Cleave's Blant

My Complete Bicycle History (Updated: 2023-11-14)

Posted: November 25, 2023 in Uncategorized
Tags: my bikes, N+1

I was inspired by a thread on an online cycling forum to create this blog entry to document my bicycle history. I updated my original post with my latest bicycle information and corrected or added to some old information. These are all the bicycles I’ve owned (that I can remember) since beginning of my cycling “hobby.” (Note: I bought the bicycle during the model year listed and the bicycles are road bikes unless otherwise noted. Bicycles in bold are in my current inventory.)

This update contains numerous corrections and my latest training bike, a gen 4 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-MOD.

1970 Magneet (unknown model): My first 10-speed bike. I got it because it had Campagnolo derailleurs on it. Never mind that they were Campagnolo Valentino derailleurs. It also had the ubiquitous (for that era) Weinmann center-pull brakes. I repainted the bike a metallic purple when the original paint sort of fell off. I actually “competed” in my first race on this bike. Not sure what I did with it after I stopped riding it.
1974 Lambert Pro: One of the finest British racing bikes ever built (not). Started out with plastic Simplex rear derailleur, ended up with a Shimano Crane. Eventually put it out of my misery by cracking the head tube. I weighed about 120 lbs soaking wet at the time. Someone wanted to buy it from me after a friend of my father welded(!) the head tube. I sold it to him.
1975 Bianchi Specialissima: Purchased in June 1976 and I still have the frameset and a couple of original parts on it after a complete restoration using period incorrect Campagnolo Super Record components circa 1984. It was originally all Campy Nuovo Record. This is probably the bike that I rode the most — more than 40K miles. Museum piece in my house.
1980 Medici Pro Strada: Truly the one bike that I wish I never sold. It was essentially a Masi Gran Criterium as it was built by former Masi USA employees. I put a mix of Shimano and Sun Tour parts on it. It did have a Campy seat clamp bolt on it. This was my first racing-only bike. I sold the complete bike but I don’t remember how I advertised it or who bought it.
1982(?) Benotto (model???) track bike: My first track bike was made-in-Mexico and had straight gauge, steel tubing. I got it so that I could train at the newly constructed, 7-Eleven Olympic Veldrome (built for the 1984 Summer Olympics). The fork had quick-release chrome plating and by the time I sold the frameset the fork had almost no chrome plating left on it. Overall, it was a nice track bike and served me well. Sold the frame and fork around 2006 at a swap meet and it’s probably a brakeless road fixie now.
1984(?) Basso (something-or-other): This was a straight gauge Columbus frame that I bought during my bike shop employee sabbatical. I built it using most of the parts off of the 1975 Bianchi and used it as a training bike (as the Bianchi had seen better days by then). Eventually I sold the bike after getting the frame powder-coated when the quick release Italian paint job gave up the ghost. Also put a mid-1980s Shimano 600 group on it and I have no recollection of who bought it.
1984 Cannondale SM-500 mountain bike: Got sucked into the mountain bike craze and this was another employee purchase. The bike was a dark metallic green and it interestingly had a 26″ front wheel (standard for that era) and a 24″(!) rear wheel. I could climb trails that would cause others to dab but it was scary descending on it. Sold it to an aerospace co-worker who, as I was told, rode it all the time all around the South Bay.
1985 Vitus 979: Built it with a combination of Sun Tour and Galli parts as a race rig. It was very light for the time and it was a noodle, but I weighed less than 130 lbs. back then so it was bearable for racing. This was also another employee purchase and I ended up selling the frame and fork to a friend.
1985 Olmo (I-can’t-remember): Built it with the same combination of parts as the Vitus used it as a training bike. It was a Columbus SL frame and many will argue that it was a better bike than the Vitus. I won’t argue that point. I also got this with a bike shop employee discount. It replaced the Basso. It also had a wild, 3-color, fade paint job. I think I sold the frame and fork through the Pennysaver.
1986 Shogun Kazé: TT funny bike that I eventually rebuilt using most of the parts off of the Vitus. This was my first TT-specific bike. Did a few sub 1hr 1 min TTs on it but I could never quite get under 1 hr. The partially assembled bike sat in our garage for over a decade. Finally sold it at our estate (moving) sale in 2018.
1987 Fisher Procaliber mountain bike: Bought this as lightly used frame. It had one of those under-the-chainstays rear brake setups. It descended much better than the Cannondale but it didn’t climb as well. Given my inability to descend fast, it probably was a bad change for me. Eventually I converted the bike into a city bike and I towed my kids in a trailer behind this bike for untold miles. Finally sold it to a work colleague’s daughter around 2007.
1988 Serotta Colorado: This was the best steel frame that I have ever owned. Built it with a combination of Shimano Dura Ace and Shimano Santé components. This replaced the Vitus. It was my first bike with index shifting and I used the Santé derailleurs because my local wrench said that they would work well with the plethora of Sun Tour freewheels that I had at the time. He was right. I eventually rebuilt the bike with 2005 Campy Record-8 components–my first bike with ergo shifting and had it repainted by CycleArt. Cracked the down tube in 1999 and sent it to Serotta for a repair evaluation. Never got it back from them as the repair cost was too high.
1990 Stowe Triad: I originally built the bike with most of the parts that I had on the Serotta Colorado. This bike replaced the Olmo as my training bike. I have a funny story about Robert Stowe but I’ll save it for another time. I rebuilt the Stowe with circa 2005 Campagnolo Chorus-10 components in 2013 and then disassembled it a year later to build a road bike for my wife. Rode it a few times after rebuilding it and the mystique of steel road bikes was lost on me after riding carbon frames for over a decade. Steel may be real but it doesn’t ride better than carbon. Sold it at the end of 2015 to a clubmate who wanted to build up a classic steel road bike.
1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti: This was the original Megatube Ti with the large, “aero” fabricated and welded down tube. It was my 40th birthday present from my wife. I built it with 1996 Campy Record-8 components. This bike became my “race” bike (I wasn’t racing much at the time) and my Serotta moved to the training bike role. It also had what felt like the world’s heaviest road fork. More history on this frame below.
2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al: I bought this frame when I cracked the down tube on the Serotta. I put most of the components from the Serotta on this frame and it became my race bike while the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti migrated to training bike status. This was when I started racing more seriously again as my kids were starting to get older. Sold the complete bike to a friend some time after I stopped riding it.
2001 Bianchi XL Ti: I got this frame in 2002 as a warranty replacement for the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti (which developed crack on the seat tube right at the weld for the front derailleur hanger). Originally put the parts on it from the Megatuble and it was my training bike for a few years. I put Record-10 on it in 2003. Sold the frame on eBay after I bought the Look KG481SL.
2002 Look KG381i: I got this on clearance in February 2003 and built it with 2003 Record-10. This and the subsequent Look KG481SL had the best stock geometry fit of any bike I’ve owned. It replaced the 2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al as my race bike. After a few years, the frame suffered from corrosion between the carbon tubes and aluminum lugs and I ended with another warranty replacement frameset.
2000 Quattro Assi Team 2000: I bought this in October 2004 as a cheap TT frame ($500) to replace the Shogun. Built it piece by piece by looking for sales on Chorus-10 parts. This is the worst riding bike that I’ve ever owned, hands down. However, I did manage to set some PRs on it but did not crack the elusive 1-hour 40 Km TT. Replaced it with the Bianchi D2 Crono. Sold the frame at a swap meet around 2008.
2005 Look KG481SL: I did a double swap on components when I built this bike in August 2005. The low mileage parts on the Look KG381i went on this bike and the higher mileage parts from the Bianchi XL Ti went on the other KG381i. The KG381i became my training bike. I really liked KG481SL. Sold the complete bike to someone through an online cycling forum in 2008.
2006 Bianchi Pista Concept track bike: Built this using most of the parts from my Benotto track bike in March 2006. Eventually replaced everything on it — not that there’s much to replace on a track bike. Put over 7,000 miles on it. All of those miles were training and racing on an indoor, 250 meter, velodrome. Thought the frame was cracking in 2013. Turns out it wasn’t. Then it developed a real crack on the seat clamp. Re-built it with a variety of leftover track components and wheels and finally sold it via a WTB post on Facebook in 2015.
2005 Bianchi Milano 120 (120th Anniversary Edition) town bike: Decided that I wanted a town bike and liked the one that my wife had. Purchased this one on closeout as a year-old model in July 2006. It’s a fun bike that is easy to ride. Changed out the bars, saddle, and seatpost but otherwise, it was pretty much stock. Always got compliments about the bike (not me). Pained me to sell this bike but it became redundant with my single-speed commuter after I retired. Sold it to a friend in September 2019.
2006 Look 565: I got this frame in 2007 as a warranty replacement for the KG381i (which developed corrosion issues at the tube to lug interface). I ended up with the wrong size but rode it about 2,500 miles in about six months as my training bike before I sold it to a friend in 2007. It rode pretty well but it really shined on descents.
2007 Serotta Attack: I got this as my 50th birthday present to myself in August 2007. Built it with 2006 Record-10. I raced on it at the end of 2007 and for all of 2008. I love how this bike rides. It’s the best fitting bike I’ve ever owned and my first custom geometry frame. Towards the end of 2008 I started getting paranoid about racing on this bike. I have never worried about crashing a bike before and I didn’t like racing with that thought in the back of my head so I sold the KG481SL (which had rotated to training bike status). In August 2015, I was racing on this bike, as usual, in a Tuesday evening race and I crashed on it. After the crash and because the frame had over 26K miles, I decided to temporarily retire it. Rebuilt the bike in early 2020 without repainting it — think of the chips as patina — using the best Campagnolo Record-10 components that I had available. This one is a keeper.
