rjones28 

Not necessarily. More money for them.

3alarmer 

...not to mention the venison.

Bah Humbug

20150611_08 by Michael Ayer, on Flickr

Can we please not do the joking about Whoosh this time? I'm sick of it. It's the reason I keep leaving for months. It stopped being funny over a year ago.

rjones28 

Who?

rjones28 

Nice fish.

Heathpack 

@Bah Humbug! How the hell ya been? Are you still looking to sell that Cervelo?! What is up
with you?

Good to hear from you.

Doug28450

Hummer, nice to see you back.

Bah Humbug

Did a tri earlier this season and came to grips with the fact that I really do not have the nerves for riding anymore; that concussion in August messed me up. So, just running, as you may have noticed on Strava. Stretching on towards 40 miles per week (did 37.5 last week, actually). Ironically, there's actually a group run from my favorite bike shop I'm doing now.

Finished watching the first four seasons of GoT and read all five books of ASOIAF. That soaked up a few hours!

Bought a new, truly fancy camera; came very late yesterday and got a few frames in today, including the one above. Still need to head to Camp Mabry and a similar museum way up north. In any case, more shots should be forthcoming.

Nice to know I was missed. There's no place on the internet quite like Addiction, at least that I can find.

Heathpack 

Too bad about the cycling. I'm more obsessed than ever. Figuring it out little by little. I rode a TT last Sunday & loved it. I'm going to go down the TT path and see where that takes me, but keep my toe in the endurance waters. Coach thinks that is actually quite complimentary with TTs as long as I keep the endurance stuff under 200 miles. Occasionally a double is ok, but I can't make a habit of them.

Love GOT. We are also working our way through Sons of Anarchy at the moment.

Anyway, great to have you back. Did you heat that @coasting passed away? No one knows what happened.

3alarmer 

...he's your go to guy for all that triathalon stuff. Maybe he can talk your girl into a more expensive bike ?

Doug28450

Will that help her in transition and on the run?

Doug28450

My wife and three daughters try to get me to do a triathlon. I tell them swimming and running are stoopid. They ask me why I officiate swimming. I tell them I'm not against swimming, I'm just not doing it.

3alarmer 

..many people do not appreciate how badly you can hurt yourself with just a bike as your instrument. I have had at least one spectacular crash that was all me, (well, me and a pothole the size of NJ ) and was fortunate my concussion was a pretty minor one. I hope after some time off the bicycle cycles you might consider just riding them around, in a somewhat casual and unhurried manner. Maybe if you get out of NY sometime.

3alarmer 

...Mr Armstrong has been thoroughly discredited at this point. It is about the bike.

Doug28450

^^^^ I'm with stoopid ^^^^

A few years ago I was looking at at bridge. I slipped, fell and banged my gourd on the concrete pavement. In an effort to be the hero in front of my coworker, I bounced up and tried to act as if nothing happened. I spent the next month battling the symptoms of a concussion. That was actually the second concussion I have had. The first time I never realized what was going on.

Doug28450

Are you my daughter?

3alarmer 

...She has an army of people in the bike and tri press penning arguments for her. All you have is common sense and logic. It does not take a genius to figure out how this is going to end, adn all you can do at this point is try to minimize the damages.

Doug28450

Yes, I know too well. Fortunately, she does not read the USAT magazines that arrive each month. She only has her tri friends to discuss these matter with. Mrs Doug28450 and I have been very good at staying in the same page regarding these matters. It helps that my wife and I attended college on athletic scholarships and have the ability to pick through athletic statistics and find the weaknesses. She also has a father (she is my step-daughter) who has participated minimally with the financial aspects of the triathlons. Often times we tell her...If you want deep crabon wheels ask your dad to buy them. That ends the discussion.

Heathpack 

@Doug28450

The truth is that the bike DOES matter.

Theres all kinds of things your daughter could do to improve her time. Some of them happen to be improvements that are bike-related. Some of them are improvements that are fitness-related. Some of them are improvements that are equipment-related.

Just saying the bike doesn't matter does not make that true. Believing that it's marketing hype doesn't mean that it *is* marketing hype.

Everything has a cost. Everything has a benefit. You may decide that the benefit of any equipment changes is not worth the cost relative to the changes your daughter might make on the free side of the equation- namely technique & fitness changes. That is completely valid. She may not be to the point yet where the equipment changes make enough of a difference for her to be worth the expense. Plus she's a kid and presumably has no money, there is a real life lesson in her realizing this stuff isn't free of cheap.

But none of that the same thing as saying (or implying) that the bike doesn't matter. She understands (correctly) that the bike *does* matter. It is reasonable to require that cash-outlay expenditures on improvements come after she demonstrates that she is serious by improving her run & transition times. But say she does improve these things and show some decent aptitude for the sport? What then? Keep telling her the bike doesn't matter? There are way worse things she could desire than a tri bike.

Doug28450

Perhaps I have misstated or been confusing.

Yes, the bike does matter. But, she is on a perfectly capable bike. She has a 2012 Giant TCR A1, this one right here...

TCR Advanced 1 (2012) | Giant Bicycles | United States

Her bike times are competitive with the girls in her division and age group. But, it is the other aspects of the event that she needs to work on. Her transition times are typically three to four time as long as her competition, sometimes longer. Her swim time has been twice the competition and her run times have been twice or more as the competition. In the race she did last weekend, her bike speed was an average of 20 mph, the winner had an average of 26 mph. Her transitions were four times what the winner had, her swim time was twice and her run was three times.

In her case, it's not the bike that is holding her back. There are too many other elements that need improvement to blame it on the bike.

3alarmer 

.
...much of it is marketing hype. Maybe once you've been around the sport a little longer, you will come to realize that, maybe not. Regardless, you ought to give some consideration to some of the factual case studies we've seen here, with young athletes trying to enter a sport and be competitive in a marketplace driven spiral of more expensive and more tech driven equipment, and wonder for yourself if it does not serve to make what was once a pretty open sport at the amateur levels somewhat exclusionary and selective by economic status.

Because I do, all the time.

Doug28450

Okay...I failed.

I just looked at her times from her last race and I failed in regards to memory. Her times were not nearly as bad, compared to the winner, as I described above.

Believe me....I certainly agree that equipment can make a difference. As an engineer, I know and understand that.

Her total time for her last race was 1:22:52.7. The winner in her class and age group had a 1:08:10.2. The bike portion of her race was 20k or about 12.5 miles. I don't think I'm wrong, but deep carbon wheels won't make up 14 minutes over 12.5 miles.

LAJ

It's good to see you, @Bah Humbug.

LAJ

Carbon fixes everything. What carbon can't fix, deep carbon can.

3alarmer 

...word.