8 cylinders (yes, of course my trackie legs are V8s) when I roll my new carbon fibre track bike out onto the launch pad in October.

Oh yeah, Dave from Daromi Cycles has already got all the measurements and specifications.  Carbon grey with red highlights.  I can’t wait.  So we end on a brighter note.

The permanent bridesmaid of Discovery/USPostal wins stage 2 of bridesmaid’s race.  He’s a loyal domestique and an amazingly tough rider but he’s long overdue for something a little more meaningful than carrying bottles or winning stages of 2^nd tier races.

I got challenged to consider what is a normal life and had to respond with this outpouring.

Dude, you picked the wrong guy on the wrong day for a “normal” discussion.

I went to bed last night at a time such that as I was in my twilight, drifting off, I was startled awake by my wifes alarm clock going off for her to go to work. Neither of us are shift workers.

because…

Yesterday daytime was 8 hours of revising quantum physics and relativity for a 3 hour end of semester exam today. Then home to referee the kids for a couple of hours before leaving for 5 hours to be the “logistics manager” at a $5000 criterium my club organises. Then home for a bit more physics revision before falling into bed at the aforementioned 4:45am. It’s now 8:20am and I’m up again and have already made 3 lots of school lunches, made 2 phone calls about the race and am now leaving to visit my mum (who had a knee replacement last week) before I dive into my physics exam at 10am.

At 4pm today I’m again the logistics manager (commonly mistaken for the race directors gopher), this time for the Tour de Sunshine Coast, 4 days of pain for which the term logistics manager must be considered interchangable with “general dog’s body” and/or “co-defendant” if the s&$t hits the fan.

All of which pales into insignificance compared to your “normal”.

I give thanks for my wife and 3 children who love me and each other.

I give heartfelt best wishes to the battling Nelsons and bow down before their ability to perform “normally” in the face of their current challenges.

Who am I?  This is a very superficial question. 

Elsewhere, like in some bike forums in my home state, I fly under the banner Big and Shiny - on the premise "Big, that's me. Shiny, that's my head" (look at my profile photo if you don't get it).  That means that in the inherently lazy manner of many forum frequenters I sign off my posts with an abbreviation of my alias.  Namely, B&S.

So, who am I?

B&S would be loosely described as an acronym of Big and Shiny.

B&S is also a homonym.  Of itself… by definition.

But B&S is also an acronym of Bald and Smelly (thank you to my dear colleague for that one).

So my handle is an acronym of a homonym of an acronym of a duality of personal physical flaws.

Oh what a tangled web we weave through this spitefully complex language.

Ms 7 first… I was a couple of minutes late going to collect her from school this afternoon.  Nothing unusual there except that for the first time her bike wasn’t locked (I didn’t notice the lock was missing until we had ridden all the way there this morning) so she had taken it upon herself to ride home.  I met her just short of halfway riding side by side with another 7 year old from her class who lives in the next street to us.  His parents were trailing along 50 metres behind fortunately.  But she’s getting mighty independent all the same.

And the boys…I was excited at the start of the year when Mr 9 asked if he could start racing like me.  That was January, and he went to a few skills sessions on the ride-to-school-beater accompanied by Mr 13 on a similar rig.  When they stuck with it for more than a month I asked if they were going to keep it up and got 2 big smiles and nods. 

So I started looking around for bikes.  The junior development officer of the club sourced a 650c road bike that became ours for $300.  I then set about Frankensteining my parts bin and an old frame into something decent for the second.  That was late February and they’re still at it.  Decent bikes but ridden in sneakers with old toe clips and toe straps.

So last week I took the next step and found some good pedals and second hand shoes.  I set them all up on Tuesday while the boys were at school.  When I got home from uni they were out riding around the street and after nearly 2 solid hours neither of them had had the awkward experience of failing to unclip and taking the slow-mo topple that usually accompanies a first exposure to this technology.

Now the garage has even less hope of fitting cars in it.  Between my 4 bikes, the boys 3 each and my daughters 2 there’s barely room to store the lawn mower, let alone a pair of family sedans.

Here I sit in a pool of tears diluted with blood.  There’s some pix at the bottom.

All I know is that I’m glad what happened didn’t happen Friday when I was doing standing starts.  0-55km/h in a 53x17 would not have ended well if it had coincided with shearing a pedal axle.  I’m not sure when I bought the pedal but it’s around 2 years ago so I’m stuffed for warranty.  I’ll send Look the pedal and a nice calm letter and see what happens.  I would have hoped that when the pedals reached the end of their working life they could have signalled me with a rough bearing or a broken spring rather than breaking a chrome-moly axle.

Just as fortunate as not happening during an interval session is that it also didn’t happen on the Saturday group ride of 80+ that I was planning on doing.  As luck would have it, it happened on the way to the big group when I was in the company of one other rider rather than 10 minutes later in the middle of the whole group.

