Coin Toss Forum

Work Related Post -- I am looking for an RA

2012-02-27T07:47:00.000-08:00

If you happen to read my blog and entertain thoughts of some day enrolling in an economics PhD. program, then read on... Otherwise this will be pretty boring:

I am looking to hire a primary research assistant (Short-term consultant contract) for data and economic analysis, to work at the Economics Research Group of the World Bank based in Washington, DC. The expected length of commitment is 1 to 2 years and the start date is expected to be between May 1^st and May 15^th, 2012.

Job Description

This job includes a wide variety of research related tasks that are focused on producing high quality research for publication in top-tier economics journals. The RA will analyze and manage a range of datasets from field experiments, and also work on non-experimental analyses. The position offers an opportunity to independently explore unique primary datasets from development related projects around the world (currently: Brazil, Indonesia, India, South-Africa, and Uganda). The RA will also be asked to conduct and write up literature reviews, help draft reports, and prepare statistical tables. Subsidiary responsibilities may include participating in the design of survey instruments and quality checking field research and analyses.

Desired Qualifications

Candidates should hold a Bachelor's or Master's Degree in economics or related field, including training in microeconomics, econometrics, and statistics. A minimum of one year of Stata programming experience is a prerequisite, and fluency as well as excellent communication skills in English are necessary. We are looking for a self-starter, highly motivated and excited to multitask and participate in an international team of researchers. Clear logical thinking, problem solving skills, attention to detail, organization skills, and the ability and willingness to manage field operations are important traits for a successful RA in this position.

The ideal candidate will be someone who wants to get research experience under their belt before starting a PhD program. The previous 3 RAs in this position are now PhD. students in top-tier economics departments, including Berkeley and Harvard, after having spent 1-2 years working in this RA position.

If this position is of interest, please e-mail Christian Salas (csalaspauliac@worldbank.org) with your CV and a cover letter.Christian is my current RA and will be leaving over the summer to start his PhD.

Dangers of fieldwork

2012-02-07T07:34:00.000-08:00

For the most part, fieldwork in developing countries is fun and enjoyable; thats why I love it so much! But every now and then, a freak accident can really hammer home the message that these places can be dangerous.

Just this past weekend, a good friend and colleague from work was attacked by a mob in Mali. She survived and has los cojones de acero (balls of steel) to stick it out for another two weeks in the field. She's a real trooper and my respect for her has grown multiple folds, although her mom will surely disagree with her decision to stay on.

Here's her story in her own words

Travel and Training -- Cape Town, Paris, Kampala, Jo'berg

2012-01-23T21:36:00.000-08:00

I joined Team Z in September last year and got all excited about structured workouts, ironically just in time for an extremely hectic travel schedule. In the space of a month and a half I made three long distance international trips, first to South Africa, then to France, and finally to Uganda and South Africa together. I managed to fit workouts into my hectic schedule and it turned out to be not that bad at all! Here are some fun tales...

Bathtub Laps and Climbing Coastal Mountains in Cape Town
Cape Town is a stunningly beautiful city, reminds me a lot of Rio -- coastal town, great beaches, nice mountains within city limits, great food, good people. It also happens to be where the University of Cape Town (UCT) is located with whom I am doing a lot of my research. So I do find myself in Cape Town quite often and I don't mind it one bit!

Combining triathlon training with this work trip was not that big of an issue as cycling is huge in Cape Town and the routes and views are gorgeous (there is a reason why Cape Argus is one of the world's premier cycling events). Plus my work counterparts at UCT happen to be great athletes, one of whom ran Boston in under 3 hours.

So the cycling and running was well covered, not so much the swimming. I was staying in a hotel which had this bathtub... err pool to offer:

Suds anyone?

I believe it was at most 15 meters in length. My workouts that week called for 500 meter repeats so I got in a lot of push off practice!

