DCCX Kalas Classics Series 2015 Round 2: Killruddery

Long Story Short

• Finished 52nd out of 71,
• Finishing time was 43:07,
• Lap times were 7:09, 8:25, 8:51, 9:22 and 9:20,
• Got lapped by 4 riders,
• Didn't crash this race.

Strava

View the race on Strava: DCCX Round 2: KillMUDDERy. 52/71.

View the race Replay on Strava FlyBys: DCCX round 2. I enabled;

• Myself, I am the posterboy for Ginger CX Magazine,
• Barry, we had a good battle for 51st,
• Andrew, he finished 7th, 2 minutes after the leader.

Course Segment

MultiMedia

Full Results can be seen here: DCCX Kalas SuperLeague Round 2.

Alek had his Handlebar camera: DCCX Kalas Classic Series 2015 (vol 2).

Sean Rowe was snapping the Ladies race, the B race and the A race.

Short Story Long

Build-up

Stages cycling support were very helpful. They said to leave the Power Meter indoors for 24 hours for it to dry out. I got a new battery door from Fitz Cycles and took it for an FTP test. The test put my 7 Watts off my 20 minute peak power which was recorded in March after a few hard months on the Turbo. I was pretty happy about the result, and I knew I could go harder. I decided to not use the Power Meter on my CX bike anymore.

I was really happy to see that the Vegan message is getting out in the open. GoVegan.ie's poster campaigns at the bus stops and the subsequent radio interviews are hopefully opening the public's eyes to the trauma that humans are capable of inflicting on a grand streamlined scale. A radio debate on NewsTalk ensued, the Vegan lady, said that animal abuse was "unethical". The "Cow and Sheep" representative had only one option left to him. He went with the nuclear response; "These Vegans believe that cows are raped". This lead host Chris Donoghue to end the interview there and then.

Even with the glaring evidence of the WHO's report, the government won't speak out about the animal trade, as they have campaign sponsors who are heavily invested in meat. Teagsc had a report detailing that by completing a conversion from a Dairy farm to an Organic Veg farm, you can increase your profits by €200pha. Although you'll have to go to Farmer's Markets at the weekend instead of CX races.

I fell victim to Amazon's Black Friday build-up deals when buying an SSD for my four and a half year old MacBook Pro. Which, like Paula Radcliffe, is running really well after upgrades are applied.

Pre-Race

The low lying winter sun blinded my eyes as I tried to navigate the non-existent car park. I didn’t know how to park. Being the third car at the event, I was going to be the car parking trend setter. The guy who handled the sign on arrived and told me there was a better car park around the corner, which I availed of. I went in to sign-on, where I encountered Alek, Barry M, Breda and our latest debutant, Luke.

I was the second person on the course. I did three laps. The first two laps I rode on the sides of the course, to discover where best to avoid the bumpy and soft sections. The third lap, I put the lap together, I knew the lines I’d be taking and the sides of the course I’d be elbowing to occupy at the start. The most important line of the course would be the entry to, and avoidance of, the water covered tractor tyre tracks. Whilst cleaning the muck out of my shoes and pedals using a tyre level, I watched riders trying that watery section. Everyone hugged the inside of the corner. I was going to ride the middle of the track and swerve across before the water. That line, would mesh nicely with the requirement to “just smash it” across the preceding section where John was marshalling.

The women’s race was delayed by fifteen minutes. I watched their start to cheer on Naoise and Breda. I also wanted to see what would happen at the first obstacle. I noted that the field was half the size of the previous week’s field, 13 racers as opposed to 26.

I headed back to the car to prepare for my race. I met Richard, Valdis and Fionn (whom I believe was making his debut in the cauldron of the A-race, fair play for not sandbagging). I lent my pump to Valdis to adjust his tyre pressures. He was going with 50psi in both tyres. I opted to go with 30psi. I should’ve gone down to 20psi, as the course evolved, it would request more grip. I didn’t anticipate this. Michael and Barry K also showed up. I consumed a gel and sank 750ml of water with a High5 Extreme Caffeine tablet dissolved in it. I couldn’t sleep until 2am that night.

