Back from the Track

Just got back from an hour at the track with my son. Had a really good time playing cat and mouse on the second half of the track. I rode the GT today as it was at home and the Redline needs some parts swapping over like the grips and the pedals. I am going to take the GT to my container this afternoon and swap over the parts and bring the Redline home to make it easier to take to the track tomorrow.

We has a great time and my jumping is getting better all the time. Also my Son's pumping is improving and he was doing little jumps today on the table tops. It took me until he had a 5 second head start for me to beat him today which is much better. The last time we played I beat him with a 10 second head start. HE even beat me today in the last game when he has a 5 second lead still!

Here is a video of my son riding. It is a bit crappy as I haven't been able to get a camera yet so it was filmed on my phone and you can not see anything on the phone's screen in the sun!

New Bike

Picked up my new bike this morning and took it straight back to the track for gate practice. The bike is amazing even though the weather was really crappy! It was blustery and raining but it was still fun even though I nearly went off of the track a couple of times because of gusts of wind!

The bike is a Second hand Redline Flight Pro 24 and I can honestly say that the hype about them is justified. I tried to win the bike a couple of weeks ago on eBay but I lost out by £40. I then saw last night that the bike had been put up for sale by the new owner so I bought it without hesitation with a buy it now offer.

Luckily I sold my mountain bike on Thursday night so I had the cash spare to buy the Redline quickly and I got a good deal.

The difference of the Redline compared to my GT is amazing, it is about half the weight of the GT and the front end is really light probably due to the carbon forks and the hollow hub I guess as the bars and the rims are the same on both bike.

I am replacing the spd pedals on monday as I do not want to use spd's for a while as my ankle is screwed and I will not be able to snap my right foot out of the pedal without damagine my ankle more!!

I am looking at Answer MPH Senior Pedals (http://www.crucialbmxshop.com/answer-mph-senior-pedals.html) but I will talk to the people in the shop when I go on Monday to see what they recommend.

I am going to keep this bike just for racing/ training and I am going to use the GT as my comute to work bike As both bikes have the same bars it makes them feel similar.

Here are some pictures of the bike:

The specifications of the bike are as follows:

Bombshell F1 carbon fibre forks. Shimano Lx crank set with Sinz chainring. Deore V brake. Sun Rhino lite rims built on Ciari cartridge bearing hubs. Super smooth wheelset that rolls forever. Tioga powerblock 1.75 tyres front and rear. S & M race stem, Renthal cruiser bars, Odi lock on grips, Shimano Dx spd pedals. 

I now have to start serious training so that I don't look like a complete idiot when I do my first race next month!!!!

Slack week

This week I have none hardly any training. The end of last week I  strained an ab muscle training so I had to miss the first race of the season. As I wasn't racing I had to travel to a friend's 40th birthday party a couple of hours away so couldn't go to the gym either. During the week I did cycle to work everyday which is technically training! Apart from that I played basketball once and that was it.

This week I am going to make up for this as my son is off school and I am working lates so we are planning to go to the track every day.

Also the end of next week we have a club training session so I am going to try and get some gym sessions in as well.

Stuff arrived

Picked up the bars and stuff from work, where they were delivered last night and took them along with my bike and some other stuff to my container/ workshop ready to do an unboxing and setup photos later today.

Here are the photos of the bike and the new bits:

NEW STUFF :-)

NEW STUFF :-)

Old bars and Stem

Old bars and Stem

New Stem on the bike 

New Stem and Bars on the Bike 

New Break Lever too

Grips too

All done :-)

First impressions are that the front feels tons lighter. I will take the bike to the track tomorrow morning and test it more.

New stuff arriving today

Just got confirmation that the new bars, stem and grips are arriving today. Will post some pictures later.

Looking at everything that I have spent on the bike until now I have shelled out around £415.87 total which is around £80 less than the new model of the bike. So in hindsight it may have been better to buy a new bike outright, although the majority of the components that I have bought are much better quality than would come on a new complete bike.

Here is a breakdown of all the stuff:

Bike = £165
Global Racing Pro Brake Lever = £17.99
Renthal Moto 24" Bars = £59.99
Crupi I-Beam Stem = £54.98
ODI Ruffian Lock-On Grips = £21.98
Tangent Platform Pedals = £29.99
2  x Maxxis DTH Wire - 24 x 1.75" Tyres = £43.96

Total = £415.87

After totalling up all that I have spent so far I am going to hold off on a new bike for a while until I have got some use out of the parts that I have. Although I can transfer the new parts onto the new bike anyway so I haven't waster the money. I am also going to this bike as by training/ commuting bike during the week so the money will not go to waste.

I had been thinking about my son's old bike and I bought a set of Skyway Tuff II wheels with tyres and tubes for £40 on ebay do I am going to put those on his old bike so he can use it as a training/ riding to work bike. The actual wheels are below:

Apparently the wheels will arrive tomorrow so by the weekend he will have a new play bike. I am also trying to find my old custom made Curtis Expert bike from when I was a kid that is in one of my parents sheds under all of the rubbish. Eventually the skyway's will  go onto that but I guess it will need to be re-chromed first as it was a bit rusty the last time I saw it. My son loved the idea of having my old bike for him to use so we will see.

