I’ve been something of a retro-Luddite when it comes to gear-shifting technology. Party this is because I had several 9 speed race wheels, and I wanted to maintain interchangeability between bikes, and (I am embarrassed to admit) I found it difficult to figure out which parts I'd need to buy to set up a TT bike with Shimano Di2.Enter SRAM’s new electronic gear system, eTap. For road bikes, this is a pretty straightforward system. Each brake lever has one gear change switch, and it operates the derailleurs wirelessly. Satellite shifting switches (the ‘’blips”) allow shifting from the top of the bars or clip-on aero bars. The right hand control shifts the rear mech up, the left control down. Pressing both controls at the same time changes the front mech either down or up, depending on which position the mech is currently in.This spring, SRAM released the eTap Aero, intended for use on TT and triathlon bikes. I decided it was time to (a) get modern, and (b) get 11 speed. So I set my Wiggle profile to email me when the eTap aero was available. Ages later, I got an email saying it was in stock. I popped over to the Wiggle website to find four sets were available. I ordered one, along with an 11-speed Dura-Ace cassette and an 11-speed SRAM chain.The box.A few days later a vast box arrived at work. The post room called saying they thought a wheel had arrived for me! Inside was the cassette and chain, and an enormous and very heavy black and red box that just exudes quality.[caption id="attachment_3638" align="alignnone" width="474"] This image shows the six smaller boxes (sourced from the Slowtwitch forum, and edited)[/caption]Inside that were six smaller but equally robust boxes containing:

1. USB battery charger. This comes with all sorts of wall socket adapters, and is for charging the derailleur batteries.
2. The rear derailleur,  with the battery detached. The red part covers and protects the attachment point of the battery: there's a complementary part to protect the battery - the front derailleur comes with identical parts.
3. The blipbox. This is quite small, and has a Garmin style twist mount, there are several included. Neither mount with self adhesive pads matches the curvature of the top plate of my aerobar, so I used the normal Garmin mount held in place with stretchy bands (but see below).
4.  One USB stick for firmware updates. Just the USB stick. Nothing else other than a few scraps of paper.
5.  The front derailleur. This has the battery detached for transport, and a buch of weird little wedgy things, about which more later. Also, it has a horribly alarming sticker saying you MUST read installation instructions before using it. You need to retrieve said instructions from the SRAM website.
6. Two sets of 'blips' (i.e. four blips in total). These are the switches that connect to the 'blipbox', which actually controls the derailleurs wirelessly. So, not much in that box.