I struggled to pin on the fourth pin, and needed help from some nice Australian/New Zealand people. I joined up to the grid. I wanted a good position after the previous week, where I started at the back. I wanted to be on the right hand side of the grid. It would allow me to access my planned line and the surface was more compacted there. I was about half way back in the grid of 71. Valdis was directly in front of me, Richard was to my left. Luke was diagonally behind me. Mike and both Barrys were buried in the scrum behind.

The Grid

Race

The countdown expired and we accelerated off. Most riders went to the left of the track. I made up lots of places by using the centre channel. Two lads came a cropper in front of me just before the water. I navigated between them and asserted my dominance over the point of track I wanted to use to cut across. Traversing this soupy section I was the second placed Orwell rider, with only Barry K ahead.

Water finds its level, and I was soon passed by Valdis, Richard and Mike. They powered along the bumpier, right side of the track in front of the hay bales. I occupied the smoother left side. After a few more corners, a guy on a mountain bike crashed, forcing me to lose momentum. I ceded places to Barry M and Luke. I looked back as I climbed the corn field section. I was about eighth last.

I was very weak on that climbing section. But I was much stronger and braver on the grass field downhill section. Throughout the race, I made up a lot of positions on this section. It was just a case of holding position through the mucky woods by going through a rut. After dismounting to jump the ditch, the lap brought us around to the timing mats. This was a nice part of the track. It allowed the tyres to shed muck, in the early laps anyway. From there it was about being brave through the wooden bridges and carrying as much speed, using a big gear, as possible through the John’s mucky section. I was getting bounced around, like a rag doll, but I was heading in the right direction. If you’re not in danger of slipping a disk in your back, you’re not going hard enough.

Another lad binned it just as I was about to make my cut across to avoid the water. I let him know I was displeased with his actions, as I dismounted and ran the following section. It was beginning to look like a Tesco Chow Mein, the one in the red box. It probably tasted nicer than its food counterpart. The rest of the lap passed of nicely.

The stuff CX courses are made out of.

I caught up to Barry in the corn field section of lap three, he said that it would not be his day. Next I caught sight of Luke. He, like many others, was paying for a fast start. John was cheering me on each time as I exited the forest section. I gave him a “Two ‘Go Luke’s for the price of one” deal as I made the pass on, nine years my junior, Luke.

Some guy rubbed tyres with me through the soupy section. I could feel the thread of the tyres jar. Then they gave way as he went down. He didn’t look as much like Harvey Dent as I expected, as he ran past me, nudging my shoulder with his back wheel. I made up another place on section in front of the bales. The guy almost lost it on the corner and clipped me. I was OK with this. I let him know that I was of the opinion that CX is a full contact sport. After my left hip coming in contact with tyres in the last three races, I could not opine differently. I encountered Michael in the corn field, we traded places twice as he sped off. The next time I saw Mike, he was standing at the side of the road.

The last lap of the race passed without incident, if you call getting skunked on the line by Barry “without incident”. After I made the pass on Barry, he was always within striking distance, just like at PunchesCross. We were able to fend off the leaders lapping us until the last lap. I sensed Barry’s presence through the corn field. I backed off through the greasy grassy downhill section, as more leaders lapped me. Any time I looked back Barry was looming larger. After transcending the ditch I had a few meters on Barry. I was on the drops giving it everything I had. There was a spec of dirt on my Garmin screen, it was obscuring my speed, I thought it read 36kmh, but it was 26kmh. I thought I had done enough, but Barry just appeared on the inside and beat me to the line by a bike length. I passionately voiced my feelings, which drew a few chuckles from the crowd. I lost the sprint for Fifty-first.

From Sean Rowe

Post-Race

Lots of riders followed my previous week's example, they took an extra lap at the end. The only problem with the races is that there is not a flag at the end. The course was laid out very well and the chip timing was a great addition to the DCCX series. The comments on Boards were very complimentary, as opposed to the previous round of DCCX.

