Sunday, June 08, 2008

Shake down ride for the new bike





I finally have my Arkansas bike built and ready to go, so yesterday I took the opportunity to get in a first ride on it. What started as a "ride around the neighborhood" quickly turned into an 1.5 rumble on dirt roads and some local trails.

The bike actually rode really well, and it was snappy. Its not nearly as smooth as my Niner, but it has a bit more snap to it when you stand and crank. Even with the boat anchor Cro-Mo fork on it, its a pretty light bike.

I was a couple miles from the house when the shaking down all started. I noticed the left crank arm making some noise under heavy acceleration. That was quickly followed by some play in it and before you know it, the crank was attached to my shoe but not to the bike anymore.

This is only a dramatization of actual events



At that point, I channeled my inner-Yackster to try and solve my problems. I had absolutely no tools and I had left my cellphone at the house. Not so good. I found a small stick and I used a rock to hammer the stick into the bolt, where I could somewhat tighten the crank arm to where I could pedal again.

Off I went.

For about 1/2 mile before the crank arm came off again. This time I just tightened it with my finger and decided to work on my right leg conditioning. I let my left leg dangle off the bike, and literally rode myself home with my right leg. I got a tremendous amount of weird looks. People weren't sure if I was injured, mentally challenged or had bike problems.

I made it home shortly after, and the yet to be named green bike went back to the garage for some tweaking. All in all, I'm thrilled with how good the bike felt and I'm already thinking about doing the entire Womble in a day on my new singlespeed.

My Giro E2 matches the new bike perfectly

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