AustinBike

The TL;DR - don't bother.

Sometimes the AustinBike World Headquarters sends me on a mission to scout out a new trail. And then sometimes this happens - I'm sent out to review something where I would have been better off riding urban around town. Headed out to McKinney Roughs yesterday and it is a mess. The trails are in terrible condition. They are almost all jeep track and terribly torn up by horses. While I was able to pull off more than 1000' of climbing in the ~12 miles of riding, it was pretty sketchy. Some of the uphills are sharp turns with switchbacks, and so loose/rutted that it was hard to clear them on my singlespeed. I would have been better off with gears unfortunately, primarily because of the terrible trail surface.

Here's the full review: http://www.austinbike.com/index.php/east-of-austin/339-mckinneyroughs

Now that the travel is done for the years I am looking to hit up some new trails. Grelle and Colorado Bend are on my list. If anyone else has suggestions on relatively close locations that I might be missing, ping me and I will add them to my list.

I am a big fan of these on my singlespeed: https://www.on-one.co.uk/i/q/TYOOCM29X24/on-one-chunky-monkey-29x24-tyre

Even with the shipping a pair of these is cheaper than anything I can get in the US and more importantly they perform great and last about a year (20-30 miles per week on the bike).

For my squishy I use Ardent 2.4's, they work fine but are definitely more expensive. May try the monkeys on the squishy one of these days. 

4 hours ago, Hakalugi said:

Looking forward to this event!! I've ridden w/ LA a couple of times... Juan Pelota isn't enough to git er done on this ride .

One of my claims to fame was that I beat LA in a race - on his own property 🙂

A few years back the Mellow Johnny's classic was run on his ranch and he ended up with a DNF. Technically anyone that finished the race beat him. 

Wow, that is an awesome price. I paid $91 for mine.

10 hours ago, crazyt said:

shimano was only 10% off, but sram and kmc were 30% off (quicklinks and chains).

I prefer KMC. Their 10-speed chains have a multiuse quick link, Shimano positions theirs as single use only (according to a very well respected wrench I talked to back in the day). Maybe they can be used more than once, but because of this I stick with KMC.

7 hours ago, DesertNomad said:

Not like he’d give us the time of day anyway.  

My sentiments on the LA story are mixed.  While he did dope and did lie and did treat some good people like shit, he also put in serious saddle time training to win 7.  Juicing alone doesn’t buy you 7.  The insanely intense training still has to happen.  

Yeah, no kidding. I am always going on the assumption that everyone was juicing in one way or another. His juicing probably made him 5-10% better, just enough to win, but what if he could have won without it? We'll never know.

The Anderson store will be shutting down, the Lamar store will supposedly be open. Are the items at Lamar also 30% off?

Yep, it is stories like those that made me consider the change.

I'm the king of ass-related advice apparently.

I'd be interested in seeing this, exclusive of any VC/angel funding. 

Right now the models seem primed for implosion. The charging piece is especially troubling: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/05/charging-electric-scooters-is-a-cutthroat-business/560747/

Just wait until people start doing the math on this. It is similar to being an Uber driver. In the early days people were very hung ho, great way to make money. Then they started cracking down on the drivers, it was harder to make money. Then the real costs started to show through in wear and tear on cars, insurance riders, etc. Eventually people started to realize that the primo side hustle was closer to minimum wage than they had imagined.

Give it time on the "wranglers". It is coming. As the economics tighten on the companies, the rewards will start to fall off. And that is when things turn inwards.

There is room for one scooter company, maybe 2 (more like 1.5). Definitely not 3. 

Bought one of these and it is head and shoulders above the Camelbak. The TL;DR if you don't want to wade through the review is that it is no longer uncomfortable since they have changed the bladder design. Camelbak has a few advantages, but the Osprey lifetime warranty is pretty sweet and I am happy to be in their camp now. Performance had them at ~$95 in their closeout.

http://www.austinbike.com/index.php/product-reviews/338-review-osprey-raptor-10-hydration-pack

11 hours ago, AntonioGG said:

Heard it on the radio that this is going to be at all Austin City Parks.  E-bikes and scooters on the trails.  They mentioned north and south walnut creek trails but it wasn't clear if this includes off-road trails or just groomed trails.  I can't find any info on it.