I missed the whole A-race, as I waited in-line to use the hose and get my clothes changed. Wobbles, who parked beside me had a pretty badass power washer. It was a tank of water and a motorbike battery with a small pump. The complimentary beer was really nice. The presentation of the prizes took place and most people filtered out after that. I stayed to watch the last lap of the World Cup race that they were streaming. Everyone enjoyed Sven Nys pulling out the victory.

Pre-hose

What Was Learned

• Hoses are good at cleaning bikes, but it still needs more attention to fully clean it.
• The number of riders that I am being lapped by is decreasing, which is a great sign.
• My climbing is still bad.

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Fixx SuperCross Cup 2015 Round 3: Tymon Park

Long Story Short

• Classified as 57th, but I ruined the rankings by taking an extra lap,
• Actually finished 64th out of 89 riders,
• Finish time was 45:57,
• Lap times were 10:45, 10:51, 11:53 and 12:11,
• Got lapped by 18 riders,
• Had a few falls.

Full results are available on the Fixx SuperCross Cup Results Page.

Strava

View the race on Strava: Fixx SuperCross Cup 2015 Round 3: Tymon Park, B Race. 64/89. Finished with 10psi in my back tyre.

View the race on FlyBys: Fixx SuperCross Cup 2015 Round 3: Tymon Park, B Race.
I've enabled the Orwell Riders;

• Myself; every race needs pack fill,
• Barry; he had a great ride to 50th,
• John; after a poor start, he recovered well to finish 45th,
• Valdis; Orwell's B-race lynchpin, finishing 16th.

Course Segment

Although some of them times are very suspect.

Multimedia

Alek had his handlebar camera on for this race, watch the video: 2015 FIXX Supercross / round 3 / Tymon Park.
Sean Rowe was around the course for the A-race, the B-race and Ladies race.

Short Story Long

Build-up

My back wheel was slipping on the Glencullen golf course when I got out of the saddle, I presumed due to high tyre pressure. I wanted to go Tubeless with my tyres, to get dem sweet, sweet low pressures. I put in a large order to Bike24 and Chain Reaction for bike upgrades. I really lusted after that Ultegra CX crankset. Live is too short to ride five bolt cranksets.

The conversion was hard, due to my rookie mistakes, but I got it done. I also got a head light, so I could ride in the dark. Orwell's A4 group are doing night intervals and there's a secret CX meet-up on Thursday nights. It's fun not having to explain to a wife about my expenditure.

"Your bike already has tyres and a pedal thing, why are you buying these, we're saving for a deposit, I can't live with Farty Frank in this dinky apartment anymore." - Non-existent wife.

"Listen love, the tyres will allow me to run lower pressures without pinch flatting, the new crankset is 40g lighter than the old one, and Frank doesn't fart as much as your mother." - Me not having to explain my logical decisions.

I rode a Mucky CX session with Mark, who won the previous two B-races. As Spectre is out, I'll use a James Bond comparison to distinguish us. He's in the class of Eva Green in Casino Royale, I more like Henchman 32 in the Timothy Dalton one.

The Paris Murders had me pretty rilled up. It took my a few days to figure out who, or what, I was truly angry at. Nothing quite like a terrorist attack to make you confront your own mortality and life. Everyone has an opinion on this whole Middle-East debacle. War has always been, rich people getting richer and poor people dying. According to Fallout, "War... war never changes".

Imagine if defence budgets were put into renewable energy forms. Praise the work of Gates and Zuckerberg. There would be no need to influence politics in foreign nations for their Black Gold reserves. But alas, we live in a world where disposable World Leaders have warmongers to obey, lest they end up like one, or more, of the Kennedy clan.

