tri-ac :: triathlete

Early race wheel rental report…

Because I get excited about “stuff” and I wish I had a TT bike, I decided to stroke my own vanity a little for my first half ironman race and rent some race wheels. I’ve been a BOP racer historically, so the addition of these toys will help me but not change my performance milieu significantly.

I had heard good things about racedaywheels.com online so I decided to go for it.

First things first…it’s $140 + 1 way shipping (+/- $20) to return the wheels. You can go higher if you want a disc set-up or take the insurance (which I did). (The insurance protects against damage, not theft or loss.) So, $180 to have wheels for a few days before the race and race day.

I checked out the various wheelsets available. I decided on Zipp, to be honest, because they’ve got the most catchet (performance, design & brand recognition). Remember this is a vanity project. I decided on the 808 Clydesdales because (1) I learned that deeper is better, and this was the deepest I could get on the base price; (2) Marc at racedaywheels suggested to go Clyde (I’m threshold Clyde size right now: 195#); and (3) the course is not likely to have cross winds. The course I will ride them on is Lake Stevens 70.3 which is rolly, but not excessively so. These wheels are advertised to be the same weight as my Shimano R500’s that came with my bike so I’m expecting no difference in climbing. Racedaywheels advertises that they use current year wheelsets for their rentals. Note to self: call them up about last years wheel bargains. You pick the hub style (shimano vs campy); the wheelset; and whether you want insurance. That and your credit card info and mailing address. If you go to one of the NA Sports IM or 70.3 races, you can drop them off after the race. (I think Racedaywheels is related in some way to NAS because I got an email from Marc from an NAS domain.) The application form reserved my wheelset.

They arrived on Tuesday before the race via FedEx “Home Delivery” (who don’t deliver on Mondays apparently). They come with a little laminated instruction sheet. It doesn’t tell you how to mount them, but it has things like: how to return them; don’t put them on your bike on your roof rack; and to pump them up via the installed valve extenders. They had a fresh set of Continental GP 4000S ’s on them. I took them with my bike to my LBS to get a race tuneup and have the cassette changed. I’m no wrench, and I certainly didn’t want to screw up someone else’s equipment that costs thousands to replace. I picked up the bike Wednesday with the wheels all mounted up & the drivetrain gliding smoothly. My LBS showed me something interesting on the workstand. He spun the cranks and then let go…the cranks still moved under the force of the chain. He said the freewheel on relatively new Zipps can be tight. As they got used more, they would loosen up and respond as expected. He suggested I soft pedal instead of coasting, just to be safe (ie keep the chain on the cogs where it belonged). No rest for the weary in a triathlon, huh? He also said it wasn’t that easy to change the cassette; nothing different process-wise, but, apparently, kind of a tight fit. He was kind enough to give me an extra skewer since mine was now in the new wheels. That way I could install my rear wheel to stick the bike on the fork mount roof rack (the chain just rests on the freewheel hub that accepts the cassette). It never occurred to me that the deep dish wheels might not fit in the rear wheel strap of the roof rack.

Thursday morning I had a 1hr moderate training session on the schedule. So that was my planned shakedown ride: do some hills and some flats and see what these babies are like. I had trouble pumping up the tires. The front one seemed to get no resistance from the tube, and the rear popped off the valve extender under pressure. HMMMMMM! I went to the web and looked up the installation instructions. There I learned that it was advisable to pre-wrap tube valves with plumbers tape and pre-install a valve extender so that once they were set into the wheel they were ready to pump. It was also suggested to poke a wire down into the valve extender to depress the tube valve to make sure it wasn’t stuck or screwed tight. Do I now need to carry an extra valve extender (not included in the rental)? and a little piece of spoke just in case of a flat? Eeeeesh. I need to check that I can use my CO2 inflator, too, before race day!

I took an old spoke and pushed it carefully into the valve extenders. Both front and back responded with a “whoosh”, so that was good. I pushed the pump head onto the valve as securely as I could without damaging the extender. After a few tries, i got the rear tire to respond and got it up to spec inflation for me: 110psi. The front I never got. I got zero pressure. Oh well, it seemed by touch that there was enough pressure to ride on. So I did my ride.

As I expected, I noticed nothing on the climbs due to weight. The ride was a little softer than my wheels, but the front wheel’s lack of topped-up inflation probably was the reason for that. They didn’t seemed too delicate for the open road, and I relaxed a bit about riding them too hard. I even got a nice downhill in to test their aero-ness. God knows if I was any faster, but they sure looked good flying along at 36mph! Not my fastest downhill, but, hey, this is just a shakedown.

I emailed Marc at Racedaywheels to see what I should do about pumping up my tires. I also called my LBS. My LBS said it’s likely the gasket on the pump head that’s not getting a tight enough seal. They were able to pump them up for the tuneup. I haven’t heard from Marc yet, which is a little disconcerting.

I’m going to buy some extra C02 tonight and a replacement gasket and practice inflating with the wheels. I think I need to practice changing the tires too. Though in some ways, I’d like to just never have to change them, if at all possible, since they’re already mounted and everything. More later…

Part II here.