Official Road Cycling Thread

MNoob wrote

Yumbo.

Another good day for em.

I do love seeing Trentin win too, that was a pretty damn clever ride by EQS.

I'll start

Alpine F31 wrote

I'll start

Ohhh, F8 disc.

Allez + me.



CruX X1

Nibili and Chavez are world class douche bags. You don't attack the leader jersey on a mechanical or crash. It just doesn't happen. But, since everyone has seen Nibili advance position while hanging onto a team car, I guess it shouldn't be too surprising. Makes me hostile.

Cowardly riding by Nibili and Chavez.:

Alpine F31 wrote

I'll start

Nice ride!

Bike was due for a cleaning yesterday so i snapped a pic afterwards. Anyone use Rock n Roll Gold chain lube? I've cleaned my chain a few times now but this last time i switched to RRG lube. Went on a test ride and the drive train was dead silent! It's supposed to repel dust and dirt as well, hopefully it lives up to that billing too.




Wife got home after racing yesterday (placed first in her age group) so i cleaned up her race bike too. Replaced the Zipp decals since the old ones were falling off, fitted a new mount that lowered her aero bottle so it was more in front of the stem than above the aero bars. Took a pic of her bike while i was at it.

MNoob wrote

Cowardly riding by Nibili and Chavez.:

It was...complicated.

Road (BMC) and MTB (Specialized Rockhopper - heavy as a rock!):

(Ignore the F8 in the background, it was a shop loaner)

dc503 wrote  

MNoob wrote

Cowardly riding by Nibili and Chavez.:

It was...complicated.

Agreed for Chavez. Black and white for Nibili.

So, i'm thinking about going SRAM eTap. Anyone with electric shifter experience?

I'm intrigued by the new shifting interface, lack of shift cables and interchangeable individual component batteries. Plus, i find SRAM hoods more comfortable.

....I'm finding fewer and fewer excuses to hold off on the purchase.

MovingChicane wrote

Road (BMC) and MTB (Specialized Rockhopper - heavy as a rock!):

Holy Seat Post, Batman. Maybe stop riding 52" when you should be riding 57"?

j/k

WoohooSoCal wrote

Holy Seat Post, Batman. Maybe stop riding 52" when you should be riding 57"?

j/k

Ha! You're right, but wrong too. That picture was before my Nate Loyal fitting and it did change although not that radically.

MovingChicane wrote

Ha! You're right, but wrong too. That picture was before my Nate Loyal fitting and it did change although not that radically.

Nate is The King.

It's also the geometry of the frames....nice bikes.

Mr Tonka wrote  

So, i'm thinking about going SRAM eTap. Anyone with electric shifter experience?

I'm intrigued by the new shifting interface, lack of shift cables and interchangeable individual component batteries. Plus, i find SRAM hoods more comfortable.

....I'm finding fewer and fewer excuses to hold off on the purchase.

I moved from sram to di2 last year. it's awesome. not light, but works flawlessly. I was looking at the sram etap as well, but didn't want to buy the first run. the sram red first run had some issues.

eitherway, it's a great way to go. the di2 battery lasts for a month or so before needing recharge. front derailleur trim is automatic. I also love that I can control my garmin from the hoods.

with sram you don't have to worry about routing wires. but I think options are limited for remote buttons.

Oooohhh electronic shifting. Tandem? Triple?

MNoob wrote

I moved from sram to di2 last year. it's awesome. not light, but works flawlessly. I was looking at the sram etap as well, but didn't want to buy the first run. the sram red first run had some issues.

eitherway, it's a great way to go. the di2 battery lasts for a month or so before needing recharge. front derailleur trim is automatic. I also love that I can control my garmin from the hoods.

with sram you don't have to worry about routing wires. but I think options are limited for remote buttons.

