The Bikes
The Bike. It is the central tool in pursuit of our craft. A Velominatus meticulously maintains their bicycles and adorns them with the essential, yet minimal, accoutrement. The Rules specify the principles of good taste in configuration and setup of our machines, but within those principles lies almost infinite room for personal taste.
It seems in some ways like a kind of Stockholm Syndrome, the way we honor our machines. We love them to a point that lies well beyond obsession. Upon these machines upon we endure endless suffering, but also find an unending pleasure. The rhythm, the harmony between rider and machine, the outdoors, the wind in our faces and air in our lungs.
The Bikes is devoted entirely to our machines. Ours, The Keepers, and yours, the Community. It features articles devoted to our bikes, and proves a forum for uploading photos of your own machines for discussion. We will be harsh, but fair; this is a place to enforce and enhance our observation of The Rules.
If you’d like to submit an article about your own beloved bike, please feel free to send it to us and we’ll do our best to work with you to include it.
- Rule #12 and the Cascade Effect
That is a very reasonable opening salvo for the Rule about bike ownership. Three is good and certainly a minimum, and we are talking road bikes here, if there was any doubt. They naturally become ordered: the #1 is ichi-ban, top dog, go-to bike for every and all rides. #2 was the old #1, ... - Guest Article: Black Is Not The New Black@kogalover is singing my song here. Bikes are beautiful. ’nuff said. VLVV, Gianni With all those posts on riding in winter and being visible, either by putting Eyes of Sauron or other car melting devices on one’s steed, or by even considering a YJA instead of donning plain black kit, it was about time to finally get ...
- Dialing in the StableThis was going to be an article about Rule #45. It is amazing how much time is wasted and matches burned when professionals stop for that second bike change to get back on their #1. With all the jigs available to team mechanics it would seem they could set up five bikes exactly the same. And ...
- Matching the drapes to the rugAs a longtime titanium bike owner, I’ve always been jealous of a beautiful painted frame but Ti and carbon frames don’t need paint like a steel frame needs paint. But I want some painted beauty. It’s like buying a white car; I can’t do white, need some color. So between a Ti frame and a ...
- Festum Prophetae: Waiting for the HourEveryone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth. – Mike Tyson The one thing everyone should always plan for is that however well-conceived a program might be, things will never go to plan. The high level plan for my Festum Prophetae Hour Ride was as follows: Have a custom Hour Bike built by Don Walker. Because reasons. Reasons like custom ...
@Brett
I hope that is a beer can in the bottle cage of your ’04 Epic.
Here is my updated R3 with 3T Rotundas. BITCHIN.
Counting down to someone suggesting I am not fit to my bike properly…
@frank
1. Its a shame you don’t like saddlebags. The amount of vacant land between your rear tyre and saddle would allow you to carry a particularly large one.
2. White hoods or black bar tape. Your choice.
@frank
I tipped out of my chair just looking at that pic. That saddle looks as though it would be at my shoulder-height. You must have extra joints in your neck to be able to look forward from that position.
@frank
Would it be prying to ask your saddle height (measured from bb)?
@Steampunk
Embody The V. ‘Nuff Said.
@xyxax
82cm from the center of the bb to the center of the rail. (My preferred way to measure, since I use all the same saddles.)
I was surprised to read that Thor Hushovd rides a relatively tiny 56 cm frame. He’s fully 6 ft tall.
@frank
Did you see this photo I linked to a bit ago?
That’s not from the Giro BTW.
I’m 5’10” and have been known to ride a 54
@michael
He’s a little closer to peaking than I am, but that’s exactly what I’m talking about. Great pic.
@frank – I’m not worried about the alarming drop to the ‘bars, but the chain in the small ring? The cranks not aligned with the seat-tube or the chainstay? Tyre labels all over the show? What is the world coming to…
@michael
If that guy isn’t Dutch I’ll eat a frame pump and wash it down with a Rock ‘n Roll Lube chaser.
@Nate
Bon appetite!
@Oli Brooke-White
Ha, we’ve had this discussion before; there is nothing hardman about photographing your bike in the big ring; has more to do with how you lay down the V in the big ring. In fact, I might argue that most of the V one lays down would be while riding in the little ring on a Five and Dime. But I digress.
Click the photo and you’ll see that the labels are directly over the valve stems, and the cranks are bisecting the angle between the chain stays and seattube, which I find to be the most attractive of all the possible positions.
@Nate
Yeah, @Brett’s right; that is Ryan Trebon, a rider I believe is based out of
PortlandCalifornia.A bit of a badass, actually.