2007 Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon: I got a deal on this TT frame from my LBS that I couldn’t refuse in November 2007. OK, I could have refused it but I was lusting after this frame from the first time that I saw it and I hated the Quattro Assi. I built it with almost all of the parts from the Quattro Assi. I only changed bars and wheels when I first built it. Who said you can’t buy a sub 1 hr, 40K TT? Currently the frame and fork are taking up space in my bicycle room. Make me an offer.
2009 Cervélo R3: In November 2008, I bought this frameset to be my race rig and bought a 2008 Campagnolo Record-10 group. I liked this bike well enough but its race speed handling didn’t inspire me — probably because it had a slightly funky front end geometry. Really didn’t do the weight weenie thing when I built it but it came in at 14.6 lbs with heavy Look delta pedals. Sold the frame and fork to a friend.
2007 Bianchi Roger single-speed cyclocross bike: Only used complete bike I’d ever bought at that point-in-time. Found it on craigslist in December 2009. It was my rain bike and single-speed training bike. Eventually replaced everything on it except the brakes and wheels and added fenders. (Not too many parts to change since it’s a single-speed.) My clubmates liked riding behind me when I rode it in the rain because it had full fenders. Unfortunately, it became redundant as a rain bike because I now ride and race on Zwift regularly, so there is no need to train in the rain. Sold bike through Facebook Marketplace in October 2021.
2010 Lapierre Xelius FDJ: After buying this frame on sale in March 2010, I put the components from Cervélo on this frame. Raced on it for a year. It was an OK race bike but it didn’t stir my soul. Sold the frame and fork in 2011 to a friend who bought it for his nephew.
2010 Cannondale SuperSix Hi-Mod: This was pretty cheap in February 2011 as it was a leftover team bike for a local club. Found a NOS Campagnolo Record-10 group for this build. Liked it a lot and raced on it for two seasons. Ended up selling the frame and fork in 2013 to a friend who easily outsprints me while riding it.
2011 Stop Proletariat commuter bike: The frame was billed as a single-speed mountain bike. I bought it December 2011 because I wanted to build a single-speed commuter bike with disc brakes and belt drive. Total custom build with low maintenance and ease of riding in mind. I liked the bike a lot though much of how I used it overlapped with the Bianchi Milano. Sold the frameset through Facebook Marketplace in 2019 after purchasing the Raleigh Cadent i8 frameset.
2012 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod: Got another end of season deal on this frame and fork. Built it for the 2013 season with the Record-10 parts off of the SuperSix Hi-Mod and I liked it even more than that bike. Eventually put an SRM power meter on it so I could see my pitiful wattage during races. Raced on it for three full seasons and turned it into my training bike after retiring the Serotta Attack. Sold it to my sprinter friend in 2018 after buying the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2012 Specialized Shiv: After the 2012 USAC Masters National Road Championships in Bend, OR, I got an itch to get a Shiv. Found this bike on ebay in September 2012 as a built but never ridden deal (wrong size). Moved the derailleurs and saddle from the Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon to the Shiv “module.” Raced it for almost 8 seasons and after making little progress with it in 2019, I decided to try a new bike. Sold the frameset in May 2022 to a friend who promptly went faster than I in a couple of time trials.
2013 Bianchi Super Pista track bike: Bought this track frameset when I thought my Bianchi Pista Concept had a crack in the frame. I didn’t build it until 2014 because I never had the time or inspiration to do so. I was thinking about selling it when I discovered a real crack in the Pista Concept. Interestingly, the geometry and build tolerances are so close to the old bike that I was able to swap parts without having to make any major adjustments. It rides about the same as the old bike. Didn’t ride any faster on it, but it was a good track bike. Replaced by the Fuji Track Elite. Sold it through a Facebook WTB post in June 2020.
2016 Fuji SL 1.1: My former race team sponsor, West River Cycles, arranged a deal for my club to get “team” bikes from Fuji for a great price and I received the frameset in Nov 2015. Since I wanted to retire the Serotta Attack, the timing for getting this frameset was perfect. Over the years, I was interested in Fuji’s top end road bikes but their geometry wasn’t right for me. Fortunately, the SL 1.1 fits me well. Built it with most of the parts off of the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod except for the crankset (mated to a Power2Max power meter) which came off of the Specialized Shiv. Early 2019 I upgraded(?) the groupset to SRAM eTap 11 to match the Bianchi Oltre XR4. In June 2022, I did a major overhaul of the bike and put the derailleurs from the Oltre XR4 on to it.
Funny how the Fuji replaced my Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod (Gen 2) as my race bike, and now I am replacing it (in the training bike role) with a Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-MOD (Gen 4). I have collected most of the parts that I need to turn it into a hillclimb race bike. I became enamored with the British Hillclimb Series and the bikes that people build to race in it. The British bikes do not need to meet UCI regulations so people go to great lengths to reduce the weight of their bikes. I am going to moderate lengths to reduce the weight to around 13.5 lbs.
2019 Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV: A number of “firsts” with this bike: my first aero road bike; my first bike purchase (November 2018) since retiring in 2017; my first foray into electronic shifting (SRAM eTap 11); my first non-Campagnolo road bike since jumping back on the Campagnolo bandwagon in 1997; and (finally) my first new-purchase bike build, specifically for training since buying the Stowe in 1990. Decided an aero road bike was my best bet for training since most of my training is on flat routes. Interestingly, it is just slightly heavier than the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod in its last training configuration because the Canondale had fairly heavy wheels. I hope this Bianchi is reasonably good for training on long climbs. Heck it worked well enough for Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk during the mountain stages of the 2018 Tour de France. I’m still allowed to dream–right? After about 24,000 miles of riding and enjoying this bike, I decided to retire it. Frameset with crankset and brakes is for sale.
2019 Cervélo P3: After a disappointing 8 seasons with the Specialized Shiv TT, I am trying a new TT bike. Not necessarily my first choice but may be my best choice because the frame, in conjunction with Felt Bayonet 3 aluminum aerobars, gives me tremendous latitude on bike setup — something that the Shiv didn’t provide. Purchased the frameset in May 2019 — just in time for the 2019 National Senior Games — and built it with the Campagnolo Record-10 drivetrain that was on the Shiv. I’m mostly faster on this bike than I was on the Shiv in the same races. Upgraded the drivetrain to SRAM eTap 11 and changed the bars to Zipp Vulka Aero Carbon in May 2020 and I continue to make upgrades to the components.
2017(?) Raleigh Cadent i8 town bike: Purchased this frameset in 2019. In theory it was a complete bike and then disassembled to sell as a frameset by the same shop where I purchased the Proletariat. Was able to move most of the parts from the Proletariat to the Cadent. Instead of being an internally geared 8-speed (i8), belt-drive bicycle as sold by Raleigh, it is now a singled-speed belt-drive bicycle.
2016 Fuji Track Elite track bike: Purchased complete bicycle used in February 2020 just before the pandemic started. Swapped the crankset, handlebars, and saddle (not much else to a track bike) between this bike and the Bianchi Super Pista. Kept the wheels that came with the bike and purchases a second seatpost for the time trial setup.
2021 Priority Apollo 11 gravel bike: I succumbed to the gravel craze but I am not going to do gravel races. Purchased this bike in September 2021. I wanted the ability to do some easy offroad riding while riding from home and a gravel bike seemed like the ticket. What attracted me to this particular bike is that it is a 1X11 setup but with an internally-geared rear hub and belt-drive. I am sold on belt-drive from my single-speed town bikes and and I thought that belt-drive was perfect for offroad riding — much less mess and maintenance. N+1-1 means that this bicycle replaced the Bianchi Roger. It also means that I have two belt-drive bikes.
2022 Factor Ostro VAM: After getting dropped twice on downhills during windy races during the 2022 race season, I decided I wanted a lightweight, aero bicycle for racing. Similar to the Bianchi Oltre XR4, this bicycle represents a number of firsts for me: hydraulic disc brakes, tubeless race wheels, complete internal routing of brake lines, one-piece carbon handlebar/stem, thru-axles, and shifters (SRAM axs eTap) that you set up through a phone app. I have been using mechanical disc brakes on bicycles since purchasing the Bianchi Roger in 2009 so I was familiar with using them and the need to align the calipers to the discs. However, hydraulic brakes are an order of magnitude more complex to install — especially with the internally routed hydraulic lines — though the caliper alignment is generally simpler. Overall, this was the most stressful bike build that I have ever done. N+1-1 was a bit more complicated for this purchase. The Factor OSTRO VAM replaces the Fuji SL 1.1 as my race bike. The Fuji replaces the Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV as my training bike, so the Bianchi becomes the N-1 bike.
2023 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-MOD: This is the 4th generation SuperSix Hi-Mod and I’ve owned generations 1 and 2 in the past. The Fuji SL 1.1 rides very well, but it is what I call anti-aero. With my experience riding the Bianchi Oltre XR4, I found I was taking a step backwards in my group training rides. (This, BTW, seemed to justify getting the Factor Ostro VAM.) I stumbled on a deal from our bike shop sponsor for the frameset and built it up with a combination of used and new parts. From the first ride, I liked this bike a lot.

