Mike was so gracious to meet with me and talk about this elusive bike that first debuted in the Tour.  Though still a prototype, it what is to come.  Thanks to Dave Erickson (www.daveerickson360.com) for the editing and great media work.

Click HERE to view the interview.

Blue Lake Triathlon

Tri-Northwest Club Championships

June 14th is Jessi and my wedding anniversary.  Wow, what a great anniversary weekend spending it with some of our friends and racing a triathlon. Pretty good if you like that kind of stuff I guess.

This weekend would find us on the outskirts of Portland at the very popular Blue Lake Triathlon on Sunday along with 1000 other people racing the Oly and sprint tris. We headed over on Friday after school. It should have been the last day of school, but thanks to those wonderful 5 snow days, we would be returning to school on Monday.

I have raced this event for the past 3 years and have come to really enjoy the event. It is early enough to establish a baseline. I am not one for flat bike courses because it normally means that there will be a lot of drafting. But I have never really seen that to be a problem at Blue Lake. It does create a great opportunity to test some thresholds and compare from year to year. It has normally been a pretty fast course for me and I have had some good splits there on the bike. The run is flat too. But if you do too much work on the bike, it’s very easy to get run down, and I know I can get run down :)

The race started at 8:00am in water that was about 71 degrees and air temp that was 60 with an overcast sky.  In the elite wave, there were about 15 I think.  I got passed by a couple guys.  I made the turn for the finish and swam straight and was 2nd out of the water. I knew the guy 1st out of the water was ahead, but I did not think by more than a minute. I saw him in T1 and caught up to him. He left transition about 4 seconds ahead, so I closed almost all of my deficit I had from the swim in T1.

Then it was pretty much open road for 24 miles. Well, and a motorcycle. I locked into a steady effort that I felt I could maintain. At the last turnaround I took a split to 2nd (still the same guy) and realized I had a pretty good gap, but I thought I would need more time. With about 9 miles to go, I picked it up a bit and pressed on to the finish. I ended up with one of my fastest 40k bike splits (54:00), and highest power output for me as well. I was pretty excited about that.  The Trek TTX did not disappoint, again.

I rolled into T2 and was greeted by many spectators cheering me on. I was really impressed. There must have been 100 people right ON the dismount line. I cruised in and threw on my KSwiss K’onas and was off. I normally feel slow in the first mile and know that I just need to get settled in.  I could see the 5 that were behind me coming in and realized I have about 3:30 on 2nd, so that gave me a little breathing room. I ran to the turn and was feeling good. I felt like I got going from mile 3 to 4 when I saw my mile split I realized that the mile markers may be off because it was a little faster than I was running. But it really did not matter. At this point I had about 4 minutes on 2nd, and knew that I just needed to keep doing what I’m doing…nothing stupid. Just run my race. I came into the final quarter mile and was pretty excited knowing that I would defend the number 1 I was wearing this time.

It was a fast race. I was happy with all my splits. None of them were earth shattering…well, maybe the bike a little, but they were consistent and efforts that I “should” be able to replicate in future races. There was never a time I felt like I was racing out of my control. So that felt promising.

Another amazing trip with great people. Races are a lot of fun, but they are even better when you share them with friends, on your anniversary, and end up setting a PR. That’s a good weekend.

Hope your weekends are great.

Saturday, August 22, 2009
Apple Capital Triathlon

Wenatchee Apple Capital triathlon has been a race that I have wanted to do for a few years now, but it has never really lined up with my schedule. On a few occasions it was the same weekend as IM Canada. But this year it did not seem like there would really be any conflicts.

Jessi and I got up at 5:00am and I was moving rather slowly, typical for me on race day. We drove up to Daroga Park and got there before the sun did.  I was able to connect with some people I have not seen for a bit which is always nice. Some people from reading this blog, and some from facebook, and some that I just have known. After getting everything relatively set up, I figured I had better do something, so I hopped on the Trek, threw on my new Rudy Project Wingspan, and went for a spin.

I have to tell everyone that the new helmet is amazing. It is so dang light and you cannot even feel it when it’s on! In the race I could not believe how it felt. I did not feel any pressure on it at all, I even looked straight down, up, everything and was amazed. Anyway, I ran through the gears, I felt slow (again) and rolled back to transition.

