It will be all white on the bike

Both Ham and Brett (g'day fella's) have been asking about the 'white bike' so I guess I had better explain. If reckoned that if I was serious about getting fit this year I was going to need get something like 8 to 12 hours riding per week, meaning mid week rides were going to be an important part of the plan. The problem being that in the UK riding during the week between October and March means riding in the dark. Since I wanted to get fit without being run over (riding in London is sketchy enough in the daylight) so I was going to have to get my head round spending some quality time sweating on the trainer.

I am no engineer but I figure that clamping a bike to a trainer is not very good for it so it was time to think about getting a training bike. I reasoned that with some time and patience I would be able to score a reasonable second hand frame on ebay. I set myself a budget and was pretty pleased to be able to land a very nice Kuota (maybe too nice) but it was within budget and the right size so I would have been crazy to pass it up. Since I had recently upgraded the transmission and brakes on the Pearson to Centaur (shaving something like 500g off the total weight of the bike) I switched the Veloce kit onto the new frame and had a very nice training bike.

Standing by to put it all together.

At about the same time my 15 year old Carnac shoes literally fell apart so I had to get some new shoes. Since its now impossible to buy cleats for the 15 year old Time pedals I had (same ones Indurain used to use, old skool) I was forced to make the ''big money'' move to Speedplay pedals (the only modern pedals that give me the float my 'unique' pedalling action requires). White bike / white shoes seemed like the right way to go so I got some very shiny Sidi shoes.


Of course one ride in the rain means they are now 'roadgrime grey ' they looked very PRO when they were new. These new toys meant even more weight saving on the Pearson, The new pedals and shoes save me another 400 grams. Almost a kilo off the Pearson but its still got some way to go to be as light as Ham's machine. The moral of the story? Lighter wallet = lighter bike.