damp friday morning

(had damn typed... but really it was just a damn ride in)

The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.
- George Bernard Shaw

Everything you've learned in school as "obvious" becomes less and less obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid. There are no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines.
- R. Buckminster Fuller

I like these two from the morning.

Bikeman.com came through and i've got a replacement glued up and it should be ready to go tomorrow if I decide to try and do a double weekend (coming off being sick? a good idea? probably not a good one if I want to increase my pathetically consistent cross results ranking). Why order through bikeman.com? Honestly, because well #1 they had the one i wanted in stock, and #2 they sponsor a cyclocross team, and #3 it is way faster and more convenient than trying to order something through the team shop, and they are more or less "local" so that means UPS ground is essentially next day delivery.

Tire showed up. Looks good. Goes on easily. It is the right one. Glue on. Wake up in the 5am hour to get the final coat on (thin thin coat on the base tape, thick wet coat on rim). Mount. Center. Roll. Inflate. Done.

Now the post install inflation pressure has been debated a bit over at the RBR CX forum and touched on a bit in the CX Mag's latest issue. And I think I've decided what may be an optimal and repeatable inflation pressure. "Race pressure." No more, no less. Inflate it to 30 psi or so (if that's what you race at) and it should be all set. Another thing that I was thinking about while gluing (yes maybe it is the Hexane getting to me). G-ride's been rolling tubulars left and right this year. Okay, everyone else has been rolling his tubbies. And he uses that funky white stuff. And the one i rolled, that he glued at the end of the season last year, still was wet and sticky in the spoke holes. The Mastik-One I use and Peanut uses and most everyone else seems to use is pretty solid after an hour, and hard after 24. And it got me thinking about over-inflation is a danger that is glue dependent. But best to be safe and not overinflate and risk reducing the bond strength in the middle. Or so my current thinking goes.

Who knows. I'm probably completely off base and wrong. Maybe crazy assumptions. All I can say is it is fun to be gluing again. Even without gloves I managed only to get one spot on my hand with a touch of glue. Hopefully i wont have to practice on my own stuff for a while.

It was a great ride in. managed to string together a handful of accelerations, got the HR way up for a while. Body really didn't like it at first. But after about 15 minutes of feeling like i was going to die, it came back. Felt okay. Well see how that translates.

heddwch
G