TRP Spyre review

Since seeing their release in magazines sometime last year I have been very interested in the dual caliper cable pull design. I rode all last winter on a set of Avid BB7's which are seen as the standard for road disc brakes at this point (though with hydraulic and new cable pull calipers coming out, that may change).

With this in mind, I picked up a set of TRP disc brake calipers and I've have had a chance to put around 400 miles on them and a couple of wet commutes to work.

The brakes themselves:

Overall, they appear to be a quality build. They are solid in design, look good and feel solid overall. The polished aluminum should hold up over time with just some easy cleaning, but I wonder how well the bearings on the pulley will hold up over the winter.

They are smaller and lighter than the BB7's with little to no caliper sticking out past the frame/fork ... with the BB7's there was always at least 1 cm of caliper sticking out from the frame/fork. Basically they are svelt and look good on the bike.

Installation:

This was both super easy and somewhat hard at the same time. With the Avids, you have the ability to move laterally with the set up to get the pads centered, but also the ability to tilt the caliper a little to make sure it's straight from the beginning.

With the TRP, they have a flat mounting surface that connects directly to the fork or extension on the chain stay. The caliper has plenty of room to move laterally to center the pads, but there is no ability to tilt the caliper. This may cause some problems with set up if your rear end is out of alignment. I had to mess with mine a little and it never set up perfectly to begin with as there was just a little brake rub initially.

With that said, after a ride or two, the pads wore down enough that the rotors are perfectly centered in the caliper and the wheel spins as smoothly as it would with rim brakes and there is no rotor rub even under hard acceleration or out of the saddle climbing.

Performance:

The first thing I noticed was a much better lever feel. The Avid's were always mushy feeling and under hard braking you could pull the levers (Tiagra 10 speed) all the way back to the bars. With the TRP's they feel like regular road brakes, levers. When set up with zero rotor rub they have minimal brake pull before engagement and at full braking are only about 1/2 - 3/4 of of the way to the bar. This is a huge improvement and that alone makes the change worth if for me.

The brakes work very well in the rain or dry. They have good power that is pretty equivalent to the BB7's in dry weather, however they feel a little weaker in the rain. Modulation is very good and one finger braking is all that's need in dry weather. Due to their slightly weaker performance in the rain, on very steep declines you may need two fingers for hard stopping (10% grades or steeper).

The main concern I have at this time with the brakes is pad wear. I've only had a couple of rain rides, but even with minimal braking needed (other than one long, steep, 1000 foot downhill with several hard stops) I have noticeable pad wear after each ride. Granted, with rim brakes I would have similar wear, but the disc pads are more expensive and look to need replacing after 600-1000 miles in the rain ... or one good, muddy Cyclocross race. I was able to get around 2000 miles on a set of BB7 pads (and still have a little pad left over).

Overall:

A quality product, the eliminates rotor rub, provides good but not great braking, looks good and is easy to set up.

One primary advantage to the TRP's over the BB7's if you are racing Cyclocross is that you can put a cable adjuster near the bars and adjust the brakes on the fly with even pad wear.

With the Avid brakes, you could put a barrel adjuster near the bars, but since only one pad moves, you have decreased braking as a race goes along because of the increased distance between one pad and the rotor.

Winter bike nearly ready ... and new shoes

 Since winter is coming, I figured it was time to get my bike ready for winter. There were a lot of things about the bike I wanted to change before winter set in: Wheels, brakes, bottom bracket, tires and add a power meter.

So, a few weeks ago, I took advantage of a few team deals and picked up some new stuff for the winter bike and started getting it ready for the winter.

In the end, it was perfect timing since it rained all week and having the changes made allowed me to ride to work on the winter bike with no worries.

Changes to the bike:

First and foremost are new wheels. I had these built up by Brent at Portland Bicycle Studio. They are comprised of H Plus Son Archetype rims, 32 DB Sapim spokes and White Industries Disc Brake hubs. The build is fairly light, spins up quickly and feel really solid. I also added 28c Continental Gatorskin tires ... which I'm not sure how I feel about yet. Once these are worn out I may switch to some Panaracer, Schwable or Specialized tires.

