GP4s

Last night, per usual on a Tuesday, I went to Wompatuck. However, as there is a real criterium with substantial prize money tonight in Salem, MA, the turnout was light. No matter, as at least 30 riders showed up. The Skipinator went up the road early, just like last week, and again we had a long chase, though not as fast this time. The pace was decent though, and several laps were done with the field pretty much single file, at least in the front half.

With the Stillwater 40K TT on the horizon Saturday, my goal was to just ride some good tempo and not do any big efforts. Thus, I stayed in the group, and at the back much of the time. I did a few turns in the rotation, and later on even did a few half-lap efforts at speed. Not sure what speed, as I'd swapped wheels before the race and the sensor was not picking up. Why the wheel swap? Well, up until this year, I always made it a point to train, and do training races, on "ordinary" wheels, as in 32 spoke Open 4's. I saved my "race wheels," a pair of Shimano 6500's with a low count of bladed, paired spokes, for real races. Now, for most folks these days, such a pair of wheels would represent their beater wheels, but I'm not most folks. As my current "race wheels" have only Ultegra-level hub internals, I've always tried to keep the mileage on them down. Way back in time, when our race wheels were tubulars and our training wheels were either heavier tubulars or some form of clincher, the wise among us bought expensive hubs for our training wheels, and maybe skimped on the race pair. The logic was that your training wheels would see far more miles, maybe even rainy ones, than the wheels used for racing would. I had plenty of Super Record race wheels too, but I was sort of a wheel whore back then. I hated repacking hubs and by working a few hours here and there at the local shop I could get bro-deal pricing on rims and stuff, so I preferred to just build more wheels and rotate them amongst my stable of bikes. But I knew lots of guys with Dura Ace/MA40s for training and 600 (aka Ultegra)/GEL280 setups for racing.

Back then, if you're pockets weren't deep enough for Campy Record Pave or Mavic SSC rims (I always found Campy rims to be rounder, and easier to build because of a better seam), the standard was the venerable Mavic GP4. This rugged ~400 gram tubular rim was cheap, strong, and still lighter than most clinchers of the day. Everyone had a pair. In fact, in the wheel pit at many crits, there would be so many Record/GP4 wheelsets shod with Vittoria CGs that it would be hard to tell them apart. I once took the wrong pair home after a race, and the other guy (who I still see in masters races) was a TOTAL DICK about it. The jackass was in the 1/2 race, and he had the same number that I wore in the 3's race, so why he was so bent escapes me to this day. But I digress...

Last night I rode on GP4s. These wheels have DuraAce hubs and they came on my cross bike when I bought it from one of the Team Saturn guys a few years back. I glued up some Tufo S33s and they have been sitting in the bike room, rarely used since then. Well, I dragged them out for Mt A and found they had a 12-23 10 speed cassette on them that I do not remember buying. Sweet. At Mt A I did not end up using them, but I had them out so I threw them on the bike before heading to Womp. They are pretty heavy by today's standards, but that is nothing compared to the spoiling I've got from riding aero wheels day in and day out. At speed, man, these wheels are more work. Not that I didn't already know this, but over this year I guess I'd gotten so used to the advantage that is was not an advantage anymore. I still did some hard efforts last night that had people struggling to hold my wheel, but I don't think they had to struggle quite as hard.

There is a lesson here, but I'm not sure what it is. Yeah, I've read elsewhere about how we should all ride deep dish carbon rims all the time in order to become accustomed to them in the crosswinds. Sure dude, it has nothing to do with being able to keep up with your buddies who train more. I still believe in going the other direction; train on heavy stuff so that your "good" stuff feels special in races. It's a mental boost. And it is all relative, as maybe your "heavy" stuff is lighter than my "good" stuff. I wonder how many people even know what GP4s are these days?

Last week I finally caved and bought medium dish carbon rimmed wheels... Still haven't ridden them yet. No more hilly races for me this year anyway. Thanks for reading.