Current inventory: 10 complete bicycles, 1 frameset (1 complete bicycle and 1 frameset for sale)

My Complete Bicycle History (Updated: 2022-08-02)

Posted: August 3, 2022 in Uncategorized
Tags: my bikes, N+1

This update contains numerous corrections and my latest race bike, a Factor OSTRO VAM.

1970 Magneet (unknown model): My first 10-speed bike. I got it because it had Campagnolo derailleurs on it. Never mind that they were Campagnolo Valentino derailleurs. It also had the ubiquitous (for that era) Weinmann center-pull brakes. I repainted the bike a metallic purple when the original paint sort of fell off. I actually “competed” in my first race on this bike. Not sure what I did with it after I stopped riding it.
1974 Lambert Pro: One of the finest British racing bikes ever built (not). Started out with plastic Simplex rear derailleur, ended up with a Shimano Crane. Eventually put it out of my misery by cracking the head tube. I weighed about 120 lbs soaking wet at the time. Someone wanted to buy it from me after a friend of my father welded(!) the head tube. I sold it to him.
1975 Bianchi Specialissima: Purchased in June 1976 and I still have the frameset and a couple of original parts on it after a complete restoration using period incorrect Campagnolo Super Record components circa 1984. It was originally all Campy Nuovo Record. This is probably the bike that I rode the most — more than 40K miles. Museum piece in my house.
1980 Medici Pro Strada: Truly the one bike that I wish I never sold. It was essentially a Masi Gran Criterium as it was built by former Masi USA employees. I put a mix of Shimano and Sun Tour parts on it. It did have a Campy seat clamp bolt on it. This was my first racing-only bike. I sold the complete bike but I don’t remember how I advertised it or who bought it.
1982(?) Benotto (model???) track bike: My first track bike was made-in-Mexico and had straight gauge, steel tubing. I got it so that I could train at the newly constructed, 7-Eleven Olympic Veldrome (built for the 1984 Summer Olympics). The fork had quick-release chrome plating and by the time I sold the frameset the fork had almost no chrome plating left on it. Overall, it was a nice track bike and served me well. Sold the frame and fork around 2006 at a swap meet and it’s probably a brakeless road fixie now.
1984(?) Basso (something-or-other): This was a straight gauge Columbus frame that I bought during my bike shop employee sabbatical. I built it using most of the parts off of the 1975 Bianchi and used it as a training bike (as the Bianchi had seen better days by then). Eventually I sold the bike after getting the frame powder-coated when the quick release Italian paint job gave up the ghost. Also put a mid-1980s Shimano 600 group on it and I have no recollection of who bought it.
1984 Cannondale SM-500 mountain bike: Got sucked into the mountain bike craze and this was another employee purchase. The bike was a dark metallic green and it interestingly had a 26″ front wheel (standard for that era) and a 24″(!) rear wheel. I could climb trails that would cause others to dab but it was scary descending on it. Sold it to an aerospace co-worker who, as I was told, rode it all the time all around the South Bay.
1985 Vitus 979: Built it with a combination of Sun Tour and Galli parts as a race rig. It was very light for the time and it was a noodle, but I weighed less than 130 lbs. back then so it was bearable for racing. This was also another employee purchase and I ended up selling the frame and fork to a friend.
1985 Olmo (I-can’t-remember): Built it with the same combination of parts as the Vitus used it as a training bike. It was a Columbus SL frame and many will argue that it was a better bike than the Vitus. I won’t argue that point. I also got this with a bike shop employee discount. It replaced the Basso. It also had a wild, 3-color, fade paint job. I think I sold the frame and fork through the Pennysaver.
1986 Shogun Kazé: TT funny bike that I eventually rebuilt using most of the parts off of the Vitus. This was my first TT-specific bike. Did a few sub 1hr 1 min TTs on it but I could never quite get under 1 hr. The partially assembled bike sat in our garage for over a decade. Finally sold it at our estate (moving) sale in 2018.
1987 Fisher Procaliber mountain bike: Bought this as lightly used frame. It had one of those under-the-chainstays rear brake setups. It descended much better than the Cannondale but it didn’t climb as well. Given my inability to descend fast, it probably was a bad change for me. Eventually I converted the bike into a city bike and I towed my kids in a trailer behind this bike for untold miles. Finally sold it to a colleague’s daughter around 2007.
1988 Serotta Colorado: This was the best steel frame that I have ever owned. Built it with a combination of Shimano Dura Ace and Shimano Santé components. This replaced the Vitus. It was my first bike with index shifting and I used the Santé derailleurs because my local wrench said that they would work well with the plethora of Sun Tour freewheels that I had at the time. He was right. I eventually rebuilt the bike with 2005 Campy Record-8 components–my first bike with ergo shifting and had it repainted by CycleArt. Cracked the down tube in 1999 and sent it to Serotta for a repair evaluation. Never got it back from them as the repair cost was too high.
1990 Stowe Triad: I originally built the bike with most of the parts that I had on the Serotta Colorado. This bike replaced the Olmo as my training bike. I have a funny story about Robert Stowe but I’ll save it for another time. I rebuilt the Stowe with circa 2005 Campagnolo Chorus-10 components in 2013 and then disassembled it a year later to build a road bike for my wife. Rode it a few times after rebuilding it and the mystique of steel road bikes was lost on me after riding carbon frames for over a decade. Steel may be real but it doesn’t ride better than carbon. Sold it at the end of 2015 to a clubmate who wanted to build up a classic steel road bike.
1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti: This was the original Megatube Ti with the large, “aero” fabricated and welded down tube. It was my 40th birthday present from my wife. I built it with 1996 Campy Record-8 components. This bike became my “race” bike (I wasn’t racing much at the time) and my Serotta moved to the training bike role. It also had what felt like the world’s heaviest road fork. More history on this frame below.
2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al: I bought this frame when I cracked the down tube on the Serotta. I put most of the components from the Serotta on this frame and it became my race bike while the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti migrated to training bike status. This was when I started racing more seriously again as my kids were starting to get older. Sold the complete bike to a friend some time after I stopped riding it.
2001 Bianchi XL Ti: I got this frame in 2002 as a warranty replacement for the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti (which developed crack on the seat tube right at the weld for the front derailleur hanger). Originally put the parts on it from the Megatuble and it was my training bike for a few years. I put Record-10 on it in 2003. Sold the frame on eBay after I bought the Look KG481SL.
2002 Look KG381i: I got this on clearance in February 2003 and built it with 2003 Record-10. This and the subsequent Look KG481SL had the best stock geometry fit of any bike I’ve owned. It replaced the 2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al as my race bike. After a few years, the frame suffered from corrosion between the carbon tubes and aluminum lugs and I ended with another warranty replacement frameset.
2000 Quattro Assi Team 2000: I bought this in October 2004 as a cheap TT frame ( $500) to replace the Shogun. Built it piece by piece by looking for sales on Chorus-10 parts. This is the worst riding bike that I’ve ever owned, hands down. However, I did manage to set some PRs on it but did not crack the elusive 1-hour 40 Km TT. Sold the frame at a swap meet.
2005 Look KG481SL: I did a double swap on components when I built this bike in August 2005. The low mileage parts on the Look KG381i went on this bike and the higher mileage parts from the Bianchi XL Ti went on the other KG381i. The KG381i became my training bike. I really liked KG481SL. Sold the complete bike to someone through an online cycling forum in 2008.
2006 Bianchi Pista Concept track bike: Built this using most of the parts from my Benotto track bike in March 2006. Eventually replaced everything on it — not that there’s muck to replace on a track bike. Put over 7,000 miles on it. All of those miles were training and racing on an indoor, 250 meter, velodrome. Thought the frame was cracking in 2013. Turns out it wasn’t. Then it developed a real crack on the seat clamp. Re-built it with a variety of leftover track components and wheels and finally sold it via a WTB post on Facebook in 2015.
2005 Bianchi Milano 120 (120th Anniversary Edition) town bike: Decided that I wanted a town bike and liked the one that my wife had. Purchased this one on closeout as a year-old model in July 2006. It’s a fun bike that is easy to ride. Changed out the bars, saddle, and seatpost but otherwise, it’s pretty much stock. Always got compliments about the bike (not me). Pained me to sell this bike but it became redundant with my single-speed commuter after I retired. Sold it to a friend in September 2019.
2006 Look 565: I got this frame in 2007 as a warranty replacement for the KG381i (which developed corrosion issues at the tube to lug interface). I ended up with the wrong size but rode it about 2,500 miles in about six months as my training bike before I sold it to a friend in 2007. It rode pretty well but it really shined on descents.
