Colorado Springs, Day 4

i passed both the mechanic's and official's exam, threw down the buxx, am now licensed, and Ben now has a mechanic for his Big Time Ventures. yay!

day 4 brought little new content, with the exception of a presentation by the USA team soigneur, who talked about his job and how he interacts with the mechanic. It was, honestly, quite interesting. Soigneurs really have a tough role to fill and have to be massage therapists, nutritionists, and basic physical therapists. We stay up late washing bikes, they stay up late mixing bottles.

We also had a presentation about doping. As in, no. And never transport anything that's locked for an athlete. And so on. The rules are pretty strict, and one big problem now is security- that unattended bottles could have something slipped in them by some opponent who wants your team to test positive. Just like not letting people steal bikes, you should keep an eye on the nutrition.

After that they returned our exams and we all argued over what the solutions should be. Calvin from Park Tools led the discussion as some guys got seriously aggro over the answers to questions like these:
It's a pretty steep uphill 5K to the end of a road race and one of your riders is in a breakaway off the front. He radios back that he hit a pothole and bent his wheel. He already opened the calipers and it's still rubbing. Do you:
a) Prepare for a wheel change
b) prepare for a bike change
c) tell him to deal, he's almost at the finish line
d) lean out the window and cut his brake cable
OK, so I went with A, since I thought D will get you a fine for leaning out the window (true) and is illegal by the brake rule (untrue). Actually the rule says you have to start with two working brakes. So, the answer is D. Oh, and wheel changes on an uphill, not a good idea, since your rider's gonna struggle to get back to the pack.
I got an 87, which was about average for the group.

Top tips of the weekend:
- Don't let the air out of your tubulars when you're done for the day. Keep them inflated so that if you have a slow leak it will show itself.
- You don't need to open the brake calipers to do a wheel change on a road bike, so don't waste your time.
- Unless you're on the pro tour, always check your bike over hours before the race- usually before you leave home. When you get to the race, doublecheck your stem, bars, seatpost, and skewers for security.
- Gap your spare wheels.
- Never ride a tubular that hasn't cured 12 hours.
- Don't trust carbon after a crash. Tap it with a coin, it should "ping." If an area thumps, that's delamination.
- You really need all four bolts on the faceplate of your stem.
- Loctite is your friend, as is duct tape and a torque wrench.
- Helping other teams is nice, but this is a race, and you don't want to be the guy that gave the other team a wheelchange that allowed them to beat you.
- When jumping out of cars, always look back first.
- Do whatever it takes, but just get the rider to the finish line.

Anyway, that's the end of that adventure. I felt like for four days I was among superheros- and occasionally treated like one myself. It's hard being back in reality. I would strongly recommend the clinic to anyone interested in becoming a pro tour mechanic or just needing the license... outside of that, it's prolly a rather expensive venture but damn, was that interesting. A few pictures are on my flickr.