Simulation Bootcamp

I feel like I've been at simulation bootcamp at work for the past few days... weeks... Lots of analyses to run, lots of new problems to solve. The good news is that I'm learning a lot. The bad news is that I'm working too much...

Healing

Well, my knee is back to where it was a couple weeks ago (before I started riding again). It feels more-or-less normal during most activities, but it's still sore to ride at all. I've been practicing some of my Gene drills in the driveway, and I notice a little pain doing that, even though the pedaling is minimal.

My plan is to take it very easy on my knee for another week, and then start to gradually introduce a little more activity. I've been using this time to stretch, work on core and upper body strength, and practice some bike-handling drills. Things have also been very busy at work, so it's just as well that I'm not trying to stay in shape for racing.

2010 Season Review

Well, after being fairly sore for 4 days after my last bit of riding, I've decided to pull the plug on this year's season. I could probably continue to ride a little, but I don't think I can push hard enough to race. From what I've gathered, these bone bruises can take months to heal. Not fun.

So, the 2010 season was kind of a dud. The mountain bike season ended up being short (3 races!) and unspectacular. I got off to a late start and didn't really get in good race shape until the last race of the year (Addison Oaks), and by that point, I was already on to my current injury, I just didn't know it. Still, I moved up to Expert, and at Addison, I beat several people and felt really good, so I know I can hang with the Expert guys. I also had a really good time at the Tree Farm Relay.

'Cross season ended up being one race. I actually rode OK, given that I'd just gotten back from Europe the day before. I need to work on the setup of my new bike a little though. I'm not satisfied with the position of my hoods, and my brake setup isn't quite right yet.

So, rather than dwell on 2010, I'm going to look to 2011. For next year, the key has to be maintaining some consistency. The injuries just killed me this year, although the second one was kind of a freak thing. I'm optimistic that next year will be much better than this year.

Linden CX

No, I didn't race today, but I went out to watch the B race anyway. The weather was perfect and the course looked fun. It made me wish I was racing.

(Mark Caffyn... so fast he's blurry...)

On the other hand, my knee got achey after just pushing the kids around in the stroller this afternoon, so it's probably better that I didn't; I'd hardly be able to walk tomorrow.

Not Quite There

Well, I rode a few times this week with mixed results.

On Monday, I did a nice easy spin through the neighborhood and then a little backyard 'cross practice. The knee felt more-or-less OK, but not perfect. To top it off, I crashed in the backyard going like 2mph. I was making a tight turn from my patio to the yard when my rear tire skipped over a rock, and somehow caused me to fall. Of course, I fell to the same side as my bruised knee. As I was falling, I tried to pull my knee in as much as I could, so I took most of it on my hip. Still, not a good way to get restarted.

I felt terrible on Tuesday night, like I was getting a cold, so I didn't ride. It rained Wednesday night, so I rode the trainer in the basement. I went harder, maybe too hard, and the knee was a little achey afterward, but still not too bad.

Last night, I met up with some Rhinos at Indian Springs and rode the paved trail. I figured it would be a relatively easy ride and a good chance to loosen things up. Frankly, after not riding for the better part of three weeks, I just need to spend time doing anything on my bike. Anyway, my knee didn't feel so hot at first, but it seemed to get better as I kept riding. It was a little cold and rainy, which probably didn't help.

Today, my knee was fairly sore in the area where I bruised it. It felt kind of bad this morning, but it seems to have gotten better as the day has gone on.

So I'm really on the fence about what to do: there are just over 7 weeks left in the season. I could try to push through it, or I could stop now. I don't see how I could rest another couple weeks or so and still hope to do anything at the last races, at least not with all the time I've already missed.

Probably the smart thing to do is to stop for now, but I haven't convinced myself yet...

So Far, So Good

It's been a slow recovery from my trip. There was lots of work waiting for me at work and at home when I got back.

My knee has been feeling pretty good, but I resisted the temptation to ride over the weekend. Today officially marks two weeks of rest (or at least, not riding), so I'm going to try to get on the bike tonight and do an easy spin and see how it feels. If all goes well, I'll get back to riding a normal schedule this week. Unfortunately, I'm sure that my fitness level has dropped over the past 3-4 weeks, so it will be a rough comeback.

I did a little light exercise on Saturday and did the FMS test for the first time in a long time. Surprisingly, the movements that I spent a lot of time working on over the Winter and Spring were still pretty good. The ones that I hadn't worked on as much were not so good.

