Yeah, lame I know, but I’m furiously getting all my crap together so I can finish up my year end/taxes and other such nonsense. Oh, and all the bikes I need to work on. And wheels to build.

So I’ll just tease you with pictures of one of the wheels I had time to build yesterday.

 

Pretty nice huh? It’s the first set of these I’ve built, and I can say that some day, I hope to have a set of these on one of my bikes.

Now it’s back to pushing paper.

Wow, we’ve just been having a run of good weather lately. It’s really hard for me not to just shrug off every responsibility and go for a ride, although nothing would make me happier.

uncommon blue for this time of year

I’m really trying to behave, both in terms of getting my work done, and resting the knee. There is still a long way to go until dirt, and I want to be in the game and not on the sidelines. Still, it’s really hard when you are presented with sunny skies and temps creeping up into the 60s.

rocking the roadies

This Sunday, Nat and I cranked out a mellow ride to Richmond and back, a short 27 mile ride that is relatively flat. I have pulled my road bike out of the trainer for the season, and am slowly becoming accustomed to it. It’s been a nice distraction while the dirt roads thaw out. I am anxious to get busy mapping the Grinder. With temps soaring into the 70s and maybe even 80s next week, should be long…

On Saturday, Mandy and I loaded up the Pugsleys, boy and dog to attend the first annual Winterbike. It is a winter fun bike festival held by our friends at MTBVT.com. Actually, it was a veritable who’s who of cycling aficionados from all over VT and beyond.



There was a large fat bike contingent, more than I’d ever seen in one place, but conditions were so good, you could have ridden your regular skinny wheels, and many did. All in all about 80 folks showed up to partake of this stellar event. The weather was perfect too, a big high pressure mass had settled over the area the day before, and with no cloud cover, radiational cooling brought the temps well below freezing overnight. Blue skies made the colder temps easy to bear. It’s been so warm lately I was half expecting it to be a total slush fest, but this little injection of cold air helped keep the trails in primo shape.

Mandy went out with the main group of riders, while I hung out with K and Seamus. Before too long, another dog showed up to the party, and Seamus was otherwise preoccupied updating his facebite status. It was really just a nice day to be outside, and I realized my biggest fail was not bringing a bike for the boy. Oh well, next year.

After a while, riders started trickling back in, and before I knew it, I was handing the kid baton off to Mandy, and I headed out solo on the trails. I ran into Ryan, one of our illustrious hosts, who decided to pedal back out with me. We shot the shit, caught up on our nefarious plot to make this year’s Gravel Grinder the best possible event ever (next to SSUSA) and proceeded to climb the most ridiculous hill I have ever ridden up on a Pugs. It was UP. In fact, I remember Mandy telling me at hand off about this really amazing downhill, and I was riding up it.

The good news is that it would wind us up at the comfort station, which Ryan had arranged to be as comfortabl as possible. He said he was inspired by our aid station from GG2011. Well played sir.

mmm refreshments...

The fire was nice, as was the keg, cheddar and hooch. Ryan made me a cocktail of VT vodka and Waterbury’s own Cold Hollow Cider. It was amazing. I forgot to mention, that I was a bad dog owner while hanging out at the registration area. Seamus had taken off with the folks that owned the other dog. He was having a good time, and was thankfully hanging out at the comfort station. He likes to hang out where the fun is. He also left the aid station before I did, bad dog…

fire is cool

Eventually, I rode back to the base area, where I caught up with everyone else, and Seamus. The circus was about to start. There was a 6x snow DH Chinese Downhill race for all the spectators, run by Knight Ide. Knight is an icon in the VT mountain bike world, responsible for much of the gravity fed trails on the Mountain side of KT, and he had spent quite a bit of time prepping a course for this very spectator friendly event.

untouchable

super awesome 6X

Brooke Scatchard eventually ended up with the W on his Lefty equipped Pugsley. Brooke is a trail builder, and responsible for many of the trails in Chittenden county. He is also an amazingly skilled rider. He is probably one of the few people that can outgeek me in bikes, and what makes things even worse, is that he is a tinkerer. He comes up with weird stuff.

like this

But anyway, I got a chance to ride his Pugs (wheels on both ends), and I have to say that I am sold. I took his bike out for a while at the end of the day and was amazed at how having suspension changed the capabilities of the big tire when grip is questionable. Actually, I wanted to keep riding, but it was getting late and the sun was dipping lower in the sky. Sadly you’ll have to wait until next winter to find out what I find out about squishy fat bikes. I’m hanging the ‘Raptor up for the summer, except for one maybe last ride …

St Paddy’s Day Pugs Crawl! You probably wont need a fat bike, but you will need a bike. We’re going to be meeting up at the town end of the Stowe Rec path at 3pm on March 17th. If this is the sort of nonsense you can truck with, then meet behind the white church in the Village. Or, meet us along the way!

I’m talking about the new WTB Frequency rims. It seems that component manufacturers are finally taking this whole tubeless thing more seriously. Only  a few short years ago, Stan’s was running amok unchecked with their tubeless system. They certainly didn’t invent the concept, but they did develop the technology that makes it what it is today.

