Fit

"This is going to hurt."

That is the exact thought that went through my mind when the car, whose value was less than my wheels pulled out in front of me while I was descending a hill at 35 mph.  It was July 2011 and I was on my way to a family cook out on my wife's side.  In fact I'd just passed her aunt's house and was so looking forward to arriving at the party and getting in the pool.

Suffice to say our plans changed that day.

Madone 5.2 OCLV 2006, Shimano Dura-Ace gruppo, Bontrager Race XXX Lite components, this was a "real" Madone.  The year after this all Trek's were branded as Madone's.

There was nothing I could do except slam into the car.  I was wearing a cycling kit that day whose primary color was red.  The girl who hit me claimed that not only did she not see me, but that I did not attempt to brake.  Uh huh, that is what she said as written down in the police report.  I went into the driver side rear quarter panel, was thrown up and over the car and landed in the road.  Thankfully no one else hit me and a former ER nurse was one of the motorists who saw what happened and helped me.

I was lucky that day in many ways.  First and most important I lived.  Physics dictate that a cyclist will always lose against a car.  In my situation I lost but at the same time I won.  The end of my ring finger was broken and I quickly removed my wedding band so that it would not cause any issues.  I also got my HR strap off asap knowing they'd cut it off at the hospital.  And the only other injury was a nasty gash in my right knee that came within millimeters of the bursa layer.  Had that gash been deeper I'd have gone into surgery.  There was some minor road rash too.  Ultimately I walked out of the ER that day.  A win right there for me.

The second way I was lucky, was that the Concord, NH, Police Officers who arrived on scene understood the bicycle laws in NH and knew not only did I have the right of way, the right to take the lane based on my speed but that the motorist did not yield to me and just pulled out right in front of me - she was at fault.

Again all too often the police are ignorant of the law and side with motorists.  So much so that motorists can actually kill cyclists and get away with just a slap on the wrist.

The Madone 5.2 after the accident.  The steerer tube blew out the head tube.

The other way that I was lucky was that I took the wrecked frame to a Trek Store that actually knew about the product they sold.  The driver had a Progressive as an insurance carrier.  I'd had Progressive as my insurance carrier once and knew how cheap they were.  Something that was confirmed by an old friend of my mum who upon hearing about the accident warned me about them.  This person ran an auto body shop with her husband and had lots of first hand experience.

Let's put it this way, Progressive spends more on their commercials then they do on customer claims.

The Progressive rep first claimed she was a triathlete, a claim that seemed dubious when she scoffed at the total value/ cost of my Madone.  FYI, it was in excess of $10,000.  Now I did not buy it all built up like that, no, I upgraded parts over time to get it to what I wanted.  Then she went and used a NH bike shop, that has 3 locations - Concord, Nashua & ??? and it became apparent that the staff there did not know anything about the product they sold.  I wasn't surprised because the shop in question wasn't worth going too.  They've been around awhile, but that is all they have going for them.

So the Trek store had to argue that while yes Trek did make the 5.2, mine was closer to the 6.2 because it was made here in the states using the OCLV process and a bunch of other factors.  The rep stalled.  But then something happened.

The Adjuster Progressive sent to the Trek store saw the busted frame and said, out loud so everyone heard, "wow he's not in hospital."  That's right it wasn't a question, it was a statement of surprise.  After he left I got a call from the Trek store saying I should expect a check from Progressive soon.  I then got a call from the rep I was dealing with and she confirmed that.  Full value for the bike.

After that I dropped the ball when it came to the pain & suffering part of the compensation from them.  I ought to have fought for more, because they fought me on what I deserved and ultimately I took about the same amount I got for my bike.  I realize now I should have gotten double or triple that.  Not because it'd have been a pay day, but my life was worth more than my bike was.

So once that was all done and dusted and the check was in hand and cleared I got to have the most fun in bike shops ever.  I literally was able to get whatever I wanted and finally settled on a Cervelo S5.

