.... the jackal rides and run....

Over the course of 9 months since I rekindled cycling, there's been a couple of niggling pains that I've experienced so I'm gonna document it over here. - Numbness in Fingers This used to occur a lot on my left hand. I think I was placing too much pressure on one hand and have the tendency to have the bar going right between the flesh lumps below my palm (apparently this compresses some arteries over there causing numbness. I've consciously done 2 things; 1. be aware of my hand placement to avoid pressure on this region 2. maintain a slight bend on the elbows and focus on balancing more on the saddle whilst cycling Yes, numbness is practically gone now. - Numbness in Feet/Toes I wear a 44 sized shoe. I tend believe this is caused by the fact that I probably need a wider shoe. To reduce the occurrence, I intentionally loosen the shoe, especially on the wide part of the feet to ensure I can move my feet a little even in the shoe. Another thing was to get much thinner sock...

So we had a nice celebration for my one year old son's birthday. Basically it was pandemonium when all the kids got together. Its amazing to see how a few balloons, party whistles and a couple of 1-4 year olds can really bring the house down! OK, back to my contribution : Shepherd's Pie Really easy to make and was quite hit with the guests. I used pork (well I made another one using lamb burger patties and that didn't go too well cos the lamb as expected has a weird smell that not many people can like....and I did not shield the taste well..), carrots, peas, garlic, onions all cooked into a stew-ish mixture. Worchestershire (pronounced 'Wuster') sauce is a must and I was rather generous with it. The wife did the potatos; simple peel em', boil em', mash em' and add some grated cheese, pepper and butter. Tastes great! Here's the cooked stew/filling and the mash. Place the mash on top and use a wet spoon to simply flatten it. Use a fork to create some t...

My conclusion after scouring the net over this topic; its very subjective and there are just too many theories out there. However, it is important to note that while the subject is chaotic in its variety of approaches, there are methods to give one a good starting point AND that can be transplanted easily from one bike to another, be it an upgrade or just another ride. To me it surely beats 'just to have a personal feel' of the bike, which i do not dispute is the best approach since its suited to the user. However, I do not subscribe to the idea of just using 'the force' every time i set up my bike for varied missions or when i get a new frame or something. I need a logical system (that I can understand and believe in) whereby I am able to set-up more or less for an 'optimal' ride on that particular frame, tweak it by feel over many rides and then put all these into meaningful records that can be re-used or just as future reference. Herewith, my own bike fit pr...

1991 Colnago Master Piu with full Ultegra components (me!) 1994 Pinarello Team Banesto with full Campy Chorus (Mr.Alu) 1996 Colnago Master Olympic with mix Campy Record/Chorus (Mr.Olympic, formerly Mr.Ti) Nice ride (no rain! luckily!). We got to try out each other's bike on this one so we really took our time. Comment from Mr.Olympic is that his Master is actually faster than the previous Ti bike he had despite being a little heavier. I find mine faster than the Saronni as well, smooth up a lot of ride fatigue and managing higher cruising speeds with lesser effort. I could not really judge which bike is better in what sense cos' they are all setup differently anyway so naturally, I'd find mine better than the rest! However, did try out the Campy stuff and must say that its quite good, but Shimano is better hahaha! Matter of preference I say. The multiple upshift option can be asset as well on the Campy but the thumb shifter position does not feel that natural to me compared...

Had the opportunity to go solo on Saturday so did a quick ECP - Changi Coast road 30km non-stop run....managed 31.1km/h average, not bad considering much of the journey (almost 3/4!) was going to some headwind! The Master Piu is definitely faster for some reason. Could be the slightly lighter weight (0.5kg lighter) or maybe even the 172.5mm cranks (was using 170mm). However, noticed that my cadence a little bit non-uniform! something I need to work out. But I do find more comfortable now going at slightly lower cadence due to the longer crank arm. All in all I believe its a positive thing for me in the long run. Did some changes to the Master Piu : handle bar is pushed down slightly so that its now pointing slightly below the rear brakes (was previously pointed towards the rear hub, which looks slightly unsightly!) and I changed to the Velo Carbon Pronto SL seat which I got from the previous Saronni originally. Surprisingly, the saddle fits well and it actually weighs 50g lighter than ...

Finally! the moment I waited for the whole week has come and passed. On Sat, I took me Piu out for the first time. The first thing that struck me was how smooth the ride was. I had initial expectations that the straight fork will somehow be less comfortable compared to the curved fork design but I was proven wrong from the start of the ride. Going over speed humps which used to be an ok affair on the Saronni (and an absolute nightmare on the GT Alu) seems enjoyable now! Acceleration wise, I would rate it similar to the Saronni but I believe this can be improved with fit tweaks. There's no reason why this can be worse off since the frame is lighter and stiffness/handling seems to be good. At Changi Coast Road, I managed to hit 35km/h against the wind with little effort, less than before. A testament to this is that normally under such condition, my heart rate would be close to 170-175bpm range on the Saronni but on this beauty, I hit somewhere around 160-165bpm. Now, thats a full 10...

Ok, just ordered myself some items for the build from CRC... Trying to keep within a budget here.....the Cane Creek 200TT Tri-brake levers being the most pricey of em' all. I need this because I WILL convert my current Ambrosio to Bullhorn-style bars. They just look so cool and retro! I found a nice site that details on this kind of conversion.... Only problem now is where to get the brake calipers!! I'm all set to sell the entire Ultegra groupset incl. the brakes....so I will see if I can take it out of the group and give some discount incentive to the potential buyers of the groupset...

Quite sad I had retire this ole faithful from 1985...still its life is not over. I plan to build it up as a singlespeed, basically recycling parts from my bin :- - Tecnotrat Saronni 54cm Columbus Aelle 'Pearl White' - Shimano Sante Cranks (thinking of removing the outer chainring) - Shimano W-RH540 wheels - Shimano 600 Stem - Shimano 600 Seat Post - Ambrosio 39cm Vintage Drop bar - Shimano Square Taper Bottom Bracket Additional items that I will need to get to build up as Singlespeed.... - Brake Calipers and Levers (damn, should not have sold the old one!) - Freehub -> Singlespeed conversion kit - Chain Since the frame has a campy horizontal dropout (the longer kind) there will be no need for a chain tensioner. I gather I would need to spend another 100SGD at least to get it the additional parts new/used.

Thanks to Mr.Ti (soon to be Mr.Steel), I have my Master Piu, fully integrated with his Ultegra SL set. Here are pics of the build from yesterday. Weight is about 10kg or slightly less, a little more than I expected but it seems to be a bigger bike and *should* fit me better. Now, whether is rides/handles better......well, I'll find out soon enough after I get all the positioning tweaked to my liking. Presenting "Master Piu" from 1991

well at work too and this damn 'economic situation' is getting into the tiniest of crannies of everyone's lives I guess. The job is not secure and I'm guessing I'm included in my CEO's cost-savings plan. Ah well, nothing much I can do about that! Back to cycling. Sunday, usual 80km with Alu and Ti. Mr. Alu was going like his arse was on fire, I could keep up but can't bear to leave Ti way behind (which we did couple of occasions on this ride alone) and I always have the toughest job I think being right smack in the middle. I call out to Alu to slow down and I tell Ti to catch up! I make a good moderator I suppose! On Saturday, Alu and Ti did not make it for the ride (Alu was pissed drunk and Ti overslept!) So yet again a short 38km solo run. 8km warm up and 30km speed challenge! Think I did quite ok Macs to Macs. Averaged about 30.3km/h and did 30km a little over 59mins but under the 1hr 'requirement'. I had a bit of help along the way, drafting 2 gu...