@michael
I’m 5’10” on a 56, but could probably go a bit smaller. I’m perfectly comfortable on the 56, but I can’t help thinking I must be at the short end of the spectrum. Following Frank’s logic, Thor on a smaller frame has some advantage, especially, I would think, given his upper-body strength and keeping that lower in a sprint. Okay, that last just came out and I don’t know if it makes any sense. Will go home and find out.
I’ve just legally changed my middle name to V. But I just don’t understand what is so V about not being able to see where you’re going. Having said that, I’m working on a winter fixie project, and had to go get me a longer seatpost to fit on a 54cm frame.
Sorry Frank, close but no cigar.
It’s just because he’s a knuckle draggin’ (Dutch)monkey.
@Geoffrey Grosenbach
I think there needs to be some sort of ruling against aero seat posts and fenders. But that’s just me.
@frank
I don’t know what you’re talking about. First editing tonight, probably will be good for the new year. Seems that Steampunk might be interested as well.
Liking the 3T, kitting our bikes out with stem and Ergosum bars
@Cyclops
After publicly humiliating myself on these pages, I took the mudguards off the day after taking that photo and haven’t put them back on since. The occasional moist butt hasn’t been as uncomfortable as I expected, and I get an extra thrill by swerving into traffic in order to avoid large pools of standing water.
Could you clarify on the seatpost? Given that it’s an aero bike, it seems to fit the rest of the theme. My mechanical knowledge hasn’t progressed to the point where I would know how to replace it with a round one, although I was eyeing the Fizik seatpost models the other day. The ones that come stock with a Cervélo are difficult to adjust.
Unrelated: it holds the saddle, so why is it still called a seatpost?
@Geoffrey Grosenbach
That’s kinda the point. If the bike requires an aero seatpost then fenders are definitely out of place. Fenders can be forgiven on a classic lugged steel frame that has fender eyelets on it but if you need to install straps and bands and clamps and… You get the picture.
@Cyclops
I get it now — You were talking about the combination of aero post plus mudguards. I definitely agree that it should be forbidden.
But it’s probably too niche to be included in The Rules. Maybe we need a secondary set of Lesser Rules or General Suggestions. “Obey the Lesser Suggestions” doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Sure: send it my way. I should warn you I’m pretty ornery after a week of grading student papers.
Yes: this, too. Once I managed to tilt my head sideways enough, I was able to appreciate this…
My commiserations. Few things more enjoyable than lecturing what appears to be a bunch of bright, motivated sutdents. Few things worse than grading their papers and discovering so many of them are not. You clutch onto even the tiniest straw of potential happiness to alleviate the mind-numbing boredom and growing feelings of generalised hostility. Straws such as “at least it’s shitty weather out, so this isn’t keeping me from my bike”. Or, in my case, straws such as “Hey, it’s been two papers since I checked http://www.velominati.com – better refresh and see what’s up.”
@G’phant
Hey! I did that, too! Actually, I spiraled into self-doubt and criticism: if only I had spent more time preparing and less time riding. But I got over that quickly. The riding through the fall was excellent, and I suspect I put more kms on the bike since September than I had March through August.
Some of them actually were quite bright and delivered, too, but I’ll spare you the rantings…
Bollocks to that. Students just need a good hard dose of the V. And your lectures would not be nearly so goood if you didn’t ride.
@G’phant
Totally. Although, from the other side, my v-breaks were taken between rote learning sections of the Evidence act.
There is nothing like cycling for procrastination. Why go to the library when there’s bar-tape to wrap? And re-wrap.
@Geoffrey Grosenbach
Thor’s 183cm on a 56cm, and he has no spacers under his stem! Haussler’s 181cm on a 54cm. Deignan’s 180cm on a 54cm. I’m 179cm. I should be on a 54cm. That’s my next acquisition.
Oh, and you’re stuck with aero seatpost on the S series bikes. You can use a round seatpost on the R series.
@Oli Brooke-White
Is this in reference to the identity of frank’s doppelganger? Because I’m hoping not to have to fry up a frame pump with chain lube before my next ride.
@Steampunk, @CJ, @G’phant
You guys are on a roll and I really, really hate to bring cycling back into this, but the key is that the mistake frame sizing assumptions generally make is that progression from size to size is a linear one. In reality, it’s closer to a logarithmic curve, where the frame size increases less and less as the rider gets taller.
Part of it, I think, is that you need to start making up length by going in the only direction you can – down. A bigger part is just to get your fucking center of mass as low as you can.
When I ride next to Jim, his and my shoulders are at about the same height, and our backs follow about the same curve. He’s on a 56cm or so, and I’m on a 61cm. To get there, I have at least 4cm more drop.
Low center of mass? Good. Sit up and beg? Bad.
@Jeff in PetroMetro
I’m 190cm on a 61cm. The smaller frame is also lighter and stiffer. And it looks cooler. Go for it!
