Why I would rather ride outside.....

...6 other sets of handle-bars to lobotomise myself on!

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A new fork and rubber

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Gary Gibson wins SPARC VOLUNTEER COACH OF THE YEAR 2009

I spoke with Gary Gibson, Wellington Velodrome Junior Coach, moments ago and he was “shocked and surprised” to have just won both the SPARC Regional Coach of the Year AND the General Coach of the Year. He believes the key to his success was, “Having such a lovely bunch of kids to coach”.

Gary is one of the Port Nicholson Poneke Cycling Clubs prized volunteer coaches and spends countless hours at the Velodrome and researching and planning his sessions at home. Gary already has plans to display his accolade, “It’s going to given pride of place in the track clubrooms”.

Athletes and parents provided an exhaustive amount of quotes to support Gary’s nomination.

“Gary has helped develop my track ability and nurture my passion for track. Every track session is the highlight of my week, and Gary ensures every one is worthwhile and makes me leave keenly anticipating the next session. His level of commitment goes beyond what most would be prepared to do”, Beth Balmer, School Sport Road bronze medallist said.

“Gary is funny he makes me laugh sometimes when he is teaching me stuff. He helped me and my friends learn to ride our bikes better and he helped me when I was scared at riding on the track. He tells us off sometimes but doesn't get grumpy. He is also my friend even though he is old.”, Victoria Ngatuere, U13 track rider said.

One winner from each region will win travel, accommodation and entry to SPARC’s national coaching convention in May 2010, where the winners will learn from and mingle with high profile regional and national coaches. Winning coaches from each region will also receive coaching apparel from SPARC and a generous supply of Wattie’s products. Gary said the juniors better hope it’s not baked beans but thinks the prizes are very generous and is elated to be recognised.

Gary is not paid but receives a huge amount from volunteering and often can't wait to tell me about the juniors achievements. Gary is a modest guy but is rightly chuffed to recieve this award and I'm sure the juniors would treat him like a hero.

On behalf of Mark Coburn and I from Track Committee and the PNP Cycling Club congratulations to our tireless volunteer coach Gary, who we are very proud of.

Rachel Anderson-Smith
Convenor, Track Committee
PNP Cycling Club
Ph: 0274039742

Gary also works with Peter Reynolds at Cogcycling.
http://www.cogcycling.co.nz

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Five go mad on mescalin

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A tale of two bloggers

I was looking at this site that I had been told about the other day. Having been out of the MTB loop for a while I completely missed its launch. http://www.tracks.org.nz . Its a very very cool site that tries to show all the MTB tracks around New Zealand.

I thought I would see who was involved in it, and clicked on a few links to find that one of the developers was a guy (Jonny) I used to race with a bit back in the good old days. The cool thing was that he has a blog, ( http://ohsaycanyousee.wordpress.com/ ) about his life in the US where he currently lives with his family.

That made me think of an american couple whose blog ( http://www.dna-nz.com/ ) I had seen about their new life in Nelson after shifting from Oregon (Don and Angela). I found their site incredibly interesting, and some of the things they come out with are quite funny considering the reasons why they made the move from the US to the sleepy hollow of Nelson.

What is really interesting is that Jonny and Helen are doing the complete opposite in their move to California. They have moved to the big smoke, family in tow, while Don and Angela are not having children to lighten the load on the Planet! I figure that's why they have more time to post on their blog, no sprogs in the way.

If we didnt have blogs we wouldnt know what people think about our respective countries. Its the little things that I find the most interesting to be honest. But some things you just cant help wonder about.

I want to know how in a country with an estimated 50 million people without health cover, there are people protesting and calling the president a nazi, while strutting around with fire arms, in response to his proposal for some kind of a public health system!

I will ash Jonny if he can give me a laymans view on what these people are thinking, or feeling threatened about. I don't think its been well enough covered in NZ, we just seem to be focusing on the extremeness of it, without any explanation for why these people are nutting off.

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Whats a Brevet? See below.

Simon Kennett, obviously inspired by his big adventure last year is going to hold his own event in NZ. ( http://greatdividekiwi.blogspot.com/ )

=======================
Howdy folks

We are planning to run a Great Divide style event in the South Island - a 1200 km, mixed terrain, self-supported cycle tour with a reasonably challenging time cut-off. Here's a map and some notes on the event (below).

We are still working through land access issues, which may well be resolved by requiring every rider to carry a personal locator beacon, but we thought we'd go public now so that you all have time to sort out gear, leave, fitness, etc.

We'll set up a dedicated blog shortly and then get some serious discussion going then. In the meantime, if you have any burning questions or comments, fire away.
Feel free to pass this on to anyone who might be interested.