Next change was the brakes. I liked the Avid BB7 calipers that came with the bike originally, however their single piston design leads to the disc rubbing on the non moving caliper. It was a little annoying and lead to a little extra pad wear.

So, with new brakes out ... I decided to go with TRP Spyre brakes. They are dual caliper, cable actuated brakes. This pulls both pads away from the disc eliminating the disc rub. They are also about 2 cm narrower than the Avid's and a bit lighter.

Set up was super easy and adjustment is just turning the cable adjuster ... no more messing with dials such as on the Avid's. With an inline cable adjuster the brakes can be adjusted near the bars and on the fly unlike the Avid's.

Overall feel is good with much improved lever feel. The Avid's always felt really mushy, but the TRP's have a solid feel to them without reverting to different cables. With some Nokian cables I would imagine these would feel as solid or more solid than a normal road brake set up. Power is good, maybe just slightly lower than the Avid's, modulation is very good which is important in the rain.

I'm not sure how well the pads will hold up in the rain though. During my first, full rain ride I could tell there was some noticeable wear in the pads. They are fairly cheap to replace, however, I got around 2200 miles out of the Avid's and hopefully can get the same out of a set of TRP's. During the course of this season I should put on around 5,000 - 6,000 miles on them ... so 2 -3 pad changes during the winter. Time will tell, especially as things get a bit more grimy with road dirt from frosty mornings and other events.

My next addition is shoes. I've been riding for several years now in the winter and my feet freeze when it's 40 degrees and raining ... even with wool socks and thick bootie covers. So this year I decided I was going to try something different. I purchased a set of SIDI Hydro shoes. They have Gore-Tex lining to help keep the feet dry and much warmer. The fit is really good and it will be interesting to see if they help during the winter and during commutes when the rain "and" cold hits.

I have two more additions that need to be added to the bike ... a "Buddy Flap" for the rear fender, which is greatly appreciated by others during group rides.

The other addition will be a Stages Power Meter. I'm looking forward to this to keep track of my training and fitness during the winter. I'll better be able to track 20 minute and FTP power during the winter, which is something I haven't been able to do before.

Overall, I'm excited about the changes and the bike feels really good. Bring on Winter!!!

Wildcat Mountain Hillclimb

Last Sunday was my final race of the season ... The Wildcat Mountain hill climb. I had thought about racing this last year, but my schedule didn't work out, so I skipped it last year. I had talked to a couple teammates/friends about the climb and most said it had some steep parts, but also had some good mild climb parts, some downhill and basically a little bit of everything.

Well ... it was harder than expected!

The first climb was much longer than anticipated and averaged what appears to be in the 8% - 9% range over 1 - 1.5 miles. From there it flattened out, then had some downhill sections that were pretty tight and twisty. The rest of the race had a combination of steep climbs, descents and a few tight turns.

Normally this would have been a pretty fast and straightforward course ... however, it started to rain a few minutes after I started, getting heavier as the race went along. By the time I made it to the downhill sections they were soaked and slick, so I backed "WAY" off down the hills not wanting to risk crashing during the last race of the season ... I've already been down three times this season.

Overall ... it was a good race, but with better conditions and knowing I needed points for the TT cup I'm pretty sure I could have taken a minute or so off my time which was 44:09 over 11.5 miles and 2200+ feet of climbing.

I ended up taking 2nd place on the day and had the 8th fastest time on the day ... pretty much where I expected I would finish based on those that had registered for the race and times of people I know that raced it last season.

It's a great race and I'm looking forward to racing it again next season.

With all that said ... I'm glad the season is over. I'm tired, feel a bit out of shape considering I've done one long ride (4+ hours) in the past two months. Most of my training has been commuting to work and racing on the weekends (but the races didn't last longer than an hour for the most part).

I'm looking forward to taking it easy for a while, getting in some good commuting miles and long rides on the weekend.

OUCH - OBRA Uphill ITT Championships

Today was the OBRA uphill state championship ITT. It was supposed to take place at Government Camp like last year, but something happened with the permits and it was cancelled ... so they moved it to OUCH this season, which is a longer climb.

