Vague Idea Racing: All over the place PBE related stuff

Where to begin?

Ahhhh... somewhere in the middle.

I did get further than I thought in the Punk Bike Enduro Derby. What started out looking like this...

photo cred: Rob Lochner

ended with @ two minutes of this:

Around the 50 second mark, you can see Beer Monkey (Christopher Beech) make a bee-line to me at the back of the scene. He then drags me around the circle and tosses me into the audience like so much beer monkey poo.

Back at home, I've had issues to attend. My bearings were screaming for attention, but with no daylight for a proper bike wash, I've been dealing with a mud encrusted, beer fouled piece of equipment.

Allow me a moment to endorse a product that I've grown to love. I thought my Enduro bottom bracket died after three days of muddy ATV trails at last year's Crank the Shield. After multiple submersions a day and then being left in my travel case for a few days, the thing was all but frozen. I pulled of the crank, removed the seals, flushed the bearings, and got another year out of it... so far.

It was feeling crunchy after another year's use that ended with this last weekend's PBE. I followed the same process (with the added punch of an air compressor) and it feels as good as new.

If you've worked on very many X-Type bottom brackets, you know that's a very nice spin despite the typical seal drag. That makes 19 months on this one X-Type bottom bracket with its original bearings. Do yourself a favor and buy one for yourself. Enjoy a very serviceable product and thank me later. I paid full retail for this thing, and it's worth every penny.

And I finally figured out an ideal use for the EPX Cycle Grease bellow-type dispenser.

I was able to load the shit out of the bearings a lot easier than just mashing it in with my fat finger.

How did I end up in Pittsburgh last week?

When I posted my plea for help on the blog, I was contacted by Jim (who I didn't know)

and he told me that his buddy Mike (who I didn't know) was leaving Charlotte Friday...

with his buddy Nick (who I didn't know)...

and heading to Fayetteville, WV (where I've never been) on the way to PBE to stay at Andy's house (who I also didn't know even though we've been in the same circles for years).

photo cred: Christopher Beech

So get to Fayetteville at 10:00PM, drink till 3:00am, wake up at 11:00AM, head over to Andy's shop, and ride out to the trails (sans breakfast).

Gratuitous bike ride self-portrait.

Our late wake up time pushed back the ride, which pushed back our lunch, which pushed back our departure, which made us miss the Pizza w/Dirt Rag and also the amateur wrestling match in Pittsburgh. To make up for it, we headed downtown and stayed out until the bars closed or some girl called me a dick... whichever happened last.

So I went into PBE malnourished, tired, and hungover. Luckily, I snagged the role of designated driver early in the day (due to natural selection), so I did not suffer the effects of a long weekend as fully as some.

But some of the effects I did feel in my realm will be dealt with this weekend.

Combine mud with small fragments of shale like one might find in a rock quarry that one might stand around in a few times at PBE, and you get a nice pedal fill compound similar to concrete.