Cervelo S5, base model frame, Zipp 404 wheels, SRAM Red grape, FSA K-Force Light Crank, 3T cockpit, Selle Italia saddle

When my wife & I got married we brought our bikes with us on the honeymoon.  On the way to Cape Cod we stopped off at Landry's Bicycles, Natick, Massachusetts, a bike shop I'd discovered the year before and had grown to love right away.  I'd recently bought a new saddle for the Madone and was having trouble with it.  The bike fit guy, Andy, helped me out and suggested I get a bike fit done, a real proper one.  So we scheduled one for the day we were coming home.  

At first, it felt weird riding in the new position that Andy put me in, but then something happened.  It became natural to me and I noticed a subtle change in my power output and performance.  Well when I got the S5 I knew that I'd also get a bike fit.  Andy had upped his game in the interim and had some new tools and toys with which to fit a rider to their bike.  

One of the items he now used was a pad that an individual sat on and mapped their sit bones.  It's how I choose the saddle in the picture above and as a result something marvelous happened.

By the time I got the S5 it had been nearly 2 months since I'd been off the bike.  My weight had gone up due to stress eating and because I had to let my body heal I'd not done any gym work.  I rode 75 miles that first day.  My wife played the roll of sag wagon that day.   I rode as far as I could and then had her come get me.  I hurt all over except one place - my ass.  That saddle fitting meant I got the right saddle for me and thus it supported me where I needed it, etc. etc.

Whenever I see cyclists on group rides that are shaking their hands out or shifting etc on the saddle I know they haven't gotten a bike fit.  They just set it up the way that someone thought it should be set up.  There's an old school mentality about slamming the stem so there is no space between it and the frame - like how most pros bikes are set up.  IT looks cool, but not everyone can ride in that extreme a position nor should they. 

The point of a bike fit is to maximize your position to get it dialed in as best as possible, while still maintaining your maximum power.  I've had Andy update my position a few times.  The first was when I put aero-bars on the S5.  April - October, the S5 is a commuter rig and I wanted to get to work as quick as possible, so having aero bars meant I could get into a Time Trial position and be more aero and faster.  Well I had to have Andy adjust my position to account for those bars and to make sure I was aero as I could be and still put out power.

Thanks to Andy I found out that one leg was shorter than the other.  That's another thing the bike fit helped with and explained why for the longest time I could not ride without holding the bars.  One result of the bike fit was I could now ride sans handlebars because I was completely balanced on the bike.

In the spring of 2015 I went and visited a chiropractor who got my legs to within millimeters of one another and I've done a lot of work since to close that gap.  So Andy adjusted my fit again and it got me lower.

Here I am at Landry's Natick, Andy is off to my right looking at the monitors I am looking at, he's got 2 cameras pointed at me.  My wife is taking the picture and took note of the gal behind me checking my back side out...

Cycling is expensive and I am always stunned by the folks who will spend thousands on wheels, frames, etc.  Yet, will still adhere to old school notions of how a bike should look.  Or they balk at spending a few hundred to get fit.  The bike fit was the best money I have ever spent.  And now as my wife is looking to get a bike this spring, her getting fit is not even a question.

If you have more than one bike and are fit to both, then it's amazing you don't even notice a difference when you ride them.

Since I started taking Pure Vitamin Club Magenesium my flexibility has increased A LOT.  No seriously it has.  Since I saw that Chiro, I've been doing the flexibility stuff she prescribed, but I was literally stuck at a certain point.  But now I can actually  get into child's pose.  So perhaps later this year I'll pay another visit to Andy and see if I can get lower.  It's all about next steps...

Call & Response

My lovely wife has of late become something of a blogger.  Her writing is fantastic.  No really it is, everyone that reads her work says that first thing after finishing her latest offering.  The most recent work delves into what it is like to be married to an avid cyclist.  Although not sure if she uses the word avid, but that's a key descriptor.

