After around 2000 miles of use I've now had my first parts failure - or at least an early warning of impending failure when I started to hear some grumbling coming from the bottom bracket. With this starting to occur with just days before the Steeplechase sportive the timing was pretty bad. Given that the bottom bracket was a second-hand "no-name" item of unknown condition its failure isn't too surprising.
Looking around for a replacement there is no clear winner as for every BB there seems to be a roughly 3:1 ratio of good to bad reviews. [sigh] In the absence of guidance I've gone for a reputable brand name and sacrificed a little lightness in exchange for the extra set of sealed bearings of an FSA platinum pro (ISIS fit 68x108). The weight penalty for the quad-bearing setup is about 20g so not too onerous. Fitting it was no drama other than realising I needed a crank puller...
With a 1 mile test ride round the block to bed it in Mark and I set off on The Steeplechase in near ideal conditions. Times much improved over last year with Mark coming home in just under 5:40 (28 min improvement) with me a little further back at 5:53 (25 min improvement). This was sufficient to get us each the Silver standard with Mark only two minutes off the gold standard!
Earlier in the year we did the Flat-out in the Fens sportive with me coming in at 4:31 and Mark at 4:30, each 15 minutes better than last year and well within the Silver standard time of 5 hours. Maybe next year we'll be able to shave off the 10 minutes needed to hit the Gold.
