MDcatV

in 2003 or 2004, i think, i was on my way home from cyclocross training. in my neighborhood, not really paying attention, dusk, and i hit a curb, endoe'd and face planted. i tore a bunch of the skin off my face and lips. i also bashed my teeth in, but that's another story.

face covered in tegaderm. next day, my wife had tickets for U2 in the corporate box her employer has. we went - bunch of her co-workers, whom i'd never met + big wigs, she works for a big defense contractor. so, i'm hanging out, meeting her co-workers with what looks like saran wrap on my grill, with my teeth bashed in (top teeth were behind bottom so i couldnt close my mouth and was drinking heineken through a straw), and no lips. i'm talking to a big wig and i see him start to kind of glance away from my eyes toward my chin, and at that moment i could feel the puss start running down my neck. the tegaderm basically filled up and started to overflow. my wife has been promoted a few times, so i guess she does a good job because i didnt help her that night at all!

rankin116

Wow that is disgusting!

tetonrider

you can swap cranks without touching a chain. shift to the inner ring (and smallest cog) before removing the crank, and let the chain fall on the spindle as you remove it. when installing the new crank, hook the chain on the inner ring and insert the spindle into the bottom bracket. works fine with practice. it's a bit easier with cranks that use 1/2 spindles (like specialized), but it can be done with sram and shimano cranks, too.

i've met many people who are decent mechanics but are afraid to touch their crankset. it's heresy to say, but i often find it more annoying to remove pedals than swap cranks.

let's not get started on the left-handed thread thing for pedals. some people will never get that right!

rkwaki

The input I can give you on this one is something that I have seen often (especially with lifters that use steroids). Your muscle strength will develop much more quickly than your ligament, tendon and all supporting tissue. There is a lag and have often seen guys get hurt in their 'early' days of lifting.
As for advice? Stay away from the meds, use some ice to get rid of some of the inflammation and rest it BUT more importantly I would look at changing your squat. I'm not a big fan of squatting that low and have resorted to focusing on box squats. Depending on height putting a weight bench between your legs and squatting until you are 'sitting' on the bench is a good depth (though you don't actually want to sit down as you could hurt your back).

I am currently using a 20" box which takes me to just shy of 90 degrees. I have found this has really allowed my strength to grow (fired off a 785 for three reps two weeks ago). If you look at the praticality of squatting to the floor you are stressing areas that will never come into play on the bike so why risk hurting them?

Rest, recover and change the depth of the squat and I think you will notice a change towards less pain and increased strength.

waterrockets 

After my recent crash, I met with my director and when I left, I realized that I had left a puddle of pus from a weep hole on her desk. Grabbed a tissue and wiped it off... smirked a "sorry," and she chuckled a bit. She's seen me in some pretty bad shape a couple times in the last 4 years...

Yep. I stopped doing the parallel femur thing on squats and saw much more improvement just going to 90.

gnome

The tubular bandage will work fine on the graze on the arm. The graze on the right butt cheek, not so well.

Enthalpic

That's when you squish blood through your teeth like the scene from fight club.

shovelhd

Not quite. A TUE is required if you need more than ~1200mg/day inhaled or if you use it injected or any other means other than inhaling. This doesn't apply to most of us so what you say is practically correct.

grolby

Cost of living is indeed lower in Nashville (the largest factor is housing, but food prices and income tax are also higher up here), but that's not relevant to what employers will pay. No one indexes their pay scales to the cost of living in an area, so far as I know. I should still come out ahead, though.

I actually am most interested in doing basic research jobs, the conundrum I've got is that the job that is most likely to be helpful to me in advancing a research career pays less than a couple others I'm looking at that are more focused on maintaining and/or coordinating labs where other people are doing the research, but that may not be very helpful for a career in capital-S Science. So I may need to be patient and take in a good $10k a year less than I potentially could earn for 2-3 years to build up my C.V. At the kind of salary ranges I'm looking at, that's a big difference. Sigh. But that's the name of the game.

