Monday, January 21, 2008

Back on the Rollers

After a couple false starts I finally got all the parts I needed to put together a rear wheel for exclusive use on my rollers:

1 used 10 speed Campagnolo Chorus cassette off ebay $56
1 existing Mavic Open Pro wheel with American Classic hub - free
2 trips to the bike store to get the right Campagnolo lock ring - frustrating
1 trainer specific tire - $25
= I'm back baby! I'm back!

Sunday I got on the rollers for 15 minutes or so. I was a little surprised as to how well balanced I was on the rollers. I didn't have to take my hands off the bars once and did a pretty good job of not drifting all over the place. My left leg is still a lot weaker than my right, so I was worried that the rollers were going to expose the difference. When you're riding on rollers, any sort of imbalance or inconsistency in your pedal stroke is instantly apparent, that's why they're so good at helping with the roundness of one's pedaling. If you can't keep things smooth you're going to be on the ground pretty quick. It was reassuring to find that even though my right leg is weaker than my left, I am doing a good job of trying to keep my right leg from doing more work than my left.

As with many things in my trek to cycling revival, I'm finding that I'm right back to step 0 with yet one more thing; my ass' ability to take it on the bike with any sort of consistency. Saturday I'd headed outdoors and ridden up and down highway 1 for an hour or so. Sunday when I got on the rollers and tried to ride I felt like I had the newbie tailbones I had when I first got back into biking a couple years ago. Ideally I would have liked to ride the rollers for 30 minutes, but 15 was about all I could handle on Sunday.

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