Road Cycling

Soldato
Joined
14 Nov 2002
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Under the Hill
My Wahoo Elemnt Bolt bundle arrived today after snagging a deal for £215. I will have fun with it later. Last thing left to do is switch my tyres to tubeless. That's a job for this evening, hopefully not too painful!
 
Associate
Joined
19 May 2005
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2,414
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Belgium
Any suggestions for a cheapish wheel upgrade for my Genesis CDF? Currently looking at the Hunt 4 Season disc but wondering if there was anything around a little cheaper? Mainly used for commuting and cobbles ideally having range from 28c > 35c!
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Mar 2008
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9,180
Has anyone got the Decathlon Road 900 bibshorts?
I'm after a decent value-for-money option and generally for sports gear I 've found it more efficient just to buy the best option in anything Decathlon do.

I've got some Rapha shorts (3/4 cyclocross - which I used for commuting) , which are great, but I dont get out on the bike enough to make it worth the investment buying their regular shorts.

I've got some Sportful bibs which are great but a bit too slippery - I slide off the saddle.

So, has anyone got the B'twins? Would like to know if there's any reason not to just go for those.

Anyone that is interested in some very high quality cycling gear - https://spexcel.aliexpress.com/store/2219030

I bought some bibs and also a wind/water proof jersey. Both have arrived and are easily the best value cycling gear I have purchased. (This is coming from someone who has a lot of Rapha gear, and a Castelli Perfetto and has gone through DHB and Planet X's offerings) The jersey I got through seems to be the same material as the perfetto, and is definitely as wind/waterproof.
Right, so some 2018 UPDATE SPEXCEL CYCLING BIB Shorts are allegedly now winging their way to me.

Looking forward to hearing everyone's reviews and adding my own.
 
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Soldato
Joined
14 Nov 2002
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Under the Hill
Tubeless on and I took the bike for a quick spin to see how they feel. 28 coming from 25 is massively more comfortable at the same 95psi. The beads we pretty stiff so took 3 levers to get the tyres on so god help me if I ever have a catastrophic flat, I expect it will take some time to resolve it roadside!
 
Soldato
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Under the Hill
I went high to ensure I got it seated and give them a little stretch so that I can get them on more easily next time. I'll drip them to about 85.

Weight savings was 50g per wheel, every little helps (says the man carrying about 10kg of excess!)
 
Soldato
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14,349
Having now slept and ate well I can say, bar the lack of sleep, the Revolve24 is definitely a different event. It has it's perks but also it's shortfalls. For the time being, whilst I restore my cognitive function to those of at least a knuckle dragger, here's some footage of @Shamrock honking. Please to meet you and @Lethal` too :cool:


This is the second ascent after having descended Druids. The GP circuit turned out to be around 100ft/mile.

I'll write up a little more for those interested shortly.
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Oct 2006
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5,386
Shamrock is a Snail :D

Good to meet you too, Benny! You must have racked up a fair few shifts with the 3 man team.

I disliked that ascent and the drag after it more than Druids.
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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8,420
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Hereford
The girls absolutely loved it. It's just a hobby atm for both of them - I'm not sure if either of them will take it seriously long term. Because Jessica has started so young if either of them did want to take it more seriously then she's definitely got the advantage - she's got the early platform to build off. It's up to them really - we're not pushy parents, they decide to train & they decide to race (let's be honest - it's a dangerous sport, even at their age they're going quick and racing at close quarters).
That's excellent, I was just trying to judge how you'd got them so involved - as obviously I'll be trying to do similar with mine in the years to come! :D

Any suggestions for a cheapish wheel upgrade for my Genesis CDF? Currently looking at the Hunt 4 Season disc but wondering if there was anything around a little cheaper? Mainly used for commuting and cobbles ideally having range from 28c > 35c!
Define cheaper, the 4seasons are around £300 which isn't much for a wheelset of their quality! Fulcrum do a set for ~£100 but they're QR front & 12*135 TA rear so may not be compatible.

If budget is a concern, do you have rotors already, if so what fitment? Match the new wheels to them and you'll save £30-100 by not buying new rotors too.

There's other fulcrums under £300 and obviously the Wiggle Prime range (which I personally wouldn't touch with a barge pole), would recommend the fulcrums over the Prime.

I went high to ensure I got it seated and give them a little stretch so that I can get them on more easily next time. I'll drip them to about 85.

Weight savings was 50g per wheel, every little helps (says the man carrying about 10kg of excess!)
Good work, pre-stretching is recommended with some rims, worth googling around to see what others have done if they're that tight!

As others have said, get them lower! 70psi front 60psi rear I find glorious but my continentals (with tubes) don't hold pressures that well below 70. It's buttery smooth while still feeling fast, YMMV of course. 76kg rider on wide 21mm (internal) rims with conti gp4000sii 28mm.

