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Thoughts on just about everything from rock-n-roll, sports, kids, to geek speak -- by John Bullock About John Subscribe to this blog  |
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February 2004 March 2004 April 2004 May 2004 June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 September 2007 November 2007 December 2007 January 2008 February 2008 |
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Thursday, March 30, 2006 |
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Marta | |
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My new Yeti has finally been named. And the winner of the naming contest is me. Yes, I was the person that found and suggested the name Marta. My father was a close runner up when he suggested Sandy. He said Sandy because of Sandra Bullock who is female, beautiful, an outdoors type and starred in Speed and Speed 2. Although my bike now has a name, it came a ride too late. I took my bike out for the first ride, before I had named her, and there were a few overly muddy spots. Apparently, much muddier than I thought they were because I I got so much mud and crap in my rear derailleur that it choked it down and when I pedaled forward I broke the rear derailleur hanger. Breaking is exactly what it is supposed to do to save the (much more expensive) derailleur from serious damage. Luckily, I was only about 300 yards from the top of my final climb and the rest was monster downhill on a fireroad that could easily be done without pedaling. I pushed the remainder up and went down (without braking) the remainder of the ride. After having the appropriate repairs, and ordering a spare part so I'm not stranded next time it might happen, I was able to do a couple more rides this week on Tuesday and Wednesday. I did name Marta before I went out though. She still loves mud, has found it on every ride, but she is not being such a bitch now that I can address her properly. I will try to post a photo of the part that caused me so much anguish. It is really small and fairly inexpensive (less than $25) but when it breaks, you are SOL. So my initial comments on the bike are still very positive. I have decided that I do like the Pro Pedal setting on the rear shock on the hard long climbs. I will have to see how I feel if the climbs are technical (they have not been so far). I'm just blown away at how well this bike goes down hill. It sticks to everything and keeps your bike connected to the ground. I find myself not braking through sections where I would always have to take a little off my speed. You can see why Mountain Bike magazine said they would make up any time lost climbing going downhill as it is so easy to go downhill fast without using much energy. The brakes are excellent. I like the more upright riding style as I feel like I'm less cramped and can breath better on the bike. At this rate, I will be taking my bike back to Sports Garage for the professional fit in the next week or so. The weather has been warmer and dryer so I am able to get out during lunch and on weekends again. It won't be long before there is enough daylight to get a good ride in after work as well. |
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Thursday, March 16, 2006 |
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Here are all the suggestions for the bike naming contest. As I can't ride my bike, I have to at least spend time thinking what to name it. I NEED to have a name before the first ride as I have to know how to address her!
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Monday, March 13, 2006 |
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UDOs | |
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Unidentified Driving Objects. Technically they weren't driving but over the past couple of days I've seen two weird encounters that you would not normally happen across. The first was Saturday when my son and I were driving home from lunch. We saw a car driving along but there was a chocolate lab sticking it's head out of the sun roof. To top it off, the top was wearing sunglasses/goggles to protect it's eyes. Alex thought that was about the funniest thing he had ever seen. The second item was this morning when I was on the off ramp to work. I saw a guy that obviously left his bottled water on top of his car. As he had not brushed his car off and it is still cold, the water was frozen to the roof of his car. Normally when you leave something on your car (and forget about it), it is gone for good. This guy should have a nice cold water when he gets to his destination though. I just wonder if these are signs of something to come? | |
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Wednesday, March 08, 2006 |
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Contest | |
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I have decided that my cool new bike needs an equally cool name. My last bike never got much of a real name out side of Baby or Girl. Come on Baby, you can do it! Lets go Girl! This is not going to fly with the new Yeti as it commands a higher level of respect including a proper name. My wife has suggested Betty the Yeti and I (half jokingly) countered with The Green Machine as a spin off on the old green big wheel spinoffs that made it really easy and fun to do controlled spin outs. I am willing to offer lunch, a six pack, or Pay Pal donation for anyone that contributes a winning name or an idea that leads to the final name. If you happen to be my wife, I will even arrange for a baby sitter and take you for an adults only evening. Feel free to ask any questions that might help get the creative juices flowing. | |
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The Adventure Begins | |
