Low Key

I still haven't kicked this cold completely. Its not a bad cold just enough to know its there. Saturday Sam and I met with Brendan at Mammoth for some single track. 10 min in Sam flats on the railroad tracks and isn't able to fix it so he had to walk back while Brendan and I ride a lap. It was wetter than we thought it would be. I fell once because the 3 foot grass was covering the trail and I couldn't see anything before I knew it I hear my tire burp and I go flying into the weeds. Nothing happened to me or my bike. We never saw Sam so it was a solo ride for him and I had to wait at the truck for while until he made it around. Today we rode to Stillwater to cheer on all the racers. Chris Fisher took 4th in the cat 2/3 crit. 3 guys went into the hay bails on the last corner before the final time up the hill. Kristin Armstrong blew all the women away just like in all the stages previous. Her speed up the hill was consistent on every lap, it was amazing how fast she climbed that thing.
The mens field was split early too, guys getting shelled all over the place. Hollywood had a good showing of followers. He had a group of 9 guys around him with Hollywood t-shirts plus a bunch more spread over the hill.

I was successful in converting my Ardennes wheels to tubeless. Stans recommends using 2 layers of there 21mm yellow tape and there valve stem for the standard 19mm road rim. I went to the hardware store and found 24mm strapping tape which works perfect for the wider 23mm rim. I had to put 3 layers on the rear just so the tire would be tighter on the rim when trying to fill the tire the first time to seat the beads. I ran 90 psi today and they rode like a dream. Railroad tracks and bumpy roads are so much nicer, the tires don't send sharp vibrations up through the bike anymore and the tires seem to stick to the pavement a lot better instead of bouncing around. Remember you can only use the Hutchison tubeless tire. Its not like on the mtb where you can use just about any non tubless specific tire with Stans to convert. Converting to tubeless is about the same weight as using a light tube and tire. It was about identical with a 215gram tire and a thin tube. I just did the conversion yesterday so I haven't done any high speed cornering yet.