2007 Serotta Attack: I got this as my 50th birthday present to myself in August 2007. Built it with 2006 Record-10. I raced on it at the end of 2007 and for all of 2008. I love how this bike rides. It’s the best bike I’ve ever owned and my first custom geometry frame. Towards the end of 2008 I started getting paranoid about racing on this bike. I have never worried about crashing a bike before and I didn’t like racing with that thought in the back of my head so I sold the KG481SL (which had rotated to training bike status). In August 2015, I was racing on this bike, as usual, in a Tuesday evening race and I crashed on it. After the crash and because the frame has over 26K miles, I decided to temporarily retire it. Rebuilt the bike in early 2020 without repainting it — think of the chips as patina — using the best Campagnolo Record-10 components that I had available. This one is a keeper.
2007 Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon: I got a deal on this TT frame from my LBS that I couldn’t refuse in November 2007. OK, I could have refused it but I was lusting after this frame from the first time that I saw it and I hated the Quattro Assi. I built it with almost all of the parts from the Quattro Assi. I only changed bars and wheels when I first built it. Who said you can’t buy a sub 1 hr, 40K TT? Currently the frame and fork are taking up space in my bicycle room. Make me an offer.
2009 Cervélo R3: In November 2008, I bought this frameset to be my race rig and bought a 2008 Campagnolo Record-10 group. I liked this bike well enough but its race speed handling didn’t inspire me — probably because it had a slightly funky front end geometry. Really didn’t do the weight weenie thing when I built it but it came in at 14.6 lbs with heavy Look delta pedals. Sold the frame and fork to a friend.
2007 Bianchi Roger single-speed cyclocross bike: Only used complete bike I’d ever bought at that point-in-time. Found it on craigslist in December 2009. It was my rain bike and single-speed training bike. Eventually replaced everything on it except the brakes and wheels and added fenders. (Not too many parts to change since it’s a single-speed.) My clubmates liked riding behind me when I rode it in the rain because it had full fenders. Unfortunately, it became redundant as a rain bike because I now ride and race on Zwift regularly; there is no need to train in the rain. Sold bike through Facebook Marketplace in October 2021.
2010 Lapierre Xelius FDJ: After buying this frame on sale in March 2010, I put the components from Cervélo on this frame. Raced on it for a year. It was an OK race bike but it didn’t stir my soul. Sold the frame and fork in 2011 to a friend who bought it for his nephew.
2010 Cannondale SuperSix Hi-Mod: This was pretty cheap in February 2011 as it was a leftover team bike for a local club. Found a NOS Campagnolo Record-10 group for this build. Liked it a lot and raced on it for two seasons. Ended up selling the frame and fork in 2013 to a friend who easily outsprints me while riding it.
2011 Stop Proletariat commuter bike: The frame was billed as a single-speed mountain bike. I bought it December 2011 because I wanted to build a single-speed commuter bike with disc brakes and belt drive. Total custom build with low maintenance and ease of riding in mind. I like the bike a lot though much of how I use it now overlaps with the Bianchi Milano. Sold the frameset through Facebook Marketplace in 2019 after purchasing the Raleigh Cadent i8 frameset.
2012 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod: Got another end of season deal on this frame and fork. Built it for the 2013 season with the Record-10 parts off of the SuperSix Hi-Mod and I liked it even more than that bike. Eventually put an SRM power meter on it so now I could see my pitiful wattage during races. Raced on it for three full seasons and turned it into my training bike after retiring the Serotta Attack. Sold it to my sprinter friend in 2018 after buying the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2012 Specialized Shiv: After the 2012 USAC Masters National Road Championships in Bend, OR, I got an itch to get a Shiv. Found this bike on ebay in September 2012 as a built but never ridden deal (wrong size). Moved the derailleurs and saddle from the Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon to the Shiv “module.” Raced it for almost 8 seasons and after making little progress with it in 2019, I decided to try a new bike. Sold the frameset in May 2022 to a friend who promptly went faster than I in a couple of time trials.
2013 Bianchi Super Pista track bike: Bought this track frameset when I thought my Bianchi Pista Concept had a crack in the frame. I didn’t build it until 2014 because I never had the time or inspiration to do so. I was thinking about selling it when I discovered a real crack in the Pista Concept. Interestingly, the geometry and build tolerances are so close to the old bike that I was able to swap parts without having to make any major adjustments. It rides about the same as the old bike. Didn’t ride any faster on it, but it was a good track bike. Replace by Fuji Track Elite. Sold it through a Facebook WTB post in June 2020.
2016 Fuji SL 1.1: My former race team sponsor, West River Cycles, arranged a deal for my club to get “team” bikes from Fuji for a great price and I received the frameset in Nov 2015. Since I wanted to retire the Serotta Attack, the timing for getting this frameset was perfect. Over the years, I was interested in Fuji’s top end road bikes but their geometry wasn’t right for me. Fortunately, the SL 1.1 fits me well. Built it with most of the parts off of the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod except for the crankset (mated to a Power2Max power meter) which came off of the Specialized Shiv. Early 2019 I upgraded(?) the groupset to SRAM eTap 11 to match the Bianchi Oltre XR4. In June 2022, I did a major overhaul of the bike and put the derailleurs from the Oltre XR4 on to it. The Fuji now my training bike.
2019 Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV: A number of “firsts” with this bike: my first aero road bike; my first bike purchase (November 2018) since retiring in 2017; my first foray into electronic shifting (SRAM eTap 11); my first non-Campagnolo road bike since jumping back on the Campagnolo bandwagon in 1997; and (finally) my first new-purchase bike build, specifically for training since buying the Stowe in 1990. Decided an aero road bike was my best bet for training since most of my training is on flat routes. Interestingly, it is just slightly heavier than the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod in its last training configuration because the Canondale had fairly heavy wheels. I hope this Bianchi is reasonably good for training on long climbs. Heck it worked well enough for Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk during the mountain stages of the 2018 Tour de France. I’m still allowed to dream–right? After about 24,000 miles of riding and enjoying this bike, I decided to retire it. Frameset with crankset and brakes is for sale.
2019 Cervélo P3: After a disappointing 8 seasons with the Specialized Shiv TT, I am trying a new TT bike. Not necessarily my first choice but may be my best choice because the frame, in conjunction with Felt Bayonet 3 aluminum aerobars, gives me tremendous latitude on bike setup — something that the Shiv didn’t provide. Purchased the frameset in May 2019 — just in time for the 2019 National Senior Games — and built it with the Campagnolo Record-10 drivetrain that was on the Shiv. I’m mostly faster on this bike than I was on the Shiv in the same races. Upgraded the drivetrain to SRAM eTap 11 and changed the bars to Zipp Vulka Aero Carbon in May 2020.
2017(?) Raleigh Cadent i8 town bike: Purchased this frameset in 2019. In theory it was a complete bike and then disassembled to sell as a frameset by the same shop where I purchased the Proletariat. Was able to move most of the parts from the Proletariat to the Cadent. Instead of being an internally geared 8-speed (i8), belt-drive bicycle as sold by Raleigh, it is now a singled-speed belt-drive bicycle.
2016 Fuji Track Elite track bike: Purchased complete bicycle used in February 2020 just before the pandemic started. Swapped the crankset, handlebars, and saddle (not much else to a track bike) between this bike and the Bianchi Super Pista. Kept the wheels that came with the bike and purchases a second seatpost for the time trial setup.
2021 Priority Apollo 11 gravel bike: I succumbed to the gravel craze but I am not going to do gravel races. Purchased this bike in September 2021. I wanted the ability to do some easy offroad riding while riding from home and a gravel bike seemed like the ticket. What attracted me to this particular bike is that it is a 1X11 setup but with an internally-geared rear hub and belt-drive. I am sold on belt-drive from my single-speed town bikes and and I thought that belt-drive was perfect for offroad riding — much less mess and maintenance. N+1-1 means that this bicycle replaced the Bianchi Roger.
2022 Factor Ostro VAM: After getting dropped twice on downhills during windy races during the 2022 race season, I decided I wanted a lightweight, aero bicycle for racing. Similar to the Bianchi Oltre XR4, this bicycle represents a number of firsts for me: hydraulic disc brakes, tubeless race wheels, complete internal routing of brake lines, one-piece carbon handlebar/stem, thru-axles, and shifters (SRAM axs eTap) that you set up through a phone app. I have been using mechanical disc brakes on bicycles since purchasing the Bianchi Roger in 2009 so I was familiar with using them and the need to align the calipers to the discs. However, hydraulic brakes are an order of magnitude more complex to imstall — especially with the internally routed hydraulic lines — though the caliper alignment is generally simpler. Overall, this was the most stressful bike build that I have ever done. N+1-1 was a bit more complicated for this purchase. The Factor OSTRO VAM replaces the Fuji SL 1.1 as my race bike. The Fuji replaces the Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV as my training bike, so the Bianchi becomes the N-1 bike.

