Friday, June 29, 2007

Makan Ride 2



Another thursday night, another makan ride along East Coast Park, through Coastal Road, to Changi Village.



4 guys, one gal. Here we are "protecting the leader." Yer gotta get through us before yer can get her phone number, yer horndawgs!"





CF Babe with her bike, CF Slut.





It is uncertain whether Arthur meant we are doing 2 loops or stopping twice for makan (food)  :-P





"Dude, can't you read the road markings? We are supposed to head in the other direction!"





Pee break.





Head to head, sprinting for the finish line at the top speed of...

...0 mph. Note our feet on the ground.





Nick and I trying to keep up with the CF Babe.





But she keeps pulling ahead!





Arthur in hot pursuit. He clocked a new personal best of 41.9 mph (67 km/h) tonight. Way to go dude!





Ben, "Dude, quit trying to take a picture of my fat ass!"





Nick, "I'll be darned if you take a pic of my fat ass!"





Time to eat!





Eve, "Yo, stop drinking my 100 Plus!"





The 3 guys and the CF Babe shared 40 sticks of satay, while I had some insane wanton noodles that had more char siew (BBQ pork) than noodles. *oink!*





Raise the red lantern helmet.

Left to right: Nick, Arthur, CF Babe, me, and Zi Jian.

Total distance covered for the social ride: 26 miles (41.6 km).
CF Babe did extremely well, especially in hills. I'm so proud of her.

Choosing to ride home (to hopefully burn off some of that BBQ pork), I clocked 40.7 miles (65 km).


Bonus: video of CF Babe breaking away.



Sunday, June 24, 2007

Tampines Track




Group shot, left to right: me, Arthur, Nick, Noel, Kit, Viki, and Melissa.





Arthur got out of the jungle trail unscathed (Noel too).





'Can't say the same for me though; I stalled on an uphill, managed to unclip my left foot but toppled to the right.


       'Tis but a scratch...


I've got a golf ball-sized bruise on my right butt cheek too  :-D





Mel still smiling despite bouncing off Arthur on a downhill. What a trooper!





Viki's always cool.





Kit checks if her rear wheel is still there after the numerous root jumps.





"What are we waiting for? Let's go! Go! Go! Go!"





A lousy shot of some of the muddy sections in the jungle trail. Next time I will take better pics, promise.





Nick decided to play Braveheart today: here, he points to the spot where he crashed for the 2nd time on his single-speed Voodoo, shod in slicks.





Bravery comes at a price. His two XTR brake levers paid dearly as well.





Somehow Viki always makes it look so easy. While I was sweating up a storm, she stays cool as a cucumber. I suspect it has to do with her Oakley Iridium shades.

Or, maybe it is the #%*@!!! tools (Topeak Alien, kevlar emergency spoke, spare Shimano chain master pins, tire boot, tire patch kit, tire levers, spare brake pads, spare cleat bolt), tire pump, shock pump, camera, spare batteries, spare memory card, first aid kit, front light, rear light, back up head lamp, swiss army knife, compass, thermometer, emergency whistle, painkillers, energy bar, energy gel, pen, note pad, and 2 liters of water in my Camelbak, you thunk?





The rest of the gang. This part is actually really easy and fun. It's too short, IMHO, though. Cloe, my Merlin MTB, is built for long, wide, fast, sweeping fire roads — such as those in Marin (1), (2), (3), (4) — and she shone here.





Group shot: the helmeted lynch mob.





Here am I being stomped for refusing to own a cell phone submit to a digital leash. I was lying on a bed of Mimosa too. Ouch.





11 l-o-n-g kilometers in the heat and humidity later: Cycle Craft. The ride there from the Tampines track was warm and dusty. The only thing that kept me going was imagining CF Babe's complaints if she was riding with us.

BTW, Viki's bike next to mine is quite a sight.





Nick's empty bowl of supersized beef noodles.





Observe the power of Oakleys: Nick's fingers magically part to allow Arthur unobstructed vision in both eyes.





Mel's completely oblivious. LOL!





Daniel thinks we are all mad to roast under the sun when it's nice and cool in the shop.





Everyone got to wash their bike at the back of the shop.





