Rides4Beer

New wheels! $460 from CRC with tires/tubes (Hutchinson Fusion5, but I prefer Continental). They come with the prism decals installed, which would probably look good on a flashier bike, but mine is dark with muted decals, so I swapped them for the black decals that also come with the wheelset. First ride will be today, but they felt good on a quick spin when I mounted them up.

Out of the box:


Swapped for black decals, mounted 25mm GP5000s and Silca latex tubes.

jadocs

Wow that's super inexpensive! Pics on the bike!

jadocs

noodle soup

A little heavy, but the price is great.

WhyFi

That's the TT version, right? Let me know what you think. I have a set of the regular road tubeless waiting in the wings, but I want to give it another month or so for the road debris to be cleared up before mounting them.

aclass

My first ever set of carbon wheels. What a nice difference and especially in the ride quality.

Sy Reene

Getting ready to try this when it becomes drier and dustier outside.. only chose this as it seems like a promising description and because nobody mentions this product... hey, that's how I like to roll

August West

I've found my Specialized Torch 2.0 shoes so comfortable I decided to give the Torch 3.0s's a try while they are still available. I also wanted something other than black which my current shoes are. Hope they fit like the 2.0's but if not I'll just exchange them.

Rides4Beer

No doubt, def a bargain for what seems so far to be a good wheelset. Did 54 miles with them yesterday, in some really strong winds and they did great, very predictable handling. They also tested well on Hambini's wheel test, within 1-2w of Enve 7.8s and Zipp 404s.

Not the best lighting, but I wanted to go ride and didn't feel like waiting for the sun to come back out.




Agreed, not the lightest out there, but when I realized that they were the same weight as the 32mm DT wheels I had on my old bike, which never seemed "heavy", I figured they'd be ok. So far they seem good, taking them on a century tomorrow, hopefully with less wind. lol

noodle soup

Park Tool flush cut pliers

phrantic09

did you swap the crank on that defy? I thought it came with a non series crankset

GnipGnop

Wow that purple Giant is nice. Dark purple I think is my fav colour for a bike.

smashndash

Not the poster but it looks like the “new” One, which is just the old pro one rebadged.

WhyFi

Yeah, I think you're right - I saw the tan sidewalls but missed the lack of "Pro" labeling. Those old Pro Ones are going for a song, now, but I've always been scared off my durability concerns.

canklecat

Pearl Izumi Elite Pursuit Speed jersey. Wasn't sure whether it would make any difference so I put a couple in the Amazon cart on "save for later" in case of a price drop. When the hi-viz yellow dropped to $20 I grabbed it. But we didn't have a warm enough day to try it until this past week.

Can't say it made me any faster. All three of my rides this week were in 15-25 mph winds, mostly whipping around. But there was definitely less cross wind buffeting. That alone makes it worthwhile, especially in traffic. And a couple of 5-6 mile rolling inclines of 1%-2% felt a bit easier into headwinds. Especially one that ends with a max effort standing sprint for 15-30 seconds to safely merge with traffic. Less fabric flapping around, saves some energy.

I liked it well enough I ordered a second in blue for $33. Prices stayed closer to $80 or higher on the cool kid colors like black and red.

The most common customer complaint is the fit. It's fairly short in the waist, especially up front, so it's intended for bibs, not shorts. There's no room for pot bellies. I'm carrying about 3-5 lbs of pudge and it fits okay. Pockets are minimal but enough for the necessities. I tend to carry way too much stuff anyway. I started leaving the Kool Stop bead jack home after switching to tires that don't demand a bead jack for every flat repair. And I don't carry anything more than a couple of gels for rides up to 50 miles now, and rarely use those. Took awhile to convince my body it wouldn't starve after 20 miles.


I'm not fast. The jersey just looks that way.

bpcyclist

Left one of my gloves at Safeway accidentally this morning. Ten year-old North Face fleece. Loved 'em. Supposed to snow a little here tonight and am riding first thing in the morning, so had to get what I could find. Took a hard pass on all the $120 cycling-specific gloves that just seemed stupdily priced for what they were. Found another pair of simple black fleece gloves at REI for a little over 20 bucks. Done.

Sy Reene

for spring season mid temps. Giro Strade Dure gel LF


.

CAT7RDR

Best cycling gloves I have used so far. Good protection and dampening for road chatter.

jadocs

No not TT, just plane “ONE TLE”. Fit my Reynolds great. Was able to pop one on by hand. I imagine I could have done the same with the other but I was impatient.

Just did 32 miles on them today. Ride fantastic.

WhyFi

noodle soup will feel vindicated to know that I've finally caved and bought some MasterLink Pliers -



I really only bought them because I anticipate that I'll be removing my chain more frequently with my recent move to waxing.

I also picked up some Lake CX237X (wide) in white, some new Speedplay cleats to go with them, and a couple of Pedro's tire levers to replace the ones that I've inexplicably lost.

noodle soup

it doesn’t cost much to have the right tool for the job.

I just bought a tool that I’ll only use for trimming zip ties.

it didn’t cost much, but it’ll pay off in blood.

wipekitty

Voler sent me an e-mail reminding me that I needed to buy stuff, so I did. Two bibs and a jersey, great sample sale finds!

Rides4Beer

I did, well, the shop did. lol The Advanced 1 comes with mechanical Ultegra and a non-series crank, so when I had the shop do the di2 upgrade, I had them swap the crank as well, since I wanted to switch to a 52/36 (the non-series it comes with is 50/34).

I love it, especially in the sun. I also love the metallic orange on my Giant Revolt, they def have some great colors!

edsta74

Swapped out my BB5 calipers for a pair of BB7s. Noticeable difference!

SethAZ 

Stages L/R Ultegra 8000 power meter

For literally several years I've wanted to get a power meter. For the last couple of years I had my eye on the Quarq DFour crank-based power meter, as it uses Shimano chainrings and blends in with the Shimano crank look, and the Quarq power meters have a sterling reputation. The only issue for me was the cost. Looking recently again it would have cost me over a grand for the DFour DUB version, and that still wouldn't have included me buying a DUB BSA/68 bottom bracket, not to mention the chainrings. I'd be looking at a good $1200-1300 all up.

I had a look at the Stages L/R power meter, which is dual-sided strain-gauge power meters built onto a standard Ultegra 8000 crankset. It would blend right in on my bike, which currently has an Ultegra 6870 Di2 power train. I read reviews on this Stages Gen 3 L/R setup, and could find nothing bad about it. People seem to think it works well, is reliable, etc.

Anyhow, it was listed at $729 everywhere. Exactly the same pricing, down to the penny. Then I discovered that JensonUSA offered a 20% discount on one full-price item, and when I put the Stages Gen 3 L/R crank/powermeter into the shopping cart and applied the code, it worked!

So, for $583 shipped (next-day to my state) I'll be getting a 172.5mm 50/34 compact Ultegra 8000 crankset with Stages Gen 3 L/R dual-sided power meter built onto it.

I'm pretty stoked. I just ordered it, so haven't got a shipping tracker yet, but it should be here sometime this week, hopefully tomorrow (the site said free next-day to my state, so hopefully it really does arrive tomorrow). Installation should take me literally 5-10 minutes tops, since it's just a drop-in Hollowtech II crank for an existing Hollowtech II crank.