CX Bike Fit: Don’t Make Me Get All Norm Abram on You

My New Leaf Spring

A cross bike saddle is like a bean bag chair without the X-box.  No.  It’s more like a crossbow with the rails as the bow and the sit surface as the string.  Hmm.  Not quite.  A CX bike saddle is identical to a leaf spring on a 1978 Toyota Land Cruiser in Nairobi.  Yeah, and your remounting tookus is the rusty two ton truck pounding on it through a Serengeti Safari.  Think about that mid-race and all the pain will go away for at least a lap.

I skipped the first cross races, not intentionally.  I was on vacation in Park City, Utah.  While I was looking at the Uinta Mountains beyond Round Valley between my toes from our Canyon condo’s hot tub recovering from a 5 hour epic on the Mid Mountain Trail, I picked up my waterproof pen and paper and scribbled a short list of things I needed to do to my CX bike before the OVCX racing series kicks off this weekend in Kentucky.  Okay, so the Sharpie and paper weren’t so waterproof.  I might’ve missed something.

The Old White Saddle In Question

Oh yeah.  Mitch, my teammate and owner of BioWheels Bike Shop pointed out that my saddle looked too low at the cyclocross time trial the other day.  Like any crosser confronted by someone questioning my bike fit, I told him to f-off.  I’ve been doing this for 10 years.  A CX fit savant, I keep a tape measure and level in my middle jersey pocket every September.  The height from pedal centerline to the top of my saddle was perfect because I measured it 32 times…definitely 32 times.  Don’t make me break out the aged cryptic postie note with my measurements on it and get all Norm Abram on your ass.  For those that eschew PBS, Norm Abram is host of The New Yankee Workshop and can build an exquisite armoire quicker than you can make oatmeal.

Still Mitch is no dufus.  The fit question niggled at me.  How could my saddle be set up perfect yet appear too low?  Great googlie mooglie!  I got it!  Even though identical to the saddles on my road and mountain bikes, the white Fizik Aliante on my CX bike was purchased used about 4 years ago.  I suspected it had lost its loft.  Sure enough, if you look closely at the pictures, the old white saddle appears to have a little more curve through the top when compared to the new blue one.  While still measuring 92.7 cm from my pedal axle, the top of the saddle would sink down an extra centimeter when I sat on it.  Ah ha!  I emailed Mitch and took back every curse word.

Two Screws Were 3mm from Piercing My Taint

For the ultimate proof, you can see how the saddle has lost its leaf-spring capability by looking at the underside.  Those two holes were caused by the saddle coming in contact with the ends of the seatpost bolts.  Not the way you want to get a prostate exam.  The moral of the story is three fold: never buy a used saddle, measure your fit 32 times...definitely, and no matter how much it hurts your ego, always trust the advice of the bike-fit pro at your local shop.

Park City Vacation: Ride a Bike, Win $100

One Rich Kid

I was hoodwinked, shammed, boonschlazzled.  The sign at the Park Silly Sunday Market read “Ride a Bike, Win $100.”  I’m pretty sure I could ride a unicycle with a square wheel through a pit of Crisco for $100, so I dug a five spot out of my wallet and expected to be $95 dollars richer in the next 60 seconds.  That could've bought a whole lot of genuine Utah turquoise jewelry on my Park City vacation last week.  It didn’t go exactly as planned.

The bike appeared to be your typical BMX bike you’d see at the jump park in Park City, Utah: platform pedals, single speed, low saddle, scary paint scheme, and with a finish only achieved by crashing it a few times or towing it on the ground behind an SUV from Salt Lake City.  This is a no brainer.  Brimming with confidence, I handed the teenager at the tent my five bucks, threw a leg over and pushed myself back behind the cones.  Uh oh.

Note the gear on top of headset-diabolical genius!

Left is right and right is left.  I got this, I thought.  The bike had been slightly modified probably in the tool shed above the Crescent Mine Grade lift.  It sported an extra head tube welded in front of the original.  A gear bridged the gap between the two headtubes.  It was genius.  Even though the appearance was medieval, the craftsmanship was top notch.  There was not a bit of slack and it steered beautifully, only the bike steered left when you turned the bars right.  Just hold bars straight and pedal ten feet and this skinny punk kid will be handing The Best Bike Blog EVER a fresh Benji.