The difference between last year and this year was distance: 5.6 miles to 16.0 miles and elevation gain, 1900 feet to 3400 feet.

I went into this race with pretty good hopes of being on the podium again (I actually won the race last year), but had not ridden this hill in about 5 years. I remembered a bit from that climb, but not much.

Overall, the course starts out a little flat, then goes into some "Rollers", then goes into a fairly steady climb at around 2-3% for the first half of the course, then continues to get steeper with the final half in the 4-6% range. The steepest section topped out a little over 9%.

I chose to race this on my road bike, but purchased some mini Vision TT bars for this race and another taking place in two weeks. They really help from an aero perspective without adding much weight. In the end I spent about 60% of the race in the aero bars ... so for me they were well worth putting on the bike.

I got off to a good start, catching riders within 5 minutes of the start (we went off at 30 second intervals). As I climbed I continued to catch riders so I felt good about my ride. At around 31:30 a former teammate of mine in a different category (who is about 35 pounds lighter and has similar power output) caught me ... knowing his time last year, I felt I was on course for a good overall time.

As the road got steeper, I could tell my power dropped a little and I forgot to drink some of my energy drink early in the race, so I think I ran a little low on energy over the last 20 minutes.

In the end I finished the climb in 1:07:50, which would have placed me 2nd in this race last season ... but was only good enough for 5th this season. There were three guys in the 1:04 range and one in the 1:06 range. My average power for the race was 335 watts, which wasn't too bad, but had I pushed a little harder I think I could have added another 10 watts or so to that power, however, that wouldn't have made much difference in my placing but would have shaved 40 seconds or so off my time.

Not a bad day on the bike, but I'm a little disappointed that I didn't make the podium this season ... even though I'm far from a climber at 195-200 pounds.

I have one more race this season, two weeks from now, the Wildcat Mountain ITT ... which is a little shorter, has more flat sections, but more steeper climbing sections as well. Then it's back to base miles, commuting and trying to re-coup for next season.

This season kind of fell apart at the end. I had some good races with PR's early season ... then I lost the ability to do lots of FTP work or 2x20's like last year and it cost me a good 15-20 watts at FTP. That's something I need to recover for next season as well as get my weight down earlier in the season and keep it a little lower by the end.

The bright part is I built up enough points today to win the TT cup again this season in the 40-49 class, which was one of my big goals at the beginning of the season. I had a lot of competition early in the season by one guy, then he stopped racing and I started getting more competition from another guy later in the season ... but it's a series that lasts from late winter to early fall ... so you have to race for a long time and I was able to accomplish my goal this this year.

One more race ... then onto next year.

Today was the OBRA Time Trail Championships, a race I've been waiting for all season. I was really hoping to come into this race healthy, peaking and ready to roll ... sometimes, life gets in the way.

Two weeks ago I had a crash at a TT which I'm still recovering from. I still have a hard time taking deep breathes and my left hand still is far from recovered ... but the race was here, so it was time to get it on! I took some Alieve to help with the pain from breathing which helped, but didn't eliminate the pain totally.

I also don't feel like I'm in peak shape at this time, having missed a fair amount of training over the past two weeks and not getting in as much riding as I would have liked heading into the Championships. I didn't feel bad, but just not where I should be heading into a championship race.

On the bright side, when  warming up, I was at least able to get my heart race into the mid 150's which was better than two weeks ago. It's still low overall, but better than before, which means my body had recovered a little.

The course it's self was the same as years past, however the road had recently been chip sealed. Overall, it was in very good shape, but the chip sealing slowed the course down a lot compared to years past. It really appeared to have an effect on larger riders than smaller riders. I came to this conclusion by talking to riders and looking at finishing times ... lighter riders were much closer to last seasons times than larger riders. I'm guessing they rode over the chip seal while larger riders tended to sink into it a bit more.

We had a 6 - 7 mph wind from the north on the day, which meant a tail wind on the way out and a headwind on the way in, but in reality it seemed more like a tail/cross on the way out and a head/cross on the way in. It was a warm day however with temps in the mid 70's by start time (just before 11:00 am) and it warmed up a lot on course with the black, tar covered chip seal. A lot of people appeared to suffer from the heat today, especially considering the highs earlier this week were topping out under 70 degrees.