Current inventory: 9 complete bicycles, 1 frameset (1 complete bicycle and 1 frameset for sale)

My Complete Bicycle History (Updated: 2021-10-24)

Posted: October 28, 2021 in Uncategorized

This update contains numerous corrections and updates the status of the Bianchi Roger. This update follows the previous update in quick succession because I sold the Roger much more quickly than I expected. Such is the current popularity of Bianchi and the demand for used bikes (I surmise).

1970 Magneet (unknown model): My first 10-speed bike. I got it because it had Campagnolo derailleurs on it. Never mind that they were Campagnolo Valentino derailleurs. It also had the ubiquitous (for that era) Weinmann center-pull brakes. I repainted the bike a metallic purple when the original paint sort of fell off. I actually “competed” in my first race on this bike. Not sure what I did with it after I stopped riding it.
1974 Lambert Pro: One of the finest British racing bikes ever built (not). Started out with plastic Simplex rear derailleur, ended up with a Shimano Crane. Eventually put it out of my misery by cracking the head tube. I weighed about 120 lbs soaking wet at the time. Someone wanted to buy it from me after a friend of my father welded(!) the head tube. I sold it to him.
1975 Bianchi Specialissima: Purchased in June 1976 and I still have the frameset and a couple of original parts on it after a complete restoration using period incorrect Campagnolo Super Record components circa 1984. It was originally all Campy Nuovo Record. This is probably the bike that I rode the most — more than 40K miles. Museum piece in my house.
1980 Medici Pro Strada: Truly the one bike that I wish I never sold. It was essentially a Masi Gran Criterium as it was built by former Masi USA employees. I put a mix of Shimano and Sun Tour parts on it. It did have a Campy seat clamp bolt on it. This was my first racing-only bike. I sold the complete bike but I don’t remember how I advertised it or who bought it.
1982(?) Benotto (model???) track bike: My first track bike was made-in-Mexico and had straight gauge, steel tubing. I got it so that I could train at the newly constructed, 7-Eleven Olympic Veldrome (built for the 1984 Summer Olympics). The fork had quick-release chrome plating and by the time I sold the frameset the fork had almost no chrome plating left on it. Overall, it was a nice track bike and served me well. Sold the frame and fork around 2006 at a swap meet and it’s probably a brakeless road fixie now.
1984(?) Basso (something-or-other): This was a straight gauge Columbus frame that I bought during my bike shop employee sabbatical. I built it using most of the parts off of the 1975 Bianchi and used it as a training bike (as the Bianchi had seen better days by then). Eventually the sold the bike after getting the frame powder-coated when the quick release Italian paint job gave up the ghost. Also put a mid-1980s Shimano 600 group on it and I have no recollection of who bought it.
1984 Cannondale SM-500 mountain bike: Got sucked into the mountain bike craze and this was another employee purchase. The bike was a dark metallic green and it interestingly had a 26″ front wheel (standard for that era) and a 24″(!) rear wheel. I could climb trails that would cause others to dab but it was scary descending on it. Sold it to an aerospace co-worker who, as I was told, rode it all the time all around the South Bay.
1985 Vitus 979: Built it with a combination of Sun Tour and Galli parts as a race rig. It was very light for the time and it was a noodle, but I weighed less than 130 lbs. back then so it was bearable for racing. This was also another employee purchase and I ended up selling the frame and fork to a friend.
1985 Olmo (I-can’t-remember): Built it with the same combination of parts as the Vitus used it as a training bike. It was a Columbus SL frame and many will argue that it was a better bike than the Vitus. I won’t argue that point. I also got this with a bike shop employee discount. It replaced the Basso. It also had a wild, 3-color, fade paint job. I think I sold the frame and fork through the Pennysaver.
1986 Shogun Kazé: TT funny bike that I eventually rebuilt using most of the parts off of the Vitus. This was my first TT-specific bike. Did a few sub 1hr 1 min TTs on it but I could never quite get under 1 hr. The partially assembled bike sat in our garage for over a decade. Finally sold it at our estate (moving) sale in 2018.
1987 Fisher Procaliber mountain bike: Bought this as lightly used frame. It had one of those under-the-chainstays rear brake setups. It descended much better than the Cannondale but it didn’t climb as well. Given my inability to descend fast, it probably was a bad change for me. Eventually I converted the bike into a city bike and I towed my kids in a trailer behind this bike for untold miles. Finally sold it to a colleague’s daughter around 2007.
1988 Serotta Colorado: This was the best steel frame that I have ever owned. Built it with a combination of Shimano Dura Ace and Shimano Santé components. This replaced the Vitus. It was my first bike with index shifting and I used the Santé derailleurs because my local wrench said that they would work well with the plethora of Sun Tour freewheels that I had at the time. He was right. I eventually rebuilt the bike with 2005 Campy Record-8 components–my first bike with ergo shifting and had it repainted by CycleArt. Cracked the down tube in 1999 and sent it to Serotta for a repair evaluation. Never got it back from them as the repair cost was too high.
1990 Stowe Triad: I originally built the bike with most of the parts that I had on the Serotta Colorado. This bike replaced the Olmo as my training bike. I have a funny story about Robert Stowe but I’ll save it for another time. I rebuilt the Stowe with circa 2005 Campagnolo Chorus-10 components in 2013 and then disassembled it a year later to build a road bike for my wife. Rode it a few times after rebuilding it and the mystique of steel road bikes was lost on me after riding carbon frames for over a decade. Steel may be real but it doesn’t ride better than carbon. Sold it at the end of 2015 to a clubmate who wanted to build up a classic steel road bike.
1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti: This was the original Megatube Ti with the large, “aero” fabricated and welded down tube. It was my 40th birthday present from my wife. I built it with 1996 Campy Record-8 components. This bike became my “race” bike (I wasn’t racing much at the time) and my Serotta moved to the training bike role. It also had what felt like the world’s heaviest road fork. More history on this frame below.
2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al: I bought this frame when I cracked the down tube on the Serotta. I put most of the components from the Serotta on this frame and it became my race bike while the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti migrated to training bike status. This was when I started racing more seriously again as my kids were starting to get older. Sold the complete bike to a friend some time after I stopped riding it.
2001 Bianchi XL Ti: I got this frame in 2002 as a warranty replacement for the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti (which developed crack on the seat tube right at the weld for the front derailleur hanger). Originally put the parts on it from the Megatuble and it was my training bike for a few years. I put Record-10 on it in 2003. Sold the frame on eBay after I bought the Look KG481SL.
2002 Look KG381i: I got this on clearance in February 2003 and built it with 2003 Record-10. This and the subsequent Look KG481SL had the best stock geometry fit of any bike I’ve owned. It replaced the 2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al as my race bike. After a few years, the frame suffered from corrosion between the carbon tubes and aluminum lugs and I ended with another warranty replacement frameset.
2000 Quattro Assi Team 2000: I bought this in October 2004 as a cheap TT frame ( $500) to replace the Shogun. Built it piece by piece by looking for sales on Chorus-10 parts. This is the worst riding bike that I’ve ever owned, hands down. However, I did manage to set some PRs on it but did not crack the elusive 1-hour 40 Km TT. Sold the frame at a swap meet.
2005 Look KG481SL: I did a double swap on components when I built this bike in August 2005. The low mileage parts on the Look KG381i went on this bike and the higher mileage parts from the Bianchi XL Ti went on the other KG381i. The KG381i became my training bike. I really liked KG481SL. Sold the complete bike to someone through an online cycling forum in 2008.
2006 Bianchi Pista Concept track bike: Built this using most of the parts from my Benotto track bike in March 2006. Eventually replaced everything on it — not that there’s muck to replace on a track bike. Put over 7,000 miles on it. All of those miles were training and racing on an indoor, 250 meter, velodrome. Thought the frame was cracking in 2013. Turns out it wasn’t. Then it developed a real crack on the seat clamp. Re-built it with a variety of leftover track components and wheels and finally sold it via a WTB post on Facebook in 2015.
2005 Bianchi Milano 120 (120th Anniversary Edition) town bike: Decided that I wanted a town bike and liked the one that my wife had. Purchased this one on closeout as a year-old model in July 2006. It’s a fun bike that is easy to ride. Changed out the bars, saddle, and seatpost but otherwise, it’s pretty much stock. Always get compliments about the bike (not me). Pained me to sell this bike but it became redundant with my single-speed commuter after I retired. Sold it to a friend in September 2019.
2006 Look 565: I got this frame in 2007 as a warranty replacement for the KG381i (which developed corrosion issues at the tube to lug interface). I ended up with the wrong size but rode it about 2,500 miles in about six months as my training bike before I sold it to a friend in 2007. It rode pretty well but it really shined on descents.
2007 Serotta Attack: I got this as my 50th birthday present to myself in August 2007. Built it with 2006 Record-10. I raced on it at the end of 2007 and for all of 2008. I love how this bike rides. It’s the best bike I’ve ever owned and my first custom geometry frame. Towards the end of 2008 I started getting paranoid about racing on this bike. I have never worried about crashing a bike before and I didn’t like racing with that thought in the back of my head so I sold the KG481SL (which had rotated to training bike status). In August 2015, I was racing on this bike, as usual, in a Tuesday evening race and I crashed on it. After the crash and because the frame has over 26K miles, I decided to temporarily retire it. Rebuilt the bike in early 2020 without repainting it — think of the chips a patina — using the best Campagnolo Record-10 components that I had available. This one is a keeper.
2007 Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon: I got a deal on this TT frame from my LBS that I couldn’t refuse in November 2007. OK, I could have refused it but I was lusting after this frame from the first time that I saw it and I hated the Quattro Assi. I built it with almost all of the parts from the Quattro Assi. I only changed bars and wheels when I first built it. Who said you can’t buy a sub 1 hr, 40K TT? Currently the frame and fork are taking up space in my garage. Make me an offer.
2009 Cervélo R3: In November 2008, I bought this frameset to be my race rig and bought a 2008 Campagnolo Record-10 group. I liked this bike well enough but its race speed handling didn’t inspire me — probably because it had a slightly funky front end geometry. Really didn’t do the weight weenie thing when I built it but it came in at 14.6 lbs with heavy Look delta pedals. Sold the frame and fork to a friend.
2007 Bianchi Roger single-speed cyclocross bike: Only used complete bike I’ve ever bought to this point. Found it on craigslist in December 2009. It was my rain bike and single-speed training bike. Eventually replaced everything on it except the brakes and wheels and added fenders. (Not too many parts to change since it’s a single-speed.) My clubmates liked riding behind me when I rode it in the rain because it had full fenders. Unfortunately, it became redundant as a rain bike because I now ride and race on Zwift regularly; there is no need to train in the rain. Sold bike through Facebook Marketplace in October 2021.
2010 Lapierre Xelius FDJ: After buying this frame on sale in March 2010, I put the components from Cervélo on this frame. Raced on it for a year. It was an OK race bike but it didn’t stir my soul. Sold the frame and fork in 2011 to a friend who bought it for his nephew.
2010 Cannondale SuperSix Hi-Mod: This was pretty cheap in February 2011 as it was a leftover team bike for a local club. Found a NOS Campagnolo Record-10 group for this build. Liked it a lot and raced on it for two seasons. Ended up selling the frame and fork in 2013 to a friend who easily outsprints me while riding it.
2011 Stop Proletariat commuter bike: The frame was billed as a single-speed mountain bike. I bought it December 2011 because I wanted to build a single-speed commuter bike with disc brakes and belt drive. Total custom build with low maintenance and ease of riding in mind. I like the bike a lot though much of how I use it now overlaps with the Bianchi Milano. Sold the frameset through Facebook Marketplace in 2019 after purchasing the Raleigh Cadent i8 frameset.
2012 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod: Got another end of season deal on this frame and fork. Built it for the 2013 season with the Record-10 parts off of the SuperSix Hi-Mod and I liked it even more than that bike. Eventually put an SRM power meter on it so now I could see my pitiful wattage during races. Raced on it for three full seasons and turned it into my training bike after retiring the Serotta Attack. Sold it to my sprinter friend in 2018 after buying the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2012 Specialized Shiv: After the 2012 USAC Masters National Road Championships in Bend, OR, I got an itch to get a Shiv. Found this bike on ebay in September 2012 as a built but never ridden deal (wrong size). Moved the derailleurs and saddle from the Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon to the Shiv “module.” Raced it for almost 8 seasons and after making little progress with it in 2019, I decided to try a new bike. Frameset is for sale.
2013 Bianchi Super Pista track bike: Bought this track frameset when I thought my Bianchi Pista Concept had a crack in the frame. I didn’t build it until 2014 because I never had the time or inspiration to do so. I was thinking about selling it when I discovered a real crack in the Pista Concept. Interestingly, the geometry and build tolerances are so close to the old bike that I was able to swap parts without having to make any major adjustments. It rides about the same as the old bike. We’ll see if I can go any faster on it. Replace by Fuji Track Elite. Sold it through a Facebook WTB post in June 2020.
2016 Fuji SL 1.1: My former race team sponsor, West River Cycles, arranged a deal for my club to get “team” bikes from Fuji for a great price. Since I wanted to retire the Serotta Attack, the timing for getting this frameset was perfect. Over the years, I was interested in Fuji’s top end road bikes but their geometry wasn’t right for me. Fortunately, the SL 1.1 fits me well. Built it with most of the parts off of the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod except for the crankset (mated to a Power2Max power meter) which came off of the Specialized Shiv. Early 2019 I upgraded(?) the groupset to SRAM eTAP to match the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2019 Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV: A number of “firsts” with this bike: my first aero road bike; my first bike purchase (November 2018) since retiring in 2017; my first foray into electronic shifting (SRAM eTAP); my first non-Campagnolo road bike since jumping back on the Campagnolo bandwagon in 1997; and (finally) my first new-purchase bike build, specifically for training since buying the Stowe in 1990. Decided an aero road bike was my best bet for training since most of my training is on flat routes. Interestingly, it is just slightly heavier than the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod in its last training configuration because the Canondale had fairly heavy wheels. I hope this Bianchi is reasonably good for training on long climbs. Heck it worked well enough for Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk during the mountain stages of the 2018 Tour de France. I’m still allowed to dream–right?
2019 Cervélo P3: After a disappointing 8 season with the Specialized Shiv TT, I am trying a new TT bike. Not necessarily my first choice but may be my best choice because the frame, in conjunction with Felt Bayonet 3 aluminum aerobars, gives me tremendous latitude on bike setup — something that the Shiv didn’t provide. Purchased the frameset in May 2019 — just in time for the 2019 National Senior Games — and built it with the Campagnolo Record-10 drivetrain that was on the Shiv. I’m mostly faster on this bike than I was on the Shiv in the same races. Upgraded the drivetrain in May 2020 to SRAM eTAP.
2017(?) Raleigh Cadent i8 town bike: Purchased this frameset in 2019. In theory it was a complete bike and then disassembled to sell as a frameset by the same shop where I purchased the Proletariat. Was able to move most of the parts from the Proletariat to the Cadent so instead of being an internally geared 8-speed (i8), belt-drive bicycle, it is a singled-speed belt-drive bicycle.
2016 Fuji Track Elite track bike: Purchased complete bicycle used in February 2020. Swapped the crankset, handlebars, and saddle (not much else to a track bike) between this bike and the Bianchi Super Pista. Kept the wheels that came with the bike.
2021 Priority Apollo 11 gravel bike: I succumbed to the gravel craze but I am not going to do gravel races. Purchased this bike in September 2021. I wanted the ability to do some easy offroad riding while riding from home and a gravel bike seemed like the ticket. What attracted me to this particular bike is that it is a 1X11 setup but with an internally-geared rear hub and belt-drive. I am sold on belt-drive from my town bikes and I thought that belt-drive was perfect for offroad riding — much less mess and maintenance. N+1-1 means that this bicycle replaced the Bianchi Roger.