Underneath these six boxes is a set of brake cables (inners and outers), the presence of which completely mystifies me. I assume that the eTap aero set would be bought either to upgrade a TT bike (as I did) or for a new build. Neither scenario would seem to require a set of brake cables to be supplied, though no doubt they will come in useful in due course for another bike project (my TT bike has hydraulic brakes).Sadly, no Haribo gummy sweets were present.InstallationI began by fully charging the derailleur batteries. Because the front and rear derailleurs use exactly the same type of battery, if the rear runs out of juice, you could always swap in the front mech battery. The instructions provided observe that when the battery is detached, both the battery and derailleur need to be protected by the plastic parts supplied to protect the connection parts. I believe the system is activated by motion sensors, and the recommendation when transporting the bike by car is to remove the batteries to avoid unintended discharge.Installation turned out to be stupidly straightforward. In fact, the biggest hassle was feeding the blip cables through the base bars, but a little ingenuity sorted that out. Pairing the three components (rear and front mech, and the blipbox) took less than 30 seconds. On my TT bike, the wires from the blips pass through handlebar setup internally, using the pre-existing slots cut for gear and brake cables (the P5's hydraulic hoses are entirely internal). Deciding where to place the blips on the base bars and aero extensions took a few minutes, before I taped the bars. And then a test. Well, the controls worked well, though the rear mech wasn't quite aligned with the sprockets. A quick perusal of the manual showed how to fine-tune that. Then all was done.You might be wondering about that alarming sticker on the front mech. I can only assume that refers to the funny little wedge pieces that apparently brace the mech against the seat tube of the frame. It's not obvious why these are needed, but I complied.UsageSo, I'm using a Campagnolo Record chainset with TA rings, SRAM mechs, SRAM chain and Dura-Ace cassette. Does that combination work? Well, on the basis of riding out to a 10 mile time trial, riding the event, and riding back, I'd say so. Shifting was very smooth (I might even suggest too smooth - I did miss the positive click of my old Dura-Ace levers), and I found the usage of the blip switches really very intuitive. I made no inadvertant gear changes, though to be frank I didn't do many changes with the front mech.Battery life presumably depends on the number of shifts you do. The blipbox uses a CR2032 cell, which i supposed to be good for over a year. Each derailleur has a rechargeable battery supposedly good for 1000km/60h of use. The system uses the same battery design for both mechs, so they are interchangeable.In the week following my first ride with the system, I revisited the mounting of the blipbox. Its garmin mount section is threaded for a screw, so I drilled the top plate of my aero bars, and fix it in place that way. It's a fair bit neater than the elastic bands!I rode the system in the NBRC Hardriders club '20', and did have some hassle with my mongrel transmission - the chain didn't want to seat properly on the inner ring. Hopefully I can sort this out without resorting to a new chainset.Worth it?Well, it's nice. It works well (faultlessly so far on my limited riding to date). I now have 11-speed on this TT bike. It doesn't require any guddling around persuading cables to pass through the frame. I am pleased with it. But does it represent a major performance improvement over the old style mechanical Dura-Ace it replaced? Well, I'm not sure, though I very much like having a second set of controls near the brake levers. I can say, though, that were I to spec out a new road bike, a SRAM eTap group would be high on my "to buy" list.Longer term, I'll do an update on performance (part 2!).

A cold and blustery morning greeted the riders who showed up for the annual NBRC Hardriders club event. There was an interesting mix of road bikes and TT bikes, possibly reflecting the confidence (or not) in muscling a TT bike up the Bow Brickhill climb not once, but twice. Some, myself included, felt the advantages elsewhere on the course merited a potentially slower ride up the hill on a TT bike.As it happened I found the second trip up the hill a bit easier than the first - though I had to get off at the bottom to make the chain seat properly on the small chainring (I think due to operator error). At the steepest part of the climb, Richard Wood came scooting past, with David Price not far behind.[caption id="attachment_3641" align="alignnone" width="500"] Just been caught! I think this picture conveys something of the gradient. Photo - Nathan Gallavan[/caption]The wind wasn't too bad, though there were some quite alarming high speed twitches of my front trispoke. Notably, the fast section just before Woburn was a bit iffy - I thought I was going to take off.This isn't a course I'm keen on - dubious road surfaces, other road users and horses. I was caught for three minutes by number 12 in Woburn Sands, and he executed an impressive pavement manoeuvre to avoid a car that backed out across the road!At least the rain held off until just before I got home.Full results at the NBRC website.

I rode out to this event knowing full well that I was flouting two rules of time trialling, enshrined in Team Grumpy' short rule book:#2 - Don't tinker with your bike the evening before the event. It will break, either then or, worse still, during the event.and#5 - Never train or race with a bad cough - it will destroy your entire season.Flouting Rule #2 was down to the fact I took delivery of a SRAM eTap aero set on Tuesday, and I'd spent several evenings fitting the kit, but had no opportunity to road test it before this morning's time trial. I'll probably review the eTap system in another post, but I can say that fitting is really easy (biggest hassle was feeding the blip switch wire through the base bar on my bike), and that the single switch controls are not only intuitive but work well. As as for rule #5 - I had been suffering a not particularly bad cold all week.Anyway, after a minor hitch when my Garmin Edge 520 refused to turn on, and I found out I couldn't quite remember how to use the hastily attached Edge 500! Anyway, I rode over to Stoke Hammond, running the chain up and down the cassette and checking the front mech worked OK. The shifts were very accurate and smooth, though I do miss the distinct click from the 9-speed Dura-Ace set that preceded it.Weather for the race wasn't particularly bad, but it was a bit cold and clammy, with on-off drizzle throughout. I regretted not bringing full finger gloves. There was a bit of a breeze that made the going a bit heavy to the first roundabout, but it didn't really trouble me again until I came to turn off the dual carriageway at about 8 miles. In the end, I finished in first place with 24:09, which I was quite pleased with - this was also good enough for 1st Veteran on standard, and second place handicap. Full results over at the NBRC website.

I went down to South Wales for the weekend and to reunite with long-time 2-up partner Gerry Oram (Bynea CC, and ex-NBRC) as usual at this time of year, to ride the Port Talbot Wheelers 2-up 25. The R25/24 course is based at Resolven, with the first half heading down a dual carriageway down the Neath valley before returning for a second trip down the valley and back on a hilly back road. It's quite a challenging course.The weather this year was quite pleasant, sunny but with a stiff breeze that made the return leg on the dual carriageway quite hard. We rode pretty well, with slick changeovers, and neither under any real difficulty in matching the other's pace. The second half featured some pretty poor road surfaces, which always offers uncomfortable bumps for the second rider! We finished in 11th place with 1:1:14 - enough to earn us 2nd composite team (the 1st placed composite team actually recorded the fastest time on the day, 55:14).

After several months confined to the garage on the turbo trainer, I was raring to ride the first club event in the 2016 series. It had been designated a 'Come and Try It' event, and I'd spread the word around local cycling groups, and we'd planned to use the BikeBus cafe as an HQ. As it turned out, things didn't go according to plan!I was all ready to ride up to Astwood when the snow came on with a vengeance - big fluffy snowflakes falling on to a heavy frost. A quick telephone conference with Tony and it seemed likely we’d call the event off. Certainly, I wasn’t keen to ride up to the course in those conditions, but I did feel as club chairman that I ought to be there for those riders who did show up.

As it turned out, the event went ahead though it was a bit cold and wet and there were only three riders. Tony, Bryan and Dave dealt with the start, while Katja and I went out to marshal a couple of the turns. It was certainly cold and exposed out there on the roadside.

Back home, it was another back to back turbo session. Next week sees the annual Team Grumpy reunion for the Port Talbot Wheelers 2-up '25', so I'll be giving the next club event a miss.

After a remarkably warm (and wet) December during which I don't think we had a single frost, there was quite a heavy frost visible on roofs and cars when I got up in the morning. This was a bit of a concern since it had rained quite heavily in the evening before. Indeed, there were quite a few ice patches on my street when I investigated when the sun got up.Fortunately, everything had thawed by the time I set out to ride over to Stoke Hammond for the first time trial in 2016. That's not to say it was particularly warm: far from it!We had an excellent turnout of 24 riders plus a variety of spectators and helpers. My legs had felt pretty weak on the ride out, so I wasn't particularly optimistic. On the bright side, it didn't seem to be terribly windy as we waited in the start area (though actually I think that was largely due to shelter.All too soon I was lined up and waiting for my start. I had the very fast James Fox behind me, and fully expected to be caught at some point in the race. Having said that, I found the entire outward leg a struggle. I seemed to be racing through treacle and I found it difficult to stay on the tribars. Maybe I should use tribars  a bit more while turbo training! James caught and passed me pretty quickly, but after I reached the turn, things improved - I suspect there was now a modest tailwind coupled with a downhill section.I roared out from the turn and across the next roundabout without having to stop for traffic. My speed didn't falter until the short rise up to the next roundabout, where again I didn't have any traffic issues as I turned right and accelerated down the hill. Upon reaching the final roundabout (another right had turn, and the last before the finish) I was more than a little horrified to see a very large puddle hugging the centre of the roundabout and spanning the lane I was in! I braked to a responsible speed and took the roundabout wide, leaving just the last section to the finish line to struggle through from a slower speed than I'd intended.I finished in 24:43, not a time I was hoping for, but at least I picked up some speed on the fast return leg. The event was won by Marcus Burnett (Ingear RT), with James fox (Luton CC) taking 1st Veteran. I came in 4th, as first NBRC rider. Full results at the NBRC website. 

