SIDI Heel Pads Too Far Gone?

With all the miles I've been racking up I failed to notice that the bottoms of my SIDI shoes were getting very ratty, and the left heel pad, the foot I always disengage when stopping, was worn through in spots, and more dire, the attaching Phillips screw was so badly worn I couldn't unscrew the pad to replace it.

What to do? Well, I did a nice ~ 55 mile ride yesterday, so I decided to take a little mid-day Siesta and sleep on it. Sure enough, the answer came to me. My 1st take was to use a Dremel cut-off wheel to deepen the + of the Phillips, but that seemed unlikely to succeed, so my **brilliant** idea was to cut a single groove in what was left of the screw-head and use a standard screwdriver to unscrew the pad.

That worked, although a steady hand and some cold water are needed, in addition to a very pristine screwdriver. The 2" stubby I had seemed to work best, and probably had never been used before (stubbies are in a class of tools that are rarely needed, but BADLY needed when they are). Using a grinding wheel on hard stainless steel generates a lot of heat - enough to melt the plastic the "nut" is anchored in, so I did my grinding on the wife's vanity and ran cold water over the screw head immediately after cutting the groove.

You do need to move the grinding wheel side to side to get a nice groove all the way across the screw head, and this requires a steady hand, so try to have a stable perch for the shoe. The edge of the sink seemed to work quite nicely for me, and tile is durable enough you don't have to worry about the sparks pitting the finish.

This little trick can save you from having to buy a new pair of shoes, and those are getting quite expensive these days, so a nice cheat if you need it.

BTW, these heel pads come in two varieties, both made by SIDI. This one is the "Anti-Slip" version, which probably wears out faster as there is about 1/2 as much rubber meeting the road. I chose the  full-bodied "Universal Heel Pad" for $2 less. Both come with a bit of LockTite on the threads, so no need to run out and buy that.

Ode to Colorado Cyclist

Tons of stuff to report on, like two short but excellent rides this week, but for me the really great news was from Colorado Cyclist. I just got off the phone with Andrea, who reported that Mavic agreed with me that the rim was faulty, and they are rebuilding the wheel with new rim and spokes! Man, I just LOVE great customer service.

I did a short, fast ride last night and had a guy on a fixie ask me to stay off his back wheel - not that 3-8 ft back it was any help behind his very slippery TT bike with deep dish wheels. (Dude, if you want to cripple your ride by tossing your gears, fine, but then no whining!) He claimed to be concerned that he couldn't stop as fast as me, so don't follow so close. Figure that one out.

Just to make a point I dropped back and followed him for 5.5 miles from Sunrise to WBP. Can you tell where he pissed me off from the HR trace?  HR was +10 LT for 16 minutes - Garmin alarming for HR the whole way. A nice 21 mph average. It's all good, and great motivation. Always respect someone's wishes regarding tail-gunning. In this case it was the way it was done that raised my ire.

Off to the periodontist to get the last 2 stitches removed, but wanted to mention this wacky little ride my bike club is putting on. One after my own heart. There is this crazy steep hill about 15 miles from here called Beatty Drive, and on New Year's Day we are going to do hill-repeats for 2 hours to establish the pecking order and get some bragging rights.

I'm guessing I'll get 10 laps in before the 120 minute cut-off at the bottom start line brings the competition to a halt. I will be doing hills again seriously for the first time in a year to get ready. Cold, thick air is the BEST for climbing. Ten laps will work out to ~ 3,800 ft of climbing in 8 miles - or 16 if you include the rocket ride down hill. (on averaged, this is a completely flat course ;)

Oh, my PI Convertible Barrier Jacket arrived this morning too. Fresh from Competitive Cyclist. The cycling hub of Arkansas. Uh, yeah, right. OK, maybe not so much, but got a great price on the SIDI shoes and then a 20% discount coupon for apparel, so liking my shopping experience there.

PS: Back from the mouth butcher. All is well. Big sigh....

Spare me the .....

