Fallen Trees and Landslides @BT Trail 31 Jul 2010

I went for a trail ride @Bukit Timah today. I was wondering what the recent wet weather in Singapore has done to my favorite trail ...


Well, upon reaching the carpark, I saw the sign below. Apparently there is a landslide in Senapang track and the sign suggests that cyclists should instead head straight to Rifle Range road and enter another trail smaller trail to get back to the carpark.

Going inside the trail, I almost didn't recognise the once very familiar trail! Water erosion has really done a number on the Bukit Timah MTB trail. Some of the places are downright dangerous to bike. Especially if you haven't been there for quite some time.

There was another closure after the 1st downhill from the carpark. Instead of going straight to a short, steep downhill section (that place is cordoned off), you go to the left into Hindhede loop.

Then just before you reach the quarry, you will reach a fork on the trail. Right side leads to a short downhill section and straight to the quarry. Left side leads to a longer downhill section followed by an even longer climb to the quarry. We took the left side and we were greeted with three (!!!) fallen trees ! Photos of the first two blockages are below. The third one, I forgot to take a picture because I couldn't see any way around ... until I walked closer and found out that I had to go through the branches of the fallen tree!

The last photo is last week's fallen tree in T15. It's still there.... and it is still blocking a nice downhill section :-)

Oakley Radar Path

Out of seven days in a week, I only manage to go out for a day trail ride on Saturdays and Sundays. Of course, if like me, you are not a professional cyclist then a day job is mandatory. From Monday to Friday I get to ride two (if lucky then three) times and all of these rides are at night.



My friend and chief contributor of things-to-review bought a spare yellow tint Oakley lens for his Oakley Radar Path.


We immediately took turns wearing the Radar Path and the difference is indeed night and day (hehehe). Instead of describing how bright and sharp the night scene of Boon Keng St suddenly became, I just took one picture with the camera behind the yellow tint lenses and another picture without the lens.





Above is the 'before' picture. This picture had me confused for a while because as you can see this is the picture that has a yellowish tint. But the yellow tint is actually from all the yellow light given off by the street lighting.




Above is the 'after' picture. This was taken with the camera behind the yellow tint lenses. As you can see there is no more hint of yellow here. Also everything seems to be very bright.



The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades



Yep, I finally managed to review something that does not fall under the category 'cheap and good' (with major emphasis on the cheap part).


The Oakley Radar Path frame has a superb fit and the yellow tint lenses keep its promise of making night time a lot clearer. This enhancement of vision also makes for safe cycling.



But ! Consider this, the Oakley Radar Path is listed at 180USD. My friend managed to grab the yellow tint spare lenses for a bargain at 115SGD. I think I would rather buy some other shades from Shimano, Specialized, etc. and I would still have change to buy one CamelBak.



So in short, maybe I'd try other shades first before I say that the large sum of money my friend invested in these vision enhancing products is really worth it.



Ok, I just returned the Oakleys to my friend and now I'm off to find some cheap and good yellow tint shades for night cycling :-)

Singapore Weather circa 2010

Floods in swanky Orchard Road? Floods in Bukit Timah? Floods? There was a time when you can not imagine uttering the word 'flood' together with 'Singapore'. However, in the news lately, normal people have already become semi-professional reporters by reporting the damages caused by floods right in their own homes!

I have been living in Singapore for 16 years now and this year is the first year that I have encountered floods here. Ok, they are not as catastrophic as the ones I experienced in Manila but they are still quite disruptive.

I will not make a guess as to what causes these floods. I have seen newspapers blame the people for throwing garbage anywhere they please. I have also heard blame being heaped on the construction of the new Marina Barrage. I will not add fuel to the fire by siding with any one and just let the real experts explain the mechanics of these floods to us.

However, going to BT / T15 today and seeing some fallen trees, one can't help but wonder at how such old, tall trees can just topple. See this example below.

This tree is blocking a space that is more or less equal to the width of a three lane road. The arrow points to the top of the roots. The roots are so high they could be mistaken for younger trees.


Here is another fallen tree blocking T15.

Inside T15 at least there are no casualties. The only effect this tree had is that it blocks the way to a nice downhill section.

... So what am I trying to say here? Uhhh maybe it's time to really take care of our environment?