Kiwi Brevet

Proposed start date: noon, Sat 6^th Feb 2010

(trying to get long days and good weather, but little holiday traffic).

Proposed course:

Start Blenheim, round Port Underwood road, Queen Charlotte Drive, Maungatapu Track, backroads to St Arnaud, Porika Track to Lake Rotoroa, Braeburn Track to Murchison, over Maruia Saddle backroads to Springs Junction, Rahu Saddle to Reefton, Big River and Waiuta Tracks, then backroads to Blackball, backroads to Jackson, over Arthurs Pass to Sheffield, Wharfedale Track, Lees Valley to Hanmer via back roads (?), Molesworth Station, Taylors Pass and then singletrack back to Blenhiem.

Approx 1200 km (note: our Google Map takes micro-shortcuts and under-estimates the total distance).

http://maps.google.co.nz/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=112695328976832403070.00047034cc217e43981f8&z=8

Approx 50% sealed roads, 40% gravel roads, 6% 4WD, 4% singletrack

Proposed rules:

Do it all yourself, under your own steam.

Riders must carry all their own gear (i.e. no domistiques).

No outside support (deliveries only to public addresses, no support from friends along the way). Prior to the race you may only post supplies to post offices.

Follow 100% of the course.

Riders must carry a personal locator beacon, and agree to cover the cost of rescue in the event they need to be evacuated.

Times under 4 days will be recorded as 4 days, 0 hours. (We're not after an exercise in sleep deprivation).

Riders must finish in under 8 days.

Drafting is OK.

When on public roads, follow the Road Code.

Cell phones OK, but must not be used to call for food or supplies (or any other assistance) to be delivered (except to a public address/business).

Call-ins to be made from designated towns to an 0800 number.

In the event of Molesworth Station being closed to cyclists due to fire risk, riders are to proceed through the Rainbow Station and North Bank road.

No entry fee; no prizes.

Some sort of koha will be requested for community charities along the route (yet to be determined).


That's all for now.

--
The Kennett Brothers
Office 523
Harbour City Tower
Brandon Street
Wellington
Phone/fax 04 499 6376
Cell 021 0753 051
www.kennett.co.nz

Distributors of Classic New Zealand Cycling Books
- Classic New Zealand Mountain Bike Rides (7th Edition, out 3rd Nov 2008)
- RIDE: the Story of Cycling in New Zealand (sold out)
- Phil O'Shea: Wizard on Wheels
- Harry Watson: the Mile Eater
- Bill Pratney: Never Say Die
- Warwick Dalton: The Lone Eagle (out Nov 2008)

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Broke-back-brakes

Bah humbug. A very fun round of the PNP MTB series came to nought for me today when a slow speed crash once again broke my Formula Oro brakes.

What happens is the lever rips the push-rod out of the piston assembly and you are munted until you get the arm off to force it back in. A 5 minute job in my shed with the correct 2mm allen key. (Note to myself - put a 2mm key in my kit).
I was having a great old time dicing around the 4-5th spot with Simon Kennet and Clydesdale Kerei Thomson in the very competitive Master two class.
Theres a fair bit of difference between the bottom age group in m2 and the top, as this is the time when as old bastards (Ian Paintin excepted) we really tail off in fitness. I remember when I came up from M1 to M2 as being the fastest period of my life, but back in those days, you didnt get burglars rarking it up ; ) . Angry Clive announced that he is up to M2 next year so that's something else to look forward to!

The Makara trails are real fun when you know where they go and I have to say I am pretty envious of the buggers that have them on their back doorstep. Signage was very good this time, but pre-riding is essential on this kind of multi-lap "portions of loops" kind of course and I suspect that all the wrong turns I made were because I had used all my mitochondria for pedalling and hadn't saved any for cognitive thought.....

I know Marco prayed for good weather and went to bed early last night cos when I rang him at 9.30 he was in la-la land chasing rabbits. It must have paid off as the course was completely mint (apart from the t2 obstacle course) and the weather stayed good right up until the prize giving.
Well done Marco and crew, and of especially Iva, plugging away on the lappy.

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This is pretty cool - make it big, then drag for 360 effect

Kokanee Crankworx — © MyPlanet 360°

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Cyclo-cross in the Hutt Valley

Its hard to understand why, but Mike Anderson from The BikeHutt was a little disappointed with the weather last saturday. Mikes 2nd Cyclocross race of the year sported the best weather for an off-road event that I have seen since......well, since his last Cyclocross event on July the 4th!

How can that be bad?
Well Cyclo-cross (CX ) is supposed to be all about racing around a short muddy circuit while plastered from head to toe in mud and sweat.