Pre-Race

I had another worry on my mind. My Stages Power Meter was on the frtiz. I thought it was Water Damaged, it was shorting out and draining batteries. How would I get it working again? How would I be able to make purple lines appear on my Strava graphs? These were my thoughts as I waited for Tymon Park to open. I parked in the estate across the road from the gates, as to not obstruct the traffic. I used Google Maps to scout the car park size. I reasoned that I needed to be there super early to get a nice spot.

I chatted to Siobhan and Alek as we signed on. I did three practice laps. I could not muster the courage to ride the drop. Valdis was making his CX debut in the Dublin area. He had previously raced north of an imaginary line. We watched the Women's race. Most of them were riding the drop. I retreated to my automobile for the thirty minutes before the race to eat, drink and pin on numbers. I forgot to check my tyres for pressure. The rear tubeless tyre was still leaking air out of one spoke.
I went over to the start line, and took a run the first part of the lap. Upon my return, I discovered that the grid was full. I would be starting from the back. There was five minutes to go to the start. I seen a track pump beside me. I had no place on the line to lose. I himmed and hawwed about it, and decided not to. I should've pumped my tyre there.

I was beside two youngsters from the Kanturk stable. They would be starting a minute after those who've been through the heady days of college life. Two pizzas, fifteen cans and a mosh to "Killing in the Name of" a week, I'm still feeling the effects of after four and a half years.

Race

Lukie Räikkönen need to whip out some Michael Schumacher type shit, except wearing a helmet and cycling on-piste. So I did what Schuie would've done, I cheated gained an advantage over my rivals. I held onto the railing and had both feet already clipped in. I felt like an absolute wanker. I havn't been drinking very much alcohol, the feelings of shame and guilt are not masked for me anymore. Those feeling quickly disappeared as I started making up places. I was in the thick of it for the first lap. I jumped down the drop, and ended up running most of the forest section. I even passed John. Then I slowly lost all the places I made up.

The socks were not so white in the later laps - Sean Rowe.

On the second lap, a guy on a Mountain Bike was trying to come by me at the start of the Off-Camber section. There was thistles to the right of the narrow track. I popped out my elbow, to defend my space. He decided to bide his time to make the pass. Opting not to cycle through the thistles. He passed me on the second climb of that section.

Most of the rest of the race I was competing with a guy in a black and white harlequin patterned jersey. I didn't descend the drop during the race, as I was losing all faith in my brakes. There was a little kid at the entrance egging me on to ride it. I had a fair few falls. I passed Michael in the forest section once. His balding rear wheel was not aiding his cause in the mucky section. Just after I passed him, I tried to remount. My pedals were so full of crud, that I could not clip in easily. I slowly fell over, as I shouted out "cunt". I had a collision with a tree trunk on my second last lap, I entered the start of the forest section with lots of speed, but I couldn't steer. I went straight into a tree trunk, my second tree collision of the season. On my last lap, I fell on the mucky downhill after the forest section was cleared. Someone bike hit my hip, but he didn't fall.

Discussing forestry with Mike - Sean Rowe.

I did fairly well in the "spiral of confusion", I was just aiming for the greenest parts that dwindled as the race wore on. On the other muddy sections, I also followed the principle of staying on the green areas on the side of the trail in the other muddy sections. The problem with the traction on the course was that there only one section for the tyres to accelerate to a speed where the mud would reach escape velocity. From the wall section to the end of the forest section, it was just constant slow speed riding and mud.

My main fear was burping my rear tyre, and/or denting the rim. The pressure in the rear wheel was slowly vanishing into thin air. I didn't put the Stan's Yellow Tape in the rim, as I thought that the standard blue tape would do the job. I do believe that this was the ride that helped seal the one spoke where air was escaping. Every time I hit the root in the wall section or the curb at the end of the lap, I could feel the rim. My rudimentary bunny hopping skills debilitated to front wheel popping skills as the race wore on. So I was not able to avoid these obstacles. But I feared the burp on the bridge. As I got to the other side of the crossing, the rear of the bike would slide all over the place as I put the power down. But the upshot of the low pressure was fantastic control in the mud. I finished the race with 20psi in my front tyre and 10psi in the back.

