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Month: June 2013

Eight Grams of Security

Published June 19, 2013

When riding at Yankee Springs two weekends ago I thought I identified the cause of some bike noise on my Salsa El Mariachi Ti: the rear skewer. After trying out an old Shimano XT skewer from another bike during some local rides it held solid, and Lumberjack seems to have proven it out. I was subsequently able to acquire a new Shimano M770 skewer (so the old one can go back on the old bike) and I’ll use this one instead of the Salsa Flip-Off that came on the bike. This comes at a whopping eight gram penalty (55g for the Salsa Flip-Off vs. 63g for the Shimano M770), which I think is worth it for a more secure rear skewer.

I’m actually quite surprised that I had difficulties with the Salsa skewer as the other two that I own have been very solid. I suspect it has a bit to do with the way the rear triangle flexes, so maybe the different cam design of the Shimano (which I believe to be easier to get very tight) is what’s needed. A through-axle would be another good way to sidestep this, but I don’t have a TA-compatible rear wheel, so I can’t do that yet…

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Garmin Edge 500 Time Issues during Lumberjack 100

Published June 17, 2013

After getting back home from completing Lumberjack 100 I was excited to review the logged data from my Garmin Edge 500 bike computer. A few times during the ride the unit lost GPS signal, but as I’ve had this happen on other rides without issue I didn’t pay it much attention. Unfortunately, it looks like this time the data really went odd. After poking with the data and attempting to correct it in Ascent I downloaded Fit File Repair Tool to see what it could tell me.

As shown in the screenshot above (click to embiggen), roughly 15.52 miles in, at 44.2119°N 86.1295°W, just beyond the Steinberg Road crossing in Road Monkey during my first lap (map here), the recorded time suddenly jumped from June 15, 2013 to October 19, 2019. This explains the strange duration I’d been seeing in analysis software, with everything from Ascent and Strava both reporting an elapsed time of around 55619:03:11, the length of a ride which I don’t quite think the Edge 500’s battery would endure, but which matches the 6-some year offset. Weirdly, Garmin Connect doesn’t show the issue (link), almost as if they filter out this problem.

When this issue occurred my Garmin was running firmware v3.00, something which I was hesitant to change soon before the race. Since the changelog to v3.20 only lists two minor changes which aren’t useful for me (power meter serial number display and a change to support manufacturing) I didn’t see a good reason to rush to upgrade. It’d also worked otherwise well for long rides, so I didn’t anticipate any problems. I upgraded the unit to v3.20 today and I’ll see if similar problems arise, but I can’t imagine I’ll be doing that length of ride any time soon, so it’ll be hard to get an equivalent test.

If any of you wish to review this damaged FIT file from Lumberjack 100 it can be found here: svigneau_2013_lumberjack100.fit.

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2013 Lumberjack 100: Complete

Published June 17, 2013

Bright and early on Saturday morning I set out for my second attempt at Lumberjack 100, a race which I tried last year and failed to complete. Just after 6pm, a little over 11 hours after starting, I rolled across the finish line having met my two goals for the race: completing it and enjoying the ride. After crossing the finish line I picked up my finishing patch from the pile sitting on a chair (the person handing them out was off taking a break), put my bike in the tent with my stuff, and went and purchased one of the nifty plaid Lumberjack 100 jerseys that I told myself I’d get if I managed to complete the whole event.

I finished with an official time of 11:03:10.42, but due to some Garmin Edge 500 issues I had a difficult time getting accurate moving time data. From what  I can tell my moving time was about 10:15:06, which sounds right as I stopped a bit. This was mostly to use nature’s toilet, but there were a few other times to fix mechanical issues, help a couple of folks, wait for traffic on the climb at the start, and deal with an exciting (but thankfully not terrible) crash.

Had I done a few things differently (not crashed, stopped less, pushed a little more on the fire roads, sat on the toilet a little less between laps one and two) I would have have broken 11 hours, but I’m still quite happy with that time. There’s also the chance that all of those things helped make it a fun time. Beating this goal (sub-10 hour would be ideal) is something to aim for if I try the race again in the future. I really enjoy this race, the area around Big M, and most of the preparation / training rides, but dedicating much of another spring doing long, endurance-type rides gets in the way of other things and starts to get a bit stressful.

Continue reading2013 Lumberjack 100: Complete
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Thoughts on Yankee Springs

Published June 9, 2013

Today I rode Yankee Springs for the first time. I did two laps, then a bonus third lap of the warm-up/beginning/first part of the trail which loops back to the parking lot. Random thoughts went through my head about the trail while riding, including…

  • This is rather like Western Michigan’s version of Pontiac Lake Recreation Area.
  • Bald Mountain could be similar to this, if it was developed with more single track.
  • Lots and lots and lots of blind corners with semi-surprising things: roots, drop-offs, things where I should have had more or less speed.
  • Devil’s Soup Bowl (a very deep, steep geological formation) is apparently not meant to be ridden into. Whoops. Good thing I stopped part-way down at the first plateau and hiked out.
  • After becoming a bit familiar with the trail, it’s a lot of fun. I’d like to go back.
  • Riding up plastic matting (photo) is weird and somewhat awkward. The same with rubbery water bars.
  • Southeast Michigan trails are mostly hard pack clay and gravel. Wester Michigan trails seem to be light sand over a firm bed. It’s different, but nice.
  • Trails through needle-covered ground in stands of Red Pine mixed with green foliage are beautiful.

I also identified the source of a rather irritating sound at the rear end of my bike: the Salsa skewer. If I didn’t stop and periodically tighten it a loud tick/knock would develop at the rear of the bike. I’ll try replacing it with an XT from my first proper MTB. Hopefully that fixes it, and then I can pursue a more permanent replacement.

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Petrol-Gel as Specialized WaterGate Valve Lubricant

Published June 8, 2013

The burst valve design of the Specialized WaterGate lids for their bottles are quite nice, and as one can twist the valve gently to remove it for cleaning they don’t suffer the buildup that plagues CamelBak bottles. However, after a few cycles of removing the valve and washing them the o-rings become dry and the valve is hard to reinsert and doesn’t move very slowly.

I have some Petrol-Gel lubricant for maintaining beer dispensing equipment, so I figured I’d give it a go on these seals. It worked great; a very light application to the o-rings and the inside of the valve seat in the lid restores the original smooth action of the valve. This makes the lid work like new.

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