In May, my friend Seth and I rode our bikes from Pittsburgh to Washington DC. Over six days of riding we covered 380 miles. Our route took us from the Pittsburgh Airport to Georgetown, Washington DC along five connected bike trails.
Finishing at the Potomac
On my single speed bike, I run front and rear brakes. However the frame doesn’t have cable routing bosses on the top tube. Right now I just have the cable housing zip-tied to the frame. This isn’t a very elegant solution and I wanted to improve it.
Problem Solvers makes a nice clamp that will route two cables. Unfortunately they don’t make them to fit my 1.0 inch top tube. Carnegie Mellon has a 3D printer and I had always wanted to experiment with rapid prototyping parts. It is very easy to design a part in Solidworks and then export it to the 3D printer. I thought I could design and fabricate something to fit my need.
Versions 1 through 5, left to right.
Continue reading “Backstop Rapid Prototyping”
The year lasted longer than I expected. I was planning on not riding from September til now. Well gladly, that didn’t happen. Here’s a quick blast of what happened since August.
At the track, I finished very well at the third Pro Series Race. I technically finished the ominum in 6th place. However, the results don’t show how the rain screwed me out of 5th place. I had won entrance into the sprint final, where last place was still guaranteed one point. That would have bumped me into 5th place. Well five minutes before the race started, the rain came in and soaked my chances. Anyways, I stuck it to Marty later in the year!
Chris Kelly and I teamed up for the second Working Man’s Madison. We rode better than our first Madison. We held our own considering we were racing against the would-be National Champ, Dan Holt.
Work obligations kept me from coming down most of the rest of the season. The one opportunity I had to make it down, I continued my Chariot race winning streak. I ended the year in 15th place overall out of 80+ racers. The highlight of the year was winning Team of the Year with Faster Mustache.
Team of the Year award. Photo Courtesy: Jon Woodroof | twotoneatl.com
Continue reading “2010 Cycling Season, Closeout”
The middle part of the season has been a busy one for me. I’ve competed in two major events at the velodrome and another three races on the road. I’ve very proud of my performances so far.
After the Keirin at Dick Lane Velodrome in May, a fellow rider Lucius Williams shot and edited an amazing video of the event. The first portion has several shots of me.
Instead of waiting until the end of the year and writing a single recap, I’m going to split this year up into three separate posts, the first of the year being this one.
My plan for this year is to again focus on track racing by taking what I’ve learned and built up last year and improve, to be one of the more competitive amateur racers at Dick Lane Velodrome. To help with this, and to make the racing more enjoyable, I’ve teamed up with Chris Kelly and Faster Mustache: Race. I’ve been friends with most of the team for many years, but finally decided to join the race team this year. The team attitude has kept me motivated to ride more and added a new level of tactics to racing.
My goals this year are to place consistently in the Pro Race Series events at Dick Lane and do exceptionally well in the Working Man’s Madison<. New this year to Dick Lane’s results are a separate team competition which combines team members’ points on Wednesday races throughout the year.
This last weekend was the first Pro Race Event and I rode fairly well. I recently upgraded to lighter, more aerodynamic wheels and I’m still adjusting to them. On the Friday night sprints, I matched my best 200 m time of 13.44 seconds, despite feeling slow. Additionally, well-played team tactics put my teammates Chris and Justin into 1st and 2nd positions in our 10 lap scratch race.
On Saturday’s omnium, I placed 8th overall and scored my first points in this event (I rode two such events last year). I can feel that I have a lot of improvements yet to make. With most of the season ahead of me, I’m excited about preparing for the rest of the year.
Going the distance at the track. Photo by John Woodruff.