Yup, its that easy.

Cielo Stainless Steel Lugged Sportif from Chris King on Vimeo.

Sure! With $100,000 in equipment and a bazillion years experience, you too can build frames!

Mtn. bike wheel deal.

HUBS
fd-128
rd-278
Phil wood bearings, black or green in color.

Rims
32h white 26" ztr355
32h black 26" ztr355
32h black 29" ztr355.

silver db spokes, alloy nipples.


$329/set.

Thats right, get the whole wheelset for the price of the hubs!

add $10 for black spokes
add $10 for colored nipples.
add $50 to upgrade to crest, flow, or arch stan's rim.

Orders must be submitted fast.


More info. on hubs click here.


What? You want superlight 1450 clinchers for cyclocross that are ready for tubeless? Get ztr355 29er rims with velocity hubs for $300. Gotta tell me you want them now.

Busy Season.

Its been super busy at both stores, I appreciate everyones patience with getting work done for you. I specially appreciate the apples, bananas, mint leaves, coffees, strawberry jelly, cupcakes, and brownies. Those investments in your local bike shop will pay dividends down the road, I promise.




Watching the Giro here. Crazy racing, every stage starts with over a hundred riders it seems, and finishes with 20-50 in the main group, super hard Racing! I'm at the downtown store 8am to 10:30 am gluing tubulars and entertaining Benon with the race on if you are bored.


Dude loves riding on my basanova(click). I'm actually riding a lot more in the last few weeks with him, its good riding with 30lb. bike and a 30lb. kid on it. Plus it gives my awesome wife a break.



1 of these left, in a 56cm.

Anyone know how fast this could be?



Anyone really following the whole drugs in cycling thing? Does anyone really care? I pray every day contador loses his chain and 10 minutes during every stage.

Repair.

This is what happens when you forget to strap your bike on your rack and drive down I70.

This is the crack all cleaned up and ready for repair.
$100 later, repaired. Beats paying $4k for a new cervelo, right?
This, sorry to say, cannot be repaired, thankfully, everyone is ok.

Gran Fondo

Gran Fondo/Century/100 mile alley cat race/ fun ride/ride to lawrence and back.

Thinking Sunday, July 31st.

6am start time, it will probably be hot.

no sag, no officials, maybe have numbers pinned. Should be fun.

Thinking everyone watches the bicycles on versus all through July and they will want to get out and do something once the tour is over.



Here's what I have in mind for the way to Lawrence, gotta add a few more miles a different way back.

Carbon Wheel Deal.

Preorder special. 2 rim choices.
38mm, 320 grams.
50mm, 390 grams.

20h radial front
24h 2x nds, 1x ds.

all cx-ray spokes. add $12 for black.

Were talking 1080 gram 38mm wheelset or 1220 gram 50mm for $700 with american made c-4 hubs. Pre order now, pay me $350, and then pay another $350 in a month when these babies are ready. Get crazy cheap prices on new tires too with wheel purchase.




These

Or These.
With These!

new wheels and rides

c-4 205/78 hubs, cx-rays, 38mm carbon rims, 1100 gram wheelset, $750 with mavic tubular tires.
c-4 170/50 ceramic sl hubs, cx-ray spokes, $1100 with mavic tires, 1 set left.



Ride from volker18, leaves at 8am for a quick ride, then meet back at 9am for the 9am ride, probably be done around 11. First ride since last sunday.

Wheels, new kits, training.

Come back from St. Louis to see 4 sets of wheels I need to start building. I really enjoying building up deep carbon tubulars, they build strong up strong with less spokes, they are also easy to ride.

I laugh at Steve when he says he is racing "training" wheels. Like $1400 dura ace clinchers are training wheels. It is true though, I would rather be riding 50mm deep $700 1100 gram tubulars than those things. I can't even find myself training on clinchers now, deep carbon wheels make the riding more easier to train harder. I've got some shimano rs80 clincher wheels, carbon rims, 1500 grams, they are $400, you buy these and then I can always ride tubulars. Forever.


New volker kits are coming, they will be here thursday. We had a great design, inspired by one of my father-in-laws "dress shirts." Had the design good and then Leopard trek releases there kit, it was pretty much the same thing so we went back to the drawing board, it will be worth the wait. $130, gets you bibs/ss jersey. Only 30 sets ordered, limited edition.


