Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

WPW's Solstice Century was yesterday. I was hoping to do a metric (100km/62 miles). That didn't quite happen. My left knee really started bothering me at about 30 miles, and the only reason I actually got 42 miles in is that if I hadn't ridden the last twelve, I'd have never made it back to my car. I kinda had no choice.

The only thing that was less than awesome about the ride was that I was completely out of my element. The ride was all over North Park and surrounding areas (we were as far as Warrendale at one point), and I'm basically not familiar with any of those areas at all, at least not in terms of getting around by myself by bike. That meant it was fairly imperative for me to keep up with the rest of the riders.

That was no problem for the first twenty-something miles, but after my knee starting bugging me, it made for a more stressful situation, because the last thing I wanted to do was be stuck in the middle of nowhere (relatively speaking) in the freezing cold.

And freezing cold it was. After the first ten miles or so, the water in my water bottles was getting pretty solid. The mouthpieces were frozen shut, and the only way to get a drink was to unscrew the whole top and suck down whatever wasn't already in an icy state. I'm going to have to pick up a couple of those insulated water bottles if I plan on doing this winter riding thing. And I do plan on doing this winter riding thing.

At least one of things I did right was to swap my studded tires out for my regular road tires the night before the ride. If I'd been riding on the Nokians, I'd have been miles behind everyone from the start. I couldn't believe how heavy those things are as I was pulling them off of the wheels on Friday night.

I threw them in the car, just in case I got out to North Park and everything was icy, but there were only a few spots where there was some ice on the road, and none of it was too terrible. The road tires were fine. But they come back off tonight as I get ready for the last two days of commuting for 2008.

The weather for tomorrow and Tuesday look surprisingly rideable (although the high for tomorrow is only 21 with 20-30 mile winds), so I may as well get out there and get riding. All of this driving to work lately has been making me crazy. Plus, after yesterday, I'm still 110 miles away from 4,000. Riding tomorrow and Tuesday should get me to about 935. 65 more miles somewhere in the last eight days of the year should be pretty achievable, even with the holidays getting in the way.

Won't you be glad when January 1st gets here and I can stop talking about how many miles are left on my quest for 4,000? I'm expecting to ride closer to 5,500 - 6,000 for 2009.

The Wheels on the Bike Go Round and Round.

I almost had a new wheelset last night.

"A new wheelset? D00d. Haven't you spent enough money on that bike already?"

Well, yes. But here's the thing: I had been thinking about a new wheelset so that it'd be easier to switch between winter and non-winter tires (or cross and skinny tires when winter isn't even a consideration), but then I did the whole flat-to-road-bar conversion last month and decided to shelf the wheelset idea for the foreseeable future.

That was going just fine until I was looking around on eBay* and saw a set of 700c wheels with six-bolt disc mounts for only $100. I kept my eye on them for the week that they were available, and with less than an hour to go, there were still no bids. Some guy bid on them with like ten minutes left, but I still ended up getting them for only $113, plus $25 for shipping. Great deal, no?

I quickly paid for the wheels and then went about purchasing a new cassette and rotors for them so that I'd have everything ready to go when they showed up. The guy shipped the wheels the next day, and everything seemed to be going well. I got the cassette on Monday, and the rotors and the wheels showed up yesterday.

I got home from work, all excited to open up the nice big box that UPS delivered. I pulled out the wheels and... hey. Wait a second. Where are the disc mounts? These are just standard road wheels. WTF, mate?

Yep. He sent Vuelta XRP Road Pro wheels instead of the CycloCross Disc wheels. I emailed him to let him know, hoping that he hadn't accidentally sent eh Cross wheels to someone who was looking for road wheels. I was a little relieved that he emailed me back less than fifteen minutes later, but his response was pretty funny:

"Sorry. Those are the only wheels I have. There must have been some confusion with the decription (sic)."

Yeah. There must have been some confusion with the description. And the title of the auction. And the picture that was in the listing. Because they all said (or showed, as the case may be) DISC WHEELS. In fact, everything about the auction was ripped straight from Bike Island's listing from a month or so ago (actually, they have them back up on eBay now)

He also said it was his first time selling anything on eBay. I knew that after looking at his feedback, but still, how do you put up a listing for one thing when you're clearly selling something different? Even without knowing anything about the wheels, you should be able to look at them and see that they're different, right?

He's supposedly refunding my money tomorrow. I really hope that happens, and I hope he understands that he needs to send another $25 to cover the return shipping. I mean, I told him these things, but I guess it's possible that there could be confusion with my email. You know.

