Football Saturday

Badger Football Saturday

Today was the first Badger game of the year against UMass, who were 45 point underdogs. Final score Badgers 45 - UMass - 0. Guess the bookies (odds makers) were right!

We biked to the game, one-way is 9 miles. On our way, there was a section where a cross road had just had new composite material laid on it - that little black sparkly stuff. We both tried hard to swerve as far out of that stuff as possible. We thought we made it through it - but about 1 mile later, we heard a pffffst - pffffst sound coming from Todd's tire - we stopped and sure enough - he had a rear flat tire. We had a heck of a time getting his tire off of the rim.  It seemed to have been melded into the rim. I bet it took us 15 minutes to get his tire off of the rim. In my opinion, changing a bike tire is never easy and yet, if you have ever seen a tire being changed by someone in a bike shop - they make it look so EASY.

Tip of the day - there are a lot of different requirements to purchasing the correct tubes.

1. Tire size  - my commuter tire takes a 700 x 32 tube. The 700 mm represents the tire diameter and the 32 mm is the tire width. My road bike is 700 X 23 (skinnier tires!). 
2. Type of Valve - all of our bikes have presta valves, which are often used for tubes / tires that require higher pressure. 
3. But the thing no one ever talks about is the tube stem length. I know about the stem size because earlier this summer I had a flat tire and while the tube I had with me fit the tire, the tube stem would not push through the rim far enough to attach the bike pump. 

When switching Todd's tube today - he had a tube with a shorter stem - while it did fit through his rim - when I was pumping it up, I bent the presta valve and broke it off. At this point we had a decision to make - walk his bike to the bike shop about 3 blocks away or replace the tube again, using my tube. So we started over and used my tube, with the longer stem! Finally after 40 minutes we had switched the tube twice and were back on our bikes and headed to the Badger football game.

At this point, our plans to stop at Union South before the game for something to eat and a beer for me were shot. As it was, we didn't make it into the stadium for the kickoff. I have never stood in line this long to get into the stadium. I don't know if the person swiping tickets was incompetent or if the hand held scanner was not set up correctly. It took forever to get through the line for our gate.  

The game was as lopsided as the score - but it was a beautiful day for football. We did stop at Machinery Row Bicycle on the return trip and purchased two new tubes - with long stems!  

Enjoy the moments!