Merida Brass Monkeys - Round 3 - 04th January 2015...

[yellowjack]

daddy cool said:

...cant remember if you used SPD's but if you do you are welcome to take my bike for a spin if/when we all meet up at Swinley. Not that its anything that special but you can try out 650b (i suppose its a halfway house to the 29'ers favoured by the racers) and also moving to a double chainset (yours is a triple, yes?). I much prefer a double because it gives me LESS CHOICE. Big ring for everything until a decent climb appears, and just going up and down the cassette.

I'm not on SPDs (yet?). Still flat (crappy, OEM original flats at that!) pedals and trainers, I'm afraid. I'm not very good at all at spending money on replacing "fings wot ain't broke". Which means soldiering on with ropey low-rent kit because it seems that the more you are willing something to fail, the longer it stubbornly continues to function.

I'm also on 8-speed triple gearing. The recent addition of a 34 tooth lowest gear means I use the 'granny ring' far less than I used to, and with 10 or 11 cogs on the back, a '2x' front mech seems to make a lot of sense. I certainly don't find myself using the big ring very much on the triple, apart from the odd tarmac section or big downhill runs.

[yellowjack]

daddy cool said:

Oh, and i dont think im going to commit to the whole Spring series - its just too many weekends when i need to be getting some road mileage in for my 2015 target. But will probably do a couple - almost certainly the Crowthorne one as its 2 miles from home and will be interested to learn some trails there that i can link into my usual Swinley routes.
Trying to get my racing-virgin mate to join in with his £3,500 bike!

Saddleback Hill, Bagshot - appears to be at the 'bottom' of Swinley, near (just west of) Pennyhill Park and The Maultway, behind the Old Dean estate.
Crowthorne Woods - is that the one north of the Devil's Highway on the other side of Foresters Way from Swinley?
Porridgepot Hill - yesterday's venue
Tunnel Hill - round 2 venue (Mytchett) from before Christmas

I'm tempted to sign up for the lot, but that's a big chunk of money gone in entry fees (£90ish). They're all pretty local to me, although cycling to Saddleback and Crowthorne might stretch the definition of 'a warm up' to it's limit.

[daddy cool]

yellowjack said:

I'm not on SPDs (yet?). Still flat (crappy, OEM original flats at that!) pedals and trainers, I'm afraid. I'm not very good at all at spending money on replacing "fings wot ain't broke". Which means soldiering on with ropey low-rent kit because it seems that the more you are willing something to fail, the longer it stubbornly continues to function.

You dont have to spend much money - ~£15 on some Shimano M520 pedals (inc cleats) and ~£20 on some Aldi SPD-compatible shoes when they next have a cycling event on.
You wont be just pointlessly replacing something that works ok now - you will be giving yourself the ability to pull up on each pedalstroke for more power/faster speeds. Well worth it!

[Gren]

yellowjack said:

I'm off now to cogitate on the relative merits of entering the Saddle Skedaddle Spring XC series, although I could do with someone explaining the differences between "Enduro" and "XC" racing... ...as they seem to use pretty much similar venues for the XC stuff as they did for the winter enduro we've just finished.

It's Enduro cos it's 'ride as many laps as you can in a set time' as in short for Endurance. XC races will be who can do x laps fastest. i.e. a normal race.

They are pretty much the same courses and are no more/less technical.

[yellowjack]

Thanks for the explantion, Gren

It makes more sense than the bike mags, who sell it as something 'technically' different, like you need a lighter bike for XC 'cause it's all about going fast over open country and bridleways, etc, and enduro is more technical, heavier going, through woodland and single track, etc, so it needs a stronger bike to take the bigger hits.

For what it's worth, I suspect that some of these genre specific labels are invented by the bike brands to convince us that we really need yet another different bicycle if we want to enter more than one kind of event.

[Gren]

That's a different type of Enduro confusingly. Enduro in the Gorrick sense is just endurance racing so tends to be longer - up to 24hrs and is about how far can you go in a time.

Not sure why the currently trendy Enduro is called that as it just seems to be timed 'almost DH' sections interspersed with untimed XC sections. I'm not sure where endurance come into it any more than other racing?

[yellowjack]

Gren said:

That's a different type of Enduro confusingly. Enduro in the Gorrick sense is just endurance racing so tends to be longer - up to 24hrs and is about how far can you go in a time.

Not sure why the currently trendy Enduro is called that as it just seems to be timed 'almost DH' sections interspersed with untimed XC sections. I'm not sure where endurance come into it any more than other racing?

So. To sum up, there's no shame in having been confused by the various 'tags'. And as far as Gorrick events are concerned, 'Enduro' is based on a time limited event where the distance raced can vary, even between individuals in the same event, whereas their XC stuff is a set number of laps, a simple 'race' in the traditional sense. And 'trendy' Enduro is for the larger chaps on 'All Mountain' or 'Downhill' bikes, who use their mass to assist gravity in getting them to the bottom of hills as fast as possible, but who dislike flat and uphill sections, so don't count those bits for the purposes of race results?

I'm sure I've got that sussed now...

[richardxjr]

Re SPD shoes YJ, my second pair for muddy larks are these £20 ones from PX. Limited sizes left, but they are bloody brilliant both on and off the bike. Cleats from the aforementioned M520s fit. Go half a size up if poss to fit thick warm socks in without restricting air flow. Actually, mine are a full size bigger than my normal shoes and are fine in winter.

http://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/SHCRIMUR/carnac-impac...