The biggest problem is that I still don't have a wheelset, and now I have the cassette and the rotors that would go with one. I might just buy the wheels that Bike Island has listed (although I'll probably buy them from their site, as they'd be $10 cheaper, and Bike Island would save money on eBay fees), since I've had a chance to see a set of Vuelta XRPs in person, and they do seem like pretty nice wheels. Certainly strong enough to hold a little guy like me. It would have been nice to get them for $100, though.

If I don't go with those wheels, there aren't too many other choices. Mavic makes a disc-ready road wheelset, but $450 is way out of my price range. I could get another set of the Bontragers that came with my bike, but I'm looking at paying at least $266 for those (not including local sales tax, since most out of state bike shops won't ship Bontrager wheelsets). And that's about it, as far as I can tell.

I'm leaning toward the Vueltas, as they're the least expensive, and they seem to be nice wheels. I just wish there were more reviews of them online. Although it's not like there are a ton of reviews for the Bontragers, either. I probably just feel more comfortable with them because they're what came with my bike. And Bontrager is basically a household name.

*Never a good idea when you're trying to not buy something. In fact, if you're not looking to buy a specific thing, don't go searching for that specific thing on the internets. Not on eBay, not on Craigslist, not anywhere. If you can keep yourself from looking for it, your chances of actually buying it shrink pretty quickly. I should take my own advice one of these days.

152 to go.

Well, if I don't hit 4,000 for the year I'll be able to lay at least some of the blame on December's weather. This entire week looks like crap, and the weather for the 20th, which was supposed to be the Solstice Century, is in doubt, too. Don't get my wrong. Saturday and Sunday were great days for riding, and I was able crank out about 45 miles. Not too bad.

Even Friday went pretty well. It was all snowy and icy - a perfect first ride for the new studded tires. They did what they were supposed to, although I did wipe out on the switchback at the end of the Hot Metal Bridge. The whole thing was just a sheet of ice, and I turned my front tire a little further than I should have, at a speed that was slightly faster than it should have been. Now I have a nice reminder in the form of a beautiful bruise on my left hip.

Beyond that, though, the commute in was fine. Riding home was a little bit more precarious.

As I went from the Eliza Furnace Trail back over to the Southside Trail (via the same ice-encrusted Hot Metal Bridge), the snow really started coming down. Seriously. It was blizzard-esque. I stayed off of most of the roads that I usually take in order to keep from being killed by some sliding car or something. That seemed to work out and I made it home without any other issues. And of course the snow stopped as soon as I pulled into the driveway.

If it's going to rain all week, I'll probably stick to driving in. I hate doing it, but getting rained on when it's only 35° isn't especially appealing. Maybe next week will be nicer.

The weather outside is... No. I am not going to start quoting lines from Christmas songs.

It is cold out there. When I left the house this morning, it was about 18°. Still, no big deal once you're pedaling for a few minutes. I was a little surprised about all of the snow on the Southside and Eliza Furnace trails, and even more surprised by all of the ice.

I have some knobbier tires on my bike right now, and I was pretty much okay. At the same time, it was light out, and I could see exactly where I should be going. This evening I'm going to go home through Bloomfield/Shadyside, because I don't feel like wiping out on ice that I can't see.

I'll be a lot happier when my Nokian Hakkapeliitta W106s show up. I ordered them on Friday from Peter White, so I'm hoping they'll be here before the end of this week. I'm just excited to have a tire that's called Hakkapeliitta.

At this point I'm 232 miles away from 4,000. I'm still hopeful that I'll make it. If I'm able to ride Western Pennsylvania Wheelmen's Solstice Century on the 20th, that'll knock off 62 or more of those (that's a metric century, mind you). We'll see what happens.

Holy cow. It's not Monday, it's Tuesday.

Rode in today. For the first time since November 14th. Which sounds like a long time, but really it's only eight working days that I missed. It could be worse, I guess. I just hope that this is the first in a decent string of days.

Well, actually I won't be able to ride in on Thursday because I have a dentist appointment in the morning and I can't afford to get to work any later by adding bike commute time. I'll already have to skip lunch and stay late to make up for getting in later. So much for that decent string of days. Oh well. It's supposed to be crappy on Thursday anyway, so at least I have a good excuse for not riding.

After I get home tonight, I'll need about 310 miles to reach 4,000 for the year. I'd really love to do that, but getting in 310 miles in December might not be the easiest thing to do. I guess it all depends on the commuting.

Really, I can pile up 310 miles in 12 days of commuting, and I have 13 commutable days left in December. If I throw in some weekend rides, 4,000 might not be that hard at all. If I hadn't wrecked in September, I'd probably be trying to hit 4,500, but what can you do?

I was able to get some riding in over the Thanksgiving break. Fifty miles over three days. I probably could have done more, but I wanted to take it fairly easy. I installed some fenders on the bike last week, and they worked fairly well, although the fit is a little funny on my bike.