@frank
it was @Geoffrey Grosenbach looking at buying the Cervelo, not @Jeff in PetroMetro and I didn’t realise you are on the biggest Cervelo frame, you must have the shortest torso in the world *freak*
@Geoffrey Grosenbach
No, don’t listen to Frank. Frank is 190cm on a 61cm and I’m 190cm on a 53.5cm Giant (although equating it to a Cervelo R3 via top-tube length I would probably require a 58cm – that said I wouldn’t fit a 58cm R3 because the head-tube is too long for my dumpy legs so I’d have to have the 56cm).
@Jeff in PetroMetro
What’s wrong with the aero seatpost?
@frank
I agree. It looks cooler. I’m not sure if it’s your ability to loudly and persistently restate your argument, or that photo of Thor from your article on the subject where it looks like he’s riding a circus bike, but I’m in. Once I actually develop some bike-handling skills, I’ll drop down to a 57. The more exposed seatpost the better, right Oli?
@Jarvis
Nothin’ wrong at all with the aero seatpost. I think it’s cool. Geoff commented on his lack of technical expertise for replacing an aero with a round Fizik. Just wanted to enlighten him.
Besides, I am a sinner. I covet my neighbor’s S3 (figuratively speaking–none of my actual neighbors have S3’s).
Regarding Frank’s height–there is NO WAY he is 190cm. 210cm maybe.
Are the seatposts on the “S” series not integrated then? *cheap*
@Jarvis
Nope. The seatposts are Cervelo’s proprietary design.
@CJ
Every Dutchman knows that volume and persistence is all it takes to be right. If not everyone in the room agrees with your argument, you just repeat it louder. Repeat until you have unanimous agreement. Cheers.
@frank
There is no possible way you are 190cm. You are waaaay taller than that if you’re riding a 61 with that much seatpost exposed. I’d guess you are about 200cm.
@frank
Ha, so much for me. I used your bb-rail measurement (same as mine, by the way, though I am 200 cm) to see what size your R3 was. I came out with a 56 (and a 20 cm drop)! I think my slide rule must need a new battery.
What’s your opinion on the new geometry for the 2011 frames?
@frank
Sometimes wrong, but always certain. Speak with enough conviction, enough authority (and ride off your wheel those who just won’t come around), and 2 + 2 = whatever you say it is.
@Jeff in PetroMetro
You are right; I am 195 or so (you stop counting once you’re over a certain height; people under 5’5″ know their height down to the fractions of inches).
But don’t forget that saddle height is more a function of inseam length than overall height. I have long legs.
@xyxax
Make sure you’re checking the geometry; old-school seat-tube measurements will do nothing on compacts to tell you how big a frame is.
Very disappointed. Unfortunately, I’ll likely never buy another Cervelo; as you can see, in order to get low enough, I needed a 17 degree stem, and it has only a 5mm spacer under it; with the taller head tube, I’d never be able to get the position right. Too bad.
I’m very disappointed that Cervelo doesn’t understand that concept; I would have preferred that they just leave the RS line with the taller head tube and leave the R3/R3SL as is.
@frank
Cervelo have taken an interesting stand in frame design. They don’t have a women’s line as they argue that the theory about women having short torso and long legs is not proven and that short blokes have the same issue as women so their smaller bikes should cover all.
I do like their point about head tubes, as they say many PROs complain about the front end being too low, so if a PRO is stuggling, then their less-fit, less-flexible customers are going to have even more trouble. That said, I need a short head tube otherwise the front end is too high for my low saddle.
The future is custom steel, or for those with the cash, custom carbon…
@Jarvis
Yeah, I read that; also studied their theory on geometry, which I like. I love Gerard’s (a Dutchman) assessment of the framebuilders who don’t follow their model: “They don’t understand geometry.”
The big problem with this particular line of reasoning is that there are not very many pros who ride a 61cm; in fact, I’m not aware of a single rider sponsored by Cervelo who rides a 61cm (their biggest frame). Even if there are a few, the amount of data points in that area is by far lower than the other frame sizes. Any data analyst would probably flag that data as unreliable.
I maintain my position that fitting tall riders is a misunderstood art. It is also probably a Dark Art.
Disappointing to say the least; I would have expected Vroomen to channel his Dutch a little more.
@frank
But is it fractal geometry?
@frank
fitting any rider is a Dark Art, but especially those who aren’t of “average” build.
Not my bike, but I bid farewell to Zabriskie’s Cervelo TdF TT bike, which has been on the wall of my coffee shop for the past several months. I understand it’s to be replaced by one ridden around France in 2008 by one Carlito Sastre.
@Steampunk
Who do you have to know to decorate your coffee shop with historical, super awesome badass PRO bikes? And where’s your coffee shop?