Oh, my. Every once in a while, the stars align and a bunch of games all show up at the same time. Rarely, however, do they all come from one company and all involve blocks. And the company isn't Columbia Games. It's GMT, who seems to have embraced the block idea about as much as it's possible to do.
So it is that I ended up getting five, count 'em, five games involving blocks within the past month from GMT. There were a few other games in there, one of which was *not* Richard III from Columbia, the only block game they've put out so far this year (their last game was Texas Glory).
Unfortunately, I have yet to play any of these games for the obvious reason - these are *block* games, which means that they tend to have a pretty strong hidden information element. Right now, I am doing little face-to-face wargaming, most of it is solitaire (which I am enjoying quite a bit, see previous posts), so only a couple of these games will be interesting without an opponent. I remain hopeful, however.
First up is PQ-17, a game about running convoys to Russia via the Barents Sea. Obviously, this is a game that requires a high degree of uncertainty about enemy forces and positions. I met the designer some years ago at WBC, and he was a great guy (as so many of the people at WBC are). In fact, I had been telling him about how I had been a playtester of sorts for Zero! but when the developer disappeared (literally) I wasn't sure if I'd still have that vanity counter. He actually came across a ballroom to show me my counter a few days later. What a guy.
My good friend KC told me that a common acquaintance, "Tex," had invited him over to play this very game, using the example of play as a starting point. I don't know that this was a great idea given how the example turns out, not to mention that this is a pretty involved game with a *ton* of chrome, and KC has stayed away from wargames because of the ultra-high rules and often situational complexity. He was, in a word, whelmed by the game, but expressed an interest to me to try another game to see what it was that those of us who like this sort of thing find attractive. Unfortunately, I suspect this game, like Elusive Victory and a host of other games, will never see real table time. Maybe when I retire.
Wait...
The game uses a wide variety of counters to represent units, from discs for aircraft (of varying sizes to distinguish broad types), 1" square counters to represent ships, and the blocks to represent the various task forces and convoys. I have to say that the game components are screaming to be played, and this sort of situation is one that I've always been interested in ever since reading 80's era Clancy novels. I may need to make the hour run out to Tex's sometime just to get a game of this in, now that I think about it.
Coming at the same time was 1805: Sea of Glory. The topic is the start of the Napoleonic Wars and the attempts by the British Navy to hunt down and destroy (or at least bottle up) the combined Spanish and French fleets. In other words, it's a game about blockade running. The Napoleonic Era has always lost me in terms of tactical or even operational games, although I do enjoy strategic games such as Wellington. The game appears to be easy enough that it might see some play at WBC West next spring if I play my cards right, or even earlier. However, it will take some doing to play it solitaire as the fog of war, as in PQ-17, is a very large part of the game. The map is gorgeous, although the blocks are significantly larger than the stickers you put on them, and in fact I'm a little concerned that they may be easy to knock over. That would be bad.
Which brings us to the games that came this week. First up is Hellenes, from the same guy who designed East Front and it's followups. I'm not sure how this game ended up at GMT while Athens & Sparta ended up at Columbia Games, but I'm sure someone will clear that up for me. All I've really had time to do is to put the stickers on the blocks for this one, although the components are very nice. However, and I'm really disappointed to see this, it appears that the designer/developer chose to stick with Columbia's brain-dead "not rules but maybe some optionals and oh yeah, a couple of really important rules or clarifications in the sidebar" format. It was a great idea, but the simple matter is that the separation between the two has been, urm, fuzzy and there are rules in the sidebar and non-rules in the rules in every game that uses them. Here's hoping that it got done right for once. On the plus side, the rules are in color, as is the very nice examples book. I'm sensing a trend here, and I *think* I like it. The problem is that the paper used for color rules tends to be glossy and relatively flimsy compared to, say, an OCS rulebook. Make them color in PDF, and heavier paper in the box, please.
The last two games are, technically, not actual games at all but expansions for the popular Command & Colors: Ancients game system. I stick by my assertion that for wargamers, this is the best of Richard Borg's C&C series for a variety of reasons involving component functionality and at least a passing attempt to model ancient warfare. The second and third expansions brought in very nice mounted mapboards, and the fourth (Imperial Rome) and fifth (Epic) expansions bring in very nice wooden card holders.