When it comes to earning potential, sometimes it's a long game, right? 24 is the age I was when I started grad school, and while it sometimes feels like it was a thousand years ago, it really wasn't. And after a pretty miserable experience there, where I had to jump on what was fabulous pay for a grad student, but ended up being so unhappy with my work that it was worth it to jump ship for a year of uncertainty and almost no income, having to wait a few years to build back up to where I "should" be doesn't seem so bad. In a sense, I'm still very lucky. My siblings and cousins are all either approaching 30 or have already arrived there, and I'm pretty much the only one on anything like a professional career path. Not because they've done anything wrong, but because it's a really tough old world out there for people in our age group.

Dolamite02

Ok, the difference in muscle/strength gains vs connective tissue to support it makes sense, I hadn't considered that issue. Box squats are also new to me; I've found some good articles and videos on how to do them, so I'll swap those in when I resume lifting. More explosive power should really help on the track and sprinting, so that will be a nice kick. On the meds: both you and Brian said to stay away from them, why is that? I thought reduced swelling was a good thing.

Ygduf

I am very liberal and I vote for equal rights and maternity leave and compensatory pay and job security and supporting single mothers with all the sprinkles.

But in reality, given that I am responsible for bringing the temps up to speed and this coworker already misses more days than the rest of us for child reasons, I think "really, another kid?"

the shame.

Enthalpic

NSAIDS are really good for friction injuries where the reduced swelling reduces the friction and therefore promotes healing. In other cases NSAIDS are of little to no benefit or may harm. Very roughly the inflammation creates strain on the cell membranes, the cells sense this strain and release signalling molecules which tells the body to come repair and reinforce the area. In trauma cases NSAIDS should be avoided at first because they slightly impair clotting function.

DerHoggz

I'll own up to this, but it was because of my old iClics wearing and giving half-clicks and such. They eventually broke in a race. Speedplays now and everything is good. The weekly crit here you can basically start at the back and get to the front half on rollout through the pack, because of everyone not being able to clip in. Technically it is neutral for the first lap, but I'm not braking for that.

I find it hard to reconcile the need to lose weight with how good food tastes.

Creakyknees

I suggest to you in complete seriousness that children (the biological drive to create them) are the only true driver of economic growth.

Creakyknees

Riders miss their pedals all the time, heck I do too, but some react more badly and compound the problem...nerves I suppose.

I tell the noobs: the designer of that pedal/cleat combination had a specific motion in mind to clip in. Figure that motion out and do it. Not complicated, just specific.

rkwaki

****...
you stole the exact thing I was going to say...
to paraphrase...
cuz I said so...

mattm

Shoes.. I figure my low-end Sidis that are spewing foam from the heel and are a few years old are about ready to be hung up.

Dumb question perhaps - or even worse, 41 - but what's a good road shoe that's under $300 or so?

I've only used Sidis and am scared to try anything else!

rkwaki

Damn I missed this, hope things went well...

rkwaki

Giro Factors

DerHoggz

Bont

Ygduf

I believe you, but the point I was illustrating was more about the dichotomy of someone who wants to believe one way, but in practice feels the other.

caloso

Last year's S-works shoes on sale on the Specialized site.

SpeshulEd 

FYI - if you order from Arts Cyclery, the "save15" code will save you 15%.

I have the blue Giro Empire's and love them. Just grabbed the blue Tour Edition Specialized R320's, should have them for this weekend (just not sure I'll have a bike).

echappist

$90 off only. still a $270 shoe...

carpediemracing 

I've only used Sidis too, at least since 1995 or thereabouts.

Giro and Fizik used Giro as the benchmark. I tried both of them on in the same size as my Giro and they both felt really good. However I never bought either, or a Sidi, and instead just overhauled my Sidis.

I also tried the high end Vittorias but I think they're more than $300. They didn't feel quite as "sock-like" as the Fizik and Giro.

If you're willing to go UK then G5s are $192/$220 at two different sites, in the middle ranges of sizes.