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Well, my adventure won't begin today. If you haven't figured it out from my previous post or the snow falling, I got my new bike yesterday. I decided on the Yeti ASR-SL. Sadly, I don't think I will be able to ride it any time soon though. With more wet and cold weather on the horizon for the next week and a trip to Mexico on the horizon, I think my new baby will get plenty of rest coming out of the gate. :( There were a couple of reasons I decided on the Yeti. First off, it climbs very well. It climbs as well as any of the bikes I demoed and definitely better than my old bike (GT Zaskar). Also, the bike descended better than any of the others, included the longer travel ETSX-70. This thing is unreal going down the hills. You just point and it will go. The handling is so unreal, none of the other bikes could come close to it. A big factor as well is the fit. This bike just fits me better than any of the other bikes. I got a medium which in most of the other bikes would have been a large. A large on any of the other bikes would have been way to big for me and the mediums often felt cramped in the cockpit for me. However, with the Yeti, I do not feel cramped at all and the bike doesn't feel big in any way. I read and believed that my final decision would probably come down to how the bike fit as all the machines (except the Blur) would have been awesome on the trail. One of the cool things about the Sports Garage is that with any (high end) bike purchase, you get a free professional fitting. They ask that you do six or seven rides on the bike before doing it though so you get a really good feel for what is working and what needs adjusting. It may take me until the end of April to get six or seven rides though. :( I haven't talked about it in any of my reviews or selection criteria, but another major reason I picked Yeti is that it had the longest warranty for the bike. Where all of the others had a one or two year warranty, Yeti has a five year warranty. I also think there are several cool bling-bling features that the other bikes didn't have (at least all of them). Items such as the cool turquoise paint job, the sweet looking and feeling bottom tube (not just a plain round tube!), the sweet head badge, or the carbon fiber chain stay. Yeti's also have a certain reputation for gathering attention and admiration. When I did the demo ride, the very first person I saw commented on how sweet the bike is. I had to admit it was a demo but liked it so far (it was very early on the ride still). Although if you just price the frame on the Yeti web site, it appears to be the most expensive bike by about two hundred dollars. However, once you add one of the kits that has all the components, it is one of the most affordable of the bunch. As I just mentioned price and components let me talk about them just a little bit. As I loved the demo, when I got to the Sports Garage we immediately started discussing how to spec out the bike. I said I really like the components on the demo bike and wanted to know the cost as it was built. Well it was about $1300 more than the budget I had been talking about with Suzanne before I started looking at bikes. Not to mention, it had to high end race components that break easier and cost more to replace. So I scaled back to the Race Kit (the demo had the Pro Kit) and then tweaked from there. I really only had to make two changes and one addition. The first change was to replace the Hayes HFX-9 disc brakes with the Avid Juicy Seven's. Everything you read and hear is the Avid's are the way to go. All of the demos that I did had the Seven's and I really liked then so decided that I would be happy with them. This cost more but I think I will be much happier with them in the long run. The other change I made to the kit, this one free, was to put a larger tire (2.35" vs. 2.1") on the front end as I really like how that makes the bikes handle. One of the odd things about the bikes is that none of them come with pedals. Don't ask me why but they don't. So I picked out some nice Shimano's (540's) for the bike as I had my old Shimano's on my GT for the entire time and they are still working very well. If I were to ride in muddier conditions such as the Pacific Northwest, I might go for a pedal, such as the Crank Brothers Egg Beaters, that sheds mud easier but they cost more and I do not know about durability. Another decision I had to make was about the color of the bike. I had to choose between pink, black and silver, and the Team color (turquoise). There was a slight twist though. The one 2006 medium frame they had was a 2006 frame with the 2005 paint job. They showed me the 2006 paint job online to see if I would rather have that. The '06 paint job has a lot of sliver on the turquoise and they move the printing around to different spots on the frame. The more I looked and thought about it, I decided that I liked the 2005 paint job better so decided to go ahead with that. They originally told me that they did not have my size in stock as they had just sold the last one. However, they were mistaken as the other guy that was interested in it still needed to think so if I wanted it, it could be mine. That guy is probably really bummed today as he will have to wait for a couple weeks to get a medium frame and the paint job won't be as cool! The final thing that attracted me to the Yeti are what current owners say about them. This group of people is the most passionate group about their brand that I have encountered. As I read the ASR-SL reviews on MTBR.com, they seemed more passionate about this bike than the other owners about theirs. This is the only bike that has a web site decided to the machines and the love for them. On the web site, YetiFan.com, they have stories and photos from the yearly tribe gathering which sounds like a blast. The only problem is that I would have leave all my friends behind as none of them own Yeti's (poor saps). However, I think with the new bike, they won't be seeing much of me anyways (only my back side at least) becase they won't be able to keep up with me anymore! In addition to all of the riders out there, Mountain Bike Magazine recently did a review of the ASR-SL and gave it outstanding marks. I actually stumbled across the (hard copy) review the morning of the demo so I figured it was a sign that I was meant to have this bike. Enough blabbing, let's check out some photos of my new baby! As I didn't get home until after sunset, the photos are all in the garage so forgive the poor quality.       
