NARROW CHAIN

[heading out to dehesa]


[where i was heading]


[the ride profile, dig those 5 bitches in the middle]

today was a great day of training in san diego [la mesa out to dehesa to do more MT's]. the surprising thing was my new chain, it was so quite, as in no noise, none. my entire drivetrain was super smooth too, very smooth. which is surprising in itself, since i need to replace the centaur rear derailer that has more miles on it than i can count and has been flung across the street after myself and good friend john lost a bike[s] versus car incident early one morning last year. the whole new chain saga started last saturday while noah and i were out doing MT's up mulholland inclines, north in calabasas. i guess i am stronger than i think [insert laugh] or my power cranks do exuded power or simply the removable link on my chain busted. as it was, the link broke [luckily after all of our planed intervals], while we had just started climbing our way back up to ventura blvd. i found all of the pieces and set about putting it back to together, as we were a good 35 miles from home. after realizing i had a multi-tool with a chain tool on it, that my good friend todd at iMartin talked me into buying years ago [thanks todd]. we started back on the road again, just to have the chain completely relieve itself of my bike. this time there was no fixing it, as most of the link parts were gone.


[road kill]

so it was time to call the support car [aka josephine] to bring a new chain from the team warehouse. i will just say that putting a new campy chain together in falling temperature and without the campy chain tool is close to impossible, but we did it and started home again. this time the temperature had dropped about 20 degrees and the sun was setting. so noah and i put it in the big ring and put the hammer down and a few espressos at starbucks [thanks carolyn, team starbucks card giver] to warm up. we made it home after 8 hours and just about 5 min before sunset. ok so now i have a brand new spanking campagnolo record ultra narrow chain. i have to say that using the campy chain tool is a joy and it is a very precise and beautifully simple designed tool [thanks to mike and alfredo, service persons extraordinare at iMartin for lending me the tool and alfredo's expert assistance].


[isn't she purdy?]