TMonk

nice one CDR!!!!

also nice ride @hubcyclist.

New tech question (not geek thread worthy): Does anyone have any experience pairing a Ptap to a Garmin device with third party speed and cadence sensors? I don't care about having accurate speed and cadence numbers so much, but if I can find it for the right price, I'd like to know that it would jive w the powertap and garmin devices.

Homebrew01

Exciting TdF stage today....

rankin116

No experience with 3rd party stuff, but can't you get that data from the PTap itself? I get cadence data from my powertap (not accurate though, always see high spikes) and speed comes from the garmin, I believe.

Or am I missing something?

himespau 

How does the powertap give you cadence? Speed I could see based on acelerometers, but cadence would be a challenge. I just use the older garmin speed cadence sensor.

TheKillerPenguin

ptap gives "good enough" readings for cadence. I think it must detect it via torque spikes on the downstroke. It also reports speed as accurate as you'd get from one of the old cateye units that used spoke magnets, as in it's as accurate as the measurement you input for the tire.

himespau 

Huh, I wasn't aware of that. Good to know. I was about to buy a second speed/cadence unit for a commuter I'm building and now I can just transfer the one from my powertap bike over there instead. Thanks for saving me $30.

Flatballer

Yeah, it's based on torque spikes. It moves around some but it's decent. If you really concentrate on being super smooth and you're not putting out much power you can fool it, but normally it works well enough, within 5 rpm or something.

Speaking of Powertap, they got back to me about how much it would cost to upgrade my wheel to the newer G3. $350. But you also get bearing, axle, freehub, etc. It's basically a new hub. The G3 hubs seem to sell for a decent bit more than the 2.4 SL I have, but I'm not sure it's $350 more and worth the hassle.

I think I'd rather just wait until I get the Powertap P1 pedals or something and sell the wheel as is. Someone else can upgrade it if they want.

canuckbelle

Left my team, so needed some new kit to race in. Went with Voler. Loving it so far. Nice stuff. Still using my team bibs, though...Castelli ftw.

Harlan

Saw your other post on this as well. We are in the same boat, only masters men on our team, no women and just one cat 5 guy otherwise. Debating just going unattached for a while since geographically we are secluded from any active teams. Are you hoping to pick up another team?

TMonk

Yeah, screw the extra sensors. I'll just stick w the Ptap and a Garmin (or other) device. Also I need a HR strap.

Yay.

canuckbelle

I'm not going to rush into being on a team for the sake of being on a team. It has to be a good fit for me, and there need to be people doing the races I want to do. There aren't any in my immediate area. The closest is Happy Tooth in Charlotte (I think they're the closest). So I'm going to wait until the season's over in Sept to start shopping around my race resume. Hopefully I'll be a Cat 1 by then, too.

canuckbelle

Took out a spacer of stem height. I'll also be wrapping my aero bars with some tacky tape for the upcoming Merckx TT as part of the Georgia Grand Prix.

topflightpro

My new job is in a giant, corporate office building. It's a LEED certified building, and all the offices and cubicles are laid out in a grid. The break room is one "block" before the restrooms.

Yet, for some reason, whenever I am going to the breakroom, I walk past it one block, realize I've gone too far, turn around and walk back.

Also, I feel the need to stop and look both ways before walking into one of the "Avenues."

furiousferret

At my old job we used to throw wadded up paper as far as we could and put money on who's cubicle it would land in. Unfortunately, too many people at my current job are too sensitive.

hack

Been there .. hated it. The setups were supposed to promote more interactive work environments, but all it did was promote a bunch of distracting noise. So, we all ended up hating each other and had to take calls in conference rooms.


My old office used to have really long walkways between the cubes. So, you'd inevitably make eye contact with someone walking the other direction some 100+ feet away, make that oh so generic friendly smile or wave and then have to keep walking toward them for another awkward 30 seconds.

Flatballer

My new place has the short cubicle wall. 4.5 or 5 feet or whatever. It's definitely distracting but I don't hate it as much as I expected to.

There's also a pillar and some file cabinets flanking one of the main "avenues", which creates a one-lane bridge bottleneck. People stop at the far end to let people through. It's amusing.

globecanvas

One additional note, there seems to be no way to run Slack on a Kindle, either via app or web interface. In case that matters to you.

hubcyclist

swapped my cassette to the 11-28 (8 speed) plus got a new chain (other one was a little too short) in preparation for the century I'm riding. I was thinking I had to replace my shifter cable, but turns out it was the 12-23 cassette causing the wonky shifting. I did drop my chain on my ride today so I need to check the front. clearly this is my A event of the year so far lol

TheKillerPenguin

nah, slack's ok, much less of a distraction than having to split the screen between the tour and notepad++

echappist

to all you sesquipedaliaphiles and cunning linguists, a challenge

canuckbelle

I'm new to skinsuits/speedsuits. Pro tips for putting them on/off?

shovelhd

If they want you, they will find you. Showing up in a generic kit is a pretty good tell. Talk it up at the races, with everyone, even the teams you are not interested in. It creates the buzz that will get you where you want to be. Good luck.

carpediemracing 

I get the shorts on, make sure they're up high, then reach back and get one arm in at a time (*edit I'm wrong, both arms in and then pull up, hence the sashaying /edit). There's some shoulder sashaying going on in the arm bit. Then zip up. Then tentatively stand up. A properly fit skinsuit won't fit right when you're standing up, the front will be a few inches too short. It'll pull down at the neck and up at the crotch. Unzipping helps with walking around.

If you want to know how to pin a number on without a friend/teammate to do it for you, it's very hard to pre-pin a number and then not rip it when getting the skinsuit on. This is where a team, Super77 adhesive (and a friend/teammate), or lots of flexibility come into play.

If you're not sweaty it's easier. For example I prefer to wear the skinsuit while warming up because it's next to impossible to get into mine when I'm sweaty. Others prefer to warm up with the skinsuit rolled down and then pull it up after toweling off/etc.

grolby

I like to make sure I've really got the shorts good and tugged up before dealing with the sleeves. In general, I've determined that there's no shame in using your hands to get today's very snug kit settled into the right place. Goes for bibs, too, not just skinsuits. Anyway, I step into the shorts, pull them up, then carefully tug up on the outside of my hip and, uh, inner thigh area for each leg to get them where they belong before getting myself into the rest of the suit. It's way, way harder to put on if the top is too low, so that's why I pay so much attention to the shorts. From there, I get my arms into the sleeves, one at a time, THEN pull it up over my shoulders. Personally I find it harder to get my arm into the second sleeve if I've already got the first one all the way in. If the opening is a little lower, it's a lot easier.

Taking it off is honestly a lot easier. You pretty much peel it off so it goes inside-out. You can do it in stages, obviously, which is how I change at races without putting on a full-Sachs type show in the parking lot.

mattm

+1 on putting the number on after the skinsuit is on.