bike report

After a few trial and error tests with different cassette and chain wheel sizes I think the cyclocross bike is set to race.. again. Changing a part, setting up or reconfiguring a bike on the cheap is never as easy or quick as it seems when I start the task. The Centurion is back to having 27" wheels, which make the braking a whole lot better. The cantilevers never worked very well with the 700c wheels on the bike. The original pro tour series came with 27" wheels and maybe its just not as easy to swap wheel sizes on bikes with cantilever brake setups as it is on bikes with caliper brake setups. Live and learn. I had to buy a new set of tires, the only cross style 27" tire I could find are made by kenda. The kenda tires are nowhere near a supple as the ritcheys that I was running on the 700s, but I think they'll do. The price for both kenda tires was less than the cost of one ritchey tire. Having good tires seems to be heavily stressed by most serious races, but most of those people also have bikes made this century. Here I'm trying to weigh the trade off between good tires / light weight and having gear options. If my race performance fails to improve over the next two races I'm probably going to return to single speed. All of these changes and modifications are at the expense of a substantial increase in weight.

the current cost of investment in my cyclocross bike.
tires $25
brake pads $12
brake levers $24
Chain $8
Frame $40
total $109