This was the year that I was going to move up from the cycling equivalent of a K-Car, my Raleigh, and move into the big leagues with Carbon, etc for the Livestrong Challenge. Circumstances, however, once again come into play. Last week my Air Conditioning went out and I had a guy come take a look. After a few hundred in repairs to the box that had burned out connecting my AC unit to the building we found out that the compressor unit outside was shot. When I told him that it was the original unit from when my condos were constructed in 1985, he said that I definitely got my money’s worth out of it.

In the end we decided to replace the whole setup which included the air handler, compressor unit, and thermostat. The argument was that the units both were way over their life expectancy and now that one had gone the chances of the handler going were high given its length of service. Rather than pay for them to come install the new compressor unit and then replace the handler whenever it decides to go, it should all be knocked out at once. In theory Ill be saving on the costs of another service visit, installation, and labor doing it all at once.

Regardless, now the money I had marked in my head over the course of this year going into a newer, lighter, faster bike will instead be going into my home. At least this way Ill get the money back out when I move again. The only solution is to get a lot lighter and a lot faster on my Raleigh to make up for the difference. Ron told me about a friend of his that crushes everyone on the nightly rides and rode 15 years on an old Trek. It’s all about the training and this locks up buying a trainer. For a couple hundred I can train daily at home and get that speed that I would’ve gotten off a new bike (in theory).

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 26th, 2007 at 11:15 am and is filed under Cycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.