Just hold the bars straight.  Now pedal. Dammit!  As I started with my left foot, I leaned left, counter-steered right and kept going left.  Dab number one.  My wife gave me encouragement for my second try, “just do the opposite.”  Easier said than done when you’re a supposed “expert” level bike rider with 15 years of racing muscle memory.  It’s not a no brainer.  Riding a bike is a no brainer.  This is all brain.  Imagine heading off a cliff to your right side and the only thing that would save you is steering right.

I tried again this time starting with my right foot.  I leaned right, counter-steered left and bam, I dabbed.  “One try left,” the teenager with the money apron smiled.  I concentrated.  I only had to travel ten feet. Three pedal strokes I calculated.  Hold the bars straight.  This time I started from the right side of the course and with my left foot first hoping that if I got into trouble I could keep the bike upright for 10 feet if I were to drift left.  Nope.

I was done.  I never got more than a quarter turn of the pedals and I dabbed.  This scheme was like Bernie Madoff brilliant.  I had fun.  It was worth $5 to try.  I thanked the kid and told him, “I hope you make a ton of money today.”

Vintage Joe Biker: Ault Park Mary

Ault Park Cincinnati.com

(Joe Biker Note:  I'm taking a hiatus this week.  It's my opportunity do whatever I want: like sniff tubular glue.  It's your opportunity to read something from this blog that's been around since July 2006.  This originally posted November 14th, 2007.  Thanks for reading and enjoy.)

When you spend your free time on the couch, you relate with other people who spend thier free time on the couch.  That’s my life observation for today.  Concurrently, when you get out and enjoy the world around you, you run into others who enjoy that too, people, of all ages, with outgoing outlooks on life, people with a little extra spark in their eye, positive people that don't let themselves get in a rut, people like Ault Park Mary.  This is how I met her.

I woke up and got on my bike for a pre-dawn cyclocross ride this morning in Ault Park.  I was supposed to meet a teammate or two.  They didn’t show.    Regardless, their initial commitment motivated me to get my carcass rolling up the long climb to Ault Park while the streets were still wet and the cars had their headlights on.  It was in the mid 50’s and just wet enough to remind you it was early morning during cross season.  When I got to the park, there were a handful of people walking, running or walking dogs, andof course, one beat up old car passed with a creepy looking person inside.  The park was just past the peak of fall colors but still pretty eye popping. 

Banking on my teammates affection for electronics, I didn’t bring a watch or cell phone, but managed to figure out about a five minute loop that had a bit of everything, some high speed corners, a steady climb, a patch of gravel road, an steep gut busting off camber climb, stairs to run, a grassy off camber traverse, and a nice no-brake descent back to my starting point.  I had ridden about 5 laps when I figured I should probably ask someone for the time to gauge my ride.

As I twisted through the trees and back to the sidewalk, I rolled up on a woman in her 50’s.  I based that on her salt and pepper hair and choice of fashion.  She was relatively thin, in good shape, and was getting her day started with a walk in through the stunning colors of Ault Park at sunrise.  My cantilever brakes sweaked me to a stop.  I said, “excuse me, do you have the time.”  She looked at me funny and asked, “did you say, how you doing Mary.”  “No,” I chucked and paused, “do you have the time?”  I quickly added, “and, how you doing Mary?”  She laughed and said “it’s 7:35; you got all the time in the world, enjoy it.”  I thanked her again and as I clipped in, she surprisingly repeated, “you got all the time in the world, enjoy it, you’re young.”  Maybe I am.  I turned 40 a week ago.

Tags: Ault Park, Cincinnati, Cyclocross, Mary, Pre, Dawn, Bike, Ride

Vintage Joe Biker: An Open Letter To The Little Girls I Almost Puked In Front Of

(Joe Biker Note: Twice a year or so, I like to take a break from the blog to decompress, touch my monkey and that sort of thing.  If you're a newer reader, it's a chance to read something from the archives.  This originally posted October 2007.  Enjoy.)


...actually, here's the full title:

An Open Letter To:  The eight year old girls who came to watch youth soccer on Sunday at Loveland’s Miami View Park and ended up watching a grown man nearly blow chunks.

Dear ladies, I’m sorry you had to witness me crying for mama between bouts of the pukes.  It happened on the 2nd lap of the Masters 35+ cyclocross race.  You were innocently standing and cheering near the course, about 100 yards after the double barriers. I was desperately trying to ride my bike as fast as possible to stay in contact with the tail end of the race.  To put it in your terms, I was totally sucking and didn’t want to be a total loser.  You probably didn’t even notice me as you texted your friends.  Or, maybe you were using your cell phone camera to film your latest You Tube epic, “Barf On Bike."