CrankBrothers Cobalt Foam Grips

One of the easiest and cheapest ways of dropping weight is to change your heavy (but fashionable) ODI grips to foam ESI grips. Those huge, thick rubber grips with 2 aluminum rings at both ends + 2 steel screws + a tube of plastic housing would make any weight weenie cringe.

I weighed three that I have for comparison:

OURY grips = 64gr

Ruffian = 54gr

Ritchey foam grips cut to 11cm = 25gr

The question is, why oh why don't we just use foam grips every time? The most common reason is that the modern locking ring grips (for example ODI grips) make life a lot easier by just turning 2 screws and presto, you have just installed your grips. It's foolproof. Not to mention that these locking rings come in a variety of colors. even the screws can be changed to titanium or aluminum anodized in your favorite color. The rubber grips come in a variety of patterns and colors as well. As for the foam grips, you can have it in any color you want as long as it is black :-)

Also, you have to be prepared for the relatively lengthy and messy process of installing them or else your foam grips will be spinning in your handle bar like SRAM gripshifts. It might even cause you an endo or two.

Well here comes crankbrothers to the rescue. The Cobalt foam grips are just that. They are black foam grips. However, crankbrothers have deciced to attach it to a plastic tubing and the tubing is secured by two minimalist aluminum 'C' rings at both ends. This approach makes customers happy by, first : not having to use messy glue and second : promising a weight of 65gr per pair (verified by my kitchen scale as 66gr or 33gr per piece).

So now, we have a happy medium. I have lost 31gr per piece (I used to use OURY with aluminum locking rings and no bar caps) and yet I did not have to resort to gluing my grips to my handlebar.

BUT ! Of course, as documented by my blog, life has taught me that there is no such thing as free lunch. After installing the grips, to my dismay, no matter how much I tighten the screws for the lock rings, the grips slip as if I have SRAM gripshifts :-( ... a few minutes of headscratching later, I decided to smear the insides of the grips' plastic tube housing with Finish Line Fiber Grip.

What a lifesaver! One day I will do a review of Finish Line Fiber Grip as I find this product really superb.

So there it is! Problem solved and I have found another 'cheap and good' product :-)

SPC wins National Mixed Championship in SDBF 2010

SPC in boat 6, NJC in boat 4 -- Priceless
it's official, winning by a pixel, boat #6, SPC !!! - race announcer

For 8,999,999,970 people on this planet, July 11th was the day Spain lifted the world cup. For 30 SPCers, it was the day that we came back and lifted the National Champion Mixed 20 trophy.

This was an outstanding achievement and shows why you train, why you make those sacrifices and why you keep pushing and pushing yourselves.

Make no mistake the level of competition we were up against was immense. NJC are the current world junior champions, Mountbatten fielded many current and ex NTeam rowers and NTU and SAFSA are true power houses in Singapore.

Special thanks to Trey, Monico and George who came back and helped us out on the day to field an impressive mens crew in our Mens Minor Final. Also for Rod McCurdy who lived the dream by drumming and we got some great support from the Paddlers In Pink - Breast Cancer Awareness. Stay tuned for more events with those fantastic ladies.

Derek was the race weekend coach and did a fantastic job pushing us hard and keeping ourselves composed. Machiko looked after the registrations, boat draws and generally herded us in the right direction, Jeremy generally steered us in the right direction, Lerma kept us fed with brownies and Manfred bailed.



-- Euan Beer


That's the message from SPC's President. No doubt there will be more stories later on. Also, we'll be waiting for our two coaches' (Derek and Nick) take on the weekend.

... AND ! How do you know when SPC is winning?

Answer: when your drummer changes from this:

drummer before being National Champions

into this :

drummer after getting National Championship medals :-)

Lastly, every race, you hear lots of obvious statements being said in SPC's tent. Here are two that I overheard :

it's not Inter Business House Championship, not some Inter Club Championship, we are now the National Champions - Eam S

we couldn't field a strong women's big boat, we couldn't field a strong men's big boat, then we win the national mixed championships... - Boxy

Carbon DB Paddles

Yesterday (Sunday, 11 Jul 2010) was the day when SPC bagged the Singapore National Mixed Championships for the 2010 edition of the Singapore Dragon Boat Festival... but that is for another post.

I attended the event and seeing a variety of carbon paddles being used by DB paddlers, I took out my digital weighing scale and proceeded to weigh each paddle that I come across. But please note that this is just a purely 'for fun' activity. I didn't even bother to note how many stickers there are in some of the paddles that I weighed (surely they must add to the weight, right?). The only criteria is they should be around 48inches in length (like my own paddle).