As the start was approaching it was time to find my way to the water. I really wanted to get in a little warm up, but knew that I would probably be a little rushed…again. The swim is a 2 loop swim that is in the Columbia River, but in a bay where there was significant milfoil growth. But they cut swaths where the swim would go.  I still was not feeling overly motivated to race this morning, but when you are waist deep in cool water at 8:00am, you figure you better do something. We got the “2 minutes to start” call, so I checked my Timex iControl and made sure it was ready to roll. 5, 4, 3, 2, (I think there was a horn or something, I don’t know, my head was under water on 2). I took off and was watching all of the cut milfoil pass below me. As I was crossing the back side of the triangle, I ran into a giant floating patch of milfoil. It represented what one would find in the drain of the women’s shower at a YMCA (just guessing). I did not freak out, but I was “in it.” I actually rolled out of it and tried pushing it to the side. I was out of it and all I could think about was the rest of the swimmers coming up on it in a pack. That could be a sight. I made the first lap and felt fine. As I was making the second, I could feel pieces of the milfoil get stuck on my goggles, cap, etc. Kind of like when you swim in a pool and you feel a hair…it bugs the crap out of me. I finally made it to the end of the swim and was headed to the bike. I looked at my watch…22:45. Hmmm, must have been a tad long. It kind of evens out since Cda Oly was short, so it’s “even steven.”

I think Bruce taught me this technique…’listen to the water.”

One thing that I liked about this race was the relatively short transitions. Then on top of it, the mats were right at the entrance and exit of transition. So your transition time was the time you were actually “in” transition. Kind of cool. I think T1 was about 36 seconds. The only bummer part of this is that your bike time includes the pre “mount” and the post “dismount” running time which makes your bike time a tad  longer. Oh well, transitions will look impressive.

I was off on the bike and ready to roll. I had a motorcycle escort so that made me feel a tad safer since we were riding on a state highway. This bike course is very rolling. There are not any real steep climbs/descents, but it’s definitely up and down. But the road surface is very smooth, which is nice. I got going and was feeling okay. Not great, but my watts were telling me that I was doing what I needed to. I pushed hard to the turn where I would get an idea as to what kind of gap I had on 2nd. Upon making the turn, I then realized that wind had kicked up a bit and I would be working against a headwind the whole way back…as would everyone else.  I kept pushing on the way back knowing that the headwind would create some problems for people.

I came cruising down into T2 and was ready to run. My bike was a solid 55:45.  I flew trough T2 in 17 seconds…nice, and was off and running. The run was 2 loops as well that took you through the park. The first part looped you back to the transition area so I was able to get an idea as to what kind of gap I had.  I came through the first lap in 18:10. Wow, that’s good. If I keep it steady, I could run a 36 and change. That’d be good. So that was the new motivation, negative split the run and run a low 36.  I crossed the finish, looked at my watch, and saw 36:06. Nice! Not only did I negative split the run, I ran one of my best 10ks in a race. That feels good.

So for a race that I really did not want to do less than 12 hours ago, it all worked out. I ended up winning overall with a time of 1:54:48.  That was pretty fast for me. But since the swim was a tad long, say 2 minutes, I think that this was hands down one of my fastest races ever! I know the bike and run portions of this race are the same year after year, so those can be compared, so the swim is the only variable…as it always is.

Keep on racing.  Even when you wonder if you should, good things often come.

Trek Madone 6.9 Pro Red

The maiden voyage of my new Trek Madone 6.9 Pro Red is done. It consisted of a rather hilly, and quite windy, ride with my wife Jessi and friend Steve. I knew we had planned on riding this afternoon and my new Madone was to come as well. UPS arrived at about 1:00pm and I immediately got into the box because it seemed too light and I thought that the wheels were missing…they weren’t. I started working on it about 2:30pm after a few other obligations. So that gave me about 2 hours to get this all sized up and set up. Seems simple, and it “can” be.

Upon opening the box all I could see was bubble wrap and styrofoam. I guess that’s good. I took the frame and many of the components out of the box and began getting them ready for the light assembly required. This would be he first bike I have had with the new SRAM Red. But I thought it was built on the Shimano platform for the most part, so how hard could it be? Well, it wasn’t that hard but I seemed to fumble around with the front derailleur more than I needed to. Other than that, taking off the reflectors on the $2000 Aeolus wheels was a little funny as well as spoke protector. Yup, the same ones you see on the bike at Toys-R-Us. After running a few measurements and checking levels, I was ready to go.

