First fully mobile post: Trek X-Caliber Review

This post has been a long time coming. I rode this bike over the holidays in Arizona. My girlfriend’s parents live a few feet

away from a trailhead that leads you into the Sonoran desert. Her Dad was nice enough to buy a guest bike for me to ride while I was there, and it happened to be a Trek X-Caliber 29er “imagined” by Gary Fisher.

There are a few features highlighted with frame stickers that I sort of understand. I went to their website for an explanation and its just marketing drivel. Here are my interpretations:

1: G2 Geomety. A name for their line-wide geometry specs, which I’m sure, are not taken from any other company and are completely proprietary and unique.

2: Alpha Gold Alloy: No popular or trusted alloy was used, so a name was needed. No mention of an alloy number on the website.

3: Gary Fisher Collection: A grab at dirt legitimacy.

Scornful and lightly bitter sarcastic remarks aside, here comes the meat.

In short: It works. And for the price, hard to beat. It tracked predictably, and turned fairly quickly. It was comfortable to ride for the four 2-hour rides I did with it.

Shifting of the future: planned obsolescence or suspiciously affordable?

A new bike will be on its way soon, and I think I’ll take one for the team for informational purposes, and use a new offering for shift groups.

I haven’t decided if it will be a road bike or a monster-cross bike, but either way, I can use a road group.

Because I have to save for a large future event and couple this summer, I will be left with few dollars to spend (looking at about $1500, tops). A full grouppo from my beloved Sram is out of the question if I go for my normal Thomson cockpit and a wheelset in the ~1500 gram area.

With the ever-climbing prices of premier bicycle parts, it would make sense that a few options should emerge to fill the gap between the cheap mass-market parts and the premier groups. So lately, two options have emerged for reliable, affordable 10-speed shifting:

Option 1:
Microshift

I heard about it first last spring when Team Movistar used it for the Giro. Which, I believe, is the reason for the first color option:

But it’s cheap. It’s even available from WalMart! Reviews exist, and people have put some miles on it…the results have been mostly positive. But I want to see for myself. I would probably flesh the drivetrain of the bike out with a 105 and Sugino.

Option 2,
Retroshift

Retroshift’s ‘About’ page says it all:

Retroshift™ is a new and somewhat unexpected approach to a combined braking and shifting system.

Totally unexpected and with an air of elitism, but obviously functional.

Check the site for the video. It works great. I just hope it feels as great looks like it works…if that makes sense. I don’t know how it will feel for road, but its function will probably be best for a monster-cross bike.

Soon, I will have to make a decision. I’m leaning toward Microshift because of its completeness, but only time will tell.

New Mavic Fury’s.

They’re not a new product, but they’re new to me…and I already love them. Full review to come after I beat the piss out of them for a few weeks.

Best bike at IMS Chicago: Johnny Campbell’s Baja Honda CRF450X.

I was working at IMS, but I snuck away a couple times and this is the only bike I bothered to photograph with a real camera. It’s Johnny Campbell’s Baja CRF450X. The little bits of prevention and protection are the best.

Take a peep.

Chicago-ish stuff.

This video is great. I’ve envisioned a video exactly like this in my mind. It’s very close, although I never thought to shoot in a parking garage exit. So sick. Great use of the BMW S1000RR as well. Very photogenic and unique.

Make sure to watch it fullscreen, because it’s shot with Nikon’s new D800.

And…SRAM Red hydraulic disc brake setup. Classy, clean, and probably crazy light.

Gnarliest day of Teahupo’o ever surfed.

If you’re a surfer or seen Dana Brown’s ‘Step Into Liquid’ you probably know about Tahiti’s break Teahupo’o. Witness it:

http://video.mpora.com/ep/5Pgs2slxu/
More Surfing Videos

Disc CX bikes…not going away.

Mr. Tweedie of Roscoe Village Bikes on a Humble Frameworks Sextant disc.

Disc CX bikes are gaining ground. First, Tim Johnson won a UCI race with a Cannondale Super-X disc. Now, ENVE and 3T have made disc forks. So, there a real options for real racers. I’m even considering having Spooky retrofit a disc tab on my Supertouch.