Ok, here goes :

BurnWater (my own) = 0.46kg
GreyOwl = 0.57kg
Typhoon = 0.49kg
ZRE = 0.45kg
Simon River = 0.54kg
Trivium = 0.41kg


So, no surprises there. Trivium has always been known for being light and also the most expensive of the lot.

Up next, the race report from SPC's President :-)

Imperial Brake Pads and Kenda Nevegal 2.1 DTC UST Tires

I have been agonizing this past week whether to get the cheapest possible hydraulic brakes available in Singapore or get a Magura Marta SL or Hope Mini brakes.

Good thing I didn't have to resort to choosing between the above choices and my problem got solved cheaply.

It all started with me finally wearing the KoolStop brake pads on my rear SLX hydraulic brakes. Bikeshops close early, generally 7PM, with the exception of very few bikeshops that close at an ungodly hour of 8PM (?!?!?!). So, if you are working normal hours, when can you get to a bikeshop? Definitely not on weekdays, unless the bikeshop is very near you. Saturdays are meant for 'Epic' rides. Sundays, bikeshops are closed.

So, in short, I cannot get replacement KoolStop brakepads. There is this bikeshop that I frequent in Kallang. I pass by this bikeshop whenever I take bus 21 home... while looking at all the nice stuff in their glass cabinets... there it was! I saw some brakepads that promise to fit my SLX brakes! They come in a cool light blue packaging and they are very cheap. These are the Imperial disc brakepads. Being a sucker for stuff that promise to be 'cheap and good' (remember the Exustar shoes?), I happily parted with my 20$ (or a bit less than that, I think) in exchange for the brakepads.

I went home, fitted it, and proceeded to break it in. These are not sintered metal pads. For organic pads, the braking power is ok. There are no suicidal downhill courses in Singapore anyway.

Fast forward 3 weeks later. My brakes became mushy!!! I immediately suspected my SLX to have given up its ghost finally. It's been two and a half years since I got them anyway. So I went to Hup Leong and described my problem to the ever patient boss, Gilbert. After listening to me, he asked me "This happened after you broke them in, right?".... wellllll, yes ...

All he did was ask one of the mechanics to take out one KoolStop sintered metallic brakepads and replace my brakepads. Guess what? That was all ! My brakes are as good as new! I protested and said that those Imperial brakes were new! I haven't even taken them to BT or Ketam! Not even once! Just 3 weekend's worth of runs in T15! That's all! He just gave me a shrug.

Anyway, now to the nice part :-) Since I didn't have to pay an arm and a leg for new brakes, I asked Hup Leong to change my tires to tubeless version of Kenda Nevegal DTC 2.1s. I have been using Stan's Olympic ZTRs anyway. As for the labor and the Stan's sealant, Hup Leong does not charge for those. So all I had to pay for were the tires!

So here they are mounted on my Stan's rims :



I've tried them on one of my city rides and today some friends and I went to Ketam and explored some of the other shorter trails around Pulau Ubin.

What can I say?! Why did it take me sooo long to change to tubeless tires. People ask me what upgrades gave me the most noticeable benefit. I always answer SPD pedals. But now, I am not sure anymore. Tubeless tires make everything easy. Don't get the wrong idea, though, that the thing that you will notice most is the grams saved by going tubeless. No, I think the weight savings is minimal. What you will notice is that your pedalling is easier in almost every kind of situation. On road, trails, over roots, over baby heads, etc. Couple this with the fact that I don't need to bring spare tube, pump and tire levers now.

Also, I have heard / read that some people experience losing air overnight. I am happy to report that this never happened to me. But the thing is I have proper tubeless rims and tires. People who lose air overnight might be using ghetto tubeless.

So, if you are looking for the next 'cheap and good' thing that you need and you have not installed tubeless tires yet, go and get yourself a pair. Your legs will thank you for it.

Lastly, here is a shot of the only BeOne Nirvana bike in Singapore. If you see this bike on the trails, do say hi to me :-)

On-One Inbred

Guilty ! Yep, I have not completed my review of the Eggbeater SL pedals yet. But it was not for lack of trying! I bought a tool kit with a big pedal wrench to take out my 520 pedals in my Jamis Durango but I don't have the strenght to take it out... or was I tightening it? My friend who loaned me the pedals said the right and left crank arms loosen in different directions.

