new rider again

[Kano]

Yikes, Tater, you're doing brevets now too?

Gotta admit, those sound a little nuts to me YET. Who knows where my thinking will be in a couple more years...

So, DH came wandering down to my office yesterday, and caught me reading my TE forums, and I was just finishing up my last post here, and he was peeking over my shoulder, watching me scroll though the screen, and suddenly, he said STOP! GO BACK! What??? You're posting pictures of your new bike on the web????

Yes, dear, we're women, we do that sort of thing....

Karen in Boise

[Tater]

Yikes, Tater, you're doing brevets now too?

Karen in Boise

Yes, I couldn't resist the call!

[mimitabby]

women put their bike pix on the web? Men do it too!

So what DO you do about the goat head thorns?

When I lived in Boise, I rode a bike exactly 2 miles once. When we brought our kids and their bikes to Weiser once for the Old Time Fiddle Festival, we ended up doing very drastic things to their bikes after 300 flat tires.
(I forget what though)

I hear you are having hand complaints. Make sure the handlebars are where they should be.

and good for you for getting out and riding!

[Kano]

Goat heads: armadillo tires or slime. LBS says armadilloes on my new bike. Slime is good, but LBS dude said not so good in high pressure road tires. Dude said it tends to just blow right out through the holes, not clog them. That was his answer when I asked to make sure armadilloes were available for my bike if I run into lotsa flats.

Tater, have you tried them?


Mimi, I will keep the handlebars in mind, but at this point, I'm adapting to a whole different riding position, and figure I should give it a hundred miles or so before I make any changes, except to the seat! I'm going to swap that out for the one on my old bike and see if I can utilize my butt a bit more to take a little of that pressure off my hands!

I'll pick up a new pair of gloves to give myself a little padding between hands and hoods, and do my crunches, and watch my diet (make less of me to hold up!) and put in a few more hours, and see how I'm doing. Now, that won't stop me from talking with the dudes at the shop to see if it's easy to make some temporary changes that will help me adapt while I'm in picking up those new gloves!

21.5 miles on the new bike, and I'm in awe of the muscles I'm feeling! AND of how easy it was to make them "feely" as my kids used to say! Which is probably WHY they're "feely" -- it was so easy to get more out of them!

Karen in Boise (debating a ride in the rainy windy icky weather today, but after work!)

[mimitabby]

Karen
you are right where I was last year. my new bike made me want to go faster,
but my old muscles weren't quite ready for it yet.
Good luck with the goatheads!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

If you tilt your bars up a bit so that the top part is parallel to the ground instead of sloping down, it will not only put your wrists in a more natural position on the hoods, but it will also bring your hoods just a bit closer to you, thus reducing the stretch/reach and getting some weight off your hands.

[Fredwina]

If you tilt your bars up a bit so that the top part is parallel to the ground instead of sloping down, it will not only put your wrists in a more natural position on the hoods, but it will also bring your hoods just a bit closer to you, thus reducing the stretch/reach and getting some weight off your hands.

You may want watch this, as this may increase the apparent distance between the brakes and the bars while on the drops. I had a fitter do this to me. I was fine on the spin around the lot, but out on the road, it was scary.

[Tater]

Goat heads: armadillo tires or slime. LBS says armadilloes on my new bike. Slime is good, but LBS dude said not so good in high pressure road tires. Dude said it tends to just blow right out through the holes, not clog them. That was his answer when I asked to make sure armadilloes were available for my bike if I run into lotsa flats.

Tater, have you tried them?


Karen in Boise (debating a ride in the rainy windy icky weather today, but after work!)

Yep, I have Armadillos on the commuter-mobile, but not the road bike. I've ran over broken glass, tree branches, road debris and not had any problems with them. Picked out thirteen goatheads one afternoon after a commute. They have to be pretty long to puncture the tube. The only flat I have had with the 'dillos (2500 miles on them) was after riding over a nail. One puncture on one side of the tube, nine on the other!

Karen, if you ride today you are a nut! That wind is just too much for me and I am wussing out of today's ride. Going forward isn't too bad, but having to lean into the wind is! Good luck if you go.

[Kano]

Karen, if you ride today you are a nut! That wind is just too much for me and I am wussing out of today's ride. Going forward isn't too bad, but having to lean into the wind is! Good luck if you go.

I did NOT ride -- couldn't even talk the dog into going out today, and will now have bad hair for a month after going for the mail! My hair now looks like this:

Instead, my daughters and I went to the mall and looked around for pretty new things to want!

DH wanted to ski tomorrow -- I've gotta work again. Hard to pass up fresh snow!

Karen in Boise

[Kano]

Forgot to mention -- stopped at the LBS today, and talked with "my" bike dude about gloves. Got a nice, boring black pair -- didn't want to limit my shirts and such by picking up the pretty blue, pink, or purple ones!

Bike dude did say give it a little more time, cuz, you DID just change over from the upright bike. I do like that he remembers me from the other day -- they're a busy place, and we didn't spend that much time in the store! But more importantly, poor bike dude had one heckuva limp today: left shin had bad case of road rash! He was pretty positive about it anyway, though -- but it looked SORE!

The other thing I wanted to ask about while I was there was those Presta valves -- had to find out how to put air in those tires before I've got flat tires and don't know what to do about them! Sweet young road-rashed bike dude was very understanding about what seemed a pretty silly question in my book, but of course, I know that the dumbest questions are the ones we don't ask! Those valves are cool! I'm suitably impressed with the dude who came up with that idea!

Karen in Boise