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Birth Announcement | |
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Tuesday, March 07, 2006 |
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Yeti ASR-SL Review | |
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Friday afternoon, I called the Sports Garage to reserve the Yeti ASR-SL for a demo ride on Monday. It was the last bike on my list to ride and I wanted to make sure that it would be available. As it has been warmer lately, more people are doing demos of the bikes. Even last time the Yeti was not available as it was already on demo with somebody else. After I reserved the bike, I called my supervisor to make sure I could take a personal day on Monday. I would have done the ride over the weekend except Suzanne went to a spa in Idaho Springs for the weekend with her cousin and I got to play with the kids all weekend. I also wanted to get it done as it is the last bike on my list and it appears that the weather is only supposed to get wet and cold this week. Not to mention that I am leaving for Mexico on the 18th so it would be a while before I could do my last demo. Did I mention that I really want a new bike and am tired of waiting as well? The first thing I noticed is that the bike seemed to fit me very well. I did not feel cramped in the cockpit the slightest bit. I know these things can be tailored to some extent with different saddle heights as well as stem height and lengths too. However, it is very reassuring when the demo fits so well, you know there are no concerns about getting it right on your own bike. I also noticed immediately how light the bike was. It had high end race components so could not have weighed more than 25 pounds tops. Another thing that contributes to the light weight is the chain stay is made out of carbon fiber (like the Racer X). Excellent bling factor that shaves 82g off the all aluminum version. The bike climbed very well. I was sucking wind but it keep on going. Although I tried the rear shock in the pro pedal position, I actually preferred it wide open. It seem to help the climbs go more smooth and keep me rolling. I also noticed that this bike corned extremely tight. If you don't pay attention you can get yourself into trouble. This bike was the first demo I had that actually had the tubeless rims and tires that I am thinking that I want. I set my front and rear tire pressure between 30 and 32 psi which is really low for a mountain bike tire. Normally when I run this pressure, I run a high risk of a snake bite flat but I had no issues at all with them. I missed the larger tire, 2.3, up front a little bit as I really appreciate how that affects a bikes handling now. Even though I ran the smaller tire, the bike descended even better than it climbs. At 3.7" of rear travel, it has the least among the fabulous five bikes that I demoed. This was such a non-factor though on the descents. It handled everything and smoothed out the trail to unbelievable degrees. On the last (main) rocky descent on the ride, I let loose. I was no means pushing the envelope or out of control, but I managed to catch up to another rider on a bike with much more travel. It was really fun blowing by him once he finally pulled over to let me by! Usually I pass people going uphill (at least later in the year when I'm in better shape) and let them pass me going down. The saddle on the bike was not the most comfortable thing in the world but I found out that is not what comes with the bike. It actually comes with the same saddle that I have on my current bike. After my ride, I drove back up to Boulder as I needed to get the bike back. During the trip up, I decided which bike that I wanted to purchase. I'm pretty sure that I would have been extremely happy with any of the bikes except the Santa Cruz as they all are hand built light bikes that have similar if not the same components. I was shocked when I got back to the Sports Garage that they had the frame in the size I needed ready to build out to my specifications. They are building it up as I write this blog entry so you will have to wait until tonight or tomorrow to find out which bike I choose because I will have to post more photos when I get my new baby (although things are not looking good to ride it any time soon with wet and cold in the forecast and a trip to Mexico coming up too). In the mean time, here are the photos from the Yeti demo bike for your viewing pleasure. The Yeti monster. This is the team color. It also comes in pink as well as black/silver.  Close-up of the front end.  Close-up of the back end. Notice the cool carbon fiber chain stay! 