I played hockey for the first time in a long time last night. I actually skated OK, but I felt a little sluggish and my puck-handling was very rusty. This is early in the season for the group I skated with, so everyone else seemed a bit slow too.

Europe, Part 2

My second trip to Europe (in three weeks!) didn't go as smoothly as the first. I got off to a bad start when my flight out of Detroit was significantly delayed. It caused me to miss my connection to Europe, so I got rebooked. I ended up flying from Detroit to Atlanta to Paris to Nice. That's a long day... to top it off, my luggage didn't show up when I did!

Once I was actually in Monaco, things were fine. The weather was nice (so much nicer than the cold, rainy day I left in Detroit). I had a good time with my colleagues from Germany in the evenings, although I definitely drank too much beer.

I had more time to poke around Monaco on this trip. I walked around most of the Formula 1 course, spent some more time around the palace area, saw the casino, etc.

Working in Monaco is definitely different. It felt a little odd to walk by a Ferrari / high-end Mercedes dealer on my way to the plant every day. It also seems like the place really clears out at night and on the weekend, at least in the non-touristy spots. I found out that all but a few of the people that work in our plant live farther away in France or Italy.

I stayed there over the weekend. On Saturday, I took the train to Nice and met one of my other colleagues. He took me around the old city; we visited with his sister who sells vegetables at the market. Then we went to the climbing gym his club is working on and spent the rest of the day there. Even though I was working (helping to hang drywall on the ceiling and putting together pieces of the wall), it was still kind of fun. Definitely interesting to see how people live away from the tourist areas.

Since I'd been up late almost every night of the trip, I slept in until noon on Sunday. I walked around Monaco a bit and then went to a soccer match being played at the municipal stadium. It's still not clear to me whether these guys were good amateurs or not-so-good professionals. Anyway, it was fun, but I got pretty cooked in the sun. (The woman selling tickets exposed my nearly non-existent French, "Trois euros". Between having to stop and think about what she said and my unfamiliarity with the currency, it took me a while to buy the ticket. She was nice though.)

On Monday night we left for Paris. My air travel woes continued. The plane we were supposed to take had been hit by lightning on the way to Nice. After some delay, they decided that the damage was too significant and it shouldn't fly again. So, we took a later flight and ended up arriving in Paris very late. At least this time, my hotel room was much nicer.

Tuesday morning was my customer meeting and then I flew back home in the afternoon. To get the later flight out of Paris, I had to connect to Detroit via Montreal. Turns out that connecting through Canada is just like making an international connection through the US (actually worse). You have to get your bags, go through customs, then go back through ticketing and security, and, as I found out the next morning, US customs. So, I had no chance to make my connection, even if I'd carried my bag. I ended up spending the night in Montreal and then I took a 5:30am flight home. Yikes!

Setbacks

I ended up picking up a cold last week. Not too surprising given my trip and racing.

I felt more or less better by the weekend, so I took my CX bike out to the club's beginner MTB ride at Bald Mountain. It turned out to be more fun than I thought to ride that bike on the trail. Yeah, it was pretty sketchy a few times, and I'm shocked that I didn't get a flat (40psi on the rear tire), but it was definitely fun to ride. I should probably do that a bit more in the Fall.

The downside to the ride was that I discovered that my knee was still messed up from my fall at the cross clinic. It was very painful that night (probably working around the house all day didn't help). I ended up going to the doctor on Monday. He said that I most likely have a contusion (bruise) on the bone. He had it x-rayed just to make sure it wasn't fractured (it's not). Prescription: quit riding for a couple weeks! I have to agree, every time I've ridden since I fell seems to have set me back.


Also, I'm heading back to Europe this week for work: Monaco and Paris. I can't complain too much about traveling to Monaco. I'd wanted to rent a bike in Monaco and go ride in the mountains, but, given my knee, I'll have to find something else.

So, I'll miss the Munson CX race; I'm also not planning to make the trip down to Cincinnati for the UCI race. Kind of a bummer...

Waterford CX

I went to bed Saturday night not sure if I would race Sunday or not. At some point during the middle of the night, I decided that I would. I figured that my body was already used to getting up early, so why not?

After having not ridden for a week, I had no idea what to expect from my body. As it turned out, racing wasn't so terrible. I actually felt halfway decent for the first lap, but things got rough and I wanted to quit after that. So, really about normal for a cyclocross race!

My only big disappointment was that I was pretty terrible over the barriers. Getting that thought in my head during the race didn't help either. Anyway, that will clean up as I start riding and practicing more regularly again.