Probably won't be racing till Wichita or the O'fallon races, to prep for Tulsa Tough. Got lots of training to do before then, I know tulsa will be twice as fast as grove. Got some new sram bb30 172.5 39/53 cranks in today. I've been racing force 52/34 right now, the shifting doesn't work good but it is fine for racing since I never shift the front, at least now I can easier. If you want a set, give me $250.


YOGA tonight. Click!

NEW.

200 gram rear, 75 gram front, both made in AMERICA!

Build some 38mm carbon tubulars 20/24, 1100 grams, $650, or some light aluminum clinchers, 27mm, 1440 grams.

Day 3.

Day 3 of the grove racing had a new course this year. Lots of turns and a hill. At the whistle there had been no rain, the corners were pretty wide but the racing still seemed really slow. Like the first 2 races, the front riders were going through the corners really slow and the it left all the riders in the back with an easy way to move up quickly. With over a hundred riders racing, it made the race interesting until the rain came. Started pouring really quick, and in the next 3 corners, almost half the field went down, the race was neutralized. We all rolled through and restarted, everyone was letting air out of their tires. I already had them down to 78 at the start of the race so I thought I was good pressure wise. The official said go and we were off again, this time I tried making some moves, but nothing stuck for us. It was too easy to coast to the corner, then grab your brakes at the last second and catch a wheels for a move to get away but eventually, a 2 rider move went, and they had 40 seconds on us after a lap or 2. At this point the 100+ rider field was down to 35 probably, most everyone was in survival mode. With 2 to go I was at the back trying hard, with 1 to go I was still there, on the backside we slowed down a bit, the field got 3 or 4 wide, I had a chance to jump ahead and be in the front going into the last 2 turns before the climb to the finish but didn't have the gogo. So I sat at the back and rolled in to the finish, top 25 I believe.

I usually don't let anything bother me in bike races, I just say its racing and keep going, but when the rain starts, and people start crashing every corner, or bunny hopping curves since they couldn't turn, only to roll over to the pit, get a free lap, then sent into the front of the field the next time around, only to fall down again...well.

grove.

Over a hundred riders showed up to the 50 degree downpouring race. Lots of crashes in the first few laps. With 20 minutes to go the racing got animated and I made a few moves, but nothing would stay. The course was changed from last year, it was a little shorter without the hill into the headwind. It was another basic fat man race. Like fridays race, I spent the first few laps feeling the course, checking to see where the best positions are and where. Last nights race it was faster on the outside where you don't scrub your speed so much but today, with so many corners, so many potholes, it was hard to tell.

Elevation change might have been 5 feet for the whole course. With the lower temperatures and pouring rain it made the race hard. I was 3rd position going into the final corner, the 2 riders in front of me took the 130 degree turn a little slow and all of a sudden you hear a few guys yelling inside and a few guys yelling outside, by the time I had made it through the corner I had slowed down to much and my hands were too cold to shift down. Ended up 11th overall. Paid $35, better than the $5 I got the night before for 15th.

New wheels are blowing my mind, 1046 grams, tires weighed 238 grams each, so really light, plus 50mm deep and 16/20spokes. Very aero. I hit every bump and they are straight as an arrow.

Embrocation is kind of a must, afterall, it is the middle of May in St. Louis.

The PRO/1 racing is way better than last year, very fun to watch, I'd rather not comment on it, you'd have to be there. 180 rider fields!<

Midtown Alley GP

Got 15th. 1.7 mile course, 4 wide corners, you'd think we could have been hauling the whole time but we only averaged about 27. It was really slow for how easy the course was. It was difficult to time the race, be in efficient position. Really weird racing.

intervals

I never do intervals when I ride, I just jump on wheels and try to hang on, but the last post got me curious. So I had 1 hour to ride last night and the descending intervals workout looked interesting.

So I did 90/60/50/40/30/15/15.

at 90 I jumped to get up to speed and held it for 90 seconds, then 90 secs of recover, same all the way down.

When I got to 15, I did all out sprints with 30 seconds in between, did 2 sets of these. Felt pretty good.



YOGA 6:30 tonight. Click on yoga.

Ride at 7:30 from 18th st. tonight.

its that easy

Click.

6 hours a week and you'll be super fast.


I read this article a while ago, not sure if it was online or in print. It doesn't really take into account the riders history. Its funny how it basically says, do this and you'll place top 20 at the nationals elite race.


If you have absolutely no idea about how to train or ride by yourself a lot, you should try this plan.

