So this morning after I got up and did my weigh-in (up 0.1 kgs to 103 .8 kgs today!) I got my son up and we loaded the car and went to Bath track via the supermarket to get the money to buy the wheels.
At the track we spent about an hour playing on the tabletop and then my son got tired and called it quits! He had just fully sent the tabletop so I said that we could call it a day and so we headed home and I had a shower and got changed while my Son emptied out the car for me.
We then got back in the car and headed to Ikea and bought a new chest of draws for my son so that we can organise his clothes properly a the draws that he currently has are terrible and don’t open and they also do not fit properly in the space that he has to put them in so they are all around crap!
When we were heading home we popped in and grabbed the Profile Elite wheel set that I bought yesterday and then we headed home and I built up the Standard with a 37 x 16 gearing for now as I had a chain and 37T Rennen sprocket in a freezer bag from when it came off of the Curtis when I went back to a 36 x 16 gearing. The chain was pretty much new so it should be fine and its only until the 18T Profile Elite Cog arrives next week then I will see about moving to a 42 x 18 gearing on there for the winter and I will swap the Curtis to a 41 x 18 as I bought a Crupi 18T cog to go on the Curtis! I have just bought a new 42T forward chain ring and some new chain ring bolts as the ones on the bike are a bit wired as they sparked when I loosened them off to change the Chainring from the 41t to the 37t so there is something not right with them! The chain stays seem to me more or less the same length on the Standard and the Curtis so the chain fitted perfectly 🙂 This will mean that I can swap gearing and chain between the bikes with little effort if needed 🙂
I have also just bought a backwards walking treadmill so that I can walk backwards indoors over the winter to try and heal my knees while it is dark, cold and wet over the winter from the comfort of my nice warm dry flat!
I have also just bought some OS20 forks and 3 pairs of black speedline chain tensioners to go on the Standard OS 20 and the Curtis and the chrome ones on the Curtis can go on the Standard Cruiser. I am going to see if I can get a set of second hand 180 mm Shimano DXR cranks from somewhere as I want to run the same cranks on both bikes for continuity!
I am trying to get some S&M 29er bars as well for the same reason but they only seem to have white ones available so I may have to get them and put them on the Standard and put the black ones on the Curtis until I can get hold of another set of black ones!
I plan to ride the Standard tomorrow morning when I go ride with my Son so that I can see how it rides! I am pretty certain that they will ride really similarly as they seem to have really similar geo and the back end is the same length too so it should be good!
So I have just won a Cult Race 24″ frame on ebay with my first bid so I have a new grey colour cult race 24″ frame, Odyssey R32 forks, seat clamp, seat post bb and headset so a lot of a bike to be honest 🙂 it will be the perfect home for the wheel that came off of the Standard and I will get the parts off of the GT to finish building it up 🙂 So it will have 42 x 18 on it.
So for the winter I am going to build the Curtis on 41 x 18 , The standard on 37 x 16 and the Cult on 42 x 18 so both the Standard and Cult will be over geared for the winter. Although I may move the Standard to 41 x 18 as well as the Curtis so that it is on my race gearing and if I want to over gear I ride the Cult for now. I think that over the winter it is important that I work on over geared sprints as well as race gear sprints to work on my leg speed as well as my strength! I will also add in some uphill and down hill sprints to the mix too.
I am planning to ride mainly flats this winter to get used to riding flats again so that I can get better at pump tracks too as I think a lot of my issues on the pump track are not being used to riding flat pedals at the moment! I have been riding flats more recently and I was riding on the track today on the jump bike and flats and it was feeling pretty good to be fair 🙂
I need to get one more set of 180mm cranks so that I have 3 sets on all 3 bikes so if I can’t find any then I will buy a new set of DXR’s for the Curtis and then move the old DXR’s to the Standard and then the GT cranks to the Cult. For now I will most likely have the 170 mm 3 piece cranks from the GT on the Cult so it will feel way different to the other 2 bikes for now.
I will use the S&M 5″ race bars on the Cult for now and I may well run 24 x 2.1 Power Blocks on it too to make it more bouncy for pump tracks and also make the gearing a bit different to the Standard as Tyre width changes the gearing a fair bit.