I ended up 13th out of 30. Basically about how I usually do. Really not too bad considering...

Europe, Part 1

Almost immediately after finishing the Addison race, I headed out for a business trip to Europe. My knee ended up getting pretty sore and stiff on the plane, but it improved as the week went on.

First stop was Ketsch, Germany. Basically not too much around there, but the hotel was nice and everything went pretty smoothly.

From Ketsch, we took a high-speed train to Paris. I'd been on a high-speed train once before in Japan, but that time, we were in an artificial "canyon" the whole time, so it was really hard to get a sense of the speed. On this train, we were more out in the open, so you got a better sense of how fast it was. Anyway, it was pretty cool.

Apparently, there was a big fashion expo in Paris the night I was there, so hotels were hard to come by. The one we stayed at wasn't so nice... the bed was on the floor (no box spring, bed frame, etc). There was no chair, just a stool. Cleanliness of the carpet was a little suspect. As it turned out, the biggest annoyance was a running toilet. It refilled loudly about every 2 minutes. I ended up sleeping with earplugs in.

I didn't get a chance to spend much time in Paris... that's how business trips go. But I did at least get to see the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe, even if only from the car. That made it better than the last time I was in Paris...

Last stop was Monaco (yes, my company has a plant in Monaco). The weather wasn't so great while I was there, but Monaco was otherwise pretty nice. It's a different world there. The yachts were bigger than I expected... some were easily bigger than my house. I also saw lots of nice cars... Ferrari's, Lamborghini's, you name it... I didn't get to spend much time there either before heading home.

The flight home was a little tense. My flight out of Nice was delayed and I ended up having to run through the Frankfurt airport to catch my flight home.

So, one week, no exercise (except the aforementioned airport jog), and the 2nd Waterford Hills cyclocross race the next day. Sounds good...

Addison Oaks XC

It was a busy weekend for me. Saturday was the FRCC cross clinic. I almost decided not to go to the instructional part, but I decided that I could always learn something. I ended up picking up a couple of interesting points. Mostly detail stuff, but still worthwhile.

It started raining pretty hard near the end of the instructional part of the clinic. While we were doing some relatively slow laps of the course, I fell pretty hard on my knee. I'm not sure if the bike hit my kneecap or my kneecap hit a rock/root, but it was pretty painful.

At that point, we still had an hour or so to wait until the race. I decided to head home instead of waiting in the cold / rain. Particularly considering that I was going to race my mountain bike on Sunday and then come to Europe. It was a good call I think, I didn't realize how cold I was until I got in the shower at home.

I wasn't really keyed up for the race at Addison on Sunday morning. I knew I was leaving for my trip in the afternoon and my knee was still sore. With regard to the knee: I hoped it would feel better once I warmed up. I also figured I wouldn't hurt it any worse by racing. It seemed like it was just the bruise on the surface that was the problem, rather than anything internal.

My first lap of the race was pretty rough. It seemed like I was physically going OK, but my bike handling wasn't sharp. I also got held up a couple times passing some of the Expert women. They were riding fine, I just caught them at some inopportune times. In the process, two of the guys I figured I should be able to beat got well ahead of me.

The first part of my second lap was about the same, except my knee started to hurt. I tried to assess what was going on while riding. Again, it still seemed like it was just the bruise, so I kept going. Near the end of my second lap, I started feeling good about my handling, so that helped my mood considerably.

From that point on, I physically started feeling strong and I felt like my handling was getting better. Then, I started reeling people in and dropping them. It was pretty cool. I've never gotten stronger during the race like I did on Sunday. I attribute it to the good base I've built up this year.

There were also a lot of Rhinos out spectating on the course (John, Paulie, Andrea, maybe more...). Their cheering definitely kept me fired up.

My lap times basically confirmed what I felt. My first lap was the fastest and my second lap was the slowest. But my third and fourth laps were only about 15s slower than my first lap! Maybe that means I could/should have started harder, but I think a lot of the gain had to do with my improved handling and confidence in the later laps.

Anyway, it turned out to be a good race for me. I ended up 15th out of the 18 finishers in my class, which was an improvement over my placement at Pontiac Lake (DFL). The bruise on my knee definitely got more sore (especially on the airplane!), but it hasn't turned into anything too bad.

Many Dimensions of Hosed

There are many dimensions of being hosed:

- I foolishly rode on Saturday morning without knee warmers (I did embrocate though!) in 55F degree weather, up hills, for 3.5 hours. Which helped lead to my next two problems.