Here are a picture of the bike yesterday.

Yesterday while I was training I played around with the handlebar position as you can see the bars were forwards from in line with the forks, I moved than to a position in line with the forks which most riders seem to use and it was much better. I also lowered the seat as low as it can go as it was hitting my stomach while I was pumping.

Yesterday I felt another massive improvement over the day before I was getting much lower on the pump and also my body position was behind the seat which made the front wheel much lighter. I even managed to manual the table top a couple of times. My timing on jumping is getting better as well. I was clearing the table tops in rhythm without the need to pull up much at all. I have also got my front wheel landings much smoother.

I had to cut the training short as my back was hurting due to over doing it at the gym on Monday morning.

The bikes

Here are or current bikes:

Dylan's Bikes:

His first £50 Haro:

His new Meybo Clipper Expert that we picked up last Saturday from Crucial BMX in Bristol (http://www.crucialbmxshop.com/meybo-clipper-comp-complete-bmx-race-bike.html):

My old GT Pro Series 24 which I think is a 2007 but not sure:

The only mods I have done so far are swapping the tyres for Maxxis race tyres which has to be the best £50 ever spent in terms of bang for your buck the bike is a totally different animal with the new tyres on. I also put on some cheap Tangent Platform Pedals that I bought for Dylans old bike but he doesn't need any more (http://www.crucialbmxshop.com/tangent-platform-pedals.html). I have also just bought new handlebars, stem, grips and right handed lever as the current stem and bars are bent, rusty and heavy and it currently has a left hand lever on it.

To be honest it would have been cheaper to but a new bike but I am planning to use the GT as my work bike once I upgrade to a new bike.

I am currently looking into ways to get a new bike for me. The two options that I have found so far are:

http://www.tredz.co.uk/.Haro-Race-LT-CF-Pro-24w-2016-BMX-Bike_87751.htm

or 

http://www.tredz.co.uk/.DK-Bicycles-Elite-CRZR-24-2016-BMX-Bike_80413.htm

About me

After stopping BMX racing over 30 years ago due to a knee injury I am making a comeback at the age of 43. For the past 20 years I have been playing basketball competitively and now have a bunch of chronic ankle problems to go with my bum knee I got when I was 11 bmx racing although I was never really very good at racing to be honest I usually finished second or third in local races and made the finals at a regional level a couple of times. I have been struggling for the past 2 years with weight problems and injury for the past 6 years where my weight has steadily risen from my playing weight of 70kgs to nearly 100kgs today (I have dropped down to 95kgs at the moment). Due to the injuries and weight gain basketball was becoming more and more difficult and stressful as I was caught in the endless cycle of training hard loosing weight getting injured and putting it all back on again!

When we moved back to the UK from Brasil I bought my son a cheap ebay race bmx and took my son to the local bmx track for a club taster day to see if I could get him interested in something other than video games as he didn't take to basketball very well. Once he got there he loved it so I bought an old cruzer also from ebay and we have been going to the track every weekend. My son has moved off of the ebay bike and onto a new racing bmx which he loves and it has helped him progress no end so far. I am trying not to push him and he has said that he doesn't want to start racing just yet so I have left it a that.

I have become more hooked on the racing than my son and I have decided to train towards returning to bmx racing this year. My goal is to drop to a more respectable weight of around 80kgs by the first local regional race in the next town from us which is on the 5th of june.

To get the weight down and try and stay injury free I have started back at the gym as well where I have asked the trainer to make me a more bmx related training program. I am also lucky that I work shifts so one week I start at 7am and finish at 15:30 and one week I start at 17:30 and work until 2am.

The early shift is proving to be more of a challenge for working out as I do not have time to workout or ride. On the late shift I workout in the gym when I drop my son off at school at 9am for an hour then I go to the track for an hour of two after the gym.

I have noticed that after 3 weeks my riding is getting much smoother and I am pumping much better than before, I am also able to jump the small table tops while pumping which is great.

I have done 2 gate sessions an I am gating pretty well and I am usually the first person to the first jump which is good. My problems lie once I get to the first jump as apart from pumping I have no advanced skills to speak of! I cant really manual and my jumping skills are limited to say the least.

I have decided to take it slowly as my ankle problems are cutting short my training when I try and push my limits. I am also going to learn to ride reversing my pedals to put less stress on my really weak right ankle that I have managed to sprain twice already whilst riding!

I have decided that I am going to concentrate on the following skills during the following months:

March = Pumping
April = Manuals
May = Jumping
June = Sprinting and gates.

Hopefully this will get me in some kind of shape to at least make the finals in my first race.

I am currently looking for a cheap video camera to record my training to measure my progress.