The Hiada

This is the tribe i always admired growing up. At my school back there in Washington State, we had a couple classes about the Natives from the region. The Hiada always stood out for me. Maybe it was the stories of the morning ritual. The massive dugout war canoes. The Totem poles. The Potlach. So many rich tradditions. The hand made hooks to fish for Halibut. All that. I found it compelling. Still do.

So this morning's ride in was the re-awakening of my homage to the Hiada. I didn't go swimming in the Bay. Which of course would be pointless in paying respect cause the water temp is around 70° here. Up there in the Queen Charlotte Islands the temps are in the upper 30s to low 40s year round. Wicked damn cold. But. Every morning they would get up and swim naked in that water, year round. So this morning it was cool. Not cold but cool. A mere 53°F when i set out. The brilliant sun in spots felt warm and luxurious. But the tree covered shade was cool. Maybe Solobreak with his steel trap like memory will remember me waxing all romantic about the culture from last year. And it is true. This isn't the first time i've mentioned it.

But there is a basis for why i will hit a 53°F morning armed with nothing more than a short sleeve jersey and bib shorts. The same kit i wear when it is 100°F outside. It is about increasing my dermal respiration rate. In other words, the skin is a killer cool organ, and like your muscles, heart and lungs, not to mention brain, and stomach, it can be conditioned/trained to deal with adversities. Take the Hiada. The conditioning ritual of the swim braces and prepares the body for dealing with the cold. Raising the metabolic rate. What happens when you increase the metabolic rate? You create more waste energy. And that waste energy is heat.

If ya always slathering on embrocation, or arm warmers and knee warmers and leg warmers and base layers and jackets and gloves and hats and all that cold weather crap... ya'll never be able to use the cold to your advantage. Now. I'm not saying i'm gonna be wearing shorts and a short sleeve jersey when the temps dip down to the teens this winter. Heck i might start covering up the knees at 40 degrees this year. Maybe even 45 now that i'm getting all old and stuff. What i found was that for cross, the dermal conditioning meant that i was pretty comfortable when others were standing around shivering and unable to speak cause their teeth were chattering too much. And yes, lots of people are different. Some can't ever adapt. Some don't want to. And yes, it does consume more calories. Any time you increase your metabolism it means you are using up more calories. Going into caloric debt is fine if you are training and trying to drop the pounds but going into a race is not the time to have a caloric deficit. That will kill your recovery, and probably cost you a fair bit of watts. NO matter how efficiently you can burn fat, or how well your fat burning engine turns out to be. That said. The only, and i mean THE ONLY way to drop weight is to operate in a deficit. If like many off season pro's in the past you bulk up in the winter, you can turn that fuel storage to your advantage and in training get yourself to riding weight while operating in caloric red. But. Once ya hit riding weight/ideal weight, and all those reserves are gone. Ya are gonna suffer. Cross is unique in that the longest race is only an hour. Pretty much don't need a whole lot of food/calories to race for an hour. Maybe at most 1000-1500 calories.

Anyway. Not sure how to explain that whole tangent. The Hiada life and influence always comes back to me this time of year. The Wiki entry for the Hiada seems to be getting better lately. And that's the crazy thing about the internet. It is growing, and that growth is noticeable.

The remix is gonna be awesome!

Someone shoot me already. I can't get that song out of my head. And it ain't even been remixed yet!

Anyway. BKW has some killer content up today. Go give it a read! WHOOOO. Kieth rocks. I wonder if this Bontrager Cross bar that i'm so madly in love with was designed by him or some dude who works for the TREK BICYCLE CORPORATION... either way they are wide and the first ergo drop that i actually like. Cross goodness.

And SPEAKING OF BARS!! Scott said his bars were all titled up and stuff cause some one who raced in Boulder or something or somewhere who set up his Kona a few years ago said you are "SUPPOSED" to point the ends of the bars to the rear hub. WTF?

Greg, anyone. What is up with that shit? Am i so old school and so ingrained as to how to set up a GD bar that i missed the revolution of stupidity?

Here, let see if we can figure out how to make riding in the drops completely hopeless. It is cross, we don't want to look like roadies riding in the drops, lets come up with a way to make it impossible to shift or brake from the drops. Yeah. That'd be AWESOME. WTF?

Set your bars up the right freaking way! The FLATS of the drops, even the 2cm that it might be on the effed up ergo bars some are running, the flats of the drops should be parallel with the freaking top tube (assuming the freaking top tube is level).

And CHAIN TENSION. IF... IF you are gonna run one ring. Set it up so that there is nearly NO slack in the 39-42 - what ever you use as a single and the 25-27 in the rear. Okay? Simple. Right? Make it work.

And another mechanical tid bit. Front Deraileurs. I was hoping to pull out my collection and give a graphical tutorial, and time won't allow me to delve into the virtual world for the expo...

There are different curves for different # of teeth. Does anyone remember when the retards designing MTB parts thought it would be a great idea to come out with Micro-drive? Any of yall mechanics ever remember trying to get a non-microdrive derailuer to work flawlessly with that tiny stuff (that just wore out WAY faster than the bigger stuff)? Didn't happen. Ya want a Front Der to work with your 46-48 front chain ring and STILL work with your 38 inner ring? Get an old skool XTR one. It'll work. No rubbing. Ya wonder why that Ultegra/Dura-Ace Front Der won't work? Heck that whole compact road crank fad that's going on now. Different flipping deraileur.

So. Not to pick on the person who mentioned the "i can't get it to not rub" but it is just an example of, if it don't work it prolly is the wrong part.

There.

Mechanic Soap Box is gonna be put away.

Go do you 50-100 mounts and dismounts. Keep in mind your momentum and inertia. Forward keep going forward as you get on...

peace
G