Really.
These are kind of odd expansions. Imperial Rome adds a *third* Roman army (this one purple), although I'm not sure what the differences are with the silver and red armies. I know there are rules for Caesarian armies (as opposed to the Marian armies used in battles from roughly 100BC through 50BC), and there are also extra units for both the barbarian armies from expansion two and the "Eastern" armies from expansion one. The scenarios are apparently a catch-all for scenarios that they couldn't fit in the box from before. Still, it feels a little like they weren't sure what to do with this particular expansion once they'd announced it. Whatever. It's still fun putting all those stickers on all those blocks, although you need to be paying attention while you do it.
The Epic box is an even stranger duck. It has two more wooden card holders (which seem very nice and appropriately hefty, especially compared to the crap plastic holders from earlier games), an improved Epic ruleset, and (most importantly) an actual deck of cards for playing the Epic games. That's awesome, because that's the thing that was really missing from before. You could use the old cards, but there were so many altered cards that it was nearly impossible to keep track of what was in your hand. I *love* the Epic scenarios, even with two people, because they're, well, epic. If you have the two mounted maps from the earlier expansions, this expansion puts this particular game series over the top in terms of high end components, no question. While there aren't any plastics as with every other game in this series, to be honest I find them harder to keep track of if you have more than a couple of types, and while the tiny illustrations can be confusing initially, it only takes a few turns to get a solid grasp on which units are which.
Now what they need are some really good dice.
However, I have to say that while I'm happy to have these expansions, they feel more like add-ons instead of continuations to the system, if that makes sense. It's like having a new bike route to ride instead of a new bike, if you see what I mean. These are all good things to add to the game system, but perhaps they should have been there from the start, making the game what it should have been all along component-wise. Even the extra scenarios for the Epics are nice, but a whole box just for them, two wooden blocks to hold cards, and an extra card deck? I'm being petty here, I know. I'm happy to have a game that looks so great, but I feel a bit like I paid to get the deluxe package when I already paid to have the nearly deluxe package.
Whatever.
Of all of these, C&C: Music Factory will have the biggest chance of seeing table time, followed a bit by Hellenes, then 1805, then PQ-17 (unless I decide to make the drive out to Tex's place). In fact, I don't mind playing C&C solitaire at all, seeing as you can simulate a bit more of the uncertainty of the cards by simply playing an extra card "on deck" to be what that army will do in the *next* turn after the current one. It's pretty easy - The first army to move picks two cards to play, then discards the remainder and draws back up at the end of their turn. One card is used for the first turn, the other used for the second. The other side draws it's cards normally (without having seen the draw for the "first" side), and plays two cards in the same way as the first side. After that, each side plays one card as normal, although it's always going to be the "on deck" card. It works pretty well, as you don't know *two* cards that your opponent has, and allows for less intel when you have to look at your opponent's deck for the rare "response" card.
And the epic battles? That's just a good way to spend an afternoon out in the sticks when no one can come over and play. And it looks *so* cool with that giant board and all of those units. SPQR had a very similar vibe for the larger battles, but I kept running out of markers and it could get very tedious. C&C plays much faster with less rules confusion, and still maintains a pretty decent simulation of ancient warfare given the ultra-low complexity (but still decent chrome).
I will report more on these as I get the chance to play them. Coming up, though, will be my first play of the long awaited A Victory Denied, Adam Starkweather's attempt to recapture the magic of A Victory Lost, which he developed for the American market from a Japanese game on the subject. Also, the next round in my epic Combat Commander: Stalingrad campaign with Matt R, and a little more work on D-Day at Omaha Beach's late game scenario, which feels a *whole* lot different from the early game. Hard to believe that game came in one box.
Also, I'm happy to report that my B-29 campaign is still on track. I took a mission off when we went to Sunriver for the casual gaming retreat, but got my latest mission in a week early. It went really well except for the part where the bombs are supposed to fall out of the bomb bay and hit things. They did not, they did not, and I got to push them out one at a time on the way home. At least the heavy flak over Tokyo missed me.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Thursday, October 08, 2009
Tuesday Gaming, 10/6/09
Mike's back on track hosting again (despite what surely appears to me to be some of the best fall golfing weather we've had in the Portland area in at least seven years, knock on wood), and this time it was Alex, JD, and myself who joined him for a couple of games.