Once on course, I felt pretty good. I tried not to go out too hard and was able to get my heart rate into the low 160's. About 10 minutes into the race I was already starting to feel it and could slowly see my HR dropping over the next 10 minutes to the mid 150's. As I approached the turnaround and started to see riders again, it went back up a little ... so I'm guessing I wasn't pushing myself hard enough.

My HR continued to be in the mid 150's but the last quarter of the race, started to climb again as did my speeds, with the last 5 miles or so in the 160 range. Overall, I ended up with an average HR of 158 BPM, which is a good 5 BPM lower than what I would normally TT at, and 10 BPM lower than what I would run a 20k at.

Coming into the last stretch I caught a couple of racers in my category, so I knew I had an OK run even though I knew my time was slow.

At the end of the race, I thought I had finally beat the cramping curse that I've suffered from during this race, then about 20 seconds after crossing the line ... there it was. My left hamstring/glute cramped up and I had a hard time pedaling back to the start/finish area, but the more I pedaled the better it felt. It stayed cramped up for the next couple hours and is sore, but feels a lot better now that I'm 8 hours after the race.

In the end I ran a time of 55:57 which is about 1.5 minutes slower than last year and the first time in two years I've not run in the low 54 minute range. The end result was 3rd in category and 18th fastest 40k time on the day (most riders were 1-2 minutes slower than they expected).

With this one over, hopefully I can build a little fitness during the week as we head into the Uphill Championships next week. The course changed this season from Government Camp/Timberline to Larch Mountain ... which means a 1+ hour race instead of a 30 minute race like last year. The climb is 16.5 miles long and climbs about 4000 feet. I've climbed it once years ago and remember parts ... so it should be interesting.

More on that race next week.

Revenge of the Disc Wheel #2

This was my second attempt at the course, with better wind conditions and slightly cooler temperatures I was hoping to put in a good effort and better my time from the previous week.

Warm up went well enough, but I was still having difficulty getting my HR up with a max HR of 151 bpm during warm up on the trainer. My legs felt OK, a little tired, but OK ... however, my HR just seems to be struggling to get up. I'm reading this as a sign of my body being tired and needing a bread (which as it turns out will happen ... more later).

Once on course I went out a little slower due to the technical nature of the first 3 miles. I kept the bike under control and looking at my STRAVA comparison from last week, I was 30 seconds slower over the first 3 miles.

Making the turn, I was a little slower in the crosswind sections, but faster in the headwind section (around 30 seconds faster). With around 3 miles to go I was ahead of my previous weeks time by a little over 30 seconds ... but lost all of that over the final 3 miles, turning a time that was 2 seconds slower than last week.

My legs are dead at this point and just need a break.

So with that said ... this is how they will end up getting a break.

As I crossed the finish line, I was coasting down on the long straight. I junior racer had finished about 15 seconds in front of me and had slowed way down, as I came up on him he suddenly turned to the left, without looking, right in front of me. I was doing 22-23 mph at the time and grabbed a handful of brake to avoid hitting him.

I locked up the front wheel and endoed on the course. Witnesses said the bike flew 5-6 feet in the air, I however went straight for the ground, helmet hitting first, then shoulder, then back and I came to an instant stop.

I laid on the road in a very extreme amount of pain, which slowly subsided enough to get up and see my bars and saddle pointing decidedly downward. I gave a brief inspection of the bike and all looked "OK" but I wasn't sure if I had cracked any part of the carbon ... so a trip to the bike shop was in order.

It appears the bottom bolt of the stem may be pulling out and a picture was sent to Argon to get their point of view ... so the integrated fork "May" need to be replaced ... however, they didn't see any other damage that was structural, just a little cosmetic damage around the headtube.

As far as my body ... My shoulder and back have a lot of road rash and hurt a lot, but I can breathe OK now. I have a "Grill" bruise on my face from the Styrofoam as my head hit the ground (but the helmet did it's job) and my left thumb is in a large amount of pain and is swelling/bruising a lot. I'm wearing a brace on my left hand that's helping a lot and taking ibuprophen at this time for pain management which is helping.

