Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Aero Baby!

(Part one of a two part series)
That's right sports fans!
I'm all aero like!
Cutting through the wind with the greatest of ease!
Low coefficient of drag!
Wind tunnel tested!
Okay, not really.
About the wind tunnel I mean.
Still, I should pick up at least a couple of miles per hour with this puppy!
Gee, I wish I had this thing the other day when I really needed it.
What is it?
What is this newfangled slip streamed device designed to penetrate the stiffest breeze and save me some precious wattage?
Only Campagnolo's finest:



My long awaited aero seat post has arrived!
I say long awaited for believe it or not, I ordered this thing like last month and it took two weeks for the USPS to deliver it "priority mail."
Thank goodness it wasn't medical supplies or something even more important like anodized valve stem caps or something.
I gotta tell you, finding the right post took some time.
Not that anything was wrong with the old post, but I just liked the look of the aero one.
Well, actually my old post was sort of messed up cause I decided to attack it with my Dremel in an effort to clean it up.
In The Flat Tire tradition, I totally took off whatever finish was on it so it ended up looking like it had sat under water for like ten years.
The thing about these aero Campagnolo posts is that there are like three or more different variations thanks to those pesky Italians.
First you got Record, Super Record, Nuovo Record, C Record and whatever Record they got left.
Then you got a Chorus version.
To tell you the truth, I don't know what the difference is.
All I wanted was the one with the badge on the side:



To show off the Campagnolo goodness of course.
Still I wasn't too keen on spending like over a hunsky for one of these things so I waited and waited until I got one for like half price.
It had a couple of scratches but I wasn't too concerned with marks below the minimum insertion point for my seat is really low anyways.
The post is about the same length as the old post:



I had to log on to a Campagnolo forum to ask folks to measure their posts for me to make sure the aero portion would be above my insertion point.
I just about made it.
The thing is, you can't see the glorious Campagnolo badge because of the seat bag strap:



Still, the aero advantages of this seat post will allow me to bring out the maniacal speed demon within.
Maniacal.
I like that word.
I like the word aero too.
Put the words aero and Campagnolo and maniacal together and it's like a match made in Italian alloy heaven.
Sort of.

6 comments:

Steve A said...

Now you need a new seat bag to expose the logo. Get one that just uses the seat rails so you have an aero bag.

limom said...

I was just looking at one of them strapless bags the other day.
I don't know if it can hold all my crap.

TrevorW�� said...

Steve A is right ...you must have a seat rail only fitting bag.
The Scicon bags I featured in my post on the 25th January would fit the bill..........
The largest of these has a zipped extension system and I'm sure you would get everything in. It even has a small Italian flag on the back to set off the rest of your Campagnolo goodness!

-Trevor

limom said...

Yeah, I remember that post.
I even went so far as to search those bags out on the eVilness.
I know Topeak and I think Lezyne makes some with the rail brackets also.
Time for another look.

John Romeo Alpha said...

Now I have concerns about excessive speed--do they make drag chutes for bicycles, just in case?

limom said...

When you are maniacal there's no such thing as excessive.
Then again, maybe Trevor can send me some kind of speed guv'nor.