First up was Zircus Flohcati, or Flea Circus. I have the original German edition with translation, while Mike has the clearly inferior RGG edition with a lot of rule changes. OK, one big one - if you complete the gala, you don't get an extra +10 points. This seems to me to be a pretty stupid rule, as it negates any reason you would have for ending the game other than to prevent others from improving their hands. Since you can almost certainly improve yours at the same time, why bother ending it?
Oh sure, I also *lost* the game because I ended it, by three points to Alex (53-56), which would have been 63-56 had that rule been in place. I think the other rules have to do with a couple of the draw cards special action cards, but I can't recall. The 10 point rule is pretty important, to my mind, and not just because I lost.
I should note that we were playing ZF because we were waiting for Dave to show up, but he never did, so we started a four player game of Battlestar Galactica. I've now played the game with four, five, and six, and I have to say that I prefer the game with five or six. Four was fine, but once one Cylon has been tagged then the suspense kind of drops off a bit.
The game started out with an extra basestar jumping in and kicking serious viper ass - by the time we managed to jump (and it took a *long* time) we were down to two vipers in the bay and the rest in the damaged box. Our first seven or eight (or more) Crisis cards didn't have jumps on them. We had quite a bit of damage done to the Galactica, including the Command Room (launch unmanned vipers, not that we had any free), the Weapons Room (Galactica shoots at stuff), and the FTL room.
Oh, and we figured out Mike was the Cylon before the first jump too. Good thing, as he had picked Admiral Adama, and so he never got to slow us down when we did manage to jump. He'd managed to get the heavy raider on the board set to offload centurions in his next turn when we managed the jump. However, it was expensive because so many civvie ships had been wiped out, and we were down to 5 population after the first jump. That's a Bad Thing, and the rest of us thought it was all over but the shouting.
That made me the Admiral (Helo), while Laura Roslin (JD) and Starbuck (Alex) got right to it. Because we'd used up all of the non-jump Crisis cards, we were able to do a lot of good things moving forward, getting Vipers back in shape, repairing Galactica, and getting some good jumps. In fact, we'd gotten more than halfway after the second jump. Unfortunately, the Sympathizer card put me in the brig for the rest of the game, as we couldn't seem to get enough of the right kind of cards to get me out. However, I was still drawing tons of cards and could use them to give other people actions, which I did.
We made two more jumps that put us at 8, only one jump away from a win for the humans. Unfortunately, Morale and Population were not doing well, and it was now that Mike managed to launch another attack of Cylons, as well as throw a Nuke Missile with his Super Crisis card. Fortunately for us, the Destiny Pile was good and we managed to *just* avoid the nuke (which would have killed us).
What didn't work out so well was that Mike then went after our last population (down to 1 at this point, as was Morale, with at least one more tick to go on the jump track before we could attempt anything) in the form of a Civvie ship or two. There was one unmanned viper guarding it from five raiders, and Mike started rolling terribly about this time. However, he had a few Piloting cards that allowed him to reroll, and after all the shouting was over he'd killed the ship and our last population point.
Or had he? It turned out after the fact that Cylons can't use the text on ability cards, so he couldn't have rerolled anything, although *we* could force rerolls. At this point, though, it was 10pm and we decided that it was close enough for government work. It was also possible that one of Mike's Crisis cards he'd played while on Caprica also got used for advancing the jump token, so we figured it was close enough. In any event, the game came right down to the wire, just the way we like it, so even with a botched rule we were happy.
I have to say that BStarG remains one of the premiere semi-coop games out there, certainly one of the best evocations of the theme of the original franchise it represents.
Next time, we plan to try the Pegasus expansion when we have a full load of experienced players who know all of the rules. Well, *almost* all of the rules... ;-)
First up was Zircus Flohcati, or Flea Circus. I have the original German edition with translation, while Mike has the clearly inferior RGG edition with a lot of rule changes. OK, one big one - if you complete the gala, you don't get an extra +10 points. This seems to me to be a pretty stupid rule, as it negates any reason you would have for ending the game other than to prevent others from improving their hands. Since you can almost certainly improve yours at the same time, why bother ending it?
