Holy crap is that the zebra?

Doug has been doing a complete overhaul on the zebra. It has needed a little love. We took apart the bottom bracket, but had some difficulty getting it off. It was so rusted and dirty that a sledge mallet wouldn't even get it off. We had to cut it with a hacksaw, and that didn't work either. Finally I got my 18" pipe wrench and we torqued it off. The picture shows after we actually washed off most of the sludge on the bracket. Pretty nasty to realize how much gunk builds up by just commuting and riding in the rain.

We did get some good rides in so far. It is hard to explain how beautiful it is to ride out here. You are out in the middle of nowhere, no cars, and trees. This is Doug coming up an extremely steep hill. It is a brutal hill. He is looking pretty strong out there.

The garage looks like a Specialized bike storage.

Planning on doing Wolf Creek on Saturday. Will update some pictures later.

Ole Trek Paint Job

I have always wanted to see if I could paint a frame. I had this older Trek that many of you have seen. It was one of the first bikes I bought. Many from our family have ridden it in our pass down system. It came back to my stable so I decided to see if I could paint it. I first had to take it totally apart and then the real fun began. Because it is a carbon fiber frame you can't sand blast it so its good ole hand sanding. You have to be real careful just to get the paint off without taking carbon off. This turned out to be the hardest part of whole deal. Flat surfaces weren't to bad, and this smile had left by the time I finished. The curved parts of the frame were just plain hard to do.

Once I got it all sanded then I masked all the openings and end pieces.

I made a paint space in my bike shop and it worked really well. I have just primed the frame and fork.

Then I started with the fork to practice. I got the paint from a custom auto body shop and some pointers as well. This is the masking and layering technique to get the design I wanted. I didn't want to just have one color, which would have been alot easier.

Each color has to be free hand masked, I found some flex masking tape that won't leak and really turns corner nicely.

This is the first layer of gloss black on the frame. It took a couple of coats and soft sand to get a good looking job.

Then the masking and layering of different colors.

The final look of the fork, with the bike put back together.

The finished product. I was pretty happy with the way it turned out. I learned alot and had alot of fun trying something new, (Thanks to retirement).

The weather is improving and warmer days are coming. Ride Safe.

Say it aint so!

As I click on Velonews today, I am very disturbed to see Alberto Contador winning the stage at de Murcia. I am finding it hard to believe that the Spanish Cycling Federation would clear Contador of the doping charges. Actually, I am disgusted! I am wondering if they plotted to bring the beef in, knowing that they might get caught doping. The likely hood that it did happen from the meat seems so extreme. And what about the plastic traces? Did the Spanish federation, just forget about that? Anyway, after years of holding out with the belief that not all are using, I have finally come to the conclusion that all the top riders are using. I have read the complete Landis article. Do I complete trust Floyd, heck no! But I think there is truth behind some of the things he is saying.

So my question is - Is doping killing the sport? With all the athletes wanting to perform at a higher level, is it taking away from the sports fan base? For example, I feel Lance retired from professional cycling because of the ongoing investigation. The numbers for the Tour of California with Lance compared to without Lance are astounding. Does the normal fan even care that they are cheating? I don't think they care. I for one would like to see a clean sport. But with the drug companies one step ahead and the athletes willing to take the risk I don't know if they will completely get a handle on it. But it is still frustrating to see someone like Alberto ride off into the Spanish sunset with a get out of jail free pass.