Road Cycling

Lethal` · 19 Oct 2017 at 16:14

Roady said:
Looks an interesting stretch of road, typical wide open coastal road with coastal winds so not even any hedges to hide behind!

I do quite enjoy it as a morning loop when I'm down that way. https://www.strava.com/activities/1214486991/segments/29956380215 The climb round the corner is 'nice' too though the first time I did it was a block headwind and made it extremely tough. This effort was with some tailwind

Fun as a descent too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lON69Nf66Y

Roady · 19 Oct 2017 at 17:06

Saytan said:
range is about 300% on alfine 8

a 38/18 on an 8 speed alfine gives a range broadly comparable to a 34t chainring on an 11-32 cassette, just a fraction lower at each end.

Good man, I'm sure there's a calc for it (gears & wheel speed) but my guess is 34*11 around 20mph @90-100 rpm? Don't think it's much more anyway.

BennyC said:
The powerbeat is a bit unsightly though... but granted if that doesn't bother you.

Good to hear communication is ongoing, bit surprising they would change the strain gauge quite late in the product roadmap as I'd think that was a fairly crucial part for development of a PWM? But I guess all they are is a component with very specific tolerances which is measured and calculated from.

Powerbeat is ugly, all of those 'on crankarm' type ones are, the Vector pods where always the tidiest looking of the bunch. I think we're just spoilt now with things like Vector3 which is getting near to the dimensions of a standard pedal, with also the DA PWM integrated in the arm taking the concept of Stages/4iiii units to the next step. I wonder how long until the 'trickle down' tech style of Shimano means a cutout left in crank arms for a PWM across the range, similar to what some frame manufacturers started to do with Speed & Cadence 'holes' in chainstays.

merlin · 19 Oct 2017 at 17:42

Gotta say i love the integrated speed and cadence sensor in my Trek. Clean.

Saytan · 19 Oct 2017 at 19:30

Roady said:
Good man, I'm sure there's a calc for it (gears & wheel speed) but my guess is 34*11 around 20mph @90-100 rpm? Don't think it's much more anyway.

what you need is this: http://www.bikecalc.com/speed_at_cadence

whenever I ride hub gears I feel like I turn a lower cadence/higher gear for a given speed than I do on derailleur

BennyC · 19 Oct 2017 at 19:58

BennyC said:
They had hoped to ship mid September but had to source a new strain gauge supplier and have just finished some final testing.

Roady said:
Good to hear communication is ongoing, bit surprising they would change the strain gauge quite late in the product roadmap as I'd think that was a fairly crucial part for development of a PWM? But I guess all they are is a component with very specific tolerances which is measured and calculated from.

I think I've said previously but their planned supplier basically just stopped responding and more or less disappeared! To quote them today they've finished some testing, which took a little longer than planned due to lateral flex of the crank was causing minor inaccuracies which has now been rectified to a circular motion only.

Communication has been good, albeit a little delayed at times but nevertheless informative. If I didn't already have a PM I'd probably be far less patient. The fact it's so 'cheap' (comparatively speaking) is also another factor.

merlin said:
Gotta say i love the integrated speed and cadence sensor in my Trek. Clean.

My Propel had one of these. As does my Emonda ALR however PM pedals for cadence and relying on GPS for speed leaves for an even cleaner look

(I only really reflect on speed after a ride, joys of riding with power taking the fun out of things

)

NotAGolf · 19 Oct 2017 at 20:53

£50 off a £100 spend at Le Col with the voucher code STRAVAB6976979. It's through the strava challenge so pretty sure it'll be a one time deal - first one to use it wins! All their stuff is out of my price range even with the £50 off

Might also be able to use 'WELCOME10' to get 10% off. Not sure if you can use them together.

sHo0sH · 20 Oct 2017 at 07:22

Just had a look at their prices - what a rip

lordrobs · 20 Oct 2017 at 11:45

sHo0sH said:
Just had a look at their prices - what a rip

Yup too rich for my tastes even with £50 off! I'll consider it when they end up on Sport Pursuit for 1/3 RRP

FishFluff · 20 Oct 2017 at 12:51

Saytan said:
range is about 300% on alfine 8

a 38/18 on an 8 speed alfine gives a range broadly comparable to a 34t chainring on an 11-32 cassette, just a fraction lower at each end.

Sounds like what I'm after. Most of the time I'm going to be using it for just pootling to the shops or a gentle commute in my work clothes. Not looking to pick up any KOMs here!

sHo0sH · 20 Oct 2017 at 13:21

Don't get me wrong, I own a lot of Rapha gear, but I ALWAYS get it in the sale, as it's so overpriced - love a bargain!