Oh sure, I also *lost* the game because I ended it, by three points to Alex (53-56), which would have been 63-56 had that rule been in place. I think the other rules have to do with a couple of the draw cards special action cards, but I can't recall. The 10 point rule is pretty important, to my mind, and not just because I lost.
I should note that we were playing ZF because we were waiting for Dave to show up, but he never did, so we started a four player game of Battlestar Galactica. I've now played the game with four, five, and six, and I have to say that I prefer the game with five or six. Four was fine, but once one Cylon has been tagged then the suspense kind of drops off a bit.
The game started out with an extra basestar jumping in and kicking serious viper ass - by the time we managed to jump (and it took a *long* time) we were down to two vipers in the bay and the rest in the damaged box. Our first seven or eight (or more) Crisis cards didn't have jumps on them. We had quite a bit of damage done to the Galactica, including the Command Room (launch unmanned vipers, not that we had any free), the Weapons Room (Galactica shoots at stuff), and the FTL room.
Oh, and we figured out Mike was the Cylon before the first jump too. Good thing, as he had picked Admiral Adama, and so he never got to slow us down when we did manage to jump. He'd managed to get the heavy raider on the board set to offload centurions in his next turn when we managed the jump. However, it was expensive because so many civvie ships had been wiped out, and we were down to 5 population after the first jump. That's a Bad Thing, and the rest of us thought it was all over but the shouting.
That made me the Admiral (Helo), while Laura Roslin (JD) and Starbuck (Alex) got right to it. Because we'd used up all of the non-jump Crisis cards, we were able to do a lot of good things moving forward, getting Vipers back in shape, repairing Galactica, and getting some good jumps. In fact, we'd gotten more than halfway after the second jump. Unfortunately, the Sympathizer card put me in the brig for the rest of the game, as we couldn't seem to get enough of the right kind of cards to get me out. However, I was still drawing tons of cards and could use them to give other people actions, which I did.
We made two more jumps that put us at 8, only one jump away from a win for the humans. Unfortunately, Morale and Population were not doing well, and it was now that Mike managed to launch another attack of Cylons, as well as throw a Nuke Missile with his Super Crisis card. Fortunately for us, the Destiny Pile was good and we managed to *just* avoid the nuke (which would have killed us).
What didn't work out so well was that Mike then went after our last population (down to 1 at this point, as was Morale, with at least one more tick to go on the jump track before we could attempt anything) in the form of a Civvie ship or two. There was one unmanned viper guarding it from five raiders, and Mike started rolling terribly about this time. However, he had a few Piloting cards that allowed him to reroll, and after all the shouting was over he'd killed the ship and our last population point.
Or had he? It turned out after the fact that Cylons can't use the text on ability cards, so he couldn't have rerolled anything, although *we* could force rerolls. At this point, though, it was 10pm and we decided that it was close enough for government work. It was also possible that one of Mike's Crisis cards he'd played while on Caprica also got used for advancing the jump token, so we figured it was close enough. In any event, the game came right down to the wire, just the way we like it, so even with a botched rule we were happy.
I have to say that BStarG remains one of the premiere semi-coop games out there, certainly one of the best evocations of the theme of the original franchise it represents.
Next time, we plan to try the Pegasus expansion when we have a full load of experienced players who know all of the rules. Well, *almost* all of the rules... ;-)
Sunday, October 04, 2009
Good Gig
Had a pretty good gig at the Dublin last night. This was our second time out, and it's kind of amazing how different things are once you've played a gig for the first time with a band. We'd learned a bunch of new songs (or refreshed them) for this gig to improve our danceability quotient, and as such neglected some of our previous set list for a good month or more. It was of some concern that we were not retaining the structure or endings of a lot of songs, and in fact at this gig there were at least seven or eight songs where the structure didn't go as I expected. I suspect I had something to do with at least a few of them, but the truth is that in rock and roll, little goes as planned.
We had a good turnout - not as good as previously (we get the door, which more or less shows how many people are present during our portion of the evening), but still very good. Our first show there we had 90 people show up, this time we had 81. I think there were more people that we *didn't* know this time around, which is nice. It's very hard to get a following when a band is first starting out, but it's critical to getting future bookings as it's why bar owners hire bands in the first place. If people come and drink and eat and play pool, the bar owner makes money and is happy. Otherwise, they're likely losing money on you. Me, I'd do this for nothing.