Dinner at some xiao long bao restaurant along Joo Chiat. The food is good; prices reasonable; and if you happen to be seated near the front door, you may enjoy some free entertainment when the vice squad comes along to bust some of our highly-skilled female foreign talents  :-P





A non-cycling couple (whose names I can't recall).





Okay, I don't know what made me do this, but I think it's something in the tea.





Cute pic!





Taken by Nick. Empty — or rather, emptied — food containers seem to be his motif  :-P





If you have forgotten who Nick is, here's his sexy mug. Single-speed, rigid, and on slicks on Tampines track!

For more gorgeous photos of Nick (and other riders too), check out Arthur's excellent blog.

According to my cyclocomputer, one lap of the Tampines track appears to cover 3.7 miles (5.92 km). There are no sustained climbs; apart from a couple of steep hardpack mud climbs in the jungle trail section, the rest consist of loose, gravelly short affairs. Total distance for the day: 28.3 miles (45.28 km).

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Makan Ride



Well, sort of... We rode from Cycle Craft to Changi Village and back.



Clockwise: CF Babe; "Masher" Dominic; Nick; Viki, pretty in pink; someone whose name I don't remember (but is fast); and, last but not least, Arthur, who clocked over a metric century by the end of the night.

Not in the picture: Louis the Brave, who rode a single-speed 48 x 19, fixed-gear; and a certain someone in a Cartman jersey.





OK, these guys are hardcore... eaters.
Watch the satay and drinks...





...disappear.
*burp!*

I tried convincing Dominic to finish the leftover bawang — with his Coke, the raw onions would be super deadly — so that he could fog East Coast Park and Marina Crescent (i.e. Aedes aegypti mosquitos) with his butt on the ride back, but to no avail. Tsk! Tsk! Where's your sense of civic duty, dude?
:-D

In other news, the CF Babe rode the whole way clipped in.
Way to go, babe!

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Why is he selling his bike?




Product description:

'07 Trek Madone 5.9 SL Triple
Only ridden 1 mile.

Specifications:

Frame Size:  58 cm
Wheels: 700c Bontrager Race X Lite
Tires: Bontrager Race X Lite 700x23
Cassette:  Shimano Dura Ace 12-25
Cranks:  Shimano Dura Ace Triple 52/39/30
Brakes:  Shimano Dura Ace
Derailleurs:  Shimano Dura Ace
Shifters:  Shimano Dura Ace 10 speed STI
Stem:  Bontrager Race XXX Lite Carbon 110mm 12 or 0 degree rise
Seat Post:  Bontrager Race XXX Lite Carbon
Handle Bars:  Bontrager Race Lite 44cm
Seat:  Bontrager Race X Lite Pro


This a "as close to new as you can get"
2007 Trek Madone 5.9 SL Triple
This bike as only been ridden one time for around 1 mile. 

eBay ad (expires 23 June 2007)


"Only ridden 1 mile."
Gee, I wonder why  :-P

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Vesak Day Ride (well, sort of)




Mr. E.'s brother's station wagon is spacious. I swear, with the rear seats lowered, you can comfortably stack 12 bodies in there. Dominic, his bike, my bike, and our assorted gear, easily fit in the rear.





The story behind this picture: we were just about to enter the expressway (somewhere in Jurong), when Dominic started fretting about having left his helmet in the parking lot in Chua Chu Kang. So Eve zooms back there in double-time. While Dominic was frantically scouring the parking lot like some kind of cleaner auntie who had too much coffee, Eve discovers that the helmet was in the car all along — wedged in the rear passenger footwell. Here, we are trying to resist taking the elevator and tossing Dominic out one of the windows in the background — with his helmet, of course.





At ECP F2 Car Park.

Young man, there's no need to feel down.
I said, young man, pick yourself off the ground.
I said, young man, 'cause you're in a new town
There's no need to be unhappy.

Young man, there's a place you can go.
I said, young man, when you're short on your dough.
You can stay there, and I'm sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time.

It's fun to stay at the Y-M-C-A!
It's fun to stay at the Y-M-C-A!






Pinky and the Brain.





Caption for this picture:

"Buddha goes for a ride."

(Okay, okay... here's the pic without the highlights :-P )

It was awfully warm. Dom and I rode the Coastal Road to Changi Village while Eve ran 5 km.