It’s all about the bike…

I often wondered what it would be like to do a TT, just you and the bike ….the most ’honest’ form of measurement.

So after 18 months of procrastinating I finally did my first 25km ATTA event at Calga last month.

The day before the event, I raced around after Saturday sport to find a TT bar to put on my colnago, and found one at Thornleigh bikes, with a nice narrow clamp so I wouldn’t need to remove bar tap to fit it.

Really a 15 minute job.

So on the day , and in fact days leading up to it, I woke early and tried to picture how it would go.

So on the day…

I also thought about warming up, its no good going flat chat and not being warm when you do it, so I rode about 10 km before the start. It was also the first time I had aero bars on the bike, took a while to venture out on to them, bringing your chin closer to the road….

I thought about diet, so had a coffee and breakfast before driving up there.

I also had a ‘mother’ soft drink about 15 min before the start, thinking glycogen and caffeine over 25km might help.

Brownie was in the TT start ramp, which was a great help for someone not used to the start procedure.

They let you go on the minute ( just like the tour TT ) and roll down a ramp and away you go….

This might seem weird but I felt comfortable in the pain that came next, the trick is to push yourself right to the edge of the lactate cliff, and stay there.

It was remarkably like rowing in a single scull, being in a whole world of hurt ..but remain totally relaxed, particularly in the top half of your body.

The 25km ATTA course at Calga is undulating and net 150m vertical on the way out and 150m down on the way back. There is a hill called ‘blood hill’ which knocks the wind out of you on the way back…about 700m of 5-10% ouch!

So after the event , I noticed everyone ahead of me was on a TT specific bike…..and so the questions flowed over the following hours and days.

One such conversation happened down in Bowral, and a cyclist lady said’ hang on a moment’ when I asked ‘ how much time will a TT bike and helmet mean to the TT course at Calga’ , and she speed dialled her coach at the NSWIS….

Back came the news ‘Frame and wheels 90-120 sec, aero helmet 30 sec…..’

WOW!

So the research for a new stead began.

I started with ‘what frame’ and looked at the Colnago first… wow very aggressive and expensive, I’d have to do yoga for a year just to get down onto the bars! I then looked at a few ‘out of the box solutions’ but they all run Shimano which is good but I have all my bikes on Campag, which would mean I would have an ‘orphan’ in the house.

I then looked at the Ridley Dean RS, which was not as aggressive as the Colnago, meaning the head tube was a little higher, but still TT, and came with brakes, seat post and headset, and was comparatively good value.

After trying to ‘beat’ that frame I couldn’t , so for my needs I started the build there.

As I mentioned it came with seatpost and headset, so all I had to buy was crankset, stem, TT bars, derailleurs, TT gear shifters/brake levers , pedals, seat and cables.

I already had the wheels.

I chose Campag chorus because, that’s what I have on my other bike, so all ‘bits’ can be swapped across the bikes. I also stuck with Speedplay pedals , so I only need one pair of shoes! I had no idea what seat to get, so I got a TT specific prologo which had several palmares..

I also bought the extra 30 seconds with an ‘alien’ helmet…really weird. I hope that was a good purchase with a melon like mine…

Finally Mr TSS was commissioned to put everything together, and I provided the measurements off my road bike so the ‘fit’ was a snip !

This weekend I am planning to ‘ride’ at Calga, hope to see some of you give it a go!

The name of the bike is “Death Star”

deathstar

 

Van Diemen

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