A good friend of mine who has known me since I first started playing in bands when I was 14 came out to see us. Because I've either sung in choirs or worked in corporate event/wedding bands for most of the past 20 years, he hadn't really seen me play since we were both sophomores in college back in the day. When I sat down to chat with him during the break, he had a grin across his face that was truly impressive, and he said it was because it was so much fun to watch the *band* having so much fun, and especially seeing me enjoying myself so much.
And that's true. I'm not a religious man, but as far as I can tell I get the same sort of ecstatic experience from music (not just performance, also in rehearsal or even just singing in the car) that people get from prayer. Obviously, I can't say for sure, and in fact couldn't say for sure as I suspect everyone has a slightly different experience. Maybe it's just an endorphin rush, maybe it's a link to the divine in whatever form that may be. I don't know, and I don't really care. It's the experience, the joy I derive from making music, that's important. Rock and roll is obviously different from, say, singing the Beethoven setting of the Missa Solemnis, but they are a lot closer than you'd think. There are many sections of the Missa that I compared to rock music in their intensity, and definitely sections that you had to just ride the rollercoaster like you do when playing rock and hope your brain and muscle memory would pull you through.
What I find particularly interesting is the difference in body movement. In a choir, I'm expected to stay still, partly because your instrument (your voice) requires it, while in rock I'm tethered only by my instruments and my microphone, although as anyone who has seen me will say, I stretch those limits as much as I can. I'm a terrible dancer (ask my wife), but I have no qualms at all when I gyrate and jump around on stage. None of it is posing, it's all simply expressing the joy I feel in making music.
After the band was packed up and touching base before splitting up after the gig, the band following us came up looking for Doug. It took me a minute to realize they were looking for me. This was a reggae band, mind you, and I have neither experience with reggae as a musician nor as even a listener. Their keyboardist was unable to play, and they asked if I could sit in with them. Had my wife not already left with some friends to meet me at another location, I might well have done it, just to see how I liked reggae. That would have been a sight, me with my black glow-in-the-dark Sword of Elric of Melnibone teeshirt playing music about Ja, ganga, and world peace! I guess I had a spare tee in the car, but still...
Of course, that would have been another four hours of gigging after three, which I suspect would have killed me. I guess I could have just grabbed a stool and sat down, but I'm probably too old for that sort of thing. And while it was nice to be asked, it wasn't like there were a lot of other keyboardists with gear sitting around and I'm pretty sure they'd already called all of their friends by then. Next time, guys.
Our next gig at the Dublin is December 5th, 2009, again a Saturday. For those of you in the area who haven't seen "the show" I hope to see you there. It's a really good band.
We had a good turnout - not as good as previously (we get the door, which more or less shows how many people are present during our portion of the evening), but still very good. Our first show there we had 90 people show up, this time we had 81. I think there were more people that we *didn't* know this time around, which is nice. It's very hard to get a following when a band is first starting out, but it's critical to getting future bookings as it's why bar owners hire bands in the first place. If people come and drink and eat and play pool, the bar owner makes money and is happy. Otherwise, they're likely losing money on you. Me, I'd do this for nothing.
A good friend of mine who has known me since I first started playing in bands when I was 14 came out to see us. Because I've either sung in choirs or worked in corporate event/wedding bands for most of the past 20 years, he hadn't really seen me play since we were both sophomores in college back in the day. When I sat down to chat with him during the break, he had a grin across his face that was truly impressive, and he said it was because it was so much fun to watch the *band* having so much fun, and especially seeing me enjoying myself so much.
And that's true. I'm not a religious man, but as far as I can tell I get the same sort of ecstatic experience from music (not just performance, also in rehearsal or even just singing in the car) that people get from prayer. Obviously, I can't say for sure, and in fact couldn't say for sure as I suspect everyone has a slightly different experience. Maybe it's just an endorphin rush, maybe it's a link to the divine in whatever form that may be. I don't know, and I don't really care. It's the experience, the joy I derive from making music, that's important. Rock and roll is obviously different from, say, singing the Beethoven setting of the Missa Solemnis, but they are a lot closer than you'd think. There are many sections of the Missa that I compared to rock music in their intensity, and definitely sections that you had to just ride the rollercoaster like you do when playing rock and hope your brain and muscle memory would pull you through.
