Racing Plans

Just thought we'd give a heads up on some racing activity over the next couple of weeks, in case anybody wants to join us for some suffering.

Sunday is the Bonanza Creek road race (aka Prison Loop) outside of Santa Fe. Info Here. Danny is a big fan of this race, as it suits his style (fast with a rolly course, no gigantic climbs). Which is really not my style at all, but we'll both be there, and hope to see some customers.

The following weekend is the Frazier Mtn. Madness XC race and hill climb in Taos. Info Here. I am also planning on making it to that one. Been having fun getting out to the NMORS series races. I've never raced this race, but have always heard good things. The course is just 17.5 miles long, which is about the number of miles I felt good for during last weekends 32 miles of punishment up at Sandia, before overheating and cramping and running out of water. However, it is at very high altitude, and I understand a few of the climbs are extremely steep, so I'm sure there will be plenty of suffering.

Then the weekend after that, August 2nd, is the Santa Fe Hillclimb. Info Here.
Not sure if I'll be making it to that one, but it also promises to be fun in that "I've been climbing for an hour now, my lungs are burning and my legs are screaming. Why did I pay to come do this?" sort of way. I'm hoping to be there.

In shop news, Tony is off on his Whistler epic as of last night. We won't be seeing him again until the beginning of August, when he will return with tales of huge hucks, rediculous days of downhilling, and foam pit jumping antics.

And that's about it. I'm excited about todays stage of the tour, should be a good one. Probably will be watching the replay coverage that starts at 10am. So if you come in before noon, and know how it plays out from the live coverage, do me a favor and don't say anything. Anybody that spoils it for me will be required to buy me lunch, or a breakfast burrito, depending on the time of day.

Goodies

Just checking these into inventory, and they are so sexy I had to share:


Hand made in the USA, as with all things White Ind. makes the bearings are impossibly smooth, and they look better in person than on the photo.

Single sided platform pedals made specifically for clips and straps, these pedals will put the finishing touch on any styled out commuter or fixie.

Show us some love!

First off, I'm going to ask a little favor here. I'm making an assumption that at least a few people who read this blog are our regular customers, and that since you are a regular customer you actually think we are a good shop, and have positive things to say about us.

So, if you would be so kind, a little review here or there on the ol' Interweb would be a positive thing for us. Particularly, over at Google Maps:

http://maps.google.com/maps?cid=1144969029970196991&hl=en&gl=us

Currently, as you will see, we have just one review, from a very irritated(ing) guy name Kelly.
This review was brought to our attention by a couple of customers who told us there was a very nasty review on Google about us, and that the guy sounded like a total A-hole. And they are correct.

I actually wrote a rather long, and in my opinion entertaining, rebuttal to this review, originally intending to post it as a review myself. But I have since decided not to, feeling like it would be satisfying but possibly a bad decision from a business owners standpoint.

A few other places to write an amazingly positive review about how good of work we do, how fast our turnaround is, how we know what we're talking about, and how you get beer when you hang out at the shop, and how when we do occasionally make a mistake we bend over backwards to try and make it right, would be at MTBR:

MTBR Bike shop review link

And now as I put that link up, our good friend Kelly has decided to post the exact same review up at MTBR as well. It seems that he is on a mission. We clearly deeply offended him by hanging out in the shop and drinking wine with cute girls For shame!

I've also been told by a local successful business owner that City Search is a good place to have reviews up:

ABQ Bike Repair on Citysearch

I'm not so sure that is as useful as the others for Bike shops specifically, though.

Anyways, if your so inclined, we'd appreciate it. And if you'd like the full story and want to waste a couple of minutes reading a genuine Lucero rant, shoot me an email at the shop and I'll send you my little love story about sir Kelly.

Well, the kiddo is up, time to play with trains.

Late Breaking News!

In a stunning display of impulsiveness, Bikeworks has decided to move the date of our Monday closings forward from July 20th to Today, July 6th.

Thanks to all our customers in their patience and understanding about our desire to generally work less and ride our bikes more. We assure you all that we will be riding our bikes today (and also drinking beer and watching some Tour de France).

See you soon.

Good Reading

I came across this link on Drunkcyclist. It is one mans daily diary from racing the Great Divide Race a few years ago. It's long, but if you've got some time to kill, he is a very good writer, and its an engaging view into what it would be like to race your bike some 2500 miles in three weeks, off road, on a single speed, with no suspension, self supported.

http://www.carsstink.org/peterson/Turtle/TurtleText.html

I can't even begin to imagine. The whole thing sounds very lonely and frightening. That is some serious time to spend out in the middle of nowhere alone.

Speaking of singlespeeds, I finally got back out on mine yesterday. We had a crew of five out at Otero, with Charlie and I on SS. It was Charlie's first ride on his Maverick SS, and he was very happy.

It was my first ride on my wheelset, which is very similar to my old wheelset, Stans 355 rims, but with DT 240 hubs rather than American Classics. I also had some new tires I'm experimenting with, some WTB Vulpines. So far so good with the Vulpines. It was a rather tacky day yesterday thanks to all the rain, so I believe most any tire was going to hook up well, but it did seem to give better traction that one would think after looking at it. I am also running it tubeless, and despite its very low weight and 60 tpi thread count, it is holding air nicely, hooked up on the rim quickly, and never burped on me at 35psi, even with pounding it down Blue Ribbon, which is about as rough and fast a trail as I'm likely to ride on a hardtail.

Charlie mentioned that he felt his Edge / Chub wheelset was extremely stiff, stiffer probably than some of his 26" wheelsets. I'm wondering if it is more a result of the rim, or of the extremely large flange diameter on the hub, or a combo of the two.

I was jealous of his 2010 Reba 29er fork. He has the 80 - 120mm U turn model with a 20mm thru axle, and it just looked nice.

Danny raced in State Championship Crit race yesterday, which took place in the Alamed business park across the street from the Baloon Fiesta Park. His plan was to race in the Masters race, and then also in the Pro 1, 2 race. Unfortunately, he got taken out in the last turn during the masters race. Haven't actually talked to him, just a few texts back and forth, but he sent me a pic of his leg with a couple spots of rather deep road rash. I think he's okay though, and more importantly, his bike and his hot new wheels came out okay.

Speaking of crits, the final Tuesday Night Crit takes places tomorrow night. We're planning on making an appearence with our grill and a cooler of beer again. I'll race the C's, maybe I'll get lucky and be allowed in the B race too, but probably not. After the nasty wreck 2 weeks ago, they were very uptight last week about what categories were allowed to race which races.

Okay, time to go to work. I've got a Hammerschmidt to install today, which I haven't done before. Been told it's actually easy, but I always get intimidated with new things and reading instructions and such.