Friday, November 25, 2011

Cycling to work...

Desperate times calls for drastic measures...
I sent my car in to Mr Siew's workshop in USJ19.
Fearing the radiator would blow-up, I took every precaution.
When I got to his workshop, I told him to give me the diagnostics.
My only ride to work, is my trusty Dahon Jetstream EX.


SRAM Dual Drive II and water..
Lessons learned from previous outings: Never dunk your SRAM DDII internal hub gear.
While pushing the bike to my car, I noticed that the rear wheel wasn't free-rolling.
It resisted every move and this proved to be painful in the 23km ride from USJ19 to my office in Section 16, Petaling Jaya.


Break at USJ4
Futile resistance
I think the internal gears on the SRAM DDII had been jammed up.
This made climbing the undulating terrain from USJ19 to SS19 really tough.
I must admit that after taking a break from cycling for nearly two weeks and the lack of sleep had really slowed me down.
With the sun directly above my head, I took short breaks at every 5km intervals.


Taking a short rest underneath a flyover in Sungai Way
Pounding the legs
The 'tight' feeling on the rear wheel presisted throughout the ride.
After 10km of cycling, I can feel the strain on my thighs.
When I reached the old Trebor building at Jalan 222, Petaling Jaya, my thighs began to suffer cramps.
This was remedied with a dash of Deep Heat cream.
All through the ride, the pain persisted...


Sharing the road with bikes and cars
The final push
My cellphone was screaming and I knew that the office was trying to reach me. There's work to be done to close the pages for an early weekend print run.
What that would typically take about 1 hr 30 minutes had doubled.
The heat, the pain, the resistance. 
All three became a factor and since I wasn't really pushing for time, I was already planning to get the bike to the workshop.
One car down and one bike short.
If the mechanics can fix the bike in time, its bound for Raub in Pahang this weekend. 
Otherwise, it will be spending some time at the workshop while I cycle my Speed P8.



Made it!





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