What I find particularly interesting is the difference in body movement. In a choir, I'm expected to stay still, partly because your instrument (your voice) requires it, while in rock I'm tethered only by my instruments and my microphone, although as anyone who has seen me will say, I stretch those limits as much as I can. I'm a terrible dancer (ask my wife), but I have no qualms at all when I gyrate and jump around on stage. None of it is posing, it's all simply expressing the joy I feel in making music.
After the band was packed up and touching base before splitting up after the gig, the band following us came up looking for Doug. It took me a minute to realize they were looking for me. This was a reggae band, mind you, and I have neither experience with reggae as a musician nor as even a listener. Their keyboardist was unable to play, and they asked if I could sit in with them. Had my wife not already left with some friends to meet me at another location, I might well have done it, just to see how I liked reggae. That would have been a sight, me with my black glow-in-the-dark Sword of Elric of Melnibone teeshirt playing music about Ja, ganga, and world peace! I guess I had a spare tee in the car, but still...
Of course, that would have been another four hours of gigging after three, which I suspect would have killed me. I guess I could have just grabbed a stool and sat down, but I'm probably too old for that sort of thing. And while it was nice to be asked, it wasn't like there were a lot of other keyboardists with gear sitting around and I'm pretty sure they'd already called all of their friends by then. Next time, guys.
Our next gig at the Dublin is December 5th, 2009, again a Saturday. For those of you in the area who haven't seen "the show" I hope to see you there. It's a really good band.
Friday, October 02, 2009
Rockin' The Dublin Pub
Just in case you have nothing to do Saturday night October 3rd and live in the Greater Portland, OR area, my band Raindriver will be playing from 7 to 10pm. I've already put up a photo from the last gig, which my lovely niece Sarah dubbed "badass". Cover is $5 at the door, of which I feel obligated I see $1 (and that's all I see, we play for the door, although we do get a couple of free beers).
We have about eight new songs we're introducing, including more slow stuff.
You can get more information on the band website here, and more info on the Dublin Pub as well as directions here. For some reason there is no info on bands on the Dublin site for more or less the entire month of October, but I"m *really* hoping that's an oversight.
Come on out and I'll mock you as you dance. A $50 value, yours for free with the cover charge!
We have about eight new songs we're introducing, including more slow stuff.
You can get more information on the band website here, and more info on the Dublin Pub as well as directions here. For some reason there is no info on bands on the Dublin site for more or less the entire month of October, but I"m *really* hoping that's an oversight.
Come on out and I'll mock you as you dance. A $50 value, yours for free with the cover charge!
Poppa's Got A Brand New Bike
OK, not really. It's the same bike I bought a couple of months ago. But it *feels* like a new bike.
Today, I took my Trek 7.5 FX down to the Beaverton Bike Gallery, where "Rambo" fitted it to me. As an engineer, it was a pretty interesting process to watch and be a part of.
The first part was aligning the cleats in my shoes front-to-back. Apparently I have nicely pronounced metatarsal protrusions. Who knew? Given my shoe size, that means that the third metatarsal is about 5mm back from that point. Of course, there was considerable adjustment after that point, but that came later.
Next it was time to get on the bike and ride. To nowhere. This was my first time on a "trainer", which is where you put a special spindle through the rear hub that allows you to mount onto a frame that lets you ride the bike as a stationary unit. I was happy to learn that I can leave this spindle in for the winter, and that the spindle on my trainer is actually better than the one on the bike.
This was also the first time I'd used the cleats in the SPD pedals I bought when I got the bike. I've been using the stock pedals (cleatless) since I got it, and it will take a little practice to get used to engaging and unengaging them. The tech set them pretty low, so it should be easy to get out fast if I need to. Definitely a different feel than I'm used to, but now I can use the pedal upstroke to generate energy as well as the downstroke.
He then set the seat height, which was astonishingly low. I'd had the height set when I bought the bike, but apparently it settled a bit or else was just way off. That will be a big change for me as well, but it felt more comfortable. Note that all of this fitting required measurements, including determining my flexibility on a yoga mat before I ever got on the bike.
