On The Road
by: Bill Oetinger 2/1/2006
All's well that ends well
This is February, and in our neck of the woods - Northern California - it seems as if spring has already sprung. We have been enjoying warm, sunny days--even a record-breaking 76° on January 23--and assorted trees and flowers are confident enough about the changes that they are already in bloom...plums and magnolias; oxalis in the vineyards and even a few brave daffodils. February means the start of the real season for serious riders. There are double centuries on the calendar already, and then there’s the first Tour of California, an event we are anticipating with the greatest interest.
Right now it feels perfect for riding, but only a fool would assume we have seen the last of our rain clouds. The months between now and May are notorious for Rides From Hell...cold, wet, miserable slogs. For the moment though, we are acting like fools...happily deluded into believing that the seasons have turned and it is now a time of rebirth and renewal.
Anyway, that’s my storyline and I’m sticking to it. Why? Because I want that theme of rebirth and renewal as a lead-in to this month’s real topic: the rebirth and renewal of me and my bike.
This is a follow-up to two columns from 2005: The Trophy Bride and Falling Down. The first dealt with the retirement of my old bike and purchase of a new one; the second was about my bike crash in October and the little butcher’s bill of injuries attendant on that crash.
Taking the latter topic first, I am happy to report that I appear to be mostly recovered from the broken collarbone and fractured ribs. The orthopedist said six weeks for the basic recuperation, but at six weeks--a week before Christmas--I didn’t feel ready to ride and was rather discouraged. However, I got some helpful pep talks from my friends, and just a week later, I was ready to try some little rides...short and flat. I started out on my funky old town bike, as I thought the more upright seating position would be easier on my collarbone. After a few short rides on the town bike, I moved over to the road bike, and after one ride on the faster bike, I took the plunge and did a century ride.
That was on January 7. It was listed on our club ride calendar as the first of a year-long challenge to ride at least one century a month. I liked the idea of the challenge, and I hated the prospect of blowing the whole deal by missing the century in the first month. I was not at all sure that I could do that many miles pain-free or that my fitness would still be there. I started with a bail-out plan figured out, should I need it. But I didn’t. I was pleasantly astonished to feel great all day, perhaps even better at the end than I had felt at the beginning. I was a lot closer to the back of the pack than the front, but that was okay. I spend a lot of time back there even when I’m in my best form.
It’s good to be back on the bike. No, it’s better than good. Two months between real rides may not seem like a long time to some people, but it was too long for me.
Anyway, that’s only a little part of the story I want to tell here. The larger part of the tale involves the rebirth of my bike, or rather, bikes, plural.
First of all, my trophy bride Trek Madone got repainted. There were some ugly chips in the paint. The worst ones were my fault, but one little one was Trek’s fault, and because of that little one, they offered to do a bargain-price repaint for me if I could ever spare the bike for a few weeks. If you read that Trophy Bride column, you know I wasn’t thrilled with the paint job and graphics package on the bike when I got it--too garish and gaudy--and the chips in the paint didn’t improve matters. So now I found myself off the bike for at least six weeks. Why not do it?
I will spare you some of the rather bizarre plot twists that went into this repaint and will stick to the essentials. I wanted a blue bike with minimal decals. Trek said no: for the bargain basement price I could get all red, all black, or the Discovery Channel team bike package. Well, I don’t know about you, but I don’t wear pro team clothing and I don’t ride a pro team bike...at least not one painted up in team graphics. It would be inappropriate, not to say embarrassing, for me to take on that pose.
But hey...the base color for the Discovery Channel team bike is a lovely shade of iridescent indigo blue. Why not just paint the basic Discovery blue on the bike and leave off all the flashy decals? Made sense to me, and eventually Trek came around to that way of thinking. So I now have this luscious blue bike turned out just the way I want. I couldn’t be happier.
But that’s still not the real story I want to tell. The real story is about my old bike...my Merlin. At the end of the Trophy Bride piece, here’s what I had to say about that old warhorse...
“I haven’t completely given up on the old bike. I’m convinced it’s still a good, worthy machine that deserves to be on the road, in the mix. I would still like to figure out why it squeaks and fix the problem. It will probably never happen though. I’m too busy capering about with my new love. The best solution might be to sell it as a project bike to someone who thinks they can succeed where I have failed. Someone who is a real mechanic, with an encyclopedic, intuitive knack for bike maintenance.”
I am happy to report now that the rehabilitation of my old Merlin has been as successful as my own recovery, thanks to my good friend Emilio. After thinking about it for several months, he finally decided to buy it from me. He did some research on its chronic problems and figured out a workable solution. He did indeed think he could succeed where I had failed, and he has been proven right.
Emilio is an engineer. He has a knack for figuring out how to make things work. Some of his fixes are so improvisational that I am inclined to think of him as an Italian version of Red Green. But generally, if he sets out to build a bike and make it work, he will get it done. In this case, I think it was more than just a better mechanical aptitude on his part. It was a better attitude as well. I admit it: I had hit the psychological wall on that bike and its problems. I was stumped. Dead in the water. Emilio came along with a fresh outlook and loads of energy and persistence, and he swept all the obstacles aside.
Now the bike is back on the road and looking good. He calls it the Silver Bullet. I confess it’s a little discouraging to be passed by my own bike on the climbs. I look over at her whizzing by, and I say to myself, “Geez, she never did that with me!” The Silver Bullet has displaced E’s old but still worthwhile Vilier as his everyday bike. But the Vilier is not dead. He plans to turn it into his fixed-gear and to reward it for its years of faithful service with a new paint job...and not one out of a Krylon can. His current fixed-gear is a totally cheesy old wreck. That sad frame is probably now destined to become a piece of yard art.
But wait...there’s more! Even that happy outcome is not the whole of the story. Emilio had to rebuild the Merlin in his own way, and that meant an all-Campy gruppo, longer stem, tubulars, etc. So he essentially only bought the frame and forks, and I was left with a very good Dura-Ace gruppo, a Sella Flite saddle, two excellent Mavic rims, an almost new stem, etc. Now, whenever I get around to it, I plan to take my old back-up road bike and put all this good stuff on it. Right now it has 7-speed Ultegra with down-tube shifters, so you can see the new parts will be a nice improvement. It’s a good bike: a classic lugged steel frame. Nice paint. With the Dura-Ace and other goodies, it will make a superb winter bike, and the precious, pampered Trophy Bride can stay home on those rainy days.
And there are even a few decent components now on the steel bike which--once they have been replaced--will fit onto my really skanky old town bike, so it will take a modest step up in class as well. It all amounts to a very satisfying cascade of trickle-down upgrades. Very little goes to waste. Almost everything finds a new home and a fresh utility. There’s your rebirth and renewal, again and again. Old bikes with new leases on life. Old bikers with new and interesting bikes to ride. Sometimes, against all expectations, there are happy endings.
Bill can be reached at srccride@sonic.net