The older mountain bike thread but now a road bike review update

Bill said:
Great day for a ride here, partly cloudy, low 70s. Did 39mi with 3000ft of climbing, lots of short stingers, several were 15-16%.
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I did mine on Zwift, steepest was 10% , 2090 feet in about 6 miles. Goal is to make hills less painful this winter..... by suffering. We won't see 70 until May, except for maybe a January thaw for a week or so. Hoping to fly 4 or 500 miles south a few times this winter to bike outside.
 
Mahneuvers said:
Lol. I have one there too. I'm a GU guy while riding. I've yet to see a Katsu flavor :)
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Quintana Roo, never heard of that brand, looks cool. The dog looks like you caught him right before he was going to take a leak on it.
 
Every winter, the temperature I'm willing to ride in increases a bit. My commute takes 1.5 hours, so, even with heated gloves and socks, the cold eventually gets to you. Today was fantasti! I'm thinking 40 degrees might be the cutoff this year. I intend to hit the weights hard this winter to get better with hills.
 
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Mahneuvers said:
Every winter, the temperature I'm willing to ride in increases a bit. My commute takes 1.5 hours, so, even with heated gloves and socks, the cold eventually gets to you. Today was fantasti!. I'm thinking 40 degrees might be the cutoff this year. I intend to hit the weights hard this winter to get better with hills.
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36 is my lowest so far this year, but it snowed today, not sure if they salted the road or not. If they did, I'm probably done outside this year.
 
I’ll do a ride down to about 37*F or so, below that I need a good reason to be out there.
 
26 is my record. It only took that one time for me to swear off the 20s forever :)
 
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PaulS said:
Quintana Roo, never heard of that brand, looks cool...
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I hadn't heard of QR until 2 weeks ago when I started my search. A serious triathlete friend has one, is considering buying a new one, and highly recommended the brand. I called the fitter at my local bike shop and he told me they are great bikes, well priced, he's seeing a lot more of them and even some of the local pros are riding them. Even though the same brand, my budget means my bike is very different than what the pros are riding :)
 
QR’s been around seemingly forever. When I was doing triathlons in the late 90s/early 00s, they came on the scene around the time Softride was first doing beam bikes and Kestrel was becoming popular.

www.triathlete.com

The Long, Slow History of Building a Rideable Beam Bike

Over the 30-year history of beam bikes, there have been some good, some bad, and a lot of ugly.
www.triathlete.com www.triathlete.com
 
I finally pulled the trigger on a bike computer. I opted for a Garmin Edge 830. I'm conflicted whether I should use the autopause feature. I guess I'll do a ride with and without to see the difference.
 
I like autopause as I don't want traffic lights etc counting against me :)
 
Sac Arrow said:
I finally pulled the trigger on a bike computer. I opted for a Garmin Edge 830. I'm conflicted whether I should use the autopause feature. I guess I'll do a ride with and without to see the difference.
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Will it integrate with your shifters?
 
TCABM said:
Will it integrate with your shifters?
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Yes. I haven't connected it yet but plan to.

I went on a ride today. The map tracks look so much better now, and having a pressure altimeter gives me credits for bridges that aren't reflected in map data (Strava replaces GPS elevation data with map data without altimeter information.) I haven't played around with mapping and routes yet.
 
I left autopause off, but Strava still separates moving time from total time, so it's doing what I want. I just connected it with the DI2. Pretty slick stuff.
 
Autopause, I use it. The garmin keeps track of your efforts, I don't want my stop times included in my speeds and times. The garmin connect data is good stuff.
 
I use autopause with my Wahoo Element. Works fine. Most stops are just for traffic lights or other obstructions vs a rest, so it's a negligible effect, but at my age I need all the ego I can get.
 
I like the integration with DI2, particularly the ability to use the top buttons on the shifters to scroll through the screens and the ability to see the status of all of the batteries. I find it a little annoying that I have to manually connect to it on every ride. Maybe I did something wrong in the setup. Anybody doing this?
 
At what pressure do you ride your tubeless tires? My fitter said much lower, like 50 in the back and 40 up front.
 
Zipp calculator recommends 52, the Rene Herse calculator recommends 57 as fastest. I run 57, the ride is smooth and the bike seems to have good speed.
 
Bill said:
Zipp calculator recommends 52, the Rene Herse calculator recommends 57 as fastest. I run 57, the ride is smooth and the bike seems to have good speed.
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Thanks. So excited to take her out on her maiden voyage tomorrow.
 