I'm guessing if you have permission to ride 12 hours/week, then do everything it says twice.

Vittoria

Wheels

Take the awesome new DV46 rim from reynolds with lighter layup, stronger braking, more aero swirl lip, add in cx-ray black bladed spokes, Ceramic Bearing made in the usa hub.


Clincher 1245 Grams
Tubular 987 Grams



Best Wheels?


46mm rim, Clincher or Tubular. You'll have to email me for a price. volkerbicycles at gmail.com


1185 gram 32mm carbon wheelset coming soon.

Tubular

I'll be gluing up some 700x21 320tpi corsa cx Vittoria Tires this week for TDG.




With every type of tubular available to me, I would like to comment on how I came to this decision.

1. They cost $65 each. My next choice is FMB, which cost $90 each. Thats $50 after two tires.
2. They weigh 242 grams. FMB weight is 270, 290tpi tires are 292, and contis with butyl tubes weigh 300 or so.
3. I use the same tread on clincher wheels, if I have to. So if I ever go between my tubulars and clinchers, I will have the same tire tread almost.
4. I have used corsa cx tubulars the past 3 years of racing, they always ride really good!
5. I have some black tires with a red stripe in stock, and no one wants them!


2 other options were indeed the fmb and the new mavic tires.

The fmb I was planning on using, they just cost way more and I don't feel I will benefit from them in racing conditions. I think I would be worried too much about my tires instead of racing my bike.

The mavic tires look awesome, they are made in the same factory as vittoria, with the 290tpi casing. They weigh about 292 grams, and are front and rear specific. Rear is made for power transfer and longevity, front is made for grip. They make sense to me! They are $65 each as well, like the vittoria.



Tires are going on a 50mm 1100 gram wheelset.

Sheehan

45degrees and a little wind all day. No sun. Sheehan is always a fun course. It was my first Cat 5 Road race ever, I've done it every year since, it is a good race.

I have never had success at this race, or for any real road race for that matter. I simply don't train properly for them.

Sheehan has lots of "rollers" with a few small climbs. The wind was going about 12-15 from the north, it seems to do that every year for Sheehan, come from the North. This means that if there are riders away at the turnaround with 20miles to go at the highway then they are probably gone. At this point in the race I was not feeling good at all. Just couldn't get the bike to go fast. It could have been my front brake rubbing, or it could have been me eating too much, or it could have been not being in shape.


It was here that Andrew Coe finally got an attack that stuck. It was a very impressive move with Shadd Smith on his wheel from Mercy. With Bill from Mercy up the road, Shadd would not pull through, had it been me, I would have looked back, saw Shadd and put on my brakes. Andrew was able to take Shadd all the way to the finish by himself, pretty impressive.


Finish was
1. Bill
2. Cameron
3. Shadd
4. Andrew



This year was probably the most fun I had at Sheehan, it was mostly due to the larger field, we had maybe 20 or 25 riders when usually its around 12. With this many riders, all pretty, it made for good racing.



At the end for me I went a little early and immediately couldn't go much further. Sheehan has a 600 meter climb or so to the finish, half way up I simply stopped, not sure why, my head just didn't want to go. Once I got off my bike I noticed my front wheel not moving, and the front brake just a little loose. I borrowed this bike from the store to race, so that I could let Andrew race his first Cat 4 race on my bike, he ordered a Xenith Elite 2 months ago, but we are still waiting. Jamis and Masi are out of carbon bikes, but I can still easily get Pinarello and Focus for anyone that asks.

The most interesting part of Sheehan this year was the "gravel." I believe there were 3 sections, all about 200 meters long. Very loose rocks all over the place, nothing like Perry Roubaix, this was fresh rocks that I am surprised anyone was able to ride through. Had it not been for my 90mm carbon tubulars, I don't think I would have made it. It was here that Shadd from Mercy attacked with his 27mm parisroubaix challenge tires. It was vicious. I had no idea the gravel was coming, but when you seee him and Coe get to the front, its common sense that you should too. I think 4 or 5 people flatted here. I was not surprised.


Next up for me is tour de grove. Its gonna be a family deal, wife and kid will be with me all weekend cheering.




Brian got 2nd at his first "real" cat 4 race. He's going pretty good. He's been training with us since last July, too bad he didn't race Cross. Charlie got 6th. We had 9 or 10 riders in the Cat 4 race, that is fun to see. Steve V. would have won had his girlfriend bought him some deep carbon wheels.