- My knees have been a bit achey the past several days, although they seem to be coming around now.

- I seem to be fighting off a cold. My legs felt terrible at the track last night, and I started feeling a bit sick after I got home. I decided not to ride to work today (or do a short-track race tonight), and I seem to be feeling a bit better.

- I've gone on a couple VERY short runs, also probably not ideal for my knees, but again, they do seem to be getting back to normal. It's amazing how crappy my legs feel after running even a little while.

- I'm going to be going to Europe next week. It's kind of a cool itinerary (middle-of-nowhere Germany, Paris, Nice/Monaco), but since it's a work trip, its coolness will probably be limited. I'll also be getting home on Saturday, meaning I'll miss the first cyclocross race of the year. I sort of doubt that I'll want to race on Sunday, but we'll see. I don't think I'll have to travel anymore this year though.

Field Test

I seemed to be mostly recovered from my "training camp" by Sunday. The Stony Creek XC race was also Sunday, but I decided that racing for 2+ hours probably wasn't the best idea; for whatever reason, I also just had no desire to race... maybe I've raced there too much over the past few years. I don't know.

Anyway, I decided to do a LT field test instead; still a hard effort, but much shorter. Even though the basement was a little hot, I still made a pretty good effort. I ended up producing my second best ever power number (my best ever at this point in a season), so I was very happy with that.

My heart rate was on the low side again though, and I'm really not sure what to make of it. Prior to this year, my average heart rate was consistently around 186bpm for these tests. This year, it's been noticeably lower, yesterday was 179bpm. I definitely pushed to my limit, so that wasn't the issue. I suppose I could put it down to the general variability of heart rate, fatigue from my riding earlier in the week, etc, but it seems like my previous tests were so consistent... I don't know. I'm not going to lose sleep over it, but I would like to find an explanation.

The other thing that cropped up again (which may be related to HR) was that I had trouble finding a good gear to ride in. The same thing happened last Fall. Seemed like I had to spin the gear that I used for most of the test a little too fast, but the next gear was a little too hard on my legs. I see now that there is a 2-tooth step between the gears I was using, so that partially explains it.

It seems to me like, if you're not in an optimal gear, you may not be able to hit your "correct" threshold heart rate because you're not really hitting your threshold power.

It's funny that I get all hung up on these numbers when I do the tests. Most of the time, my only "training tool" is a stopwatch (and a GPS if I'm on unfamiliar roads). As it is, my HRM is pretty low-end, and my "power meter" is a calibrated trainer... so, it's probably best not to get too carried away with this stuff...

Change Those Cables!

As a matter of course, I usually change the cables and housings on all of my bikes in the Spring. I did it on my mountain bike this year, but not my cross bike, since I was thinking about getting a new one.

So, everything was fine until a month or so ago, when I could no longer shift into the big ring. "No problem" I thought, probably just cable stretch or something a little out of adjustment. Once I got home I took a harder look. Hmm... seemed like the shifter wasn't pulling any cable... not good.

I didn't do anything with it for a couple weeks, hoping that I didn't need to replace the shifter itself ($$$). Finally, I got a chance to work on it again yesterday. Turns out that wires from the cable housing were getting sucked into the shifter (how that even happens, I have no idea), but once the wires got in there far enough, they jammed things up pretty good.

So, after a quick trip to the bike shop for new cables and housings, the bike is back to working normally. So, change those cables!

Summer Training Camp

I did a little "Summer training camp" last week. My family rented a cottage in Pentwater last week, and I took my bike and rode in the mornings.

Day 1 - A little over 3 hours in the saddle. I did some "cruise intervals" during the second hour of the ride. I ended up on some good roads that had lots of nice rolling hills. One thing that the map doesn't show is all of the wind! Inland, there was a pretty strong wind from the North, and then, as I got closer to the lake, the wind seemed like it was more from the West. Definitely some tough going in spots where I was out in farmland and had no protection. This ended up being my toughest ride.


Day 2 - Almost 4 hours in the saddle, although not by design. Much less windy than the day before and I took it a bit easier. The directions I was following, from MapMyRide, had some errors. They showed me going over some dirt roads and some places where there were no roads! I muddled my way through, but I did end up on some very sandy dirt roads. The sand was deep enough in places that I had to get off and walk. A narrow road tire at 80psi just sinks too deep in the sand to ride it! I saw lots of pumpkin fields while I was out there, which was kind of interesting. It was mostly a good ride, but I didn't particularly enjoy riding back down to Pentwater along the lake. The road was just too narrow and rough and there was a little too much traffic.