After getting the seat height, it was time to check for the lateral setting on the cleats and the pedals. My left pedal was off enough that it required a 3mm washer as well as a pretty strong lateral adjustment to the cleat on that foot. The right leg actually bent *inward* rather than outward, but not as much, but it did require the rough equivalent of a washer under the cleat, and now I can't walk on hardwood floors with these shoes. Like I was going to.
Finally, we checked the stem and handlebar, and the stem was also pretty short. One of my few complaints about the bike was that I was with my hand position on the straight handlebars. You know how your hands flex outward when you're using a keyboard? The opposite of that. A longer stem helped there, although it's black and the old one was a powdered silver. The mutation of my bicycle has begun!
And then it was just a matter of making sure all the torque on the various nuts was correct, and off we went. I haven't gotten a chance to actually ride yet (that will be Sunday after my band's gig on Saturday - I've been told not to ride on gig days as they'd like to have me there alive), but I plan to get on the trainer on Sunday to watch football, and it will be interesting to see how much different the bike feels. I was pretty happy with it before, but with all of the changes (and the new SPD pedals, which will allow me to do one-legged pedaling on the trainer) I'm looking forward to getting back on.
Special thanks to Laurent and Nina, who both strongly urged me to get the bike fitted, and to Nina for her awesome comment last Sunday when I came out in my gear and she said, "Well, don't *you* look credible?" I am *so* using that at the gig on Saturday. That and, "I think I just lost a bet with my wife."
Today, I took my Trek 7.5 FX down to the Beaverton Bike Gallery, where "Rambo" fitted it to me. As an engineer, it was a pretty interesting process to watch and be a part of.
The first part was aligning the cleats in my shoes front-to-back. Apparently I have nicely pronounced metatarsal protrusions. Who knew? Given my shoe size, that means that the third metatarsal is about 5mm back from that point. Of course, there was considerable adjustment after that point, but that came later.
Next it was time to get on the bike and ride. To nowhere. This was my first time on a "trainer", which is where you put a special spindle through the rear hub that allows you to mount onto a frame that lets you ride the bike as a stationary unit. I was happy to learn that I can leave this spindle in for the winter, and that the spindle on my trainer is actually better than the one on the bike.
This was also the first time I'd used the cleats in the SPD pedals I bought when I got the bike. I've been using the stock pedals (cleatless) since I got it, and it will take a little practice to get used to engaging and unengaging them. The tech set them pretty low, so it should be easy to get out fast if I need to. Definitely a different feel than I'm used to, but now I can use the pedal upstroke to generate energy as well as the downstroke.
He then set the seat height, which was astonishingly low. I'd had the height set when I bought the bike, but apparently it settled a bit or else was just way off. That will be a big change for me as well, but it felt more comfortable. Note that all of this fitting required measurements, including determining my flexibility on a yoga mat before I ever got on the bike.
After getting the seat height, it was time to check for the lateral setting on the cleats and the pedals. My left pedal was off enough that it required a 3mm washer as well as a pretty strong lateral adjustment to the cleat on that foot. The right leg actually bent *inward* rather than outward, but not as much, but it did require the rough equivalent of a washer under the cleat, and now I can't walk on hardwood floors with these shoes. Like I was going to.
Finally, we checked the stem and handlebar, and the stem was also pretty short. One of my few complaints about the bike was that I was with my hand position on the straight handlebars. You know how your hands flex outward when you're using a keyboard? The opposite of that. A longer stem helped there, although it's black and the old one was a powdered silver. The mutation of my bicycle has begun!
And then it was just a matter of making sure all the torque on the various nuts was correct, and off we went. I haven't gotten a chance to actually ride yet (that will be Sunday after my band's gig on Saturday - I've been told not to ride on gig days as they'd like to have me there alive), but I plan to get on the trainer on Sunday to watch football, and it will be interesting to see how much different the bike feels. I was pretty happy with it before, but with all of the changes (and the new SPD pedals, which will allow me to do one-legged pedaling on the trainer) I'm looking forward to getting back on.
Special thanks to Laurent and Nina, who both strongly urged me to get the bike fitted, and to Nina for her awesome comment last Sunday when I came out in my gear and she said, "Well, don't *you* look credible?" I am *so* using that at the gig on Saturday. That and, "I think I just lost a bet with my wife."
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