All we can hope is that the scooter companies all go belly up. Once they run out of their VC cushion they'll come up with the unfortunate truth that their business models are unsustainable. Literally. They need to be rounded up each night, charged, and then redeployed every morning. There is no way this is viable when you consider the high capital cost of entry and the high operational costs. Hopefully the demise will happen quickly.

I have passed Lance on one of those unnamed trails. We were about to go down it and he passed by going up it. Just sayin'.

I have KS's on my bikes. The LEV on my singlespeed has been great and worry-free. The i950r on my full suspension has been sketchy. It drops easy but I usually have to grab it with my legs to pull it back up. Will replace that with something better when I replace the frame in the next year or so. 

This is my daily workout, down around the lake and back, about 18 miles round trip, always been a great way to kill some time and keep in shape. Earlier this year they put up the "no motorized vehicles" sign to keep the scooters off the trail. This afternoon I saw 2 guys from park police and asked them when are they going to start enforcing that because the scooter situation is getting out of control.

They aren't. And it gets worse. Starting on 12/1 they are going into a 1 year "pilot program" of allowing scooters on town lake trails. 

Fuuuuuuuu.......dge.

Get ready to start dodging frat bros and douchebags on scooters racing through the trail. They did impress upon me the need to call 311 any time we see idiots going too far (i.e. racing, weaving in and out of people, knocking into people, being general idiots, etc.) Those complaints will get registered, it's our only way to show the impact.

Brace yourselves, scooters are coming.

Yeah, yoga is a good idea. Any stretching is a net positive.

I'm up for that. Just say when.

Speaking of slashes, I had two sidewall tears in Bentonville. Not ripped through but enough of a cut to let air out.  I put a tube in one, but for the other I took the tire off, cleaned it up on the inside, put on a boot and then put lots of crazy glue on the outside. More than a month later it is still holding. Plan to pull the tube on the second tire and use that same process. Originally I was skeptical of the crazy glue method but it seems to be pretty solid. I am still skeptical of the boot, I believe that the Stans inside the tire will eventually loosen up the boot adhesive.

Change your Stan's. Since you just got it and this is cold weather, you're good for 5-6 months. You can tell when you put air in if a little fluid comes out. In the summer put in an ounce or so every month or two. You'll eventually find the sweet spot. Basically it evaporates or dries out.

Also, Pump your tires up to about 40 and spin them before putting your bike away for the first week or two. This help seal the bead on the rim and fills in a little extra goop in areas where you might need it.

Otherwise, generally trouble free.

Sometimes flags can’t be upside down 😉

four stars for the original forts and two blue stripes for the 2 branches of the river. 

Just rode in the jacket I bought yesterday. 48F outside and it felt GREAT. Best bike jacket I have ever worn. Kept me warm, blocked the wind and kept me from sweating from the venting. Sleeves come off too. Great deal at 30% off:

https://www.performancebike.com/shop/cycling-clothing/mens-cycling-clothing/outerwear-raingear/performance-elite-transformer-jacket-11-4207

There are still some left.

I will be there about the same time with the same plan, but I will be in the slow group. 

I dropped about $300 at the Lamar store yesterday - new osprey, jacket with removable sleeves, wool socks, new seat, etc. Everything was 30% or better. 

The clothing was pretty picked through, was hoping for some long sleeve jerseys and there was nothing. Their shorts/pants were worthless. Their prices are pretty high, even with the 30% off they were priced about the same as Pearl Izumi on Amazon and I prefer that brand over performance's cheap attempt.

Yeah, the problem is that I have shopped online (email required) and they correlate that to my credit card name. If I were Bob Smith it would be a much more difficult task. But there are exactly 2 people in the country with my name, one in TX and one in CA. So when I buy it is easy to make the connection.

Every time I shopped at Performance they would take my email address and start spamming me daily. To the point where the last time I went in there I specifically told them DO NOT EMAIL ME to which they guaranteed that they will not.

And then Monday morning I had a new spam from them.

For this reason alone I am fine with them going out of business. They do not understand their customers. It is trivially easy to add someone to an unsubscribe list, but to automatically re-subscribe them because thy made a purchase? That is just wrong.