Caveman’s Race Rig for 2010 24 Hours of Rocky Hill

AUSTIN, TX- Caveman is notorious for being a rebel when it comes to bike setup. 1×9, rigid, singlespeed, funky handlebar, square taper bottom brackets. This year’s bike setup for Rocky Hill won’t be much different for Caveman than 2009. Proud Mary, a 2007 Kona Kula 2-9 frame, will be the anchor for this year’s race. Last year Caveman had setup the Dark Knight with a singlespeed drivetrain and intended to go the distance on that rig, but it barely made it a lap with drivetrain issues before Caveman hopped on the “backup” Proud Mary and rode it to victory. This year Proud Mary has undergone some upgrades to go on a diet and provide for a more posh ride, all the while increasing reliability.

The most notable upgrade is the swap of the Origin 8 Alloy Space Bar for an oversize Ragley Carnegie carbon bar. The shape is very similar with 25 degrees of back sweep and about 680mm width.The forward sweep negates the use of a longer stem. It is an oversize clamp, though, so the older Thomson Elite 25.4 was swapped out for a lighter Ritchey WCS 31.8 stem. The bar is not only safer to use for mountain biking, but weighs less and has a more rigid feel about it, all the while maintaining that silky dampening carbon is known for.

Also new this year is a Stan’s Notubes Crest 29er wheelset. The rims are laced 3x to American Classic hubs with DT supercomp spokes. Parts were sourced from sponsor shop Eastside Pedalpushers while the build was professionally done by Dennis Lozano, a buddy of Caveman’s from the days of racing with NRC. The wheels are not only lighter but the tubeless setup is more reliable and the high quality AMC hubs should be able to take more of a beating than last year’s ZTR hubs.

Last year’s Origin 8 Black Ops rigid carbon fork was ditched in lieu of a Rock Shox reba with 80mm of travel. Overall, the course is favorable for a rigid fork, but a few sections still leave Caveman with nightmares of how that rigid fork beat him to a pulp in the final hours of the race.

The old steel square taper bottom bracket was upgraded to an uber fancy American made Action Tec Titanium bottom bracket. It’s simplicity and elegance is only outdone by its functionality and its high performance.

The old light-but-unreliable titanium seatpost was replaced with a Kona deluxe BC 375mm seatpost. A tad heavier than the ti post, but Caveman won’t have any problems with the saddle rotating up on he hits a huge bump while seated. The gunmetal grey looks bitch’n too.

The last upgrade is a small one, and we’ll only get a glimpse of it later in the race when fatigue will dictate a gear change from the 18 tooth to the 20 tooth cog, but a brand new Niner Cogalicious single speed cog is ready to slap on the freewheel when the time comes and do its duty upon this fine workhorse.

Advertisement