New Bike - Kinda

The Schwinn is getting a face lift for its second year of racing. Inspired by Mark Lalonde's "freak bike", and wanting to reduce the overall weight of my rig, I decided to go 69er. Careful, not that 69, the 69er setup with a 29 inch wheel at the front and a 26 inch wheel in back. The 69 setup doesn't reduce the weight of the bike, but it allows me to replace my heavy front shock with the bounce of a 29 inch wheel and rigid carbon fork. Here is a picture of ol' Blue before the facelift.

I'll have to weigh it before and after the transformation. It looks like a could cut 2 to 3 pounds from the bike, which would really help me push my up those hills. I guess I could finally take the rear rotor off the hub. I don't really need it for the v-brakes. Maybe I will get rid of the seatpost and seat. Who needs those....

Flying Wing

After crashing beautiful Stryker, without even getting it in the air, I decided to go the cheap and easy route with my next series of builds. Andy sent me a link that describes a bluecore flying wing that uses 2 pieces of foam to form an airfoil. I built a 36" wingspan version last weekend with some success. After dialing in the controls and CG, the wing flew great. The problem is that I had a number of hard crashes, that eventually killed version 1.

Since I had the template for cutting version 1, I decided to move forward in building versions 2 and 3 for this weekend. I took what I learned from version 1, and made some simple modifications. Both versions will have pusher props with a stronger motor mount. Version 3 will have some surprise features to be debuted at the maiden flight. 

Black Ops Night Ride

It has been about a week since I was on the bike, so I decided to conduct the black ops night ride. In all seriousness it is probably dangerous, but you do what you have to when you are restricted to riding after 8:30pm. I call it the black ops ride for a couple of reasons:

1. It's is dark out.
2. I don't have any lights.
3. My cycling cloths are black.
4. I hide from cars.

My typical objective is to make it from my house to the green line trail without any cars passing me. Once I am on the trail, I am free to hammer without the fear of being run over. By turning it into a little game, I am able to ride a little faster with fear. At night, you can see the lights of a car approaching from a good distance. When this happens, I start to sprint to my next turn, or some other location where I know I will be safe.

Once on the trail, the trick is to not run over walkers and cyclist coming from the opposite direction. You also have to be careful not to get jumped, as this has been happening more often along the green-line. That is probably one benefit of not having light, as the 'bad-guys' don't see you coming. You have to stay alert, which gives me adrenaline to ride faster.

I averaged about 18mph last night, and made it home without from my 16 mile out and back without issue...