Let me quickly walk you through the bike. The bars that came on it were Bontrager carbon bars that are 44cm wide. That’s pretty wide for a narrow shouldered guy, but feels super stable on the road. The bars are nicely matched up with a white carbon Bontrager stem. Very sleek and bold…yes, both. The SRAM Red brakes are fitted with carbon pads to accommodate the Aeolus 5.0 wheels (that happened to be clinchers…hmmm).  The bar tape and cable housing are a very bright white, for now, and really set off the bike.

I really like the seat post design that is a carbon mast design. Many frames are going this route to save weight, and decrease parts while making things stiff.

The front derailleur is a clamp on, which happens to be one of the first bikes in a long time that I have owned without a braze on.

The SRAM Red package was complete with the red accents and the cassette that has red anodization detail facing the spokes…pretty cool. I completed the bike with a pair of Look Keo Carbon Ti pedals.

I got this bike all built up literally 10 minutes before we had to leave. So as I walked out the door with my new ride, I was not 100% confident that I double-checked all the bolts. Oh well, should hold. I rolled down the driveway and grabbed the brakes…worked. Whew, I can stop. How about a quick acceleration? Yup, everything held. How about shifting from chainring to chainring under load? Yup, did it. So as Jessi rolled down the road too, we were off. Currently there is absolutely no computer of any kind on the bike. No speed, heart rate, cadence, time, …nothing! So I was riding by all feel on a completely new feeling bike. I felt like it looked cool. I mean, how often do we go out and train on a set of racing wheels? Though I was sitting way more upright than I do on my TTX, I felt like I was cruising along nicely. Jessi was tucked in behind me not complaining.

We came to a few stops and climbed a few more hills before we ran into Steve. From that point, we pick up the speed and started running the bike through the tests. It climbed like it was 10 pounds and as stiff as a downhill bike (I think those are stiff?). The shifting was precise, and never left me shifting up two to come down one. It is designed on a 2-click system that you can quickly adjust to if you are used to Shimano STI. I had no problems with it from the get go. We hit some pretty big climbs and I found the brake hoods very comfortable and had a large enough platform to rest your hands. They also allowed for out of the saddle climbing, and even shifting, with success and ease.

There were only a few times that I found myself in the drops, but when I did, I felt like I was pulling a Tour peleton behind me. Granted, I was going down an 8% descent. It made my ride go by so quickly. Since this was a brand new bike, and I did not change ANYTHING out of the box other than adding pedals, I was happy to ride for a bit and not experience any soreness. I did not even change the saddle! Jessi, Steve, and I had a great ride. I was so lucky to have such a great couple of people to ride with and let me test this new steed out with. I dragged them all over the place.

So to sum it up, this bike is race ready out of the box. I have ridden quite a few bikes from steel, aluminum, and carbon. I have used all the great components from the down tube retro-friction shifting to the Campy Ergo, to the Shimano STI. This bike was honestly a pleasure to ride. I would like to let everyone come and ride it and experience what it is like, but it’s mine and you can go buy your own :) I highly doubt many local Trek dealers will stock these bikes in a full size run, so if you are ever at a place that they are demoing them, take advantage of it. It’s like being at the BMW test track with a fist full of keys. Now I really know that Lance was not on drugs. I know exactly what he was on.

A HUGE thank you to Team TIMEX, Tristan, Tom, and all the great minds at Trek. It’s because of all you that I am in need of a tent to sleep in… but it should only be a temporary arrangement.

If you are not into looking at bikes and admiring their craftsmanship, don’t waste your time reading this (Rachel?).  But I LOVE looking at technological developments in the bike industry.  And Trek has a real beauty here.

Now I don’t have really any specs on the bikes, but I have seen a lot of pics after seeing them in the Giro and the the Tour. So I thought I would try and get more pics and try to solve the mystery of this new gem.