To refresh your memory I was riding a pretty green, blue and white bike with a matching outfit.  I was in dead freaking last place, right behind the guy on the mountain bike.  For future reference, if you every get into bike racing and are riding a custom made lightweight cyclocross bike in a cyclocross bike race, you should always be in front of people on heavy mountain bikes.  Put it this way, if Barbie is driving down the freeway in her Jaguar, she should always be in front of her friend in the pick-up truck.

You see girls; I ate an egg burrito about two hours before the race.  I thought the hour and fifteen minute bike path ride to the park would’ve speeded digestion.  But, apparently there was a little eggy left in my belly that didn’t want to go down.  You know how your mommy tells you to wait a little bit after eating before you go swimming?  Yeah?  Well, it’s the same with bike racing.  Listen to your mom, or you’ll totally barf in front of strangers and embarrass yourself.

So, I hope I didn’t gross you out to the max by hacking, snarfing, wheezing, drooling and spitting in front of you.  Since we’ve spent the last six weeks buying a new house and moving, I am a little out of cyclocross shape, mistimed that burrito and probably shouldn’t have rode my bike 20 miles to the race.  Not to mention, riding in dead freaking last place doesn’t quite sit that well with me after staying in contact with those fast Kentucky guys the last two years.

So, little ladies, please know that I am grateful that you came over to cheer for the bike riders.  Your shouts of “go go go” were encouraging.  Thanks to you, I nearly caught that guy on the mountain bike on the last lap and kept some the 45+ guys behind me too. 

Most of all I’m soo glad that you found cyclocross racing more interesting than watching your sister’s soccer game.

Tags: Cincinnati, Loveland, Cyclocross, CX, Miamiview Park, October 21st, Race, Zepher, Report, News

Tags: video

Vintage Joe Biker: Cycling Sucks...I Mean Socks

The Contents of My Sock Safe

(Joe Biker Note: About twice a year, I like to take a break from the blog.  It's my chance to decompress and your chance to read some vintage Joe Biker.  This originally posted September 2007.  Enjoy.)


Remember the movie “Office Space,” where Jennifer Aniston had to wear flair for her waitress job.  I think cycling socks are like flair.  Don't "tisk" at me.  You know you love your cycling socks almost as much as your bike(s).  Face it, you and I are the weirdos who like a little flair, down there. 

Count ‘em up.  There are 24 pairs of cycling socks in the above photo.  2 dozen pairs of socks.  Some are brand new.  Some I won in race raffles.  Some I won as race prizes, after paying a $25 entry.  You have to love those cheapo promoters.

We’re moving.  I own a total of 27 pairs of cycling socks.  The other three, my faves, are in my kit-bag.  I actually did throw one pair away.  I lent ‘em to a friend, and they had such big ankles that they stretched the neck of the sock like George Costanza and the sweater on Seinfeld.

As I gathered up my socks to place in a high security sock safe for transport to our new home, I started laughing.  My God!  I have 27 pairs of cycling socks.  I literally could wear a different pair everyday for a month, if, I rode everyday.  More than likely, I could wear a different pair every time I ride for two months!

What got me giggling is that I had bizarre little reasons for keeping every single pair.  I’m no packrat.  I took a 4-Runner full of stuff to goodwill which had it’s share of old cycling stuff.  I gave away 4 sets of good mountain bike tires and a dozen and a half water bottles to friends.  Somehow, I can not part with cycling socks.

First off, they’re all in good shape.  They should be, when realistically, one pair only gets worn 6-10 times a year.  For goodness sake, they could be in good shape till 2025! 

Some were brand new socks, still attached by the plastic umbilical cord.  Can’t part with those.  I almost tossed a pair of red and black ones, and then realized I have an old Jamis Team kit, that they’d look spiffy with.  On and on it went.  Ooh, those are funny.  Those match this year’s team kit.  Those match last year’s.  Can’t part with those, they’re from Revolution Fitness, my wife’s team sponsor.  Then there's two pair of Independent Fabrications socks, and I love my IF Planet X.  Of course, I need one pair of black ones and one pair of the classic IF green.  Oh brother.

I have two pair with robotic little yellow and blue monsters on them.  They match my team kit, and are probably the socks that get the most “what the hell is on your socks” comments in the peloton.

So what is it about cycling socks?  It’s about flair.

Tags: Cycling, Socks, Flair, Jennifer Aniston, Revolution Fitness, Cincinnati, IF, Independent Fabrications, Bike