On the weekend after a really late night out with friends, I woke up early to receive my rental bike and a ride to Houts Bay where I was going to start my ride. I had already biked to Cape Point (Southern most tip of Africa) on a previous trip so this time I was going to bike through some wine country and climb some nice hills including the famous Chapman's Peak.

The funny thing is as I was heading out of the hotel in my bike shorts, cleats, and helmet, a bunch of my work colleagues (the non-athletic ones) were getting ready to board a tour bus for a guided romp around the city. Now every person has a quirk or two and my big quirk is that I absolutely hate organized tours -- I would have to be beaten and shackled before I ever board a tour bus. The freedom I get from exploring on my own, getting lost, and finding my way is priceless. I simply do not understand why people volunteer to be herded like cattle... ughh!

So after feeling sorry for my colleagues, I got dropped off at Houts Bay with my bike and a map. I brought my Garmin along this time in order to keep my HR in check and stay in low zones on climbs.

The views were magnificent. Here are some of the pictures I took but they do very little justice:

This picture taken right from the road. Stunning beach!

The long winding climb up Chapman's Peak

I could get used to this view

Self portrait

I didn't see any but whales can often be spotted from here

While descending Chapman's peak, I hit a big pothole and my garmin went flying. Unfortunately it never worked again, but I got a replacement under warranty (since the bike mount failed). The ride continues further North into the city center

Running the Paris Monuments (and some unbridled revelry afterwards)
One of the key advantages of being a pseudo-academic is that I get to travel to some fairly nice conference locations. This particular one was in Nantes, a cozy and quaint fishing town in Western France. The conference and the crowd turned out to be a lot more fun than I expected and a subset of us found and spent an inordinate amount of time at a salsa club that night after the conference.

Of course, I tacked on an extra day to my trip to spend in one my favorite cities in the world, Paris. One of my good work friends, Mattea, had just moved to Paris to start her Ph.D. at the Paris School of Economics and I was excited to go hang out with her.

The TGV gets you to Paris in a jiffy and Mattea and I were planning to meet in the afternoon and my grand plan for the morning was to do my weekend long ride on a Velib. Unfortunately, that plan failed miserably as the bike kiosk refused to accept any of my credit cards, even my uber fancy World Bank issued diners mastercard.

Désolé, mais je n'accepte pas les cartes de crédit américaines

Not to be outdone, I decided to lace up my running shoes and do a long run instead. So off I went from L'Arc de Triomphe circumnavigating the city's iconic monuments. First, I ran East towards Montparnasse and the famous Basilica Sacre Coeur. Along the way, I bumped into the following

And its more attractive neighbor!

Next up was some serious hill climbing all the way up to the Basilica.

Time for quads to work -- this is much steeper than it looks

But this view is the reward!

Didn't spend a whole lot of time there as all the tour operators and their blind cattle made me want to puke. But the views of the city were nice and this guy was playing one heck of a harp:

A bit hazy but you can see most of Paris from here

After a swift descent onto the main streets, I flew past some Oriental neighborhoods towards the Seine. Finally got around to taking this picture next to the Louvre...

and then eyed my destination...

Finally made it to the tower and soaked in the beautiful Fall day!

My Paris run -- About 10 miles

No run can be complete without a recovery drink and I managed to find a French version of chocolate milk

Grabbed a quick lunch and headed out to meet Mattea for a fun evening. We walked around town, stopping in to grab some yummy macaron at Laduree and checking out some books at Shakespeare and Co. A sumptuous dinner and wine was followed by some late night revelry that lasted till about 5AM or so. Just in time for me to get in a cab and head to the airport for the flight back home!


This place has the best macarons. Period.

Thanks Mattea for a great evening!

Sleepless Treadmill Intervals in Kampala
Kampala is a great city but for some reason I'm never able to sleep very well while I'm there. The hotel I was staying in had a nice pool so swim workouts went pretty well, though the kids splashing all around me kept wondering what in the world I was doing swimming laps.