[yellowjack]

richardxjr said:

Re SPD shoes YJ, my second pair for muddy larks are these £20 ones from PX. Limited sizes left, but they are bloody brilliant both on and off the bike. Cleats from the aforementioned M520s fit. Go half a size up if poss to fit thick warm socks in without restricting air flow. Actually, mine are a full size bigger than my normal shoes and are fine in winter.

http://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/SHCRIMUR/carnac-impac...

Thanks for that link, Richard, but I think I'm looking for something with a little more in the way of tread on the sole, probably even with the studs at the toe, too. Almost everywhere I ride locally can turn into heavy going with a bit of moist weather, and I'd like to be able to get up the sides of hills and gulleys dragging a bike if necessary. I've still got those SPD pedals you gifted me, I've just not invested in the shoes and cleats to go with them. That, along with the fact that I'm still considering something along the lines of the DMR V8/V12 pedals with some 'proper' MTB flat shoes.

Receipt of a decent sized cheque from my solicitor in the next week or so should have me in a position to buy something fairly decent, so I'll need to make up my mind about it soon. I've happily used SPD SL pedals on my road bike for the last four years, so I'm not 'scared' of clipping in, I'm just not convinced of the benefits (for me, at least) off-road, where (especially at the start of races) there is more need to dab a foot down at short notice. Those Carnac shoes do look ideal for the old steel bike that'll become 'Frankenbike' when I get a replacement road bike sorted.

[richardxjr]

They kept me upright in horrendous mud yesterday when I had to get round a fallen tree on a steep slope. Just jetwashed 'em along with the bike

[yellowjack]

richardxjr said:

They kept me upright in horrendous mud yesterday when I had to get round a fallen tree on a steep slope. Just jetwashed 'em along with the bike

OK. Having looked again at the picture of the sole, and had a quick look at the soles of my trainers, the Carnac shoes would certainly be a better bet for some grip in slippery conditions. Not massively better, but I think definitely enough to notice the difference.

Also, A quick question for the SPD users of this parish...

If you have to get off and walk/push/sort a mechanical problem/etc, and it's boggy/sticky/gloopy under foot, how do you fair when it comes to clipping in again? Do the cleats not clog up and prevent you from getting a decent engagement with the mechanism of the pedal? If I'm going to take the plunge, and go SPD, I need to be confident that I can clip in every time, whatever the conditions. Remember that the first round of the Brass Monkeys series is fresh in my mind, and that was spectacularly horrible under foot with all the mud and the rain. It was at the very extreme limit of what I would ride in, and if I hadn't paid the entry fee up front I'd probably have rolled over and gone back to sleep on race day

[daddy cool]

Yeah, its just mud - they'll clip in again fine. Worst case, give your soles a squirt from your water bottle!

[yellowjack]

daddy cool said:

Yeah, its just mud - they'll clip in again fine. Worst case, give your soles a squirt from your water bottle!

OK. Next question. I've "clipped in again fine" - can I now unclip OK? Or will the mud clog up the release springs, leaving me with both feet attached to the pedals as I keel over, à la Delboy falling through the bar? I really don't fancy spilling my drink, or breaking the stemware

Or am I overthinking it again? Mud (and worse still, grit) getting into the pedal mechanism is the concern that has played the biggest part in keeping me from committing to SPDs.

[gazza285]

yellowjack said:

daddy cool said:

Yeah, its just mud - they'll clip in again fine. Worst case, give your soles a squirt from your water bottle!

OK. Next question. I've "clipped in again fine" - can I now unclip OK? Or will the mud clog up the release springs, leaving me with both feet attached to the pedals as I keel over, à la Delboy falling through the bar? I really don't fancy spilling my drink, or breaking the stemware

Or am I overthinking it again? Mud (and worse still, grit) getting into the pedal mechanism is the concern that has played the biggest part in keeping me from committing to SPDs.

It's the same for everybody else, yet 95% choose to ride with clip in pedals, stop procrastinating!

[Gren]

I'm a committed flat pedal wearer (5:10 Freeriders on Superstar Nanos are hard to come unstuck on) but even I've got to admit if you want to race faster spds are the way to go.

My missus swears by hers, much more efficient and less tiring and she's never had a problem in hers. Multi directional clipping spds set at the loosest settings mean you'll never have a problem unclipping either.

[richardxjr]

Yer mechs are going to block with mud before pedals and cleats, so ditch them too

[yellowjack]

gazza285 said:

It's the same for everybody else, yet 95% choose to ride with clip in pedals, stop procrastinating!

I do tend to spend a long time considering decisions of this magnitude. Even then, I often end up soldiering on with whatever kit I already have. As for 95%? Are you sure? Looking around at the other riders at the three races I've attended, I'd say it's higher, 98/99% at least. Possibly more. I was certainly the only one I spotted wearing shabby old running trainers when on the bike.

[daddy cool]

Close, it was actually 99.67%.

[gazza285]

All the racers will have them, I was being generous and included the ride round at the backers as well.

[BadgerBenji]

Final overall results tables are out -> http://www.gorrick.com/racing/endurobm/brass_monke...

Super pleased to finish 7th overall in 4hr vets