Size matters. Larger tires run at lower pressures. The Zipp calculator recommends 67 for my tires (30s) but that feels too low and squirrelly on hard corners. I'm running 75. I think you have a maximum of 72 for hookless tubeless tires.
 
Sac, true. I’m running Continental 5000S TR, 32mm. I like the wider tire and lower pressure personally, the bike is smooth and fast and less chatter on rough fast downhills.
 
Hookless has a lower maximum recommendation. The tire will list what it is, but typically it seems to be mid-70s. Wider tires can be run at lower pressures. I've been running 25s @ 70-75 psi or converted rims (the rims are not hookless). I'd start running 28s @ 65-70 and see how it feels.
 
Swing and a miss. Flat tire 1.5 miles in. The bike is back at the shop.
 
Bill said:
tubeless? What sealant and how much? On the first dose, was the tire swung properly to fully coat everything?
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Yep. Tubeless. I was sold when my fitter suggested I might not get another flat :oops: I should have known better. I'm a flat magnet! When I brought it back to the shop they said they had never seen this before. They reinflated and it appeared to keep pressure. They are holding on to it for a couple days to see if it acts up.

I live in a gated community and, to get around the gate, I went over a rounded curb and over 10 feet of grass before getting back on the road. The flat occurred shortly thereafter. Could something like that cause a flat? Maybe the curb twisted the tire in some strange way??
 
Thanks @Bill. This is good info. I didn't trust myself as tubeless is new to me so I had the shop perform the initial install. I'd be shocked if they didn't install properly.
 
Coating a new tire like above is very important, I also follow the same procedure when I re dose a tire.

Sealant brand is subjective, but I really like Orange Seal.
 
Did a ride this morning. I was only a couple miles in to it when I spotted a shredded tire carcass on the shoulder. I did my best to steer clear of it, but I knew I was screwed. Guess what. No more than 200 feet later, pffffffffft. I spent fifteen minutes trying to pry out the tiny wire that pierced the tube. I was almost going to say f*** it and call for a ride back but I fixed it and finished the ride.

I decided I like autopause.
 
47 miles yesterday, no flat. Love the Di2 shifting. Once I drop another 15 lbs, I expect aero position will become more comfortable.
 
I'm in the same boat, re. needing to drop 15 lbs. My bike is geared for climbing, but the extra cargo does make a difference on extended steep grades.

I was wondering how much value the cycle GPS would add over the Strava phone app coupled with a Cateye computer when you aren't using route navigation. I like having the real time pressure altitude on the display, plus cumulative elevation tracking is so much more accurate. So yes, I'm glad I went there.
 
I'm generally a big fan of the GCN videos, but man, in this one, the wax salesman just RIPS on dry lubes. I've had nothing but great luck with Finish Line dry teflon lube. I think he has some sort of green environmental agenda against them versus wear and performance issues.

 
Ah, the deep vortex of waxing chains. This is close to high wing/low wing or what oil should I use in near religious adherents of each side. I have shifted to wax and have to admit it's a lot of work at first but much easier once you get it into a routine. Helps to start with a brand new chain. Some stuff involved in cleaning it, but once it's clean and waxed it requires little maintenance other than a dip in hot wax every month or so and wiping it off after a ride.
 
If you haven’t done it yet, get a heart rate monitor. Helpful on the hills, lets you know when you are about to blow up.
 
I have a Trek 870 that I put slicks on and pretty much made a road bike. It is fast.
 
So I have this perfectly great GPS mount that also has a Go Pro underside which can support a headlight with a Go Pro mount. I ordered it with the Garmin 830 not realizing that the Garmin shipped with it's own slick mount.

So what I think I'm going to do, is strip the Cateye and crap cheapies lights off the Tarmac, put the Go Pro/Garmin mount on it, and turn it in to a capable night riding bike, with a 10,000 lumen front light and decent rear flashers. I don't do a lot of night riding, so I plan on keeping my Cervelo clean, and packing the lights on the Tarmac. I can use the Garmin 830 on both. It's a win-win situation. There are a lot of night hazards on the road that can't necessarily be seen even with good lighting, and I don't have to worry about trashing a good set of wheels.

It would certainly encourage me to ride the Tarmac more. Not that it hasn't fulfilled its role. It has 34K miles on it and it is still going strong. One thing I realized is that after all that time, the drop bar was angled way low. I rotated it up more like my Cervelo is. It might transform it in to a better rideable bike.
 
Put on a Go Pro as a dash cam for when you get someone in a car doing something stupid. Evidence for the trial.
 
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