Granny's Grab Bag

For those of you out there in internet-land who personally know Oude Granny, you're all too familiar with my encyclopedic knowledge of useless facts. But for those of you who share the same passions as Granny, every once in a while that knowledge can actually "help a brother (or sista) out!"

So starting this weekend, I'd like to introduce a new Triple Crankset (TC) feature; The Grab Bag. In it we'll try to drop some of our knowledge on you, like products we use in our daily cycling lives, to new products we've tested. So without further fanfare, here's your first tidbit.

Scenario: Let's say you're that random person, who like most these days, has a busier than busy business schedule, but also plays as hard as you work, maybe does half a dozen triathlons in a season or needs to stay fit for the upcoming cycling racing season.

So what do you do in your down time? Well you're probably on your rollers, or on some fixed trainer, in your garage (on some cold floor where Granny's probably sat on before while I did some wrenching and lubing, you know who you are!) spinning or doing some intervals on the steed you use for your races. Do you at times feel that your road tires are heating up too much on the trainer or there is the distinct smell of burning rubber?

If you're the pragmatic sort, then you've already planned on putting on some new race tires for the outdoor season. But if you're also like Granny, who has to have good racing tires, you know that they cost some coin (or as another of Granny's minions refers to money, "pieces of meats and bones," as in you owe me "49 pieces of meat and 95 bones, $49.95 for those tires").

If you're the intellegent sort, then you only drop $24.99 and switch out your racing tires with Conti's (Continental Tires, yes they make car tires too) Ultra Sport Training Tire.

"With an indoor trainer and the UltraSport Hometrainer tire, cold and rainy weather will interfere with your indoor training sessions. Thanks to its special cold-running compound, the UltraSport Hometrainer tire doesn´t experience the heat buildup of your typical road tire, nor does it suffer the tread separation that the road tire is prone to under the special loads occurring when in cycling and braking on indoor trainer or rollers. This tire is not suitable for on road use. "

It's been said, (thanks Ma and Pop) to know Oude Granny is to love Oude Granny. But if you don't trust me how about these ladies down below. No this wasn't a clever German advertisement bit, these are some of the actual factory workers who produce some of the best racing tires on the market!