FLASH-POINT BLOG ARCHIVE: Jun 2006

Like some of the other "fanantics", this blog is long past due.  My apologies. 
Since I don't race and have only been riding 3 years, I am still learning much every time I ride.  But this I know...I love my Flashpoint wheels.  They look good and ride smooth, and I like to hear the sounds they make.  After an initial but brief problem learning how to get my tubular clinchers on the rim and holding air properly, and then breaking a spoke putting it all together on my new bike (which Zipp promptly fixed for me)the wheels have been absolutely trouble free and a delight to ride.  
The weather here in Indianapolis has been great for riding, with the exception of normal spring rains.  Not too hot, nor humid. Sounds a bit different for our Finnish friend.  My rides have generally 15-25 miles alone after work, and a 42 mile club ride on Saturday. I've got about 1000 miles on the wheels  by now.   On my solo rides I appreciate so much how trouble free the FP60s have been.  Simply no problems.  The Saturday club ride is the best place for me to compare myself and my wheels to my old wheels and my progress as a rider compared to others.  Compared to my former wheels, the FP80's coast fast, and I climb well on them.  I have read others say they are heavier than their "climbing wheels" but for me they seem very light and I defintely climb better using them.  
Since I am generally not as fast as some of my club mates, I am not sure yet just how fast they really are...I just know that I am a lot faster on them than I was on my wheels and bike.  I suppose the fact I am riding more and better, and have a new frame could have something to do with that, but I am guite sure the wheels are a very big part of my improvement.  I am able to keep up with the "front group" for much of the ride, but eventually drop off to a second group, then regroup and get my heart rate down a bit.  My ride group is great though, as they regroup 2-3 times a ride. 
A comment on wind - with the higher profile of the rim I was a bit concerned I would get blown a bit in a strong side wind; but, this has not been a problem.   A couple of times I think I noticed I got pushed a bit in a strong gust, but sos far not enough to bother me.
A comment on stability - Two weeks ago I had my first fall on the wheels.  It was own my fault, as I simply went into a sharp turn too fast and three abreast.  I had to move quickly to avoid a rider on my left and my bike slid out from under me and I went down on my right side.  My shorts took a beating but my bike and wheels didn't get a scratch.  On this morning's ride I took that same corner a bit slower and generally paid more attention in the turns.  Life and learn, and hopefully, ride another day.
That's all for now. 
Mike
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The winter is finally gone, and summer is here to stay, at least for a while. What's better than to start of a new season with a pair of brand new 60mm deep carbon wheels? As always we've had a really long and cold winter here in Norway and I have spent several hours on the trainer, waiting to get out and feel the wind in my hair again. Knowing that I had a pair of Flash-Point 60s ready to go made it at least a little bit easier. I had my last exam at the university for this semester today and I'm now looking forward to over two months only riding my bike.

My first impression was how good my bike looked with the high-profile carbon wheels on, almost like a real pro bike! And second, the sound! A sweet rattling sound while freewheelin' and "schwosssh" when pedaling, I can never sneak up on anyone now.

I rode the wheels for the first time with my local cycling club last week, and I got a lot of questions and the guys just stared at the rims, "is it all carbon fiber?", "how did you get those?" and so on. Some of them were so excited that I had to give them a test ride each.

I have now done five rides with the FP 60s, all under windy weather conditions. I thought that with so deep rims that it could be some steering troubles, but that turned out not to be a problem. I will get back with reports on stiffness, acceleration, climbing and so on when I get to ride them more.