Day 3 - About 2.5 hours in the saddle, and Dad rode with me. This ended up being the hilliest ride I did; we also put in a 50 minute "tempo" effort in the middle. There was a tour in the area the weekend before, and there were a couple signs painted on the road. My favorite was "Climb Time" just before a tough little climbing section... hey, when you're tired, the little things are funny. The tempo effort was pretty good for me; I probably need to do that type of training on the road more. Dad did a good job hanging with me too!

In general, it was a good week of riding. The roads were good (and hilly), and most people around there seem to be used to people on bikes. I only had one incident where someone passed me too close, and then Dad and I had another when someone (who presumably misjudged our speed) pulled out in front of us and we had to brake hard. I was pretty tired by the end of the trip though. We also went to bed late most nights and the kids were up early, so that was kind of a tough combination. Still, I think I will appreciate that little training block when cyclocross season heats up.

Standing

I've been working a bit on my standing pedaling lately. It's kind of a long story, but I want to try standing more over short climbs and see if it doesn't help my overall speed.

Interestingly, almost as soon as I started working on this again, my left knee started feeling just a little off and my IT band has been tighter again. This is the same knee I injured this Spring. I had also been working on standing pedaling at that time. (On the other hand, I've also ridden 9.5 hours over the past 5 days, so that may have something to do with it.)

From a number of different articles and talking to different people, I understand that proper standing technique is to keep the back straight/arched (not rounded) and hips over the pedals. I doubt that I consistently do this, at least not the back straight part. The articles suggest that, if your back is rounded, you don't effectively use the muscles in the hips and glutes, and you end up recruiting other muscles, like the IT band. Which, in my case, I know can lead to the knee issue.

PLRA XC: Crashfest 2010

OK, so maybe "crashfest" is an overstatement, but I did have some of the biggest crashes I've had this year. I'm definitely feeling the effects today...

I didn't really have any expectations for the race. I was hoping my legs would feel halfway decent, and I was hoping I didn't have to go into "survival mode" too early. I also didn't want to finish last.

The pace was pretty high off the start, but not unmanageable. I was doing fine sticking with the back part of the field. I could immediately see how the Expert racers were different. Everyone basically rides well, and everyone knows how to pass and be passed. It's nice.

In the first part of the race, I was riding around a group of four. It looked like I was stronger on the climbs and flats, and they were stronger technical riders. On the first lap, I'd made a gap to some of them before the second half of the trail. Then, my first crash: a pretty easy sweeping left-hander and my bike just washed out. I'm pretty sure it was a case of leaning my body too much relative to my bike. I fell pretty hard on my left hip, but it didn't bother me right away. By the end of the first lap, our little group was back together. (Now that I look at the results, these guys must not have all been in my class.)

We eventually all split up again on the second lap. A couple guys went ahead, but I knew I still had one guy well behind me. I was still feeling more-or-less OK for most of the second lap, but I could feel my hip starting to get sore.

I was getting pretty tired early on the third lap and I was basically riding alone. The last time up "2-mile hill" put the hurt on me and I wasn't thinking very clearly coming down the descent. I got target fixation on a decent-sized rock on the trail (my brain was just going "rock, rock, rock")... with predictable results. I bashed into the rock; I must have also been on the brakes, because I went over the bars and off the trail. I sat there for a couple seconds trying to figure out if I was hurt. Eventually I realized that I wasn't, so I took off again.

The last crash took a lot of the fight out of me, and I was basically in survival mode for the rest of the lap. With about 3 miles to go, the guy who'd been behind me for so long finally caught and passed me. Pretty much nothing I could do about it at that point. So I ended up being the last finisher in our class.


Even with the crashes and bad result, I still felt pretty good about the race. I rode OK and my legs felt the best that they have in weeks. I think, as my fitness progresses, that I should be able move up a bit in the field. The main thing that I noticed was that, even though I'm riding better, there are still sections of the trail where I'm not as confident and slow down. It was clear to me that this is where huge gaps were opening up. I'm not fit enough right now to close those gaps down, at least not so many times per lap for three laps.

Mixed Progress

A lot of mountain bikers from the club met at Pontiac Lake to ride last night. My plan was to get there early and ride one lap alone, and then ride two with the group. As I mentioned in my last post, I also wanted to (gently) push against my boundaries a little.

