At Home on the Drome
This weekend was filled with a lot of riding and a big first for a lot of us here at the office, our first time on a velodrome.
After meeting up at the Metro in NoHo, Jordan, Mike, and I all took the bike path out to the Encino Velodrome. There's really nothing as nice as going out for an afternoon ride after a morning rain. The air cleared up, the sun came out, and the bike path in and of itself was beautiful.
But the velodrome, oh, the velodrome, never thought I could fall in love so fast. All you have to do is get on and it's easy to understand how people can get addicted to that thing.
After going over the basic safety spiel (how not to kill ourselves) we did a few pace lines and some follow the leader, working on drafting and sticking together as a group. Then the real fun started. We did 200m times and started flying. By the end of 3 hours, we were pretty beat. We had a nice ride home, and called it a day.
(Justin, our fellow Pure Fix rider, in the front, followed by Nick, Jordan, and Mike in red)
But I think the highlight of the whole thing had to be the bikes. We all took our own custom Pure Fixes and ran into a fourth Pure Fix rider at the velodrome. They were perfect machines, perfect for getting to the track, and they out-performed us on it. I mean, at no point did I feel like the bike was holding me back. Just took off the bulls, threw on some drops, and it was seamless. I know the pros can go 40mph, and quickly, but we were hitting 30mph on our 200m times, and we all felt like the bike could have given more if we had any more to give ourselves. And then, as always, it was as smooth as butter on the ride home.
Yes, yes, I know, I'm massaging my ego, but still, it's the truth. Hopped back on mine to commute this morning, and just felt nice knowing it had really given a good run over the weekend. No, it's not a thousand dollar track bike, but I love it for what it is. And now I can officially say, it's at home on the road and the velodrome, tested and approved.
BOOM!