As with all little accidents there’s expense beyond the pain and embarrassment.  In this case I’m out over $1000. 

Jersey $60

Pedals $150

Helmet $250

Shoes $250

Mobile phone $600 (I just got a new one in February on a 2 year contract so the replacement will need to be an outright purchase)

As a student, that hurts more than the elbow, knee and hip.

The biggest surprise, given the nature of the event, is that I didn’t rack the boys.  There’s no scratches or bruising whatsoever on the inner thighs or groin.  All in all the injuries are minimal but a bit weird.  Here’s a list of actual issues with the associated WTF outcome

Jagged pedal axle stub… no gashed leg

Shredded jersey shoulder… no scratches on upper body

Perfect knicks… scratches, grazes, bruises on upper right hip

Shattered helmet… no head ache

Classic downward momentum crash… no crushed nuts

Fat man sprawled in middle of major intersection… no rednecks laughing out of car windows

The best part is now I’m a real bike rider again.  I haven’t crashed in a decent manner since I did my collarbone in June 1990.  Any crash that can be accurately describe using the work topple isn’t a real crash.  Stupid stuff like stalling out in the driveway or touching a toe on a front wheel.  But shattering a chrome-moly axle under acceleration and spearing over the handlebars is definitely on the radar.

These photos are shown in the order they would have occured on the road

Here's the dodgy component that started my spectacular involuntary dismount.

Here's the first thing to hit the ground.  This shot was taken at t=crash + 3hr.  Needless to say the shoe is stuffed and the toe, 48 hours later is still changing colour.

That's the fleshy part of my right hip.  Strange that the knicks only have 2 pin holes.

Here's the most obvious of the cracks in the helmet (note the silver sticker is in 2 pieces).  I've counted over 30 cracks as well as the compressed section that took the direct hit.

Needless to say, as a brain challenged trackie I went home and had a shower then straight to the bike shop to buy a new helmet and off to the races in the afternoon.  The shave-legged equivalent of "when you fall off the horse, get straight back on."  That was Saturday and I didn't end up racing.  My 9 year old dropped me on the first hill of the warmup course. 

I got back on the horse again Sunday for a light 30 minutes with the junior skills squad.  A couple of short sprints using the same restricted gears as the kids.  Man spinning isn't comfortable when you're bashed and bruised.

And I got back on again today.  A public holiday signals a longer road ride with the junior squad.  Today it was decided would be a hill climb which is just what an injured trackie wants to hear.  So I ground my way up 7km of 6-10% switchbacks.  I was chaperoning my 2 boys on their first trip up this monster climb.  They were both climbing side by side in the beginning until Mr 13 bailed after about 2km of climbing.  An honourable first attempt since he's had head aches all week and been sleeping 15 hours a day.  When I stopped to help load him into a vehicle I told Mr9 to keep going and I'd catch up.

I was mobile again in about 2 minutes but it still took me over a kilometre to catch him.  When I'd left him there was a 13 year old girl and her father about 100 metres up the road from him.  When I caught him he was riding alongside the daughter and actively backing off to stay with her on the steeper bits.  I rode up with her father chatting until the last kilometre when Mr9 said he couldn't pedal so slow anymore and accelerated... mean old dad hadn't considered providing a granny gear so he was slugging it out on a 39x25 bottom gear.

It took me while to catch him then he asked how far to the top.  I wasn't exactly sure but guessed about 600m and said so.  He sat down and had a drink then asked how he'd know the finish.  I told him he could see the coloured jerseys of the others from about 150m back.  At that moment we both caught a glimpse of red up the road, his bike went clunk-clunk-clunk as he got out of his seat and dropped halfway down his 8 speed cluster.  And he was gone.

He smoked me by over 10 seconds, and his total time of 34 minutes flat is only 7 minutes slower than my fastest time over the past 3 years.  All that from a 45kg 9 year old wearing unlaced sneakers.  Yes, you heard right.  I haven't spent money on fancy pedals and shoes for them yet.  Yet.  Here's a picture of the boys at home after the ride.

Sorry about that.  After I posted the last photo I realised it's a bit hard to tell the difference between Mr9 and Mr13 based on size and stature.  Mr13 is in the blue helmet.

As helpful as he may or may not be, at least he’s prompt. 

Unholyrouleur Jim (readily compared to Dr Phil, but overloaded with sarcasm and sporting a fetching set of shaved legs) has posted a response to my begging yesterday.

He writes as funny as he looks.

Unholyrouleur Jim posted a description of symptons of a cycling addict.  My symptoms weren't listed so I'm asking for additional advice.

Dear Unholyrouleur

I think I may have a problem.  Can I please get your expert opinion?