Anyway, I don't care! Why? Those nice guys at TEF Bikers Junction @ Novena are clearing their On-One frames (look here http://www.togoparts.com/shopping/fmnlist.php?sid=65).

I was drooling at their On-One Inbred Steel frame since day one but I missed the sale last December. I am not going to miss this one! :-)

So you will see below my new frame. I am trying to transfer all the parts from my Jamis to the Inbred. I have also ordered a new Deore Crankset from Chain Reaction Cycles. This time, I will definitely have no problems attaching the Eggbeater SL pedals to the new crankset.

I will be updating this post once the bike is complete and of course I will not forget to update the post om the Eggbeater SL pedals.

July 12, 2010 - update

I have taken the Inbred for a test road ride. I have a pair of bells attached to the railing of my saddle. On the trails, it helps other trail users (and snakes, and monkeys, and big lizards, etc) that I am coming. These bells keep on ringing while I was cycling on the cobblestones of Toa Payoh's numerous housing estates. I, however, do not feel any vibration reaching my butt. The bells are ringing though. So it must be true that steel does 'deaden' trail buzz or in this case, cobblestones.

I'll give another update once I have brought the bike to a proper trail this weekend.

CrankBrothers Eggbeater SL Pedals

This pedal does not have any audible click when it engages and disengages. That's what my friend said about these Eggbeater pedals. He added : The only way to know whether you are engaged or disengaged is to pull your feet up and see if the pedals are connected to them.

This got me thinking ... then how do the numerous Eggbeater pedal users live with these pedals? So, my friend, being the nice guy that he is lent me his pair of Eggbeater pedals for this review

:-)

The Good

I bought my XT pedals for 110SGD. A pair of XTR pedals costs 180SGD. I think XT pedals are around 350grams (?). XTR pedals are jusssttt a little bit lighter at 325grams. The claimed weight of the Eggbeater SL pedals are 266grams! BUT when I weighed them, 1 pedal is just 132grams! These pedals are beginning to look like a financially challenged weighweenie's dream-come-true because they only cost around 150SGD!

Another thing, while most pedals in the market have only two positions where you can clip in, these pedals actually, has four! So no more rotating the pedals so you can slip your shoes in.

The Bad

I have been researching about these pedals for this 'review' and I have come across a few posts about the pedals destroying the soles of MTB shoes. I thought to myself maybe these are just people who don't follow instructions .... but Crankbrothers themselves sell a shield that goes in between the soles of the shoes and the cleats (http://www.crankbrothers.com/accessories_shoe_shields.php). So, the manufacturer knows about this and has even created a product to prevent this from happening! Uhhhhh ... I have four pairs of Shimano cleats and not one of them destroyed the soles of my shoes... So what gives?

There is also the fact that Crankbrothers sell a rebuild kit for these pedals (http://www.crankbrothers.com/accessories_rebuild_kit.php). Selling rebuild kits is not bad but the thing is apparently, these pedals need to be serviced every few months. The pedals that I have with me are a testament to this as the left pedal is all wiggly due to one of the bushings disintegrating (?!). These pedals have only been used for three months and they have never been used for off-road. This is another 'what gives?'. I have a pair of Shimano 520 pedals which have been subjected to jetspray, mud, seawater, etc. for the past two years. This is Shimano's cheapest pedals (I think) and they have yet to fail me....

It's beginning to look bad for the Eggbeater pedals!

I bet the magazines you subscribe to never said anything about the issues I stated above. Hah! The joys of being an independent 'reviewer' :-)

no side to side adjustment?

The Ugly ?

12 July 2010 - update

Finally! My OnOne Inbred is finished and the I was able to install the pedals to my new Deore crankset. However, after I installed the cleats to my right shoe, I noticed that unlike Shimano cleats, Crankbrothers cleats do not have any side to side adjustment (see picture above)! Is this good? Won't this have a bad effect on my knees?

After installing both cleats, I went for a road ride. I can summarize the feel of the pedals in one word : float ! Is this good? I am truly not sure. I read in lots of internet reviews and other publications that float is good for the knees. But this much float? I think if I bring this to a trail ride and I go downhill, cleats with this much float will accidentally release from the pedals!