At the end I took an extra lap. I don't know why I did it. It happened. I'm not proud. My life was divided into two parts, before that extra lap, and after that extra lap. I just live day to day now.

The finish, or what should've been the finish for me - Sean Rowe.

Post-Race

I was so covered in shit, that I just said hello to a few people and went back to the car. I used the three pieces of Kitchen roll that I brought to get the largest pieces of muck off. But alas, Plenty Kitchen roll's CX bike cleaning properties were not as effective as Occam's Razor or Newton's Flaming Laser Sword at disproving Last Thursdayism.

The tyres were caked in shizzle, but they cleared on the path back to the car.

I ate and lounged out in front of my computer watching some meaningless crap as darkness crept up on me. I had to clean the bike with minimal lighting, in colder temperatures.

When the results were released, my extra lap made me feel really bad for taking the extra lap at the end. But then I went to the Ireland vs. Bosnia match and that made me happy again.

What was Learned

• Get to the grid early,
• It takes less than five minutes to pump your tyres,
• Stop off at a garage on the way home to clean the bike,
• Clean your bike in the daylight,
• Cheating is extremely effective.

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Giant PX-2 Wheels Converted to Tubeless

I wanted to change my clincher wheels to tubeless for CycloCross. The Mud is starting to appear and running 40psi (2.75bar) is not ideal. I also didn't want to pinch flat from running lower pressures. I don't complain because that's what losers and victims do. I solve shit.

What you will need:

• Tubeless Compatible wheel; Giant PX-2 Wheelset, although wheels without spoke holes in the rim are best, like the DT Swiss rims.
• Tubeless Ready tyre; Maxxis Mud Wrestler EXO TR,
• Tubeless Valve Stems; ones with removable cores are the best,
• Tubeless kit: Sealant, Yellow Tape, Valve Core Remover and Sealant Injector,
• Tyre Levers; plastic are recommended,
• Soap Application kit; Sponge, Sink and Dish Soap,
• Tyre Inflation Device, i.e. a pump,
• An Inner tube, for the initial seating/rounding of the tyre,
• Patience and a Work Ethic,
• A sense of humour, as there are some dodgy jokes in this article.

Process

Where I fucked up: Install Stan's Yellow tape over the Blue Rim Strip. Do this first. It makes it easier when air is seeping out of the spoke holes.

Other Notes: The Stan's black Rim Strips didn't bring me any success. I couldn't get the tyre to seat at the valve using these.


Put on the tyre, get it aligned and the thread direction correct. Install a tube and inflate it, this will seat one side.

Tubeless tyre with a tube inside to seat one side.

Deflate the tyre, unseat ONE SIDE of the tyre, and remove the tube. In the picture, I should have the Yellow Tape installed.

Keep one side seated as you remove the tube.

Install the Valve stem. Twist on the  Again, I should have the Yellow Tape installed here.

Valve Stem Installed.

Put back on the unseated bead and try to get it as high up the rim as possible, so it will seat faster. Apply the Dish Soap to the unseated seated side, to create a temporary seal. Now take a few deep breaths, mentally prepare yourself for the upcoming struggle. Pump it, pump it like there's no tomorrow. I aimed for 60psi (4.1bar).

Pump it like you're a pornstar.

I missed the picture where I'm injecting the sealant. I put 60ml (2oz) in a tyre with the Yellow Tape, and 90ml (3oz) in a tyre without the Yellow Tape. Add more air and distribute the Sealant inside the tyre. Shake that tyre, like you're an irresponsible baby sitter. I had problems with air coming out of the spoke holes, so I put the holes at the bottom, grabbed the tyre by it's outsides (3 & 9 o'clock positions) and flipped it backwards really fast a few times, until it stopped leaking.



Leave the tyre on each side for five minutes. This will seal the side walls.

Seal the sidewalls.

Wait a while before riding the tyres. Take them on short rides near your home at the start. Enjoy life with less PSI.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad