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Thursday, December 04, 2008

Black Thursday : Putrajaya Ride

Woke up at 4.30am this morning to prep for the ride to Putrajaya with AJ.

Decided to meet him at Science Centre and cycle with him from there. Left home at about 5.15am and reached SC by 5.30am. It got to be the fastest 10KM i've done.

We met up and left towards Putrajaya. Everything as per normal, except with AJ, you tend to be running harder...or pedalling harder.

We also have a good sprinting exercise to outrun a bunch of rowdy dogs near Taman Desa.

Apparently, AJ do not take the route like how i did. He is used to ride down KL-Seremban and enters via another slip road. I estimated that the journey is about 2km shorter.

As i enter the E20, i felt something funny. There seems to be a strange feeling that i was having a flat. Everytime i pedal fast, it tend to get some slight tapping feeling from the rear and pushing past 33km/h was a task.

Looking down, it looked perfectly ok.

It was ok until i reached the RnR (the road today was very dark, someone decided to save electricty and there wasn't an ounce of lights for 10km) and i dismounted and check the tire.

Yeap, got a puncture.


This was all it takes

I spent 5 minutes pumping in the air and hope it will last until the toll plaza.

By then, AJ already waaaaaaayyyyyyy ahead.

The air couldn't last more than 500meters and it went flat again. In case i damage the carbon rim, i decided to just dismount and do the right thing - CHANGE THE BLOODY TIRE.

I looked at the time : 6.45am
I looked at the distance : 36km.
I looked at the average speed : 27.4km/h


Serdang KVDT

No choice. Got to change the tire and thank goodness i brought my tire! Decided not to use the green goo to automatically patch the tire as i do not want to waste it.

And today was the first time i change a tubular tire!


!@*&%^$

It was easy. Much easier than doing a clincher.

Got the tire inflated and by then, AJ was already on his way back. Flag him to go on without me i do not want him to slow down.

It took me bloody 30 minutes to inflate that bloody tire.

My own fault actually, i did not ensure that the valve was properly attached. Apparently, the valve head could be disloged from the valve body. And i spent 20 minutes getting the air into the tire, only to have it leaked out again.

Dumbass.


Dumbass with a big tummy


I fixed the valve head and pumped in about 100psi (could only roughly manage that).

Crossed the highway and pedalled back.

I hammered the crank and managed to get the average back up to acceptable value.

Total distance was 66km and it took me bloody 2:19 to do today's ride.

If there was any consolation, today's ride made me feel really thankful that i don't need to deal with traffic jam in most of the road. I was way ahead of many cars and the 20 minutes it took me from MidValley to Damansara seems really fast compared if you were driving this morning!





Reached home at 8.45am. Showered. Change-Parade. And i did a recovery jog to office and was in office by 9am.

Priceless. And sweaty.



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