Also, my friend is right. Although there is a 'click' when you clip in. There is absolutely no click when you unclip. So his problem of determining whether he is unclipped or clipped is a valid one. There really is no way to know but to pull on the pedals.

As for being able to clip twice faster because of having four clip points (whereas other pedals only have two), I think it is either overrated or I don't know how to clip in properly. I did not notice this on my old pedals but it seems the way I clip in is I put my toes on the pedals and then I gently roll into position until the cleat under my shoes 'finds' the engagement point and then I press in. This is second nature to me and so I do this without thinking. But when I did this to the Eggbeater pedals, the pedals just rolled !

The Verdict

I really really want to like these pedals. They have this bling factor and they are light. So, no matter what, I have to test them and find something that will make me want to change all my pedals and cleats to Crankbrothers!

However, my short experience tells me that my friend was right in stowing these pedals under his bed and getting XTRs instead.

Anyway, it looks like I will be bringing these pedals to the trails this weekend as my 520s are still stuck in my old crankset.

Maybe, I'll put up another update once I've done some trail rides with these pedals.

GT Avalance 1.0 2009

For MTB enthusiasts the GT Avalanche needs no introduction. The Avalanche is normally what a seasoned rider would recommend a newbie for a starter bike. Now don't get me wrong. I know a lot of people who would kick my butt using an Ava 3.0. It's just that this series of bikes have been associated with newbies because they offer one of the best bang for the buck deals that you'll get. You can just about go to any bike shop and ask them for a 'cheap and good' MTB and these will no doubt be one of the bikes that will be offered to you.

Anyway, I have a friend who just bought her first 'proper' MTB. She went straight to the top of the class. Instead of opting for a GT Ava 3.0, she got the all-singing, all-dancing 1.0. I think LnT (bikeshop in Tampines) is clearing their 2009 line of bikes to bring in more bling stuff. Any one interested in what's on sale, here's the link http://www.ltcycle.com/lnt_promo_mtb.html.

Since this is a 2009 bike, I will not give an 'in depth' review of this bike. There are lots of those on the net expecially now that we're already midway to 2010. What I would like to add to those reviews are some very positive things which I think previous reviewres might have missed or forgot to mention :

1. If you go to any site that shows a picture of a GT Avalanche, you will see that the top tube is straight. This is because normally, the reviewers have a medium sized bike. For the Small size frame (and maybe the XS if they have that), the top tube is "dropped". This is very good for standover clearance.

2. Since my friend has a small frame, the crankset that came with it has 170mm arms. The stem seems to be 80mm. The reasoning, no doubt, is this frame will fit a smaller rider more if these contact points are shorter.

3. At this price range, I don't know how GT managed to squeeze in an XT Shadow RD ?!?!? Even the 2010 version of the Ava 1.0 only has SLX Shadow RD!

Those three points are what sticks out in my mind as the highlight of this frame. As for the rest of the components, the forks are RockShox 100mm TORAs, the brakes are hydraulic Tektro Aurigas, the shifters and the FD are Deore units and the wheelsets are WTB SX24 with no name hubs. The supplied tires are Kenda 2.1 Nevegals. I just don't know if these are DTCs or Stick-Es as there is nothing that identifies them as such.




We did not weight the full bike. However, my heft-o-meter says that the bike is quite light. The venue for the trail test ride is Pulau Ubin and the owner of the bike is a 5'2'' girl. She was able to carry the bike without any problems down the stairs of Changi Ferry, into the bumboat, out of the bumboat, and on the way back, she has to carry the bike up the stairs of Changi Ferry again.

End of Blue Diamond loop, Start of Black Diamond loop



Trail Ride

The trails chosen were Chek Jawa and the various hidden trails around Pulau Ubin. The last trail loop of the day is the Blue Diamond route of Ketam. Our test rider did not complain of any issues with the bike. There was even a time she was riding the bike with the TORAs locked out. The fit of the bike is also spot on. The only comlaint that I heard was that her butt hurts which is also no doubt, the biggest complaint we hear from 100% of new bicycle riders.



As I said at the start of the article, there are very few things I can add to the numerous reviews already done on the 2009 GT Ava 1.0. This is a value for money bike. If there ever was a category of 'cheap and good' MTB, this would be one of the top contenders.


So, that's about it and before signing-off, I leave you with a pic of what I had for lunch today at Charlie's Corner (my fave eating place at Changi V)

Beef Stew, Papaya Salad, Rice