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Thursday, March 02, 2006 |
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Rocky Mountain ETSX-70 Review | |
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I was able to do another demo ride recently. When I arrived, they asked which bike and I told them I wanted to ride the Yeti ASR-SL but they said it was out on a demo so I grabbed the Rocky Mountain ETSX-70 instead. It is probably a good thing that the Yeti was not available as I was starting to think that I might not ride the Rocky at all because it is a different beast from the other four bikes that I am looking at. Where the other four are definitely cross country (race) bikes, this one is an all-mountain bike. What that means is that it will have more travel (five inches vs. four) which means more material and weight. The frame alone is 1.3 pounds heavier than the RacerX frame. Then when you add the weight gain for the shock and fork (as they have more material to allow them more travel), you have even more weight. I didn't weigh the bike but it didn't feel overly heavy. The first thing you notice about this bike is the cool paint job. It has the maple leaves on it as Rocky is a Canadian company. They take a lot of pride in their work, hand building all their frames and wheels in house. The other thing that stands out on this bike is the great value. For an all-mountain bike that has high end components all around it is a steal. The draw back would be that you have to go with their component choices but you could not build the same bike piece by piece for the price they sell if for. The thing I noticed first when riding the bike is that it did not climb as well as the other bikes. In fact, I would say it climbs about as well as my current bike. The other thing that sticks out right away is the adjustability of the bike (beyond what all the other bikes have had). For starters, you could adjust the amount of travel in the rear shock from 4 to 4.5 to 5 inches of travel. I left it on 5 inches the whole time which might have contributed to the poorer climbing characteristics. Also, the front fork, Fox Talas RLC, was adjustable between 90mm and 130mm. I cranked it down to 90 for all my climbs and put it back up at 130 for all the flats and descents. I'm not the kind of person and rider that really wants or needs all this adjustability. I would rather set it and forget it for the most part. I don't want to have to stop at the top or bottom of every hill and change the configuration of my bike. The bike comes equipped with Shimano Dual Control Levers. This means you use the same leavers to shift as you do to brake. All other manufacturers have these functions separated into different units. Shimano went this route for weight savings. In the past when I tried these I have not been a fan. I don't know if it just took me a little while to get used to them but I had no issues with them and even enjoyed them this time around. I was not a fan of the tires that came on the bike. I missed having a larger tire (> 2.1") and the Kenda tires. That combination on the other bikes really helped them hook up to the loose trail conditions at Green Mountain. After riding a little while, I could tell the bike was definitely too small for me. It wasn't until after I was done that I remembered test riding the bike in the alley behind the Sports Garage and thinking the small was too small for me. The bad thing though was I have very little stand over clearance with the small that I think I could not stand comfortably over the top tube if I had a medium. When I told the salesman about it, he remarked that I do have a longer torso for somebody my size which is why I'm having some fit issues on the demo bikes. Although it would rarely affect me, I did notice there was very little mud clearance on the the back tire. It would be even less if somebody decided to run a larger tire. The bike handled well and was fun to ride. At the end of the ride, I felt very fresh and was bunny hopping all over the parking lot. I could have sworn that the bike got lighter between the beginning and end of the ride. My next (and final?) test ride will be the Yeti ASR-SL. The salesman, who I seem to share very similar tastes in bikes, setup and such, said that I saved the best for last which has got my excitement up to say the least. I see people riding Yeti's all along the metro area but most of them are riding the 575 which is more similar to the ETSX-70 (both are all mountain bikes) when the ASR-SL is more like the RacerX and Truth (XC bikes). Check out this sweet looking machine!  The backend. Notice the quick release lever near the rocker where the rear sock hooks up the bike. This is how you adjust the amount of rear travel.  The front end (with Shimano Dualies and longer travel fork). 
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Double Standards | |
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Why is it that Bill Clinton got impeached for getting a blow job in the oval office while nothing happens to George Bush when he ignores warnings about hurricane Katrina and thousands of people die. WTF??? Also, Suzanne recently saw that some approval ratings for the president in all sorts of areas. When asked if they approved of the President personally, only 29% said they did. How did this man get into office? Are all of you just figuring out that this brainless twit is just in office to help out his cronies make more money? |
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