Watching Lance’s ride on the 4th of July in the Tour, I think I was watching his bike more than I was watching him, or the race. The Tour is where you see “what will be” in the future. From helmets, shoes, wheels, etc. So it’s a bit of a debut of new stuff. Love the new stuff.

Looking at this bike it is obviously quite different from the current TTX. Starting at the front, I believe that Lance used the SRAM R2C (return to center) shift levers. These are slick and I would love to have a pair. The idea is that the lever stays in the forward position and you click up, or down, when you want to shift. The lever never points “down” or “up.” It simply stays neutral creating what you would suspect to be a more aero position by allowing your hand position to stay forward.

I also noticed on Lance’s ride on the 4th that he was using an aero extension potentially form a different mfg than Bontrager…maybe not? Looks like a shift couplet that integrates the shift lever into the aero bar.

In this picture you can also see that Contador is using a new handlebar design that allows the extension to be tightened with an external design. Seen here in an aluminum material/color where the aero extensions meet the base bar. If these are Bontrager bars, this is a very new design. Once which I appreciate because it allows you to stay flat on the base bar.

One of the newest designs on this bike, but not new to the industry, is the bayonet style fork.  Felt started this a couple years ago on the ’07 DA that cost about $7200, and now it seems like a lot of manufactures are following suit. But I like how Trek designed this, and I would suspect that it is supported by wind tunnel tests as well. They took this one step further…

Internally routed has a whole new meaning. Cables around the stem, which would eventually be routed into the frame, have totally disappeared on the new frame…gone…non existent! Love that.

Last year the engineers of the Trek TTX and the Madone came and met with us at the TIMEX camp in Oceanside.  As they were now looking to design a new TT bike they were wondering how they could make the best bike better. They were thinking of nutrition options, how they could do an internal hydration system, etc. Just ideas, things they thought we would have an interest in.  As Kyle Marcotte and myself were talking with them, we told them that we thought the bike is so aero right now it’s incredible. But as you look at it form the front, the ONLY thing that sticks out is the front brake cable. Is there a way to “hide” that.  Windtunnel tests show that “hiding” the brake behind the fork actually creates drag. Although some bike mfg do it because it looks like it would be more aero. But we suggested hiding the brake inside the fork and have the cable come down through the fork tube. It would be a mechanics nightmare, but would get the cable and the brake out of the wind.  So, when I see this being implemented into the new bikes, I smile. Not that we came up with this, but obviously other people in the engineering world thought the same, and made it happen.

The hidden front brake in the fork is amazing! This is a HUGE advancement and I would suspect that it cost a lot to design. But the bar has been raised, and we will now watch the other companies follow suit. Personally, I think this is one of the coolest improvements, that all the others improvements in the frame will be lost unfortunately. There have been a lot of changes to the, dare I say, ‘old’ TTX. But this one is as big as they come.

Look at the above shot of Contador in the TT. Where did the front brake caliper go? This bike looks like a track bike other than the brake levers (I think I just came up with the next design improvement :)) However, you can see that Contador’s bike is not using the SRAM R2C shift levers.

So the front brake is gone…it would seem appropriate to hide the rear as well. And that is just what Trek did. This is also something that a few other bike companies have done. But Trek has just done it better. Most other bike companies simply bolt the rear brake near the bottom bracket. Not Trek. Look how this brake is in the same lines as the frame. The matching paint helps to hide it too, but look at the lines. So clean. I am not too sure what that block of black tape is. Maybe hiding something….

It looks to me as if the rear stay is larger too…beefier you might say. That might be a result of the smaller rear triangle…also probably hidden in the wind tunnel.

You can see in these last 2 pics that the rear triangle is smaller. Less material and less exposed to the wind. The above pic of the yellow frame you can see a little black hole, or cable, coming out of the non drive side of the rear stay. I am not too sure what that is, or what it is for. I was told it was for Treks Duotrap system, a variation of Speedtrap, that mounts sensors for speed and cadence pickup directly into the frame. By using wireless ANT2+ tech they can put the sensor directly into the frame.  It’s near where that block of black tape was on Contador’s bike as well.

Looks like the seatpost is s similar design as the current TTX. Which is more of an internal compression design. Look how big the bottom bracket area is…similar design as the Madone utilizing a different BB design.

I am excited to see what they release to the public. Pretty exciting and definitely a bike that will truly raise the bar.