Current inventory: 9 complete bicycles, 1 frameset (1 complete bicycle and 1 framesets for sale)

My Complete Bicycle History (Updated: 2021-10-01)

Posted: October 1, 2021 in Uncategorized

1970 Magneet (unknown model): My first 10-speed bike. I got it because it had Campagnolo derailleurs on it. Never mind that they were Campagnolo Valentino derailleurs. It also had the ubiquitous (for that era) Weinmann center-pull brakes. I repainted the bike a metallic purple when the original paint sort of fell off. I actually “competed” in my first race on this bike. Not sure what I did with it after I stopped riding it.
1974 Lambert Pro: One of the finest British racing bikes ever built (not). Started out with plastic Simplex rear derailleur, ended up with a Shimano Crane. Eventually put it out of my misery by cracking the head tube. I weighed about 120 lbs soaking wet at the time. Someone wanted to buy it from me after a friend of my father welded(!) the head tube. I sold it to him.
1975 Bianchi Specialissima: Purchased in June 1976 and I still have the frameset and a couple of original parts on it after a complete restoration using period incorrect Campagnolo Super Record components circa 1984. It was originally all Campy Nuovo Record. This is probably the bike that I rode the most — more than 40K miles. Museum piece in my house.
1980 Medici Pro Strada: Truly the one bike that I wish I never sold. It was essentially a Masi Gran Criterium as it was built by former Masi USA employees. I put a mix of Shimano and Sun Tour parts on it. It did have a Campy seat clamp bolt on it. This was my first racing-only bike. I sold the complete bike but I don’t remember how I advertised it or who bought it.
1982(?) Benotto (model???) track bike: My first track bike was made-in-Mexico and had straight gauge, steel tubing. I got it so that I could train at the newly constructed, 7-Eleven Olympic Veldrome (built for the 1984 Summer Olympics). The fork had quick-release chrome plating and by the time I sold the frameset the fork had almost no chrome plating left on it. Overall, it was a nice track bike and served me well. Sold the frame and fork around 2006 at a swap meet and it’s probably a brakeless road fixie now.
1984(?) Basso (something-or-other): This was a straight gauge Columbus frame that bought during my bike shop employee sabatical. I built it using most of the parts off of the 1975 Bianchi and used it as a training bike (as the Bianchi had seen better days by then). Eventually the sold the bike after getting the frame powder-coated when the quick release Italian paint job gave up the ghost.
1984 Cannondale SM-500 mountain bike: Got sucked into the mountain bike craze and this was another employee purchase. The bike was a dark metallic green and it interestingly had a 26″ front wheel (standard for that era) and a 24″(!) rear wheel. I could climb trails that would cause others to dab but it was scary descending on it. Sold it to an aerospace co-worker who, as I was told, rode it all the time all around the South Bay.
1985 Vitus 979: Built it with a combination of Sun Tour and Galli parts as a race rig. It was very light for the time and it was a noodle, but I weighed less than 130 lbs. back then so it was bearable for racing. This was also another employee purchase and I ended up selling the frame and fork to a friend.
1985 Olmo (I-can’t-remember): Built it with the same combination of parts as the Vitus used it as a training bike. It was a Columbus SL frame and many will argue that it was a better bike than the Vitus. I won’t argue that point. I also got this with a bike shop employee discount. It replaced the Basso. It also had a wild, 3-color, fade paint job. I think I sold the frame and fork through the Pennysaver.
1986 Shogun Kazé: TT funny bike that I eventually rebuilt using most of the parts off of the Vitus. This was my first TT-specific bike. Did a few sub 1hr 1 min TTs on it but I could never quite get under 1 hr. The partially assembled bike sat in our garage for over a decade. Finally sold it at our estate (moving) sale in 2018.
1987 Fisher Procaliber mountain bike: Bought this as lightly used frame. It had one of those under-the-chainstays rear brake setups. It descended much better than the Cannondale but it didn’t climb as well. Given my inability to descend fast, it probably was a bad change for me. Eventually I converted the bike into a city bike and I towed my kids in a trailer behind this bike for untold miles. Finally sold it to a colleague’s daughter around 2007.
1988 Serotta Colorado: This was the best steel frame that I have ever owned. Built it with a combination of Shimano Dura Ace and Shimano Santé components. It was my first bike with index shifting and I used the Santé derailleurs because my local wrench said that they would work well with the plethora of Sun Tour freewheels that I had at the time. He was right. I eventually rebuilt the bike with 2005 Campy Record-8 components–my first bike with ergo shifting. This replaced the Vitus. Cracked the down tube in 1999 and sent it to Serotta for a repair evaluation. Never got it back from them as the repair cost was too high.
1990 Stowe Triad: I originally built the bike with most of the parts that I had on the Serotta Colorado. This bike replaced the Olmo as my training bike. I have a funny story about Robert Stowe but I’ll save it for another time. I rebuilt the Stowe with circa 2005 Campagnolo Chorus-10 components in 2013 and then disassembled it a year later to build a road bike for my wife. Rode it a few times after rebuilding it and the mystique of steel road bikes was lost on me after riding carbon frames for over a decade. Steel may be real but it doesn’t ride better than carbon. Sold it at the end of 2015 to a clubmate who wanted to build up a classic steel road bike.
1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti: This was the original Megatube Ti with the large, “aero” fabricated and welded down tube. It was my 40th birthday present from my wife. I built it with 1996 Campy Record-8 components. This bike became my “race” bike (I wasn’t racing much at the time) and my Serotta moved to the training bike role. It also had what felt like the world’s heaviest road fork. More history on this frame below.
2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al: I bought this frame when I cracked the down tube on the Serotta. I put most of the components from the Serotta on this frame and it became my race bike while the 1997 Bianchi migrated to training bike status. This was when I started racing more seriously again as my kids were starting to get older. Sold the complete bike to a friend some time after I stopped riding it.
2001 Bianchi XL Ti: I got this frame in 2002 as a warranty replacement for the 1997 Bianchi Megatube Ti (which developed crack on the seat tube right at the weld for the front derailleur hanger). Originally put the parts on it from the Megatuble and it was my training bike for a few years. I put Record-10 on it in 2003. Sold the frame on eBay after I bought the Look KG481SL.
2002 Look KG381i: I got this on clearance in 2003 and built it with 2003 Record-10. This and the subsequent Look KG481SL had the best stock geometry fit of any bike I’ve owned. It replaced the 2000 Bianchi XL EV2 Al as my race bike. After a few years, the frame suffered from corrosion between the carbon tubes and aluminum lugs and I ended with another warranty replacement frameset.
2000 Quattro Assi Team 2000: I bought this in 2002 as a cheap TT frame (< $500) to replace the Shogun. Built it piece by piece by looking for sales on Chorus-10 parts. This is the worst riding bike that I’ve ever owned, hands down. However, I did manage to set some PRs on it but did not crack the elusive 1-hour 40 Km TT. Sold the frame at a swap meet.
2005 Look KG481SL: I did a double swap on components when I built this bike. The low mileage parts on the Look KG381i went on this bike and the higher mileage parts from the Bianchi XL Ti went on the other KG381i. The KG381i became my training bike. I really liked KG481SL. Sold the complete bike to someone through an online cycling forum in 2008.
2005 Bianchi Milano 120 (120th Anniversary Edition) town bike: Decided that I wanted a town bike and liked the one that my wife had. Purchased this one on closeout as a year-old model in 2006. It’s a fun bike that is easy to ride. Changed out the bars, saddle, and seatpost but otherwise, it’s pretty much stock. Always get compliments about the bike (not me). Pained me to sell this bike but it became redundant with my single-speed commuter after I retired. Sold it to a friend in 2019.
2006 Bianchi Pista Concept track bike: Built this using most of the parts from my Benotto track bike. Eventually replaced everything on it — not that there’s muck to replace on a track bike. Put over 7,000 miles on it. All of those miles were training and racing on an indoor, 250 meter, velodrome. Thought the frame was cracking in 2013. Turns out it wasn’t. Then it developed a real crack on the seat clamp. Re-built it with a variety of leftover track components and wheels and finally sold it via a WTB post on Facebook in 2015.
2006 Look 565: I got this frame in 2007 as a warranty replacement for the KG381i (which developed corrosion issues at the tube to lug interface). I ended up with the wrong size but rode it about 2,500 miles in about six months as my training bike before I sold it to a friend. It rode pretty well but it really shined on descents.
2007 Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon: I got a deal on this TT frame from my LBS that I couldn’t refuse. OK, I could have refused it but I was lusting after this frame from the first time that I saw it and I hated the Quattro Assi. I built it with almost all of the parts from the Quattro Assi. I only changed bars and wheels when I first built it. Who said you can’t buy a sub 1 hr, 40K TT? Currently the frame and fork are taking up space in my garage. Make me an offer.
2007 Serotta Attack: I got this as my 50th birthday present to myself. Built it with 2006 Record-10. I raced on it at the end of 2007 and for all of 2008. I love how this bike rides. It’s the best bike I’ve ever owned and my first custom geometry frame. Towards the end of 2008 I started getting paranoid about racing on this bike. I have never worried about crashing a bike before and I didn’t like racing with that thought in the back of my head so I sold the KG481SL (which had rotated to training bike status). In August 2015, I was racing on this bike, as usual, in a Tuesday evening race and I crashed on it. After the crash and because the frame has over 26K miles, I decided to temporarily retire it. Rebuilt the bike in early 2020 without repainting it — think of the chips a patina — using the best Campagnolo Record-10 components that I had available.
2009 Cervélo R3: At the end of 2008, I bought this frameset to be my race rig and bought a 2008 Campagnolo Record-10 group. I liked this bike well enough but its race speed handling didn’t inspire me–probably because it had a slightly funky front end geometry. Really didn’t do the weight weenie thing when I built it but it came in at 14.6 lbs with heavy Look delta pedals. Sold the frame and fork to a friend.
2007 Bianchi Roger single-speed cyclocross bike: Only used complete bike I’ve ever bought. Found it on craigslist in 2009. It is my rain bike and single-speed training bike. Eventually replaced everything on it except the brakes and wheels and added fenders. (Not too many parts to change since it’s a single-speed.) My clubmates like riding behind me when I ride it in the rain because it has full fenders. Unfortunately, it became redundant as a rain bike since I now ride and race on Zwift regularly, there is no need to train in the rain. Complete bike is for sale.
2010 Lapierre Xelius FDJ: Put the components from Cervélo on this frame. Raced on it for a year. It was an OK race bike but it didn’t stir my soul. Sold the frame and fork to a friend who bought it for his nephew.
2010 Cannondale SuperSix Hi-Mod: Got this pretty cheap in 2011 as it was a leftover team bike for a local club. Found a NOS Campagnolo Record-10 group for this build. Liked it a lot and raced on it for two seasons. Ended up selling the frame and fork to a friend who easily outsprints me while riding it.
2011 Stop Proletariat commuter bike: The frame was billed as a single-speed mountain bike. I bought it because I wanted to build a single-speed commuter bike with disc brakes and belt drive. Total custom build with low maintenance and ease of riding in mind. I like the bike a lot though much of how I use it now overlaps with the Bianchi Milano. Sold the frameset through Facebook Marketplace after purchasing the Raleigh Cadent i8 frameset.
2012 Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod: Got another end of season deal on this frame and fork. Built it for the 2013 season with the Record-10 parts off of the SuperSix Hi-Mod and I liked it even more than that bike. Eventually put an SRM power meter on it so now I could see my pitiful wattage during races. Raced on it for three full seasons and turned it into my training bike after retiring the Serotta Attack. Sold it to my sprinter friend in 2018 after buying the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2012 Specialized Shiv: After the 2012 USAC Masters National Road Championships in Bend, OR, I got an itch to get a Shiv. Found this bike on ebay as a built but never ridden deal (wrong size). Moved the derailleurs and saddle from the Bianchi D2 Crono Carbon to the Shiv “module.” Raced it for almost 8 seasons and after making little progress with it in 2019, I decided to try a new bike. Frameset is for sale.
2013 Bianchi Super Pista track bike: Bought this track frameset when I thought my Bianchi Pista Concept had a crack in the frame. I didn’t build it until 2014 because I never had the time or inspiration to do so. I was thinking about selling it when I discovered a real crack in the Pista Concept. Interestingly, the geometry and build tolerances are so close to the old bike that I was able to swap parts without having to make any major adjustments. It rides about the same as the old bike. We’ll see if I can go any faster on it. Replace by Fuji Track Elite. Sold it through a Facebook WTB post.
2016 Fuji SL 1.1: My former race team sponsor, West River Cycles, arranged a deal for my club to get “team” bikes from Fuji for a great price. Since I wanted to retire the Serotta Attack, the timing for getting this frameset was perfect. Over the years, I was interested in Fuji’s top end road bikes but their geometry wasn’t right for me. Fortunately, the SL 1.1 fits me well. Built it with most of the parts off of the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod except for the crankset (mated to a Power2Max power meter) which came off of the Specialized Shiv. Early 2019 I upgraded(?) the groupset to SRAM eTAP to match the Bianchi Oltre XR4.
2019 Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV: A number of “firsts” with this bike: my first aero road bike; my first bike purchase (November 2018) since retiring in 2017; my first foray into electronic shifting (SRAM eTAP); my first non-Campagnolo road bike since jumping back on the Campagnolo bandwagon in 1997; and (finally) my first new-purchase bike build, specifically for training since buying the Stowe in 1990. Decided an aero road bike was my best bet for training since most of my training is on flat routes. Interestingly, it is just slightly heavier than the Cannondale SuperSix EVO Hi-Mod in its last training configuration because the Canondale had fairly heavy wheels. I hope this Bianchi is reasonably good for training on long climbs. Heck it worked well enough for Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk during the mountain stages of the 2018 Tour de France. I’m still allowed to dream–right?
2019 Cervélo P3: After a disappointing 8 season with the Specialized Shiv TT, I am trying a new TT bike. Not necessarily my first choice but may be my best choice because the frame, in conjunction with Felt Bayonet 3 aluminum aerobars, gives me tremendous latitude on bike setup — something that the Shiv didn’t provide. So far, I’m mostly faster on this bike than I was on the Shiv in the same races.
2017(?) Raleigh Cadent i8 town bike: Purchased this frameset in 2019. In theory it was a complete bike and then disassembled to sell as a frameset by the same shop where I purchased the Proletariat. Was able to move most of the parts from the Proletariat to the Cadent so instead of being an internally geared 8-speed (i8), belt-drive bicycle, it is a singled-speed belt-drive bicycle.
2016 Fuji Track Elite track bike: Purchased complete bicycle used in February 2020. Swapped the crankset, handlebars, and saddle (not much else to a track bike) between this bike and the Bianchi Super Pista. Kept the wheels that came with the bike.
2021 Priority Apollo 11 gravel bike: I succumbed to the gravel craze but I am not going to do gravel races. I wanted the ability to do some easy offroad riding while riding from home and a gravel bike seemed like the ticket. What attracted me to this particular bike is that it is a 1X11 setup but with an internally-geared rear hub and belt-drive. I am sold on belt-drive from my town bikes and I thought that belt-drive was perfect for offroad riding — much less mess and maintenance. N+1-1 means that this is replacing the Bianchi Roger.