I settled on 60-70psi for my tubeless setup in the end - worth experimenting.
I'm running almost that on my tubes lol (70 rear 65 front) ;)
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
8,420
Location
Hereford
Having now slept and ate well I can say, bar the lack of sleep, the Revolve24 is definitely a different event. It has it's perks but also it's shortfalls. For the time being, whilst I restore my cognitive function to those of at least a knuckle dragger, here's some footage of @Shamrock honking. Please to meet you and @Lethal` too :cool:


This is the second ascent after having descended Druids. The GP circuit turned out to be around 100ft/mile.

I'll write up a little more for those interested shortly.
Liam the climbing domestique being paced by team car? Who's the GC rider on his wheel? Love it, riders in front = smash smash smash! :D

Really interested in how it went and how you all found it. The whole concept sounds great on paper but in practice (as we've seen other years) is utterly brutal!

Well done to you all, we could enter an OcUK Pedal Powered team! :o
 
Associate
Joined
18 Aug 2003
Posts
351
My Wahoo Elemnt Bolt bundle arrived today after snagging a deal for £215. I will have fun with it later. Last thing left to do is switch my tyres to tubeless. That's a job for this evening, hopefully not too painful!
I#d be interested to know where you got the bundle from, as I've been looking to get a new bike computer.
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Feb 2004
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18,141
Location
Hampshire
Big thumbs up again to Rapha CS, my core bib shorts I got about 18 months ago had really started to thin out, I always followed the correct washing instructions. So sent them an email with a few pictures and they've given me a voucher for the full price shorts!
 
Soldato
Joined
8 Dec 2002
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20,077
Location
North Yorkshire
Big thumbs up again to Rapha CS, my core bib shorts I got about 18 months ago had really started to thin out, I always followed the correct washing instructions. So sent them an email with a few pictures and they've given me a voucher for the full price shorts!

That’s great customer service - fantastic to see in this day and age. Hope you stay loyal to them now :p
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Sep 2006
Posts
14,349
Shamrock is a Snail :D

Good to meet you too, Benny! You must have racked up a fair few shifts with the 3 man team.

I disliked that ascent and the drag after it more than Druids.

Pleasure.

Yeah, after turn six I hung up my shoes. I'd hit my mileage target 120+m (the first 80 of those being between .85/.9 IF :eek: / whoops) and would have just been accumulating unnecessary fatigue. It didn't occur to us until 20 hours in that it would have probably been better to have every 4th hour without a rider on the track to allow for longer recovery and food to digest. But we had set the bar high!

I was suffering with acid reflux and general gut discomfort from the start of my second turn which made eating on the bike interesting... Riding, sitting and then laying down obviously doesn't do wonders for digestive transit!

I rode at 3:30PM, 6:45PM, 10PM, 1:45AM, 5:30AM (which saw the sunrise) and 9:15AM. The wind was picking up after that, I'd not slept a wink and all the loonies for the 6hr had been released. I didn't sleep until 6:30PM Sunday evening which was knocking on 48 hours? even then it was an hour's nap before getting up to eat. I did have today off though which involved a lay in and an afternoon nap :D

Really interested in how it went and how you all found it. The whole concept sounds great on paper but in practice (as we've seen other years) is utterly brutal!

It was a pretty well run event given it's infancy, my only gripes were (as Shamrock) pointed out there was zero lighting where there really should have been some for safety. For example on descents or corners taken at speed. Fortunately it was dry so standing water wasn't an issue but the corner in to Cooper Straight was off camber with not a massive margin of error. I wouldn't have been confident at all riding in the dark in lashing rain. Even cones with flashing beacons that they had at the end of the pit lane would have easily allowed you to have a better idea of where the apex was, which line to follow and cost them nothing.

Some riders front lights were unnecessarily bright. I had one of said riders glued to my rear wheel at 2:30AM, unwilling to either pass me or (a rarity) take a turn. Wouldn't stop following me (even when traversing to make it apparent I wanted him to **** off!) so I had no choice but to burn a match I'd have rather kept.

There were obviously some riders in a very dark place (pardon the pun) during the twilight hours :p

Due to a lot of kit changes there were hundreds of riders without numbers after the first 4/5 hours. The excitement settled down once everyone had their first turn out of their system but I was very nearly taken out by an un-numbered rider whilst doing 30mph at the end of the start straight. His bars probably weren't more than an inch off of mine, you get idiots everywhere but it was just stupid & unnecessary and you're irritable enough as it is.

Most of the turns were pretty much just solo TT's because it was very rare to find another rider with the same pacing strategy. There were a lot of similar fitness but many seemed to want to coast on descents and spend longer grinding on the ascents but I'm not that way inclined and it's also slower overall.

Other than that it was great. We had a nice courteous pit garage shared with 5 or 6 other teams & there was a good atmosphere.

Ask me in a few weeks if I'd do it again....
 
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