My TRP CX-9′s are great in the dry, but when it’s really wet, they have trouble (just like any other rim brake). They do alright in the snow, but take a little dragging to get some heat into them. So, they have downsides in performance. Discs have one definite downside: weight. But like any bicycle product, they’re getting lighter. They also have one conditional downside: cost. Depending on your rim brake of choice, you could end up paying more for discs.

I’ll do some actual research (read: simple googling) and compare the two possibilities in two types of price ranges.

Claimed weight per wheel:

Comp:
430 grams – Avid BB5 road mechanical caliper with 160mm Avid G2cs rotor. $49. Cheap! 95 grams of rotating weight (rotor).

157 grams – Avid Shorty 4 cantilevers. $35. I won’t even speak to their performance, but they come stock on “comp” level cyclocross bikes.

Pro:
451 grams – TRP Parabox ‘cross specific parabox disc brakes. $469 for the setup (rotors, calipers, and hydraulic box). And you still have to buy mechanical cables. Such a weird, odd-looking setup for such a high cost. But it probably works incredibly well…I hope. I may drop coin on

128 grams – TRP CX-9 ‘cross specific v-brake (my favorite). $149.

For the “pro” setup, that’s a crazy difference in price and weight. Even if you pop for a set of TRP CR959′s at $349 (and anybody who does is getting the “least braking performance for their money” item on the market), that is still $110 difference in price, and 323 grams per wheel. Still not easily swallowed.

And just as I thought I should not overlook the other possible weight differences between rim and disc, I checked the weights of ENVE’s ‘cross forks…460 grams for both. Nice…but unnerving. Wheels can be lighter with disc setups, but that would be a whole different topic.

In the midst of this wad of info, the economy and sense comes in the shape of the Avid mechanical setup: greatly improved wet-weather braking, without a huge difference in price, and a weight you could overlook.

Without testing the two disc setups, unless you’re doing some crazy hilly races, the mechanical setup should be plenty.

Another upside of discs: ease of use. In pleasant weather, their pads last a good duration of use, as opposed to soft rim-brake pads that would offer close to comparable braking. With pad changes, no alignment is needed. Rim brake adjustments take a mechanical finesse that most people do not possess. With proper setup, quick wheel changes are a breeze, and can be quicker than with canti’s and v-brakes.

Many other topic can be ground out, like rotating weight relocation, carbon rim braking, etc…but those are for another time.

Short story, expect to see some more disc ‘cross bikes in your hood next season.

The enabling forks from ENVE and 3T:

Needs more squish! Full-suspension fatbike!

Photo: Salsa Bikes

Salsa is building a fully suspended prototype fatbike! They say it may or may not be built for the public, but if they don’t, you can be sure somebody else will. It’s not really Surly’s thing, but 9:ZERO:7 and others could possibly offer one in the future.

Blog post from Salsa about their prototype: Prototype Talk: Full-Suspension Fatbike

Some of the finer points on this frame: a tapered head tube for front-end strength. A curved seat tube to allow more clearance to bring in the rear tire, in order to keep the wheelbase at a reasonable length for quick handling. A rear suspension linkage design intended to keep the rear stiff, yet still offer compliance. Good stuff. I still haven’t dropped the coin down to buy a Pug or Necromancer, and the way this winter is going here in Chicago is going (no snow) I might wait to see how these pan out.

Also, I totally forgot to take a photo, but I saw a Moonlander at Higher Gear in Highland Park on a ride. The paint is beautiful…a spacy-looking blue-ish black sparkle. And the fatter tires made the Moonlander dwarf the Pugsley next to it. Looks like a blast. The bike I saw was for a higher-up at Sram. XO on a fatbike…good stuff.

New Years Resolution Video

This just has to be posted. Sick video, done with a sick camera, by a Cinematographer who uses it well. Make sure to make it large or full screen!!

CCC’s New Year’s Resolution Photos: Sunday

Didn’t go Saturday, but I stood freezing, hungover, to scream at the pros and take some photos on Sunday. Here are the good ones.