Blogging on an iPad

I discovered there's an app for that of course, but it's $2.99. Not bad I guess. I can bypass it with a ghetto work around using the HTML code field. I will see if I can post pics later. Tying on this thing is irritating andc I am getting a headache in the car. Ugh!

The Weigh-in

Before ordering the new generation KMX light weight seat, I need to be absolutely sure how much the thing weighs. I've sent an email out to Utah Trikes hoping to get a response later today or at least by tomorrow. I'll rip out the seat frame this evening and weigh it so I have a solid number to compare the new one to.

I'm getting conflicting information.
1. One KMX Viper owner tells me it weights 6.95 lbs.
2. Another says their old steel Venom seat weighs 9 lbs.
3. Utah Trikes claims the new Venom seat weighs 6lbs less. That would mean the new seat weighs 1lb. Highly doubtful.
4. I contacted the owner of BROL to see if he can help weigh the seat since he's reviewed one and has one in possession.
5. I've also contacted another BROL member for numbers. He has the 2011 Venom.
6. There was one more Venom owner (probably the older one) that I emailed just today.

Hopefully these guys can get back to me on the actual weight. I wish KMX was more cooperative and didn't have a dealer take care of all their calls. KMX themselves should have specs of their parts, shouldn't they? Looks like KMX is slowly giving up on their customer and their own brand, looking to dealers to support them rather than the other way around. I don't see good things for the future of KMX. Hopefully I'm completely wrong.

UPDATE: 5/25/11

I removed the seat this afternoon for the final weigh-in to see what the stock seat weighed. While I was at it, I took the opportunity to replace the idlers and clean up the frame. The midsection of the crucifix was pretty dirty.





So how much does the stock seat weigh? Drum roll please...

With the pump, alarm and both water bottle cages, the total weight was 9.2lbs. I should have weighed the frame + wheels but forgot.


UPDATE: 5/26/11
I did it! I did it! I gave in. I ordered the aluminum seat and was able to negotiate for free shipping. I used the fact that I'm using this for the ALC and that some shops offer a 10-15% discount for riders participating in this event as leverage. No tax, but the total still hurts. $200 for the aluminum seat and an extra $50 for the hardware. I'm hoping that the old horizontal bracket under the seat that physically mounts to the frame can be swapped to the new seat. If this works, I won't need the hardware and Matt (Utah Trikes) said that I can return it for a full refund if it's not damaged. I've never been so excited to return something. Hopefully this is the case.

If not, I'll have to grind down the frame to make the new hardware fit. Crossing my fingers hoping this thing goes through. If it does, it'll be pretty darn amazing. The price still seems high though b/c I just remembered that carbon fiber seats are about $350. That's way out of my price range for a stupid seat. Plus I'd have to figure out some way to fabricate brackets to mount from the seat to the frame - all in 9 days (and that's assuming there's zero ship time and the seat can magically appear in my garage). Not going to happen.

I'm really relying on the seat bracket being interchangeable btw seats. I'm desperate enough to figure something out if it doesn't. We'll just have to wait and see.

UPDATE: 5/27/11
I got some exclusive pics taken by Utah Trikes! These aren't published anywhere else. These are spy shots of the aluminum seats! Hush hush.

Looks similar. I hope it's "exactly the same." The intention is to use all the parts except for the cross bracket in the middle of the photo.



If I can omit the furthest piece on the right and replace it with my current one, it'll work. *Deep breath*. I am a bit concerned though b/c it doesn't look exactly the same from what I remember.



UPDATE: 6/1/11
The seat's still not here! Ugh. I've been waiting at home when I could be out triking. I'm giving Utah Trikes a call tomorrow to get a tracking number.

UPDATE: 6/2/11
A bit frustrated that the package didn't arrive Tuesday as Utah Trikes said it would and it's now Thursday, I called them back up for a tracking number and apparently it's supposed to arrive today. If I had the tracking number earlier, I wouldn't have waited around to receive the package and could have taken the time to train some more on the trike.

It's 2:26pm and the package still isn't here yet. I'm expecting it before 6pm, but that's a few hours from now.

The scary thing though is that the UPS site says that the package weighs 10 lbs. I really hope that's not true. I'm waiting for a 4lb 1oz item with maybe a pound of packaging material. We'll soon see. The seat should hopefully be installed by this evening.

Shave me

Whoa la! This is the Braun M90! It had only occurred to me a few days ago that I need a shaver for the ALC ride! With 2,500 riders and a few hundred volunteers, access to the sinks will be limited. I figure I should stay away from the cream and blade and go for an electric shaver.

I found one that can be charged by USB, but it got horrible reviews. I found another one from Ross that's super tiny and only $10, but that too got horrible reviews.

I finally found one by Braun, a trusted brand. It's the same manufacturer as the one I have now. The one I've been using works without being plugged in for a total of 20 seconds before it goes dead. The battery's history. This was a handmedown of my dad's from who knows when.



It didn't take me long to find a compact travel sized one that runs on batteries that got good reviews on Amazon. I ordered this one for $18.15 shipped! It's got a protective swivel cover, sideburn trimmer and brush. I hear it gets pretty good battery life on two AA cells.

The design of this thing is pretty good too. The silver part swivels out to reveal and protect the foil. It also prevents it from accidentally turning on while being stored for travel.

New Wheel Review

Wow! It's either this thing weighs a ton or the 20+mph headwind really whacked me in head. This thing was super slow. I felt like it was worse than when I had the mag wheels all around and the Schwalbe Big Apples on all 3 wheels.

Do the benefits of having a rear brake and being able to climb any hill outweigh the costs? Errr, I'm still thinking about it. It undoubtedly looks amazing now with the matching black spoked rear wheel but boy is it heavy!