As you know, the sram components have individual batteries with the derailleurs being rechargeable and the shifters using CR2032s. They claim 1000k for the rear derailleur, i think it was double that for the front which uses the same battery and they say a year or more of heavy riding for the shifters. The only remote capability is what they call blips, which on a road system plug into the shifters. (on a TT system, all the blips plug into a wireless stem mounted unit)

Aside from the wireless aspect, i think the largest difference is the shifting dynamic where as the upshift comes from clicking the right hand shifter and the down shift comes from clicking the left hand shifter. Not unlike DCT or any real sports car paddle shifting set up. To shift the front derailleur is more like F1 neutral selection, where you click both right and left simultaneously to initiate a change. The same input initiates the up and down shift.

This initially had me looking more at Di2, but the more reviews i watch and read the more i'm being swayed towards the sram interface. Most who have tried it claim that it's very intuitive and after just a short time testing the system, they find themselves using their left shifter to down shift when they get back on their manual system that they've been riding with their whole life.

I don't have internal cabling on my bike, so not having to run wires in their place is an added bonus. Loosing 50% of my cables is quite appealing.

Expanding bike computer compatibility with eTap is something i would be looking forward to via firmware updates. I would very much like to have my gear selection viewable on my computer, but i don't want to have to buy an Edge 1000 to do it. I currently use a Fenix 3 and i'm happy with it. I use it as an every day watch which means i never forget my bike computer.

The fact that the short RED derailleur cage is limited to a 28t sprocket had me concerned because i'm currently using an 11-32 cassette. I know, i know... what the hell am i doing with an 11-32 in FL. Well, my bike came with it and i've stuck with it due to hill training and because the Montana tour i'm doing in the last week of July has about 21,000 of climbing in 5 days. So far, in my 7 month cycling career i've ascended only 30,000. I figured i'd be needing that 32t sprocket quite a bit since the elevation on the trip will be between 3000k and 6500k each day. But.... yesterday i stayed out of my 32t and ended up feeling fantastic after 61 miles and 2700ft. On top of that i only used my small ring for 4 climbs. I'm still trying to convince myself that 11-28 will be just fine for Montana.

Mr Tonka wrote

This initially had me looking more at Di2, but the more reviews i watch and read the more i'm being swayed towards the sram interface. Most who have tried it claim that it's very intuitive and after just a short time testing the system, they find themselves using their left shifter to down shift when they get back on their manual system that they've been riding with their whole life.

I feel the same way. For whatever reason I've always been a Shimano road person but the more I think about the eTap shifting, the more I like how its operated and think it's natural.

It's a good time for bike tech, although I currently make use of almost none of it haha.

dc503 wrote

It's a good time for bike tech, although I currently make use of almost none of it haha.

Some folks don't even have indexing on their downtube shifters *cough*.

wdb wrote

Some folks don't even have indexing on their downtube shifters *cough*.

I still have to lace and tie my cycling shoes, one pair of them at least!

wdb wrote

Some folks don't even have indexing on their downtube shifters *cough*.

There is an ex-pro who lives in Dade City. He's been trying to organize a Saturday group ride for a few months now. I went out with them a few weeks ago and a guy showed up with a Peugeot with shifters on his down tube. I don't know of they were indexing or not but it was a cool retro bike.

Unfortunately, he got dropped pretty bad on the first hill which is about 4 miles in. He made it to mile 7 where everyone was waiting on us. (a few of us turned back to pick him up) He had told the ride organizer that his last ride was about 25 miles. But he neglected to say that his last ride was also over a year ago. haha

A few riders broke off to escort him back to the parking lot.

dc503 wrote

I still have to lace and tie my cycling shoes, one pair of them at least!

I wanted to buy a pair of those, i think specialized had some out a year or so ago. Just too narrow for my feet though. I thought they were pretty cool!

Mr Tonka wrote

I wanted to buy a pair of those, i think specialized had some out a year or so ago. Just too narrow for my feet though. I thought they were pretty cool!

Giro and Specialized both make lace-up versions of their high end shoes now, I have the newer gen S-works Sub6 and it's surprisingly more roomy than the previous gens. I was skeptical of the performance though, I admit I mostly wanted them for the look, it's true I'm kind of a shoe geek at times. However, they work really well with distributing the lock down pressure and have been awesome.

Then for non-road, these arrived today in prep for some gravel stuff later this month.