I felt like I ended up doing a pretty decent job of staying relaxed and letting the bike roll through some of the faster parts. There are still a few sections / corners where I have mental hang-ups, but, in general, I rode better and still felt in control. I need to keep practicing my Gene drills though; the corners go so much better when you use the correct technique!

We split the group in two and I rode with the faster group. The pace was a little faster than I expected, but I was doing OK. It was interesting to follow. It seemed like any trouble I had keeping up was due to fitness. No offense to these guys, but they are not necessarily super-strong riders (of course, I'm not either), so I was a little surprised that they were pulling away on the flats. Of course, with my knee injury this Spring, my fitness is nowhere near where it should be. Last year, which also wasn't a particularly good year, I'd been riding for 17 weeks before the PLRA XC race; this year, it will only be 9 weeks!

One of the downsides to riding the technical parts faster is that you have to be a little bit more careful about what you ride over (or how you do it), since you tend to hit things harder. I was riding through a big dip when I felt (and heard) my rear wheel bottom out hard on a sharp rock on the way back up. Not good. A minute or so later, I could feel that the tire had gone soft. My first flat in 2.5 years with my Stan's setup. I put my spare tube in and tried to pump that up... but the tube was bad too. By this time, the "slow" group had caught me, and John let me borrow his tube. That one worked, but it ended up being a super slow tire change.

Everyone else was only riding one lap, and without an extra tube, I decided it probably wasn't the best idea to go out for a third lap. So, I'll have to re-seal my tire before the race on Sunday. I may decide to run with a little extra pressure; I was only at 28 psi or so. I'm sure I could bump it up a little without changing the handling too much.

Confidence Gap

"You may think you believe what you know, but you really only believe what you feel."
- Malcolm Gladwell

For whatever reason, I had the realization the other day that I'm probably riding noticeably below my skill level. I've worked on my riding skills a lot over the last year and a half, but my actual riding hasn't necessarily kept up. I'm not sure if it's due to riding alone, habit, not racing or what, but I've gotten to the point where I'm rarely stressed by the trails I ride. I know for sure that I often hit the brakes when I don't need to (I get through the corner and think "gee, I didn't need to slow down that much"). I'm much more comfortable on descents than I used to be. I can pretty comfortably ride over the trail obstacles around here.

Although I still have plenty of room for improvement skill-wise, I also believe, in my gut, that I'm much better than I'm showing.

So, for now, it seems like I'm bumping up against a confidence ceiling rather than a skill ceiling. I'm planning to get in several mountain bike rides this week (including my first Expert race at Pontiac Lake). I think the plan will be to try to relax, have a fun attitude, and let it rip.

I've been thinking back to my car racing / karting days recently. My mantra for squeezing out more speed was: "Relax, look ahead, be smooth."

Trip and Tubulars

The trip to Boston went much better than I expected. The kids did well as could be expected in the car and at night, so it was about as relaxing as it was going to get.

When I got back, I was suprised to see an email that we were starting cyclocross practice at the track this week! Cyclocross already? Really?

So, I packed up the new bike and took it to the track last night. I brought my tubular tires and wheels to try out with the new bike. I had a fleeting thought that I should really check the glue, but I'd already aired up the tires so I didn't.

Things went OK at the track. Between the heat and not having ridden in a week, I didn't feel so great, but I managed. The SRAM drivetrain worked OK with the Shimano cassette, maybe just a little noisier when shifting to the bigger cogs. I still need to get used to the shifting though. I found myself not shifting when I should have just because I wasn't confident with it. A few times I tried to shift to an easier gear when I was already in the biggest cog, which resulted in going to a harder one... not nice!

Otherwise, I really liked the bike. The handling seemed quicker than my old bike; this was one of the main reasons I chose the Salsa over the Bianchi that I tried. The carbon fork also seemed to help damp out some of the vibration from the always-bumpy surface at Waterford.

Right near the end of the night, I was trying to make a fast tight corner around a tree when my front wheel slid out. It was a small crash, so I hopped right back on the bike and got going again. Then I could hear something thumping on my bike. I got back off and spun the front wheel, it went halfway around and stopped. The tire had partially rolled off the rim and was hitting the brakes. I popped it back on and kept going. Knowing that the glue was suspect, I didn't push hard for the rest of the night. So, now I've rolled my first tubular. It really wasn't too big of a deal, but I'll get them re-glued before I use them again.