There was plenty of sweat, but the mud pretty much stayed on the dry firm ground. The course was still challenging, and favoured the CXers more than in the last event, which had a short muddy hill in it. I am pretty sure Mike was hanging out for some more mud! Mike had the traditional CX man-made obstacles placed in exactly the right spot to bust your rhythm.

CX is a great sport for the family and spectators with a constant stream of riders coming past the start finish - most people taking between 2 and 4 minutes to do a lap.

Mike held a 1 lap kids race which could easily become a big feature if the word gets out. These courses are fully doable by any kid with 2 wheels, and you know that's a very rare thing in hilly Wellington.

Mike has a good relationship with the Council who are no doubt impressed with the state he leaves the grass in!! The numbers were down a little from the 4th of July event which also had a fancy-dress element to it with a very popular appearance from Wonder Woman. (More pix from round 1)

This time around there was more Coffee and and an impressive mobile Pizza Oven from NYPD Pizzas. Craig Madsen was there taking pix with Cycletech supplying extreme value for money prizes given the $5 cost of entry!
Well done Mike.

The saturday morning time-slot might be a tough one to fill with family's and kids sport but time will tell.
Top image supplied by Craig Madsen.

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Formula Oro Puro brake dismantle/disassemble

There is an exploded diagram at bottom of this post.

The Formula Oro Puro disc brake has been around for a few years now. Its a very light brake with good stopping power and modulation.

The only downside I have found is with the FCS (Feeling Control System) adjuster, which can break, in impacts where the lever assembly is pushed "away from the handlebars". When this happens the push-rod usually dislocates from its seat in the end of the "piston" which is housed in the lever or "pump" body (as it is called).

You can usually carry on riding after forcing the push-rod back into the piston-kit Assembly, by applying the brake very firmly, in the normal braking manner, and replace the FCS adjuster later when you have the required tools.

In order to recondition the "pump" body you need to remove the actual brake "lever".There are two types of levers, alloy and carbon.

If you have the alloy lever you need to look carefully inside it. Above the threaded end of the push-rod, recessed into the lever, is a small 2mm grub-screw. This screw fixes the pin which the brake lever pivots on. Loosen the grub-screw a few turns and push out the pivot-pin with the end of a 3mm allen key.


There are actually two types of carbon lever, one has no grub-screw! The pivot-pin lever is "pressed" into place. Carefully tap it out with something of a slightly smaller diameter.

Although you have removed the pivot pin, the brake lever is still attached by the push-rod, to the piston, which is housed in the "pump" body.

Hold onto the brake lever assembly and gently but firmly, and with a lot of force slowly wrench the push-rod out of the end of the piston kit which is still firmly attached to the pump body. It is only held in by a firm "press-fit".

When the lever assembly with push-rod attached, is removed from the pump body, you will be able to see the piston-kit assembly and FCS adjuster are held into the pump body by a small torcx screw. (see above)

If you have broken your FCS adjuster in a crash, or your brake levers are no longer returning to their neutral position after use, you should undo the torcx screw that holds the FCS and piston in place, while keeping pressure on the top of the FCS adjuster in case it flies off after the screw is removed.

If the FCS adjuster is broken, then replace it with a new kit.
If the brake lever was not returning properly then replace the "pump-piston kit" with a new one, after coating liberally with the grease supplied in the kit.

Assemble in reverse order. This time you will need to apply a bit of force when seating the end of the push-rod back into the piston assembly.

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Whakapapa, an attempt at skiing

The snow was great.
Day 1, white out and 20cms of fresh powder.
Day 2, more snow, 5 metres of visibility and slight rain.
Day 3! More snow, sunny all round but high winds so the chairs werent open other than Happy valley. We got in 1 whole days skiing overall and stayed at the Graduates Lodge. They have a great chef there call Paul. This is the view from the bathroom window on day 3.

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Wiggins hangs in in the hills. Tour de France stage 15

Interviewer:
Brad, you were able to counter-attack the best with Armstrong Kloden strong. You done in great performance there?

Wiggins:
Yeah. I have yeah. Wodga want me to say? I dunno. I dunno what to say. Yeah.

Interviewer:
You proved to be among the best at this Tour de France.

Wiggins:
Yah reckon? Well see eh. Theres a long way to go. Yah know, lets not get too excited ya know. Thats one day. Tomorrows another day. Tommorrow I could be last in the tour de France. Ya know. Who knows.

Interviewer:
But, you are satisfied Brad no? You are highly satisfied?

Wiggins:
Yeah. What'd you think.

http://www.steephill.tv/players/cosmos/?title=tdf-st15-wiggins09&id=14597099

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