I'm guessing a couple days off the bike and I should be OK ... but it's not something I want to repeat again.

I'll see where I'm at and hope to hear back from Argon before deciding to race next weekend ... I might take the weekend off since the ITT championships are two weeks away and I want to be healthy for that race ... even if I may lose a little fitness over the next couple days ... though the rest will probably help me get some strength back on the bike, if not make me a little heavier.

Overall ... a good race with a painful ending. I still love the course and organization of the race ... the promoter gave me a call today to check up on me, which was pretty cool.

Now to heal up and get back on the bike.

Revenge of the Disc Wheel #1

This weekend was the Revenge of the Disc Wheel, a new TT series this season (and hopefully for seasons to come). It's an 18.3 mile course in Brownsville, OR that is on many of the same roads at the State Championship Team Time Trial.

The day started out a little odd in the fact that when I was driving to the staging area there were a lot of cyclists on the road. Pulling into the staging area, there were more cyclists ... it turns out that Cycle Oregon was using a few of the roads in the area and the same staging area as a rest stop ... so we had 2000 other cyclists in the area at the same time. Thankfully they were not going the same direction on any of the roads and we only crossed paths twice.

The wind was the story of the day ... with a steady 12-15 mph wind from the north and gusts into the 20+ mph range. I didn't really think about it before heading down there, only bringing my 90mm front wheel ... which as it turns out was a bit of a mistake and one I won't make next week ... having options is always a good thing in the end.

The race started with a tail wind, which under most circumstances would be nice, but the first 3 miles were the most technical of the course with a tight "S" turn and multiple 90 degree turns. Many people had issues through here due to the higher speeds with the tail wind and overcooked corners. I about blew it through the "S" turn, but was able to pull it out somehow.

After the first 3 miles or so, we took a right hand turn into a heavy crosswind. The deep front wheel and rear disc helped with the "Sail" effect, but the bike was a handful to handle as I was getting pushed around a lot on the crosswind sections.

About a mile later we went into a long, direct headwind ... speeds dropped off dramatically. I tried to spin through this section as best as possible maintaining speeds in the 22 - 24 mph range. This was also where I caught my 1 minute man. About mid was through this section my HR dropped by about 5 bmp and stayed there until near the end of the race.

The last section of the course had a couple of little rollers, then a descent with a crosswind ... which was a lot of fun at 38 mph. The finishing stretch was again into a crosswind and a gust about knocked me over at 32 mph. It was a sudden gust that turned my bars way more than expected ... I about crapped my shorts at this point, but dropped down a gear, spun for a second or two while I regained my composure, then crossed the finish.

The wind was so strong all day, I only took one corner in my aero bars ... every other corner, even sweepers I would normally stay tucked in, I rode through in on my bull horns. When coming out of corners, it was so strong I couldn't get out of the saddle because it was blowing my front wheel around so much, so acceleration was slow.

Overall, I felt good about my performance but felt I could have gone faster on the day. My average HR was only 157 bpm, well below normal and even during warm-up I couldn't get it over 152 bpm. I think it had something to do with riding 1800 miles over the last 6 weeks, some of it racing out at PIR and other hard rides. My legs felt OK, but never full of energy ... so I was happy with my performance.

I was also really happy with my position on the bike which I've been working on for a while. I didn't move around on the saddle and kept my position through the whole race. This was also the first long TT where my hamstring/glute didn't cramp up at the end. I would like to get a little more hip angle, but I'm not sure if the aero trade off is worth it at this point ... maybe a few changes next season, but for now, I'm keeping it as is.

In the end I finished 2nd on the day in my class (40+ Masters) and had the 7th fastest time overall on the day. I was about 2 minutes slower (41:56 over 18.3 miles) than what I should be able to complete the course with calmer conditions (which I'm not sure we will see during the 3 race series).

I'm looking forward to this Saturday for another shot at the course ... hopefully with less wind and a better wheel selection.