She had me hooked long before I found out the night we met that she wanted to do triathlon.  Right away I could see she was funny, smart & beautiful.  And that she had a horse was not a problem whatsoever, because horses are probably just as expensive as cycling can be.  So it made arguments for expensive wheels, all that much easier.

I loved what she wrote and told her as much and that I would do a point by point response to what she offered up.

And with that....

1. Your weekends are probably already planned.  Yep, they usually are.  During the cold months of winter that weekend planning also comes with a stalker like obsession with local weather forecasts.  What's the temperature going to be?  Will it snow on Friday?  Who can watch the kids if need be, etc.  Come spring through fall it's more about planning as it pertains to how many layers are needed and if a rain coat will be tucked into the jersey.

And yes, charity rides will often involve food of some variety at the end of the ride.  In fact you can often judge charity rides based on the food found at the end.  Moreover, I have not gone back to charity rides because of the food they did not offer but had promised.  Food matters to cyclists...

2.  Your pantry will get weird.  Yes you might have big ass jugs of electrolyte sports drink on your fridge for eternity.  But at the same time your pantry might start to resemble something that you wouldn't think it would.  The traditional view of edurance athletes like cyclists or runners needing carbs, carb, carbs, CARBS - is old, outdated information.  Fat is where it is at.

Look at Joe Friel the go to standard for triathlete training, he's paleo and co-authored The Paleo Diet for Athletes.  Or look to Vinnie Tortorich and his podcast, that is free and available via iTunes.  His cohost Anna Vocino has a wicked excellent no sugar no grain cookbook Eat Happy.  Robb  Wolf, Chris Kresser and Loren Cordain are all experts in the field of ancestral health/ functional medicine and talk of and write about how grains & sugars are not the right food for humans to fuel our daily lives.

Fat is what we should be doing to fuel our bodies.  When I was fat adapted I could do a hundred mile ride, eat a meal post ride (steak, veg) and be ready to rock another ride the next day as well as finish strong on the day of the event I'm doing.  Cliff Bars and Powerbars never did that for me - ever.

In 2012 not only did I discover paleo and dropped a crap ton of weight, which saw me tip the scales at a weight lower than that I was at when I got my driver's license in 1992, but my performance on the bike shot up.  So we'll have lots of stuff like sweet potato, bacon, avocado, hamburg, eggs, steak, nuts, etc.  And I'll skip the bread and pasta.

And before you say I can't get rid of bread or pasta!!!  I'm of Italian descent, holiday dinners at the massive rectangular table at my grandparents involved pasta.  I love pasta, but that doesn't mean I need it.

3. The bikes will mysteriously multiply. The formula n+1, where n represents the number of bikes one currently owns is accurate.  However, one thing my wife didn't get to really was that different bikes have different purposes.  For instance I did have a cyclo-cross bike for a bit due to the dirt roads we lived on being impassable in the winter on skinny 23mm road tires.  Last spring I got the bike I plan to use to do the Mt. Washington Auto Road Hillclimb next summer.  The road bike I had prior to this new bike was a bit too heavy even after the component upgrades.  Whereas if all goes well this new bike will be sub 14lbs once it is completely built up the way I want it.

4. They will get hurt.  Yes this is true.  Invest in a good helmet and replace it every two years.  Maybe that is a manufacturer's standard so that you're constantly buying something from them.  But I look at it like an investment in your safety.  Plus it's a Styrofoam liner and that will break down overtime after baking in the sun.

And don't pull the "well I didn't use one as a kid."  If you are even close to my age, you never used a cell phone, dvd player, bluetooth, blu-ray player or the internet as a kid.  I see guys (it is always guys) that are older than me, that probably use that logic but will gladly use other cycling gear improvements like clipless pedals for instance.

It's also true that we will inform our spouses, partners, etc what the status of our bike is before we say what our condition is.

Pro tip:  If you experience road rash, stand in the shower and wet down the bandages first to remove them more easily.

