Asphalt Junkies CLOSED AND GETTING OUR FIX (Page 96)

That might freak me out a little! There was just a thread in TriTalk about a guy who had a fawn following him on his run. It was a funny story.

Animal stories...

Was out for a ride 2 summers ago at 5:30am.  Saw something on the road 100 yards ahead playing around.  Thought it might be cats.  Then I could tell the movements were those of cats but must be puppies.  Got closer yet and realized that it was 3 young foxes playing in the road.

Another ride:   Dogs usually bark and chase and generally annoy you with the possibility of crashing you.  This time I saw a dog in the middle of the road and it saw me...then...The dog freaked out and ran away at a full out save-it's-life-terror run!  It ran straight away from me down the road.  I was doing 20mph and it was keeping pace ahead of me.  This lasted for about 1/4 mile when it came to a dirt road that went off to the right.  It turned the corner still in a full sprint.  As I later came up to the same road I looked right to see what it was doing.  I figured that after rounding the corner it felt safe and slowed but when I got there I saw it a hundred yards down the dirt road still in the full sprint!

yet another time.  Big golden retrieve laying flat in the road, lifeless.  As I approach, it gets up and walk off the road.  It was the cool time of the year and it was warming itself on the pavement.  There's so little traffic there it can take naps between cars.

This Saturday's ride had a couple of horses chase our riding group all the way along their pasture fence as if they wanted to play with us.

Oh boy!  I'm tired!  I'm sure my Sprint Tri this coming Sunday is going to be a pretty sad effort.  Oh well.  I knew I'd be tired after the hill climb.  Must be good to my body for the rest of the week.

Oh no!  What happened this time???

In my Hill Climb race report, I forgot to mention Mr. Whoop Whoop. We leapfrogged the whole race and about every 1/4 mile, he would rip out a "whoop whoop" or "yeah" or "go tiger." I wish I would have had my ipod. I decided to leave it at the cabin so I could listen to the wildlife. Little did I know.....

Last night, I realized that I didn't get a single blister or hotspot on my feet from the race.  In fact, I didn't chafe anywhere!  I'm amazed!

LOL, well she was trying to go up a hill and didn't make it and got unclipped and started walking when she said she needed to put on her "big girl" pants and just do it.  She tried, and that is when Bronco bucked her off, and when she got up, she finished walking up the hill and at least got to ride down.

BTW, she wants to change the name of her bike from Bronco to SOB but I told her no...lol

There are a few interesting animal stories going around.  I really don't have anything other than dog chase stories that I ave probably mentioned already.

I have caught up on everyone's RR's and left comments for everyone there.

Tracy, even with the annoyance of the guy hollering all of the time I think you made the better choice by getting to listen to the sounds of nature.  I have had a few races where someone has done similar things but not for that long a period of time.  Maybe you could have run up along side him at a prime location and given a little shove, thereby bringing some resolution to the problem.

I also think you may be fine for your race on Sunday.  Just make sure there is all kinds of hydration and recovery going on.  I imagine your legs are really sore from the constant climbing and then the likely dehydration that occured may provide more soreness still.

Karl,  I tried the bike naming thing and it didn't work out well for me.  I was asked on facebook what "her" name was and I immediately thought of "Shelia" because it's a Felt S-22.  Well, my wife quickly remembered an old high school girlfriend that wouldn't let me go for some time whose name happened to be Shelia.  She threw me a bunch of flack about it, mostly joking, and I kind of thought it best to just forget it.

Also, try to get your wife on the trainer and just have her clip and un-clip for a few minutes here and there.  She'll get to where she can do it with no problems, it just takes a little time.

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I am almost done with my RR for last weekend but I have to get some training in right now.  I have the run portion to complete and then it'll be done.  I'll get it up later on tonight before all of you go to bed so you can read my report to fall asleep faster.

Karl, I'm to sorry to hear about your wife falling again and I had to laugh at the SOB name but I think Bronco is the perfect name for her bike. Hopefully she will get a little more comfortable riding and I agree with Dirk the trainer is a good idea if you have one but then again I fell off mine.