Prologue

So, the usual features of Team Grumpy's preparation for the Duo Normand are generally not conducive to a good performance! This year was no different.

My bike had some real issues with its gear indexing. This was noted in training over in Normandy a month before the Duo, and also back in Blighty. I was optimistic that when he re-jigged the tri-bar extension before the Duo, this might have been rectified - but… Team Grumpy Rule #2 may well be violated again this year!

A few years ago, I obtained a 6th Generation iPod Nano by virtue of a product recall (the 1st Gen nano had a battery problem). I've used the replacement iPod far more than the 1st Gen version, so I was a bit dismayed when the power button stopped working a month or so ago.Repair via Apple didn't seem terribly worthwhile, so I investigated whether it might be possible to sort this out myself. When the 6th Gen iPod Nano was released, iFixit wrote a teardown guide - there's an astonishing amount of stuff crammed into a tiny case! I found a blog with a description of how to fix the power switch problem, which seems to be relatively common. After a bit of procrastination, I set about attempting the repair.It's not quite clear what the malfunction really is - there's a surface mounted switch (it's the gold coloured circle mentioned in step 7 of the repair instructions), and I guess that something wears out or gets dislodged making it inoperative.I didn't really have the specialised tools needed - I used the plastic lid of a Bic biro pen as a spudger/lever, the tweezers from a Swiss army knife, and the small blade of the knife as a screwdriver. To get in, I used a hairdryer to melt the glue and the knife to lever up the screen. I avoided disconnecting the screen or detaching it completely, and once I had the battery loose, I used a rubber band to hold it to the screen. I noted that of the four screws you remove for the repair, there are three different sizes (all tiny!) - I took a quick photo and labelled it so I knew where they go. I fashioned a small square of plastic to glue to the gold switch with contact adhesive.Too much of the original glue was lost, so I reattached the screen with a contact adhesive using a bulldog clip to hold the screen down while the glue set. The result was a bit messy, and I doubt the unit is waterproof any more. But hey, once I had reassembled the iPod, the switch was working again. Who knows how long for...

This event had been scheduled for the Stagsden course, but we moved it as we felt the roundabout turn on that course might be a bit busy on a Saturday morning. I chose to ride the Cervelo P3 with the kit I’ll use on the Duo Normand in a fortnight’s time: Hed 3 front and rear, with Powertap P1 pedals.

Once again, we had windy and wet conditions for this event. It was a kind of tail wind to the turn, with a bit of side in it. The descent from the start was pretty good, not really as twitchy as it could be. I held a decent speed for a bit, but took the intermediate roundabout at Marston Moretaine easy - it’s a peculiar one, plus I noted a diesel spill which gave me some concern. During the outbound leg, I was in a kind of a bubble - the tail wind plus the aero hat had me riding in near silence!

Freshly returned from my holiday jaunt to Normandy, I was somewhat dismayed so see the heavy rain that greeted me as I rode over to the Stoke Hammond course. It did stop by the time we raced, but by then I was really quite cold. Indeed it took me until I got onto the dual carriageway before my legs felt like they were limbering up.

As I was off number 1 of 5 riders, I didn’t have a rider to chase. As I rounded the turn, I could see other riders apparently going rather better than I was! I duly buckled down and made a bit more of an effort. Tom Krause later said I looked good at that point, so appearances can clearly be deceptive!