SoliD · 20 Oct 2017 at 19:43

BennyC said:
Not when you are on narrow extensions, on an aero frame with enough cross section to cross the channel, it's not

Your uci legal frame is pathetic! What you think I use my 808 on.

Bear · 21 Oct 2017 at 11:43

Braved the winds and it wasn’t too bad although I spent a large amount of energy riding into the wind for a large portion of the ride. Wasn’t at all dangerous apart from a bell end in an Astravan trying to overtake two cars and missing me by a couple of feet at about 60mph on my side of the road :rolleyes:

UTmaniac · 21 Oct 2017 at 12:21

Brutal headwind commuting in this morning, often having to use several gears easier than normal... Karma should be happening soon, but given the weather is much nicer than expected, do I abort the original plan of a fairly direct ride home?

Lethal` · 21 Oct 2017 at 17:26

Woke up with a very rough feeling knee. Walking up the stairs was tough.. so probably not the wisest idea to even ride but went ahead with planned 75 mile mostly tailwind ride to Cambridge and train back

Some pretty hairy moments with the crosswinds but overall a pretty nice route (forgetting the London part!)

SoliD · 22 Oct 2017 at 05:06

Whilst you're all moaning about the wind and rain I'm busy getting fat in texas. Took a visit to Mellow Johnny's this morning. Some of you may have heard of it. If not a picture says a thousand words..

Yes it's Lance's. Great bike shop with great coffee house on the side of it. Loads of nice classics up on the wall and a few of his too.

Got some cx tubes that are like rocking horse doodoo in the UK for me and my club mates, 10 in total... so a productive morning.

UTmaniac · 22 Oct 2017 at 13:59

No hill reps between start/finish line and T1? Shame on you!

SoliD · 22 Oct 2017 at 19:01

No bike! Ran up it though! Doesn't look that steep!

Vonhelmet · 22 Oct 2017 at 23:51

No riding for me this weekend, though I did go for a run. Really need to get some decent riding in before the end of the year or I'm not even going to hit 5k miles.

Roady · 23 Oct 2017 at 10:10

BennyC said:
Communication has been good, albeit a little delayed at times but nevertheless informative. If I didn't already have a PM I'd probably be far less patient. The fact it's so 'cheap' (comparatively speaking) is also another factor.

The main factor! Great to hear communication is good, can only hope that continues upon release.

I annoyingly missed a set of P1's (dual not P1S) over the weekend on the 'bay which went for <£470, most seem to sell for £600 (which I can't justify)!

mpledge52 said:
£50 off a £100 spend at Le Col with the voucher code STRAVAB6976979. It's through the strava challenge so pretty sure it'll be a one time deal - first one to use it wins! All their stuff is out of my price range even with the £50 off

Might also be able to use 'WELCOME10' to get 10% off. Not sure if you can use them together.

Yanto Barker is a big wearer of them and tend to see the brand/label lots of times on TV, mostly worn by presenters?

But correct, far too expensive for a fairly new brand. They need to build a premium price, not just expect it!

SoliD said:
Whilst you're all moaning about the wind and rain I'm busy getting fat in texas. Took a visit to Mellow Johnny's this morning. Some of you may have heard of it. If not a picture says a thousand words..

Yes it's Lance's. Great bike shop with great coffee house on the side of it. Loads of nice classics up on the wall and a few of his too.

Got some cx tubes that are like rocking horse doodoo in the UK for me and my club mates, 10 in total... so a productive morning.

Those all Lance's race winning bikes? Didn't know he rode discs!

Only 10 tubes? Doesn't sound many!

topgun06 · 23 Oct 2017 at 10:22

Are we still just really bad at forecasting weather, or do the BBC display the forecast in a very misleading way?

I checked the forecast for Sunday on Saturday night, screen-shotted it and sent it to my father with reference to organising a ride on the Sunday morning. We decided to give it a miss based on the fact that every hour from 6am - 11am was, in BBC language, black cloud with two raindrops. 12 onwards was black cloud with 1 raindrop. I made other plans and that was that.

So after a little lie in I got up and reluctantly went out to walk the dogs expecting to get drenched. There was a little rain in the air but nothing serious. Not what I was expecting. I checked the app again, and solid rain has turn to just cloud for the remainder of the day. And that is what happened. No rain at all.

What on earth is going on BBC? Is their threshold for displaying the rain symbol set to 1% chance or something? What weather forecasting service should I be using?