5.The gear is not cheap.  No it is not, but then you want to be comfortable and perform well.  However thanks to the internet you can often find wicked good deals.  The tires you prefer may cost $80/ tire, but you can find them for $35 - WIN!

And some of us are willing to spend hundreds to shave a few grams off the weight of a part of the entire bike.  Those folks are weight weenies.  It's mental, all mental because bigger performance gains can be garnered by dropping body weight.  That being said, you want the best you can get.  For instance the aforementioned new bike has a carbon fiber bar due to the natural vibration dampening effect that carbon fiber has, but the stem is aluminum because the weight difference was a few grams, but several hundred dollars in price.  Next month I'll have a new crankset put on that is expensive but very light and stiff, which is something you want as it means all that force & power you are putting out actually goes into propelling the bike.

Also, if you are gonna drop thousands on a bike, then spend a few hundred to get a professional bike fit.  And whatever you do, don't listen to the moron who says you gotta slam that stem.  Yes it looks cool, but you may or may not be as flexible as the pros and the best position for you isn't going to be the same as the moron who is more than likely ill fit to their bike.  Numb tingling body parts should not occur - it means your set up is not set up properly.

Pro tip: Get a saddle fit.  After the car hit me (as referenced in the blog) I was off the bike for 2 months.  First ride out I did 75 miles and the only thing that did not hurt was my backside because I had a bike fit done that mapped out my sit bones and a saddle was chosen based on that.

6. Tools, tools everywhere.  There are some repairs that are easier said than done.  But that being said, if I can save some dough by doing easy things then I will.   If you have a carbon frame then you'll want a torque wrench, a good one, that has a digital readout.  If you over tighten carbon it will crack and if like me you'll then go through several seat posts/ masts over the course of a few years...

7. Data overload.  Yup, I was the only senior in my high school geometry class full of freshman and sophomores.  As an undergrad I was able to handle statistics.  So there is something to the notion that if the subject is applicable you can do the math, so while I couldn't do it in high school I can somehow do it now.

8. Cars.  I grew up in the 1980s and during that time we didn't use helmets and I would ride my bike to work every day and pretty much every where all hours of the day without lights at night through a summer resort community full of terrible drivers from Quebec & Massachusetts.  Where traffic was so heavy it could take 45 minutes to move 1/2 mile in a car.  I have a healthy respect for cars and understand that physics dictate the car will win everytime.

That being said I am not opposed to confronting a shitty driver or calling the cops on one.  I play a game where I recite random license plates as a memory exercise.  Looking over my shoulder frequently is a habit I do as well so that I am not surprised by a car.  I use a blinking tail light and head lights in the spring when I ride in to work early.

A lot of cyclists now use GoPros mounted on their helmet or bikes to record their rides and errant behavior of motorists.  The reason we have to do this, is because sadly a lot of cops will side with the motorist even if it is apparent the motorist is at fault.  Thankfully in my case when I was hit, the cops who arrived on scene understood the law and my rights and faulted the driver.

Cyclists have the same rights as drivers do and with that comes the responsibility to ride responsibly.  Nothing irritates me more than some moronic ass hat running a red light or doing some other egregious behavior on a bike and irritating a motorist who doesn't differentiate between cyclists.  We are all the same to them.

9. The mess.  Yep, many a time I have come home soaking wet covered in grit or post ride wiped down my chain and cassette and come up with greasy hands.  You do an outside sport were there are no rain days you are gonna come home messy at times.  Bikes are not fine china, get out and ride if its above 40 and raining regardless of the weather.

10. You will be recruited.  And that recruitment can vary from following us to take some photos for an essay contest to win a bike or as a possible support vehicle for a ride of ridiculous length.

And finally here's one last point.

Cyclists are inherently lazy, sure we have no qualms riding 100 miles in a day, but will do whatever we can to remain stationary once on the couch.  Have our 6 yr old go grab a can of seltzer - sure.  The adage among the pros is why stand when you can sit and why sit when you can lay down....