Monday, February 12, 2007

RIP






The end of an era, or at least the my favorite bike I've ever owned. The do it all beast. Fixxie or free, I could ride this bike anywhere. Road, offroad, cross... This bike rocked.

A little scavenger hunt alleycat on Friday. Celebrating Ausitn Bikes one year anniversary. Riding with my GB, Eric Mills. Going down some stairs I locked up the rear wheel and my rear wheel really locked up. Thought it was just the chain that fell off, but the crank wouldn't turn all the way around. And then I saw the crank was getting caught on the drive side chainstay!

Shit, we were out on the east side and I had a long ass walk back to Austin Bikes where beer and party was waiting, let alone to get home. A little weight to the bottom bracket and my crank would pass. Easy ride back, but if I stood the crank would hit the chainstay on the drive side.

Took her apart. Yep, the chainstay is definately bent. You can see it got crimped on the little dimples Surly builds into the frames for clearance? Same place where my 1x1 broke a little over a year ago.

Brought it over to my buddies at the Peddler. Jeremy threw it up in the stand and put a frame allignment tool on it. Yep. Bent about 1/4 of an inch towards the drive side. Then we saw that the drive side drop out was also broken where it attachs to the stay.

They're going to try and take care of it for me. See if QBP will warranty it. Seems like they should. Thought steel should last more than a couple of years. The frame bent on an intentional dimple. Probably weekens the steel a bit when they bend it, I guess.

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

GB CVO Tribute Week

been getting motivated by my homeboy. motivated to ride to work. twice last week and once to some downtown offices I had to get some reports from. 50 miles of unburnt gas.

Yesterday was a good day. rode to work and then rode downtown after for a meeting. 45 miles. pretty sweet that my truck didn't burn gas for those miles. Rode about 16 on Monday to meet my wife and grab some dinner. won a superbowl pool at work. didn't even know I won till i got to work. that pissed some people off.

planning on riding to work tomorrow. it'll be sweet. then some more miles this weekend. legs feeling a bit tired, but that's good.

biggest cvo tribute though is what happened while riding home from my meeting last night. was out in the left lane cause I had to make a left at lamar. some lady started honking at me and yelling what I was doing is illegal. caught her at a light. rode up to the window to have a conversation and to congratulate her for beating me to the red light. wise ass as hell but with a calm, collected voice. again comes the illegal shit. being up between cars. guess having a little shit lap dog on your lap while driving is not against the law. called me a little penis and I got behind her car. when the light turned green and the other cars drove off she put it in reverse and backed up into me! luckily she had a super small geo or something and when I put my hand on the spoiler the car stopped. I rode around her and then she started driving at me. rode past her and then really carefully tried to let her pass. came at me again. conneticut plates. crazy bitch. watch out.

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Like a Dear in the Headlights

Got a call at work yesterday from my homeboy, Jeremy to go for a ride. Finished up the things I was working on and headed home for some ride time. We decided to do the Mt. Bonnel loop. Nice and quick loop that heads over to Balcones from North Loop and then up Mt. Bonnel and across 2222. Some nice climbs and descents. The fixxie allows you to carry a lot of momentum on the downhills and then hammer the ups.

Sweet ride and everything was sweet till we hit Mesa. Lots of deer out last night. I was drinking some water and up a head were some deer and on coming cars. Jeremy called it out, put the bottle back in the jersey, and grabbed the brakes, figuring out which way I was going to go. The SUV missed the first buck, but the second buck got clipped and pushed into us. This deer was coming right for us, then at the last minute was able to change directions and miss us. Close call. Driver and passengers were cool, but a bit shooken up. I assume the deer was okay. No damage to the car and if the leg was broken I don't think the deer would've been able to change directions and miss us.

Close call. Like to think that maybe being cooler headed on the road and avoiding confrontations with motorists might have put some luck on our side.

Stay safe out there.