The shifter for the hub is now a lot more reliable than what I had on the SRAM 3x7 and looks better on the handle bar but again, I'm not sure it's worth it yet. The weight is a big drawback. I made it worse by using a Schwalbe Marathon tire rather than a Racer tire. Once I get some (hopefully) reliable Qtubes in the mail, I'll put the Racer back on and see if there's a noticeable difference. The new hub is harder to remove and put back on (sorta) so I wanted to keep the rear wheel pretty much puncture resistant. The weight penalty hurts though - big time.

I'll have to take it for another spin on a less windy day to get a more accurate assessment. Hopefully I'll have good news to share. The weight's been hurting so much on this test ride that I'm strongly considering, 85% blowing $163 on the upgraded 5lb lighter weight seat from KMX. We'll see.

I Placed Second!....to last

I attended the race to meet some fanatics and got much more than that! This is me in a Velomobile. It's made of the same stuff kayaks are made from. Super durable and comes in 11 different colors. The dealer brought this one and was nice enough to let me to take it around for a spin.

Here's a little bit of marketing for him. Visit his site and check out what he's got to offer. He's a super nice guy - very easy to get along with.


There were about 29 riders a couple families and friends came, but people came alone for the most part. I guess it's a bent thing. We're kinda weirdos and don't have much company in that respect. Much like magicians I guess. The announcer made a comment about how socially awkward we are. Hahah.

The track is 0.2 miles. Pretty short. But when you're going around 8 laps like I did for the "trike's only" event, it feels much longer. I placed last in that event. Ouch. I'm happy that one of the guys who beat me was riding a Catrike 700 - a white one! Looked great!

Rick pretty much built this thing! He bought the clear cover, but everything else was built with his two hands! That's a grey Catrike Speed hiding in that fairing.


Meet Paul and his faired recumbent. It's got side entry so he can hope into this thing w/o the help of a crew. He took this exact model across the country. Over the three month ride, he covered 50-90 miles/day! That was 11 years ago but still lots to be proud of.

The Mango was one of the favorites. Greg rides this Velomobile as a commuter! Yup, that means every day! The Milkman was also a first time visitor to the velodrome. Covered 57 laps in 30 minutes.

This is what an 80T chainring looks like. The owner built this whole thing himself including the welds. A chainring that big has to be custom built, right? Yup, he built that too! There were a of homebuilts at the race.

I didn't get a chance to chat much with this Cal Poly team, but they had a whole crew representing their HPV group. Here's the front half of the fairing.


And here's the other half. This is the reason why they brought a whole crew. They need one rider, one launcher and about 3 people to catch the Velomobile when it stops at the end of each event.

This is what happens when your derailleur catches onto a spoke and rips apart. As we were watching the 30 minute race, we heard a huge crash from behind us.


Cal Poly's HPV crashed big time. The rider came out unscathed....from what I saw. Here they are trying to straighten the chain out w/o taking it apart. It's harder than it looks. How many Cal Poly kids will it take to do it?

This guy pretty much beat everyone's butt. He's faster than the Velomobiles!




A bit about Velomobiles. They are the jellybean looking things with full fairings where you typically only see the rider's head or sometimes just their eyes. The surprising thing is that even though these things weigh 55-65lbs, the reduction in air resistance or improvement in aerodynamics offsets the increase in weight. These things look like they're hitting the upper 30's in mph. Crazy fast.

This is the start of the elimination round where the last place person in each lap is disqualified until there's on man standing - yes, all the riders are men. No women recumbent riders came to the event. Lots of our wives decided to stay home or do their own thing, as did mine.


I was impressed at the shutter speed of the Kodak Sportplay camera. They're catching these images w/o blur!


Here's one of Cal Poly's rides - the one that suffered a gruesome death at the end (the bent - not the rider).



Here's one of their other ones.





The famous Mango! One guy called it a banana. This thing was fast. It better be for $8,000. Looks really slick. The lines are cut nice on this one. I wish I had a shot of the rear.


The colors were just too cool to not take a pic. I brought my naked trike over for a snapshot. It was a beautiful day!


I should have taken more still photos. It's such a pain pulling them from videos due to the software I use. I would have to convert the video to another format and then make stills. Such a headache. I'll do it later, but not tonight. There was a Catrike 700 out there worth mentioning. It was white too! The rider was cool.

There was a lot of downtime in between races. There were a few surprise events: 60 and older event, 6'-0" and taller event. This gave me some time to take some shots with the others.

The shape of that Velomobile is nice, huh? I like how the rear is carved out like that.

Arm Warmers

ACCESSORY 49: Arm bands, $30 Amazon

It sounds stupid - I know. Arm warmers. Why not just wear a jacket like the rest of us? The advantage of these which I discovered not too long ago is that they can be bundled up and stuffed into your jersey. Unlike a jacket that weighs a lot and is bulky, arm warmers are much more convenient to put away when not in use.

It blends right into the color scheme! Canari had the only two toned arm warmers I've ever seen available online or in a store. They're designed very well. Rubber in the upper sleeve holds it in place. The seams are all of high quality.

I found out the hard way of the disadvantages of a jacket. It was cold in the morning so I wouldn't have left the house without a long sleeve. Later that day it was too hot to keep on. My jacket had removable sleeves and even trying to stuff the sleeves (while wearing the vest part of the jacket) into my bag was a task. These are small enough to fit in the jersey pocket!

Energy Gels

First was the energy drinks like Gatorade, then came the bars like those made by Clif. Now we have energy gels. Having only tried it once, I did some research and found a bit of info. Here's a review of the competitors by once LA local: