Garrett Wonders Memorial Criterium

Saturday was the Garrett Wonders Memorial Criterium up in Westerville. A great local crit for a great cause. Garrett Wonders was hit and killed on a training ride and this race is held in his name. I believe all proceeds of this race go toward his foundation.

It was another early morning, I had to leave the house at 6:30am to make the 9am start. I thought I was running on time but ended up leaving 10 minutes late. On top of that, I had to fill up my nearly empty tank. I arrived at 8:15 which wasn't great but better than arriving 30 minutes to the race. Turns out they were running behind.

Instead of taking advantage of the extra time, I socialized and was put back into the same situation of not having much time. I suited up and set up my bike. Took a quick spin and lined up to race. It had rained right before our race. It had stopped raining but the pavement was still wet. Wasn't the ideal situation.

The gun went off and we all started racing. The last few crits I have done, I felt great and hoping for a good result this time. I stayed up toward the front and was in good position. That was until the end of lap 4 going into the last corner. At the apex of the corner, my front wheel just slipped out and I was on the ground sliding two lanes on the still wet pavement. I must have hit the painted crosswalk line. Looking back at the data, I was going into the corner at about 30mph. Luckily (or unfortunately depending on how you look at it) I did not take anyone out. My bike was fine except for the shifter being bashed inward.

After my free lap, I was back in the group but about 2 laps later a crash happened in front of me in that same corner. I was thinking "Oh shit, I'm going to crash again." Luckily the guy I was going to T-bone had slid just enough to the left that a gap opened up where I could sneak though. But that was enough damage done as the field had sped away. In hind sight, I should have gone down and taken a free lap. I chased and chased and chased until I felt I would not be able to make it back.

Another unfortunate DNF at this race. The 4 times I have done this race, I only finished once. And still, I think I finished off the back on the one race I did finish.

But racing isn't all about just the race, it's also about hanging out with your buds. I hung around and watched the 1/2/3 race and cheered Isaiah on. He didn't get a great result but yesterday (Sunday) he took the win so it all worked out for him.

Afterwards we hit up City Barbecue for a nice post-race meal.

My road racing is pretty much over now. I will probably do a crit on September 5th but after that it is all about cyclocross.

Miles: 185

YTD: 5034

Wheels!

My new wheels have come in straight from the factory!!! To be more specific, my living room. I've been building wheels for some time now but I am now branching out and take a plunge into the world of commercial custom wheelbuilding. What can I offer that all those other custom wheelbuilders offer? Well to be honest, not much more than the other guy can. We are all going to have similar build qualities, prices and weights considering most of us buy our supplies from the same people. However, I am your LOCAL custom wheelbuilder, you race with me, you know me.

Anyway, to the good stuff. Pictured below is the newest of my builds. The rim is a KinLin TB-25. KinLin is the company behind many other rebranded rims, most notably IRD. If you haven't figured it out, TB stands for tubular and 25 is the depth in millimeters. Hole count for this build is 20.

The hub is a new one which you may not have heard about. It is from a company named Alchemy Bicycle Works. Alchemy is a custom wheel parts wholesaler as well as a manufacturer of two hubs, the Front ELF (Extra Light Front) and the Rear ORC. The ELF hub weighs a scant 64g but one of the toughest and stiffest hub out there. The flanges are put out as far as possible, any wider and the flanges and spokes would hit the inside of the fork leg! On top of that, it uses a large 6900 ceramic bearing. Its light, but also strong.

Spokes are pretty standard affair, Wheelsmith DB14 spokes with their Aluminum nipples (purple anodized of course). I typically only recommend aluminum nipples on front and rear non-drive side road wheels. Brass on the drive sides and all around for mountain bike wheels. I could have built these wheels with nicer Sapim CX-Rays or DT Swiss Aerolites but considering I am using these wheels for Cyclocross, the added cost for marginal aerodynamics wasn't worth it. Also its a lot cheaper to replace spokes should I ever break one.

The wheel is laced radially, trued, stressed and tensioned. The weight comes in at 600g. That is 45g less than a Mavic Ksyrium SL front wheel and at substantial cost savings! 20 holes sound a little sketch for cyclocross? Last year I ran the same build except with DT Swiss 240s hubs and they were rock solid. I did not have to touch the spoke wrench to the wheel all season. They will be back in action this year.

Also coming soon is an EDGE composites 1.68 wheelset laced to Alchemy ELF and ORC hubs for my sponsored rider. How about a EDGE 45mm clincher that weighs less than 1300g!? Exciting things are happening and stay tuned

Back to Riding - Lake Hope MTB Race

I took the last 9 days completely off the bike and decided to get back in the swing of things by going out and doing a mountain bike race. The race was at Lake Hope, just 40 minutes away.

I rolled out of my house around 11am and when I was about 10 minutes from Lake Hope, I remembered that I forgot my helmet! I could have turned around and went home to go pick it up, but that would have left me less than 30 minutes to register, suit up and warm up. So I decided to keep going to the parking lot and see if anyone might have an extra. Luckily the guy I was following to the race had an extra helmet and saved the day.

I had done this race before two years ago and did the expert class. That was not the best race I've had since I got lost warming up and missed the start. This year I didn't stray far from the start. I decided to do sport since I didn't really feel like racing for 3 hours. Cross races are onlty an hour so Sport would offer a similar effort.

At the start I was able to stay up front and actually be the first one into the woods. However I put myself into the red zone and would pay dearly for it later. I was pretty much pegged to the max the first 20-30 minutes and I didn't need a HRM to tell me that. My legs felt awesome but 9 days of no cardio work did some major detraining on the lungs. To make things worse, my contact had shifted and I could barely see out of my right eye. So I pulled off and let the others behind me pass so I can rub my eye and hope I could see again.

I was still pegged to the max eventhough I let off the throttle. I slowely got into a nice rhythm and started passing people that had passed me before. I was cruising until I hit a fallen tree. It was one of those duck down and you can make it fallen trees but my visor blocked it. I heard and felt a big thump, I blacked out for a second and then the pain came on. I pulled off to make sure I was still alive. Luckily I just hit the top of my head and didn't go face first into that tree. After that hit I was a little disoriented. I lost the nice groove I was in and struggled to get going again. But sure enough, I started feeling good again and picked up speed and was big ringing the trail. That was until I hit a lot of traffic.

I was able to get around a huge group and then it was the big super steep climb to the finish. Everyone I saw was pushing their bikes. I motored on and dumped down to the granny (the only time) and spun my way up the climb. The finishing stretch is on road so I motored on. I almost caught the guy in front of me but the finishing chute was about 5 feet wide. No way to pass.

I think I finished up 11th in Sport Senior (19-34)

Miles driven 50

YTD 4849