Right now they can't be used at all with 35mm tires (although Planet Bike doesn't claim that you should be able to use them with 35s, so I can't complain about it), but with some tweaking, I might be able to get them to work. I put my 35mm tires on last night because we were supposed to get snow (we didn't), which meant I had to take off the fenders. And really, that's silly, because you want the fenders when the weather gets worse, so stuff isn't flying up into your face and all over your bike.

If the adjustments that BruceW suggested don't work, I'll just get a set of the 45mm fenders and keep the 35mm fenders for non-winter weather and skinnier tires. Or something. Regardless, I wasn't overly excited about the quality of the hardware that Planet Bike ships with its fenders. The faces on two of the screws got stripped without me even trying to do it, which meant I had to get a wrench out to adjust/remove them. Kind of annoying.

I might actually just take them back to REI and try a pair of SKS P35s. I really like that Planet Bike gives money back to Bike Advocacy groups, though. Such a conundrum for something as simple as fenders!

A few more things about me and my bike.

Speaking of bikes, I've hardly been riding. Since October 24th, when I was officially cleared to go back to doing things that normal human beings do, I've only put about 220 miles on the bike. Of the 23 days that I've been back at work, I've only biked in for six of them.

The first week back I tried to do too much too soon and had to take a few days off. The second week back, I had some other problems. The last two weeks I've had this really nasty head cold that refuses to go away once and for all. It's really annoying. I think the cold is mostly gone now, though.

I'm planning to celebrate Thanksgiving by waking up early and going out for a ride of some decent length. I hope to do the same thing on Black Friday while most people are out shopping. To that end, I'm going to have to be careful not to get run over by any crazed bargain hunters. I'm also going to have to be careful to not overdo it and get myself all screwed up again. I really want to get back into the routine of riding to work every day.

Driving is annoying.

I've got a bike, you can ride it if you like.

Dear Diary,

It's been a long time since I've written. I can only offer heartfelt apologies and try to assure you that a delay such as this won't occur again. Anytime in the near future. Maybe. It's tougher to write on a regular basis when you're not just sitting at home recovering from a bike wreck. Although when I look back at October, it does seem like I did a fair amount of posting the first week that I was back at work. So I guess I don't really have any excuses. I'm just lazy. I think of things all the time, I just never actually end up getting them down.

Since I only ever talk about my bike, that seems like a good place to start. It's a road bike again. If you recall, I switched out the drop bars for flats when I bought it back at the end of April.

Well, Chainlove kept putting up Ultegra triple brifters (along with all of the cables and everything) for only $145 (retail is like $400 or so), and I couldn't hold back any longer. I bought them. Which meant that I had to get a road bar. Two days later, Chainlove conveniently provided an Easton EC90 Equipe Pro for a very good price. I found the front derailleur I needed on eBay, also for much lower than retail and took the whole box of junk over to Pro Bikes (Honestly, when are these guys going to update their website? Maybe I should offer to do it for them in exchange for a nice new mountain bike) to have them install all of it. All I had to buy from them was the bar tape and a set of Salsa Cross brake levers.

So why did I get it converted from road bars to flat bars and then back to road bars again? Well, I initially went from road to flats because that was what my first bike was, and I wasn't sure I'd like road bars. I didn't think I'd be into the narrower steering surface. But I had these Ergon grips with nice magnesium bar ends, and I found myself wanting to use the bar ends almost all the time because it was just more comfortable. Not coincidentally, this would be essentially the same hand position as if I was riding with a road bar/shifter setup. I figured if I wanted to have my hands like that for the majority of the time, it would probably make sense for my fingers to be in close reach of my brakes, as opposed to having to shift position to get back to them like I had to do with the flat bar setup. When Chainlove started putting up those Ultegras at that price, I decided to just go for it.

Did I spend more money doing it this way? Of course! That seems to be what I do best. Back in April, I had to pay for the labor to switch from road to flat. Now I had to pay for all of the new components. Then I had to pay for the labor to switch from flat to road again. On the plus side, the Portland originally came with 105s for the shifters and front derailleur and now I'm rocking Ultegras, so at least I have that going for me. And... the stock road bar on the Portland was a $50 Bontrager Race which pales in comparison to the glorious carbon fiber of the Equipe Pro. Would I have ever considered upgrading if I had kept the road setup to begin with? Probably not. But I really shouldn't be thinking about that, right?

One other thing to note is that the majority of this upgrade was subsidized by me selling a bunch of CDs on eBay. I have more at home that have to go up, and those should cover the balance. I also have all of the parts from the flat bar setup that I need to try to sell. Probably also on eBay. So it's not like this upgrade put any sort of dent in our finances. It's just that if I had been smarter, it never would have had to occur in the first place. Oh well.