Mike's Bike Blog

What a great day for a ride, it was nearly 70 degrees and for the first time in awhile there wasn't an obnoxious amount of wind. Just a great day for a spin. I had to take Zeb to his skating lesson, which he passed Snowplow 2. Next was the leaves, I got those mowed and mulched. Finally around 3pm I was able to hit the road.

I got everything ready, turned on the Garmin Forerunner and as it turns on it starts freaking out about low batteries. I turn it off, take it inside and plug it in. I don't need it, the PowerTap keeps track of everything but the route. Finally I shoved off and the first few pedal strokes I hear a weird clicking noise. I unclip a few feet from my driveway, narrow the noise down and find a staple sticking out of the rear tire that was rubbing when the tire rotated. I pulled it out, luckily it didn't seem to puncture the tube. Off again, heading down Anderson Mill to Limecreek for a down and back to Volente Beach.

Heading down the 3 Sisters I get into an aero tuck, I'm flying down the road. My goal is to not touch the brakes at all on the decent. At the peak of my speed near the bottom of the sisters it happens. There is an unmistakable sound of metal clanking, however it sounded oddly familiar, but in the heat of the moment I couldn't place the sound. In my peripheral vision I see something, a spoke flying off perhaps. In a matter of seconds the air in my front tire was out and I was rolling on the rim.

If you know the sisters, you know at the base of the hill there is a sharp turn to the right. There was no way I could make the turn on the rim, I quickly glanced ahead to see if I was about to be struck by a car coming the opposite way or if I needed to pull the emergency shoot (i.e. take my chances with road rash and hope I didn't roll into oncoming traffic). Good for me there was no cars coming, so I kept it straight and came to a stop in the dirt.

I checked to see if I had a spoke sticking out of my leg, negative. I then looked over the wheel, no broken spokes. I set out to change the tube, a fellow biker rolled by, asked if I needed anything. I thanked him and said I had it covered. With the new tube in place I pulled out the CO2, twisted on the quick inflator head, but no air was coming out. Gave it a couple shakes, twisted it, but no air. Untwisted it and low and behold it was empty. SHUCKS!

About this time the thoughtful rider came bombing down the hill, he didn't slow. Can't blame him as I had just told him a few minutes prior that I was fine. So there I stood with no air I was about to succumb to defeat and call the wife to come get me. I call and get "the machine", everybody is outside! The good samaritan comes back, I flag him down, he gladly offers to let me use his frame pump.

I get it pumped up, it feels firm. Good Samaritan says he has a PSI gauge. He digs in his bag and pulls it out, he slaps it on and says I only have 60 psi. Darn that's not enough. I go back to pumping, man my arm is getting tired and then it happens... The valve busts off and shoooosh, out goes the air.

Once again I have to phone home, again the machine. I start walking up the Sisters, it's only 3.78 miles from the bottom to my house. I get to the Fisher Hollow Rd and prop the bike up against the mailboxes and walk down a bit to see if I can find what I ran over. On the side of the road I find the culprit.

A broken tape measure. The yellow metal tape was broken into 2 or 3 sections. I think this is the section I more than likely ran over and it explains what I saw in my peripheral vision. It also explains the familiarity to the noise I heard. Finally I get ahold of Jennifer and the SAG wagon is on the way.

It was a great day for a ride, but it wasn't in the cards for me. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for a ride.