OK, ok first off, let me throw out an apology for my recently developed inability to update my blog!  I have been swamped!  Between finals, nationals, racing, work, training...  yea, yea, yea you've all heard the story I'm sure!
It's been a long time, so a race-by-race update would be a bit much to read - but here are the highlights!  My first big races of the season were the 2006 NCAA Collegiate Nationals in Lawrence, KS - a weekend of fun, festivities, ridiculously large field sizes, and oh yea, 30+mph winds the entire time!  There is a TTT on Friday, a road race Saturday, and a crit on Sunday.  I was really looking forward to the TTT but when Friday rolled around it became apparent we'd have a 32 mph headwind for over 8 miles of the open course!  Our team started off strong, with the fastest split of the day coming through the first time check, but then the wind got the best of us and we ended up in 5th.  I was hoping the wind would continue for the road race, as the course wasn't really hilly enough to break things up - but unfortunately our race was early in the morning so things were relatively calm.  I attacked on virtually every climb and crosswind section, but just wasn't able to make anything stick.  The crazy part of our race came with 6 miles to the go when a huge crash took out almost half of our 90+ person field!  It was so devastating that they had to STOP the D2 women's race behind us and wait for things to get cleared up before they could finish their race!  By the time the sprint rolled around I had pretty much shot my legs from attacking, so I finished a disappointing seventh.  The crit the next day was a BLAST!  An 8 corner, figure 8 course with a steady grade up the entire back side.  Less than 10 minutes into the race Sarah Uhl and Rebecca Larson - two super-amazing professional racers - got in a break by themselves.  I knew that was something to worry about, so I rode up to it and the three of us were off the front for a significant amount of time.  Apparently this shattered the field, because when we finally got caught there were only 30 or so people left!!!  The rest of the race was attack after attack, and I ended up finishing in 6th.  I took the last corner before the downhill a little conservatively and it hurt me at the finish!  I need to work on my sprint!!!
After tapering for nationals, it was time to amp up the training!  That's where the Flashpoints come in!  Our training rides have a tendency to get pretty heated - so having such a fast set of wheels to ride really helps out!  To this day, I have yet to have a single problem with the Flashpoints - and they have thousands of long, hard training miles on them!!!  I do notice a bit of drag in a cross-wind, but as my fellow Fanatics have noted - the extra weight helps counter that significantly more than with lighter wheels.  I definitely feel comfortable riding them in much windier conditions than my Zipps.
The local race scene has also been a blast!  My teammate Tracy Huber is so incredibly strong and the two of us have really been working on ironing out our race strategy!  We're on a roll right now and have managed to win all of the races we've been in together so far this year!  A good majority of the time we've gone 1 & 2 off the front!  Things are just really coming together really well and it's great to have such a strong team!  We've also been testing the water out on the velodrome this year.  Tracy has raced on the track before - and actually racked up a national championship in the team sprint (I think) at masters nationals last year - but I've never done anything but just ride around!  We raced for the first time a few weekends ago and went 1 & 2 in two of the races and got second in the third!  We've gotten up to the track a bit more to train - it adds a nice change to the typical training routine.  Maybe one day I'll be able to translate it into a sprint out on the road :)
Ok, one last race of note, then I'll call it a day - I won my first big (i.e. not local) race at Melon City in Iowa over Memorial Day weekend!  If you haven't done the Memorial Day Weekend races you HAVE to go next year and you're in for a treat!  Interesting, challenging courses, huge fields, and lots of money!  It was a blast!  I had a rough first day in the Snake Alley Criterium, crashing twice on "the snake" - a 12% grade, switchback, brick road up the middle of Burlington, IA.  I chased back on both times despite a sideways saddle and crooked shift lever and managed to squeeze in a 10th place.  But Day 2 - Melon City - went way better!  This course is a ~1 mile loop with a rather significant winding hill up to a 180 degree turn to the finish!  Prior to the race I picked out the spot on the hill where I thought I should go - and quickly realized it was way too far out!  But come the last lap, everyone in the front had pulled off by that point and I just had to go for it up the hill!  I somehow managed to hold them off for the win!!!  It was amazing!!!
So needless to say, things are going pretty well.  This weekend is the track and then getting some good training miles in on the Flashpoints, then next weekend is the track state championships and Tour de Grandview - one of my favorite races of the year!
I'll keep you posted!
 

Two more races in the bag-One AG medal and another that put me in the back of the pack.
I finally went down on my bike-first time ever. Didn't bother me too much.  It was on a bike leg in a Tri. I didn't know the course and was riding a slight downhill at approximately 30-35mph. I saw a left hand turn up ahead but did not realize that soon after it morphed into a sharp right. The "S" curve was to much for my meager bike skills and down I went. I slid across forty feet of pavement on my rear, but luckily my shorts took most of the damage. I hopped back up, put my chain back on my bike, and finshed the race while flashing the spectators some moon. :)   The only bad part of the fall is that I missed 2nd in my age group by 40 seconds and I can't help but think that if I had stayed up, I would have gotten 2nd instead of third. That's racing.
My tri last weekend was a disaster-it was my first open water swim and it kicked my A** far worse than my spill. It was a lake swim but the wind was kicking up and the surface had waves like the ones that sank the Edmund Fitzgerald (maybe slight exageration). I think the water level dropped several inches during my swim beacuse I drank about a quarter of the lake. Anyways, by the time I made it to my bike, the race was over. I had an OK split but could never get past the fatigue of the swim. I just looked at it as training-but perhaps  "schooling" is a better term. It did make me face the facts that I'll have to devote more time to the swim.  I hate to swim.
But I do like to bike. The flashpoints have held out really well. I have only needed to replace one spoke despite several hundred miles of training and racing over rough pavement. (my LBS swapped the spoke for me quickly and free of charge-thanks Jim and Chris). I am happy with their performance so far and will keep you updated as the season moves along.

I finally decided to mount a magnet for my bike computer on the Flash-Points.Considering that I am not in my best cycling shape right now, but still riding the same speed, it must be the wheels that make me faster ;-).Right now, since work is crazy, I meet up with a friend twice a week early in the morning to get a good 1,5 hr ride in. Otherwise, it's not gonna happen.I am taking off for "Ride the Rockies" in about 10 days. Quite unprepaired due to the lack of hills in this area....anyway, I saw on their website that Flash-Point will be part of the Product Testing! It would be great to meet the people in person that gave us those great wheels!