Friday, May 28, 2010

Bike Maintenance...
The list is growing as we are only at the end of May and my goal to not spend money on bike maintenance has been thrown right out a large picture window.  After the soaking wet mud slog at the Cohutta 100 in April I have changed out brake rotors, disc brake pads, chain, bottom bracket bearings, headset bearings, shift cables, shift housing, repacked one front hub bearing(new set ordered) and now possibly some bearings on the pivots of my Epic's rear suspension.  I don't feel so bad about a few parts, but the Cohutta totally ate through my brakes like they were worn out before I started.  Front and rear were new on Scrub Rotors with organic pads before the start.  I quickly found out (I was aware before) that the wet conditions we faced that day were not good with my choice of braking material as the mud and grit from the race ripped the braking material from the backing plates.  This resulted in some God awful noises whenever I squeezed the rear lever trying to stop as my front brake was totally gone and the rear was pulsating as it heated up from being worn down at this time in the race to the backing plate.  Thankfully this all happened in the last ten miles of this 100 miler.  Last weekends Chequamegon 100 went without many parts/mechanical issues accept for the squeaking/creaking noises from my rear suspension pivots in certain gear combos and totally being dependent on my cadence.  It's always fun to find that sweet spot with shifting/cadence after you've been on a bike for nine hours and brain fade has started to cloud your already bad senses and motor skills!  In the end it all worked out and my bike held together as my selective hearing kicked in full throttle.  Thankfully I've mastered the selctive hearing skill from being married for twenty great years...  The rear suspension pivots are a maintenance project that I dread, but it is necessary evil after two hard years of long races on this bike in all sorts of conditions. It goes back to the old saying that I'm reminded of constantly by others, "if you're gonna play, you're gonna pay!"   If I didn't spend time and lots of money on this great hobby/lifestyle of mine, the money and time would go towards something else and to be totally honest with myself, it would be hard to top the sport of mountain biking.  Pedal on...

1 comment:

Jay said...

I think the selective hearing is from the selective head slaps from Laura.