After taking nearly 2 weeks off to rest, I had a rather weak ride last Wednesday. There was only one short stretch where I felt my legs were under me. I would have been really disappointed, except I have noticed that while my 1st ride back is typically weak, my 2nd is typically epic.

Friday's ride was no exception. In fact, except for the ride I did hopped up on Claritin in April, the average power in watts set a new PB at 257 for the entire 1:45 minute ride. Sans the warm-up leg to Sunrise via Bannister Pk, average HR was 145 - so ~ 1:30 minutes at LT.

I was a bit late thinking to lean into it on the Beals Pt climb, but still got within 15 seconds of my PB. In short, it was an epic ride from start to finish and my legs felt like thunder and answered every call. AWESOME!!!

I met a guy up at Beals, Jean Claude, who is from the Virgin Islands. That, of course, got us to talking about Tim Duncan, power forward for the San Antonio Spurs, the most dominant forward in the NBA for most of the last 10 years. He's also from the Virgin Islands, and only started playing basketball because a hurricane destroyed the swimming pool he used to train in.

It turns out, Jean Claude used to swim in that same pool, and is now very interested in getting into cycling to get his cardio mo-jo back. A really refreshing conversation, and he was all smiles that someone knew where he was from, and something about his homeland. I am hoping he shows up at Meetup.com as I promised him I'd lend him my freshly rebuilt steel steed if he wants to go riding together. Before I shoved off I fixed the brakes on his daughter's bike. Simple, for an old mechanic like me, but greatly appreciated nevertheless.

It's such a great feeling to make someone feel - welcome!

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I got a killer deal on some new Sidi shoes from Competitive Cyclist (great size selection too)  As a bonus, I got a 20% off coupon for any clothing item, which I am going to apply to a water-resistant rain shell. Nice!

I'm not riding with them yet, because I forgot they don't come with cleats - pedals come with cleats. Duh! It does, once again, bring up the importance of having spares for the many, many things required to ride your usual ride.

I found the Shimano cleats I needed at Amazon, which not only had the best price, but free shipping. I also ordered a spare Garmin mount for my Edge 305, as those have a bad reputation - one well-deserved in my experience - for having the retaining clip break off at the tab, making it impossible to remove the unit from its mount without an ice-pick or small screwdriver.

I also picked up a spare Vredestein Fortezza rear tire for my spare rear wheel, on sale at Performance Bike Shop for  $29 (front wheels almost never fail, and if you ride very long you'll find yourself slowly collecting extra front wheels as you tend to buy wheels in sets, and the front one always outlasts the rear one - more on this tomorrow), and a half-dozen spare tubes as I was down to my last spare. You should always have 3 tubes on hand - 2 in your bag when riding in winter, and one at home.

I say in winter for two reasons. First, because while you can stop and wait for help, doing so for very long invites hypothermia - a serious threat in winter (always carry a SpaceBlanket in winter). Second, because when roads get wet in winter, tires get wet, and that attaches very sharp sand pebbles to tires which burrow their way through the tire and pop it. On wet days the race mechanics at the TDF replace the team's tires after a single day. Better bring a pump instead of a CO2 cartridge too, as I have found glueless patches VERY unreliable.

TMMV, depending on where you are, how much you ride alone, the length of your rides, and how tolerant of mechanicals your club members are, but certainly, at least at home, a spare set of brake pads, cables, 10ft of cable housing, 2 extra boxes of handlebar tape, a half dozen spokes of the correct length, at least 1 spare tire, 1 spare roll of Velox rim tape, a dozen or so spoke nipples, elastic HR monitor strap, oh, and shoes.

In general do an inventory of what you put on and depend on when rolling out the door, and buy spares for those. More spares if you call around and your LBS doesn't carry them - the the Garmin mounts. Oh, that reminds me, when I get the rain gear from Competitive Cyclist, I need to get a spare ratchet and strap for the shoes. Those are NEVER in stock at your LBS. Buying spares ahead of time, on sale, can save you a lot of grief and money.