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Thoughts - March 2 - No Beast, Yes Double Ironman, & Frankenbike

So, I have this conundrum about The Beast Series, and now I'm back to square one again.

Everything has to do with transportation to Virginia. I do not want to drive for 8 hours to an ultra, do the exhausting race, then drive the 8 or so hours back to Staten Island.

That leaves 2 options, commercial transportation and carpooling.

Commerical transportation is a stretch at best. The best option is Amtrak, and the earliest train arrives at 8:30PM before the race (pdf). The race venue is 25 miles away from the start, so that puts me in a bind. Renting a car is an option, but an expensive one. The bottom line is that commercial transportation turns out to be not very feasible when it comes to expense. So that is out.

That leaves carpooling. I honestly don't know of anyone in the NY/NJ area who is doing The Beast Series. I will send some feelers out to see if anyone else here is doing it, but it doesn't look good.

So that leaves me with my original plan. Forget about The Beast Series this year and focus on the two 100 mile races (Massanutten and Leadville) and do the Double Ironman in October.

If I don't get into the Western States 100 next year, and if anyone else is willing to do The Beast Series, I can tag along then.

Sounds like a plan!

---

Another month, another project.

This one is triathlon related.

My road bike failed me last August, and although I cobbled together a bike for indoor Computrainer usage from old parts, I'm afraid I do not have a road worthy bike for triathlons this year.

But I'm up to the challenge.

I want to see if I can get a used bike frame, and equip it with old and new parts to make a bike worthy of a champion.

I'm calling it the Frankenbike project!

A couple of goals I need to keep in mind...

1) The frame must be cheap to buy. This means a good, used frame at a reasonable price.

2) The parts to put on the frame are dependable, but cheap as well.

3) The bike must be robust, roadworthy, and safe. Nothing more to say here.

4) The bike must perform to my excellent standards. I *know* I can make a $2000 bike that performs better than a new $5000 bike that was pre-built from the bicycle shop. I just have to prove it.

My frame of preference right now is titanium. The metal is perhaps the best option for a bike frame due to its durability, weight, and flexibility.

There were a couple of frames on Ebay, but they weren't the right size (55-56cm).

I'll keep searching for that perfect bike frame every day. Until then, I'll try to get other options available in case this fails.

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