A Ride and Review

As I'm planning on road racing this year I quickly looked in the ole' bike stable and quickly realized that I don't have a road bike (which of course, makes racing road bikes a bit difficult) The 2002 Kona Jake the Snake right now is currently playing that role, but come road season its certainly going to be time to switch over to a road bike instead of just a cross bike.

Fortunately working at Wheat Ridge has given me the opportunity to try out a number of bikes and see which ones I like and Uncle Sam is hopefully going to come through with the tax return to finance it.

Today I took out a 2011 Tarmac Comp (nevermind the ginormous saddle bag the zipper broke on my regular size one)

As far as the Specialized Tarmac line up- it couldn't be better, both the SL2 (Tarmac Comp) and the SL3 (Tarmac Expert) frames are incredibly stiff and when you get out of the saddle on a long climb the bike moves underneath you quickly. With that said that stiffness that is felt through the entire frame translates into you feeling just about every bump in the road. Some might say this gives it a more "lively" feel, some might say it just simply beats you up. My opinion tends to rest somewhere in the middle of the two. If your looking for a race bike however and on a budget to get bang for your buck it might be a good option.

On the way up Squall Pass at 8-9 thousand feet or so toward Echo Lake and Mt Evans

The Tarmac Comp is equipped with Fulcrum Racing 6 wheels which from what I can deduce are actually the same as the 7s you would buy retail. The bike also sports the new 2011 revamped Ultegra drivetran- which I've unfortunately found a bit lacking. I'm not sure if its the new design and getting the bugs out from Shimano, but it seems to me that the shifting is not as crisp and efficient as it was on the 10's. I've ruled out that its not just bad adjustment as I've played around with it a bit and also ridden 3 separate bikes that were equipped with it.


Anyway, if you are looking at the Tarmacs as a race option, I would suggest looking one level up from this bike to the Tarmac Expert- for an extra 600 bucks you go from the SL2 to the SL3 frameset, a wheelset that you could race on and a subtraction of 2+ pounds off the weight of the entire bike (the Tarmac Expert w/ Ultegra @ 16.06 lbs and the Comp at 18.2) You also get a regular crank set instead of one of those silly compacts that come with a boatload of gears you will never
use.


Ride on friends, Ride On!

Wheat Ridge Cyclery

I wanted to do a post on the shop that I work at. Wheat Ridge Cyclery. Wheat Ridge was started by Eugene Kiefel in the 60's or 70's as a BMX and local bike shop and has since grown into one of if not the largest shops in Colorado.


The shop has quite the racing background as well and really caters to the real high end cyclist (and for all you naysayers- Colorado is one of those places where you can cater to high end cyclists and still have a HUGE shop) To add to the racing and high end legacy of the shop the general manager, Ron Kiefel- Eugene's son raced for the American 7 11 and Motorolla teams and managed to ride in a number of Tour de France's in the late 80's. Many of his old team bikes are displayed on the walls of the shop which really gives the place a great appeal.

Our shop has a full sales team (which I am a part of) and a full service team that take care of our gigantic fleet of bicycles. To boot, the shop has a enormous selection of demo bikes in all sizes and varieties and a pro fit studio that includes a size cycle and video capture technology that can analyze the fit to the max. (and I'm pretty sure they break out some crazy lasers-and hell, if lasers are involved, you can't have anything to complain about!)

We sell a full line of Specialized, Trek, Orbea, Cervelo and Yeti bicycles as well as pretty much every cool accessory that you could EVER possibly want for your bike

Midwestern Swagger on Colorado Trails

I have long since figured out after (maybe even before) moving to Colorado from Michigan that the trails out here were going to seriously kick my ass.

Being accustomed to great Midwest Trails like John Muir (outside of Milwaukee) and Novi Tree Farm (outside of Detroit) where you could literally roll through the woods averaging 16-17mph on a short travel 26 inch hard tail, coming to Colorado offered a new type of trail that 80mm of travel just doesn't soak up very well!

In the time I've been here, I've ridden a bit of the trails in Fort Collins and Denver only to be rattled to death all over the place.

So there was today, headed out to Apex (Golden, Co) for the first time that goes up Lookout Mtn to 7600 ft. After about 20 minutes of walking/ riding/crashing in the granny gear over sheets of ice I decided to turn around and actually get a ride in instead of a hike.

Took the old mountain bike, which unfortunately hasn't been ridden in months over Lookout on the road to Morrison, Co and back great ride good times... peace out!

Inagural Blog Posting

This is my inaugural blog post on a new blog that I'm starting focused mainly around bicycle racing, training, new products and bicycle culture.

This year I am planning on racing road again for the first time in 3 years and wanted to document it through a blog. Most likely I will be racing unattached this year but am planning on doing a week or so of Superweek and an assortment of road races, crits and cyclocross races throughout the year.

I hope you enjoy what you read!

Out for a ride sporting the "vintage"
Saturn getup!