Way back when, there was UST, the tubeless system developed by Mavic, which was the first, and actually still present system. Back then, the tires were heavy, expensive, and the caveats too great to make them accessible to the mainstream market. Stan worked on a better, lighter system that played better with others.

The only problem (or so the “industry” seemed content to convey) is that Stan’s didn’t adhere to any “standard”. This is legal BS concocted to protect the manufacturers from Joey Armchair Mechanic mounting up his tires incorrectly. I’ve had several tire manufacturers tell me that their tires aren’t tubeless ready, yet I have used everything I sell tubeless with the Stan’s system with minimal problems. But then again, I’m a professional.

To cut to the chase, there are now multiple systems out there. Bontrager has their own system involving a big plastic rim strip, Stan’s is now licensing their Bead Socket Technology to Sun rims, and then there is the “new” UST along with it’s varients. WTB is pimping out their TCS or Tubeless Compatible System, which is designed to work with UST type tires.

WTB has been making rims forever, and have some good technologies that make them a viable choice for riders looking for a lightweight yet strong rim. Their tech page is jam packed with easy to understand info on their system. I’d just be regurgitating it.

Let’s talk about these wheels!

Out of the box, the quality was what I expected. I kinda like the graphic treatment on the rims, but for those that don’t it is a sticker that can easily be removed. I had a set of I9s that were mis-shipped to me, so I decided I’d build them right up. I went with a classy triple silver build. The rims were nice and straight, and had a nice flat profile. They tensioned up nicely as well, which I attribute to the 4D spoke hole drilling. Basically it angles the socket where the nipple rests against the rim, aligning it with the spoke itself, and I was able to wind these wheels up a little tighter in the stand than a set of Stan’s rims.

silver niceness

So here are the numbers. The rims weigh 530g, exactly the same as a Stan’s Flow. Why one over the other? Inner rim width is the reason. The Flow is 22mm, the Frequency is 23mm (hence the name i23). Doesn’t sound like a lot, but it allows the tire to have a wider footprint. 1mm can make a big difference depending on the tire. Wider is better. The front wheel built up to 930g with rim tape and valve stem, the rear 1020g. About what you’d expect for a wheelset built to take some abuse. They also make this rim in a lighter more XC 19mm inner width.

TCS works, even without sealant

I used the new WTB Weirwolf, which I mounted up without using sealant. I wanted to see how good the TCS interface was. I was surprised to see that they held 35psi for a couple of days just sitting in the shop. I’ve been waiting for a while for the new WW tires to come out, but I was pretty bummed on the size. They come up a bit narrow, and are far from the 2.5 printed on the sidewalls. I’m hoping they grow a little with use.

So why would you get these over a Stan’s system? Well, the new TCS tires from WTB will not work on a Stan’s rim. I just about popped an eyeball, along with 4 tire levers trying to get one of these tires on a Flow. It didn’t even come close. It easily slipped on the Frequency rim though, and WTB does make some of the finest rubber out there. If you want maximum tire compatibility, I’d suggest giving these a try.

In a complete 180 from my last ride, involving my heavy snowbike, I set out on my super light A9C to do a little road ride. My knee was feeling a bit punky due to the different type of effort it takes to ride the ‘Raptor, so I didn’t want to do anything too strenuous. I had some lofty ambitions, but I am learning in my middle age, and I managed to keep it somewhat easy.

do as the Stormtrooper says

Well, my legs were kinda pissed with me anyways. I felt as though I was pedaling though mashed potatoes, even though I was on mostly dry pavement. It was the headwind. Coming out of the south, it was gusting hard enough to slow me significantly. Ugh, it was a push, but when it let up, I surged forward. I guess you have to have those days every once in a while. The best part about it though, was that the headwind was WARM. Oh man, I peeled off my arm warmers and relished in the fact that it was warm AND sunny.

another dam fine day

Upon getting back to the shop and uploading all my Strava details, I found that I had achieved a personal record on the climb up Duxbury Gap. Yay me! Not too bad for feeling so loagy and slow. Still, I wish I had my Garmin. I enjoyed the real time data I got with it. Hopefully I’ll sell a couple extra sets of wheels and can afford to replace it before too long.

soon, this will all melt

The short term forecast is for all the snow to rapidly disappear. Bye Bye snow… bike riding time is here.

Not like something Nell would say, more like describing the fleeting snowbike season. It ain’t over, but the fat lady is warming up her pipes. I snuck out for one of what I imagine will be one of my last fat bike rides this season, and struck out on some new “to me” territory.

dam nice day for a ride

I headed out on the Waterbury end of the Little River State Park, parking in the empty snowsheen parking lot. Seamus was quite excited to get to go for a bike ride. From there, we climbed up to the dam, past the state park, and up up up. At the time I was feeling woefully overdressed, and before too long, I had my gloves off and everything unzipped. Of course, I probably only rode for a couple of miles, but on the Trundleraptor a few miles feels like many more.

I rode on the well packed snow machine trails up towards Cotton Brook on the Daley Loop. Once upon a time there was a town on this side of the valley, but it had all but vanished once the dam was in place. The foundations of the old houses are still there, some are marked with little plaques, telling you who owned them and what they did etc. There is one creepy old farmhouse still standing.

creeeeeepy

Of course, having no