I love all of the bike names!  So creative!

Jo, congrats on your award.  It doesn't surprise me at all that you succeed in so many areas.  Way to go!

Tracy, impressive race!  You are one tough cookie. 

On a personal note, our dog is pretty sick right now.  The vet thought he had lymphoma, but the tests are coming back negative.  They can't seem to figure out what's wrong, so now we're waiting on some blood test results.  Poor guy! 

My race report is up.  Check it out when you would like or if you would like.

Overall I am pretty happy with the results from this past Sunday's race.  Last year I placed 10/63 AG and 49/505 so I was pleased to move up in the AG standings as well the overall AND cut exactly 3 minutes from last year.  I also noticed that I dropped one place since the original posting was made.  I am now 34/435 overall and my AG placement remains 5/56.

Dirk, GREAT race report and race.  If you were not so fast swimming you would be able to draft...lol

Hey great job on staying focused on the bike!  Run was killer!

Allison, I hope hey find out what is wrong with your dog.  Please keep us informed.  We love our dog and understand.

Tony, thanks for sharing about falling off the trainer.  I told wife that and she felt a little better, see your falling was all for a good purpose.  lol

Karl that is too funny at least I don't feel so bad about it now. Hopefully no more incidents on the bike for your wife.

Allison I am sorry to hear about your dog. I hope they can figure out was is wrong and that they can take care of him. Hope he is doing feeling better soon.

I finally got a few pictures from the Oly Tri that I did a few weeks ago that I wanted to share. These are probably the best of the lot.

Sorry guys I wanted to post the photos in the thread but obviously have no idea what I am doing. I finally figured it out.

Yes I do know...

If it's not rubbing the brake pads each time around he is fine to keep riding it.  However, he probably will notice the rear brake pulsating as he uses them.  It's a good idea to keep your rims true so the solution is to take the wheel in to a local bike shop and ask them to true it up for you.  Cost will probably run $20-$30.

If money is tight, it can be put off.  That's as long as it's not bad enough to be rubbing the brakes each time around.

If it is rubbing, but it's just a little, he can try opening up the brakes a little wider to see if he can get clearance.  That is done by turning the barrel adjuster on the brake caliper inward (clockwise).  But he needs to be careful to avoid opening the caliper up so wide that the lever travels to the end without fully squeezing the caliper.

Thanks Jeff. He says it's not rubbing anything, just finished riding and didn't have any trouble. He's not really riding very far yet so he's leaning towards waiting to do anything with it until he can get it to the shop we bought it from for the first check-up unless you think it will do any real damage to anything. The shop is 1 &1/2 hours away so it might be a little while before we get it there. Or if it's something more serious we can take it to a local shop sooner.

I should have mentioned he had a little spill the other day leaving the neighborhood. The old stop for traffic, one shoe clipped then fell right over. It was at the beginning of his ride but he continued on not realizing that the brake was rubbing the whole time. He is literally deaf in one ear and didn't hear it and wondered why his ride felt so hard . Anyway, I'm sure that all has something to do with the current wheel issue. 

Something else for you to try with your husbands bike is making sure the wheel is in the drop outs correctly.  I think it is possible that during the fall he may have dislodged the wheel slightly and it's not sitting square.

I also think the LBS should have made sure the wheels were true before it left the shop  No longer than he has had the bike it might be a good idea to take it back and let them true up the wheels on their dime.  I have put 6800 miles on my road bike and almost 1400 on my TT bike and I have had no need at all to have my wheels trued yet.  I check the truing routinely when I air the tires before most of my rides.  I simply give them a quick spin, before I pump them up, while looking through the brake caliper and checking for any "wobble" that may be occurring.

Thanks Dirk - we'll check that. I'm reading that suggestion to my husband and he's nodding his head that could be very possible. 

Thanks Tony. Ironic that all the times I have fallen I have not had any trouble like that but he falls once and now his tire is wobbly.