Current inventory: 9 complete bicycles, 2 framesets (1 complete bicycle and 2 framesets for sale)

9/11 Revisited: Looking Back 20 Years

Posted: September 11, 2021 in 9/11

20 years after 9/11, I am republishing what I wrote within days of the tragedy. I am going to start with the epilogue. About a week after the attack, I found out that a former classmate from Jericho High School perished in the collapse of One World Trade Center (the first tower that was struck). Leo Roberts worked for Cantor-Fitzgerald, a firm that lost 658 employees. I was not close friends with Leo but we talked over the years at school. Two other Jericho High School alumni, Gary Lutnick and Glen Winuk, worked for the same firm and died in the collapse. Gary was managing director and bond trader at the firm run by his brother, Howard, who was not at the office because he was dropping off his son for his son’s first day at kindergarten.

There is a story associated with finding Leo’s name at the 9/11 Memorial and taking this photo.
Cleave Law photo

After 20 years we remember those who perished, those who worked tirelessly for days and weeks sifting through the rubble, and those who lost their loved ones in what was the worst terrorist attack on the United States of America and that we will never see anything like this ever happen again, anywhere in the world.

Below is what I published to my cycling club’s newsletter (having the privilege of being the newsletter editor and publisher) in September 2001.

The World Trade Center twin towers dominate the Manhattan skyline on a beautiful summer day in June 2001.
May those who perished in this tragedy rest in peace.

As most of you know my wife, Nina, and I are native New Yorkers. The tragedies of this past week have hit us especially hard as The City (New York City) has always been a special place for both of us. There is no other American city that better defines one of our country’s greatest strengths ― diversity.

While growing up on Long Island, my family made frequent trips to The City, especially to visit the Chinatown district. My father spent most of his youth in Chinatown and our family enjoyed regular Sunday “brunches” of dim sum. Chinatown is located at the foot of the Manhattan Bridge, just north of the World Trade Center (WTC).

As a youth, I watched the Twin Towers rise to dominate the New York skyline. I marveled at the feat of their construction and was proud to know that (at that time) they were the tallest buildings in the world.

When completed in 1973, they became not only a fixture of the city skyline, but a key to the financial district, being adjacent to Wall Street. Though relatively recent in The City’s history, they were immediately integrated in its infrastructure and culture.

I always enjoyed taking the tour to the top of the south tower. The last time I was there was in 1989 when I went to New York with a cycling buddy to ride the Masters Cycling Nationals. We spent a day sightseeing in New York and the WTC was on our list.

This past June our family spent an all too short day in New York City. We took the subway from Queens into Manhattan. We rode the number 9 train to the last stop, South Ferry, in the shadow of the WTC, on our way to see the Statue of Liberty. I remember pointing out the towers to our sons and reciting some of their history.

Elsewhere on these pages is one of the photographs that I took from the ferry as we made our way to the Statue of Liberty. These images are how I will always remember the south end of Manhattan.

However, I will also never forget the images of the hijacked jetliners crashing into the towers and their subsequent demise as they crumbled from the intense fire that swept through them. I will also never forget the sickening feeling of knowing that thousands of people never made it out of those symbols of our great American city. I trembled at the thought of the people and families whose lives are now irrevocably shattered by the senseless acts of extremist terrorists.

I also wondered if any of our family or friends were a part of the tragedy. Fortunately, none of our family was involved and, so far, we know of no friends who have been impacted. Enough for now. Peace.

Grid-Less

Posted: April 22, 2021 in Being Green

In March 2018, we started living in this grand experiment that we call our Green Dream Home (www.lawville.org). When we built our Green Dream Home (GDH), we tried to consider all environmental aspects from cradle to its eventual grave. Naturally, the longest timeframe in the GDH’s lifecycle is the time when it is occupied.

Day-to-day, our largest environmental impacts are electricity and water consumption. While we currently do not have any water recycling systems in the house, we have pre-plumbed the house for potential gray-water recycling. On the electric side, the GDH is an all-electric house (no gas service) and during construction we installed 12 – SunPower, 345 watt panels for a total system rating of 4.14 kWh. We also installed a Tesla Powerwall 2 battery that stores 13.5 kWh of electricity. This was all we could afford to install at the time. However, we could afford to pay for the structure to mount additional panels and the wiring to support those panels and an additional battery.

The original array of 345 watt SunPower solar panels with additional standoffs in the roof for future panels.

The arrival of the Tesla Powerwall 2 battery during construction of our Green Dream Home.

The original system served us well for 2 years and there were a few random days when we would not draw any electricity from the grid. Our limiting factor seemed to be battery storage as the single Powerwall 2 would typically drain to our minimum preset level (30% capacity) sometime during the night and we would then draw electricity from the grid until early morning, when the solar panels would start producing enough electricity to power the house.

By early 2020, we saved enough money to complete our solar panel and battery system. We added 9 – SunPower, 360 watt panels and a second Powerwall 2 battery. Adding these components was relatively simple from a house systems perspective, but local building codes were an issue primarily because Long Beach didn’t really understand how to analyze our proposed system. Thankfully, the owner of Xero Solar, Ben Lochtenberg, had enough understanding of the issues to help guide the city engineers through a more realistic analysis rather than a worst-worst-case analysis.

The six panels on the right side of the array are the new panels.

Three additional panels in a separate area of the roof.

The new Tesla Powerwall 2 battery sits in front of the original battery.

Now we have 7.38 kWh DC of potential electricity production on our roof and 27 kWh of electricity storage in our garage. We installed the additional panels in July 2020 but we didn’t get the second battery until December 2020 because of our negotiations with the city engineers. This meant that we couldn’t start understanding the performance of the full system until January 2021.

I want to make the point that designing the capabilities of this system based on planned consumption, during the construction phase of our GDH was apparently extremely difficult to near impossible. Most solar photovoltaic/battery systems are retrofit to existing houses with an electricity consumption history. New houses getting these systems generally are not trying to have zero consumption of electricity from the grid. They are typically looking at net zero consumption, meaning they generate more electricity than they consume. That is a good goal but it is a different goal than we had — we wanted to minimize the amount of electricity that we consumed from the grid. More on that in a post to follow.