Sunday morning I raced the local criterium (poorly).  As I was packing up a club member called out to me that someone had left a pair of gloves in the next parking area up.  I promptly forgot.  Later that afternoon I realised that I hadn't collected the gloves for lost and found.  I was also still fuming about my disappointing race outcome.

So in an act of self flagellation I decided to ride the 42x18 fixie for the 30 mile round trip to pick up the gloves.  When I got there I discovered that they had been collected already.

When I got home and surveyed the damage I cried.  A rough tough trackie crying like a baby at the demise of a rear hub.  Then I slowly turned the wheel and realised I'd killed a Suntour Superbe Pro 32 hole low flange road hub, a collector’s item, which caused the sobbing to deepen.

I undertook some therapeutic activity that mournful Sunday evening, lovingly dismantling the wheel and setting aside the battered remains of a hub to which I owed so much, with which I share so many memories – June 2008 would have been our 22^nd anniversary.  I then rebuilt the wheel with a similarly configured Campagnolo Record (c. 1985) hub that I had been using as a chain keeper (which was an ongoing source of dismay for my LBS owner).  

Last night at the velodrome I showed the corpse to a clubmate who is a precision fitter.  He said he could repair it.  I told him I didn’t want to ride a Frankenstein hub and he calmed me with words of confidence in his ability to make an “invisible” repair.

A trackie and a foundry worker share a brokeback moment.

I wait panting for the return of my beloved hub.  The bike just doesn’t seem right somehow, Campag is nice, but it’s not the same.  And that attitude permeates every ounce of my being.  I have Suntour Superbe saved in my eBay profile as a favourite search.

Here's where I think my problem lies.  Not that I rode 45 kilometres recovery in the afternoon after a hard race.  Not that I rode a hilly route on a fixie for that recovery ride.  Not that I launched with vigour from a red light near home and stripped the thread on the hub.  Not even when I made the call of shame.  The problem is that I love Suntour Superbe Pro to the exclusion of all others.  I know I’m living in the ‘80s.  I know that technology has moved a long way in 20 years.  I know I’m worshipping a dead brand.  I know my friends think I’m weird.  But I love my Suntour.

Please help me
Big Mike

I refer to myself as a competitive bike rider - nothing like a pro, but certainly competent.

What I discovered this week is that to qualify as a bike rider you need to ride your bike.  Regularly.  Sure, in the eyes of a non-cyclist I’ve ridden a lot.  But 400km in 8 weeks is lame.  Especially when that figure includes the Sunday club races and the Wednesday night velodrome sessions.

This weekend I got my wake up call when I raced the first open criterium of the road season and had a worse result than last year.  Then today at the club race I barely made half distance.  On top of that I’ve gained 7kg in the same timeframe.

University started late February and the state track titles were early March.  The momentum really fell away from riding with that double whammy.  So there’s the excuse wagon rolled out and dusted off for another lap around the block.

I’m pedalling so rough it’s uncomfortable to attempt anything over 55kph.  So to kick start my wake up call I’ve removed the 42x17 from my fixie and setting myself up on a 39x18.  I’ll either smooth out my pedal stroke or dislocate a hip trying.

Here’s to a new years resolution in late April.

For one of us.

My darling wife finished her final teaching prac late in March, then had an interview with a panel from the regional office of Education Queensland the following week.  She then spent days filling in all the paperwork to gain provisional registration followed by a subsequent period of 3 weeks moping around the house waiting for confirmation.  Once that arrived she started on the “I’m female and my English/SOSE qualification makes me a cliché” rant.  After the mid-term holiday she called regional office to advise that she was available to work.

They didn’t ring her back!

Because they offered her a referral on the first call.  Here’s an excerpt from the teacher orientation pack discussing the student demographic of the school where she was offered an interview.

XXX is one of the lowest socio-economic areas in Queensland.  According to the most recent census, there are over 700 single parent families and other families (grandparents, extended families) residing on the island.  The impact of this is that many of our students are from separated families, either living in single parent homes or with relatives, e.g. grandparents.  25% of the islands population are pensioners. Six of our students are currently in foster homes.  There are over 700 housing commission homes on the island.

A number of students come from homes where their parents are 2nd and 3rd generation unemployed, and do not value education.  Generally, the student population is not very academic, therefore, we have programs to cater for the non-academic stream of students.  The unemployment rate for teenagers in the local region is quite high.  Despite the school having a number of at risk student, destination studies indicate that rate of unemployment over the past three years has been 7% on average for our students.

So yesterday at 6am she drove away for her first day of fulltime work in nearly 14 years.  Based on her confidence level and the description of the school I was prepared for tears last night.

Wrong.

It’s going to be great.  Apart from the 170km round trip each day.