When we made decisions on things that consumed electricity in the all-electric GDH, we tried to buy highly efficient products. This meant Energy Star appliances when possible, LED lighting, smart switches, and other energy efficient products and systems. We also installed a Level 2 charging system for our Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV), the Chevrolet Bolt, and for our eventual Plug-In Hybrid automobile, the Kia Niro. We charge both of them almost exclusively at home. Even with trying to maximize the electrical efficiency of our GDH, because everything is electric, we use more electricity than the average household on a daily basis.

What have we seen so far in 2021?

Out of 108 days (through April 18, 2021):

40 days self-powered (no electricity from the grid);
49 days producing more electricity than we consumed;
Produced 3,516.7 kWh of electricity;
Consumed 4,036.6 kWh of electricity (including charging the batteries in our cars);
Average daily production of 32.5 kWh and average daily consumption of 37.4 kWh of electricity;
January had zero days where we were self-powered and zero days where we produced more electricity than we used;
April (through the 18th) had 16 days where we were self-powered and 17 days where we produced more electricity than we used.

What have we learned?

Our smart home systems are not that smart — I do a lot of manual management of electricity use, such as identifying the best time of day to charge the cars;
The second battery is key for being able to go through the night without drawing electricity from the grid;
The second battery buffers the system for peak demands during the day so that we don’t use electricity from the grid (ex. using the electric clothes dryer and oven at the same time);
The solar panels still produce significant amounts of electricity on overcast days;
The solar panels do not produce a lot of electricity on rainy days;
We will be 100% self-powered for most days until at least late September.

There are a lot of nuances on how this system works to achieve our electricity production goals and I am happy to answer questions about how our system works at the detail level. We will continue to analyze the data, but so far we are doing better than we expected in significantly reducing our reliance on the electric grid for a good portion of the calendar year.

Pandemic Cycling

Posted: April 15, 2021 in Bicycle Racing, Bicycling

(Dislaimer: I have no relationship to Zwift other than being a subscriber. I also subscribe to another service called Bkool but the reality is that Zwift is the elephant in the virtual cycling room.)

I originally posted this entry to my Facebook page and I decided that I also wanted this information in my blog.

I missed the 1 year anniversary by a few days, so now it’s been over a year since I last raced a bicycle outdoors at the Piru 40 Km TT promoted by Tren Morris. Most of you know that my greatest cycling passion is racing but I also advocate for cycling as a lifestyle. I’m focusing on what I’ve been doing to satisfy my passion for bicycle racing and staying somewhat race fit during the global pandemic.

Please note that I will remove any responses discussing the politics surrounding the pandemic. Nina and I made decisions on how to act during this time and this post provides an example of how a bicycle racing addict stayed sane during this time.

If you told me after that Piru race on February 29, 2020, that I would have to ride more than half of my annual mileage on an indoor trainer for the next 12 months, I would have said, “No way!”

Who knew this would be my and Greg’s last race before the pandemic struck?

When I started racing bicycles in the 1970s, I lived on Long Island in New York. Winters were not arctic but they were not conducive to outdoor riding — especially with the kind of clothing readily availabe to cyclists at the time. For example, we did things like wearing wool socks over our cycling shoes in cold weather and that really didn’t help much. For indoor cycling, we rode these contraptions called rollers. Riding on them make you look like something out of a circus act but they worked and we even had roller races. (Look up roller races on the internet.)

However, six years of riding rollers regularly during the winter in the northeast took it’s toll on me, mentally. During the 1980s in Southern California, I had rollers and an early “turbo trainer” for rainy days and I got to the point where I couldn’t bear to ride these torture devices more than 30 minutes and 30 minutes was a stretch.

Let’s fast forward 35 or so years. I have a stationary trainer for the express purpose of warming up at bicycle races where it is either impractical or impossible to warm up adequately on the road. We were supposed to have a wet El Nino winter so on the advice of a trusted friend, I bought a “smart” trainer and I tried an early version of a product called Zwift. Some people were saying Zwift was going to be the next thing in cycling. I thought it was interesting but not compelling enough for me to subscribe to the service. Also it hardly rained that winter.

Fast forward to March 2020 when the pandemic lockdown starts and USA Cycling revokes all race permits until further notice. What to do? Well, I have this extremely lightly used smart trainer, my Zwift trial account still exists, and many cyclists are raving about Zwift. I jumped in and the water was fine.

Riding Zwift or one of the other dozen or more similar products brings another of world technical goodies to cycling. Being a technology geek, I took it as a challenge, but I wish it wasn’t such a challenge. Regardless, I got everything to work and the next thing I know I’m training virtually, riding with friends virtually, making new friends virtually, and racing virtually.

That’s Bkool on the screen with my original smart trainer running on an old Microsoft Surface Pro 2.

As of today, I’ve done over 65 races on Zwift. I’ve raced solo, with friends, and on teams. I’ve raced on virtual representations of real roads in Europe and fictional roads that are virtually terraformed on real South Pacific Islands. I’ve logged over 7,500 miles on my trainers and about 1,800 miles on the road in the past 12 months. (Note the plural trainers as I bought a top-of-the-line trainer after a few months of using my years-old, entry-level trainer.)

During this time I’ve seen friends who stopped cycling for various reasons, get back on the bike during the pandemic and start getting race fit again. I’ve also had friends who were hesitant to try racing in real life because of the dangers, start racing on Zwift because it’s almost impossible to crash on an indoor trainer.

For me, virtual racing for a given distance is physiologically as hard or maybe harder than racing outdoors. Viscerally, it’s not close. The wind is the fan you need to keep from melting and cornering is watching your avatar zip through turns at unrealistic speeds in the middle of a pack of riders. On the important social front, instead of your small group of local racing friends, you now have some of those local friends (who decided to race on Zwift) and thousands of people from around the world who compete in these races. Also when do you want to race or do a group ride? It doesn’t matter the day or the time, there is a race or group ride available on Zwift 24/7.

Team Lightning Velo (Category C) during season 1 of the Zwift Racing League.

Oh, and my prior 30 minute psychological time limit? I’ve ridden over 100 Km on virtual roads several times and I will try 100 miles within the next month.

I anxiously await the return of outdoor racing and big group rides but a benefit of the pandemic is that I have an indoor alternative for training, racing, and making new friends.

#PandemicCycling #VirtualCycling

Obituary for Cleaveran O. Law, Sr.

Posted: July 10, 2020 in Family

Cleaveran (Cliff) Law, 91, passed away quietly in his sleep on the morning of Wednesday, July 8, 2020, in Murrieta, California. He passed after a long series of illnesses.

Cliff was born on February 8, 1929, in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, to Harry C. Law and See Chin Law. He attended PS 23 in Chinatown and graduated valedictorian from Metropolitan Vocational High School in 1946. He married Marilyn Heu of Honolulu, Hawaii, on February 24, 1957, in New York City, New York.

Cliff was a dairy farmer in Pine Plains, New York, when he married Marilyn. Shortly after the birth of his son Cleaveran (Cleave), he entered the restaurant business and his family moved to follow his entrepreneurial endeavors, first to Irvington, New York, where his son Randall (Randy) and daughter Doriann were born. Following another move to Syosset, New York, his son, Michael, was born.

From 1968 to 1998, his family resided in Jericho, New York where Cliff and Marilyn raised their children and were actively part of the community, as well as being part of the Long Island Chinese Center, an organization that still thrives today.

After many years in the restaurant industry, Cliff continued to follow his entrepreneurial instincts as a general contractor as construction was always a talent and passion of his. Finally, Cliff had the opportunity to work for Ecolab, a national supplier of commercial cleaning products. He used his mechanical troubleshooting skills to solve daily issues and was always a favorite among his customer base.

In 1998, several years after retiring, he and Marilyn moved to a retirement community in Murrieta, California, to get relief from the hard northeast winters and to be closer to much of the family that previously relocated to California. There they enjoyed traveling, making new friends, and convincing a few old friends to move to California. Cliff also took up golf and cycling and became a devoted member of the Lions Club where he held several offices and received the Lions’ highest honor, the Melvin Jones Fellowship Award.

Even though he moved to California, he remained a lifelong NY Giants fan and was able to attend a Giants game with his son Cleave and grandson Oliver – three generations of NY Giants fans. He always rooted for Big Blue whether the team was winning or losing.

Cliff and Marilyn are members of the Murrieta United Methodist Church in Murrieta.

He was preceded in death by his sister Ethel Ryan, and his brother Rowelin Law. He is survived by his wife Marilyn, children Cleave (Nina), Randy (Grace), Doriann, and Michael (Dawn), and grandchildren Nick, Elliot, Oliver, and Tyler.

Due to Covid-19, the family does not know when a memorial service will occur. We anticipate a memorial service in 2021.

Indoor Pandemic Fun

Posted: June 10, 2020 in Bicycle Racing, Covid-19, Green, Dream Home

This post is probably not about what you were thinking it was about. Until this year, I kind of hated indoor cycling. Maybe hate is too strong a word, but after years of training on rollers during my early years of racing in the Northeast U.S., I couldn’t muster the will power to ride even 30 minutes on a trainer.

If there was any personal good to come out of this pandemic, it is that modern cycling simulators, such as Zwift and Bkool, have allowed me to endure and dare I say, enjoy indoor training. These simulators have another feature that takes the roller races of the past and turns them into race simulators with everything from criteriums to track races to mountainous road races to time trials. Again, ‘fun’ is now part of my indoor training lexicon.

I never considered indoor training as a function of the bicycle room when we built our Green Dream Home. Fortunately, it works.

A screenshot of virtual me (orange and white jersey with pink socks) during the Category C race of the Eldo Crit Series.

Finally, Nina afforded me the leeway to upgrade the computer I was using to run the simulations. For the first time in about 20 years, I built a PC — a modern gaming PC. I did a bunch of research, ordered parts, watched PC building videos, built it, plugged in the power cord, and voilà, it worked! Yes, I was happy and yes, the simulations run much better on it.

Sad to See

Posted: May 14, 2020 in Family
Tags: Dementia

Went to with my Dad to his dialysis session yesterday. The dialysis center requires that someone has to be with him due to his dementia. Clearly, the end is near.

Physically, he is not recovering from his broken hip. The bone is healing but before he fell, he could stand and use a walker to get around. Now he can’t stand without assistance. Basically he is wheelchair bound.

When he was living at home, he had some understanding of where he lived. Now he is totally confused as to where he lives. Several times he told me that we had to leave to go home because we were late. I explained each time that he had to stay until dialysis was done and that he lived at a house that was a care facility. He really couldn’t process what I was telling him.

On the bright side, I spent a couple of hours showing him photos of our Green Dream Home and its construction. That connected with his past life as a General Contractor. He also recognized photos of our old house. Moments of light.