The lack of sleep and long work hours caught up to me one night and I wanted nothing to do with a treadmill, let alone intervals on a treadmill. I had woken up at 4AM and worked through till 10PM. I was wiped out and ready to collapse. As luck would have it, my beloved coach Ed Zerkle chose this very day to send out one of his signature motivational emails. Here are some key excerpts:

- "I see some of you working your tails off! Some of you, not so much…"

- "Remind yourself what your goals are and why you joined this team in the first place..."

- "Our biggest risk for the holiday season is that folks take time off, or continue to train but do so blindly without much focus."

- "There is no off season in our sport."

- "Unfocused training over the winter... will come back to haunt you."

- "Get out there - and have some fun."

Ughh.. Off to the gym I went and knocked off treadmill intervals at 10:30PM going on 3 hours of sleep. On the bright side I did sleep quite well that night!

Long Run and Food Poisoning in Jo'Berg (in that order)
Given that I have four projects running in South Africa, I was back there barely a month after my Cape Town visit, but this time just to Jo'berg. After a blitz of non-stop meetings over three days, I finally had some free time over the weekend to look forward to. One of my RAs, Meg (also a runner) volunteered to run with me on Saturday so we set out at a local park for a nice 10 mile run.

For some reason I didn't realize that Jo'berg is at significant elevation, 5,000+ feet above sea level, so the 10 miles were considerably harder than they should have been. But Meg was great company and she told me all about her athletic exploits with her dad growing up. This was perfect conversation as I'd like to nurture a similar outdoors oriented relationship with my daughter as she grows older.

Run in (and all around) the park

Over dinner we planned an ambitious mountain bike adventure for the next day and I was totally psyched about it. The problem arose over the course of the night, however, when my stomach completed revolted against dinner and I ended up spending the night next to the toilet and most of the next day in a state of absolute nausea. Normally my stomach is pretty resilient (and boy I have eaten some iffy things!) but I guess my luck ran out.

The best part of the whole ordeal was that I had to board a plan that night, but the anti nausea medication knocked me out completely and I slept all the way home..

Overall, these trips confirmed to me that work travel and training are indeed compatible and combining the two can be a lot of fun!

Random travel rant -- headlights!

2012-01-19T10:11:00.000-08:00

I get to travel a lot for my work, almost entirely in developing countries and its really interesting to observe differences in living environments, cultures, and customs. At the same time, there are a few things that one expects to be somewhat consistent across settings such as norms for formal greetings, clothing (i.e. people wear them), etc.

Driving norms ain't one of them!

Here I want to pick on one aspect of driving: the (mis)use of vehicle headlights. Normally designed to facilitate vision at night, headlights take on numerous additional roles in developing countries. Here are just a few:

- Size and functionality of headlights is strongly and inversely correlated with the size of vehicle. What looks like a small scooter in the distance invariably is a large tractor trolley with a bulging load and one (weakly) functioning headlight.

- Scooters and motorcycles, in contrast, are fashionably adorned with flashing gadgets and Hollywood inspired signs that would put Kit to shame.

- Rickshaws typically don't need headlights (and many don't have them) as you can hear them well before you see them. Speed of sound is clearly faster than speed of light in this case.

- At home the unwritten rule of high beams is that we can use them to signal other drivers, for example to allow them to turn when its your right of way, etc. In contrast, the fairly explicit rule in developing countries is that high beams can and should be used as a tool of direct intimidation. If someone is trying to overtake in front of you, the best thing you can do is to blind them with your high beams!

- Vehicle horns (some with catchy melodies) are a direct substitute for headlights. For some reason, they rarely malfunction.

Frequent travelers who read this blog, feel free to add your own bullet points below

All systems go... well almost!

2012-01-14T15:05:00.000-08:00

My transformation into a triathlete is almost complete:

Nutrition dialed in... CHECK


Speed Demon acquired... CHECK

Accomplices hired... CHECK

Recovery protocols set... CHECK

Cheerleader sufficiently bribed with chocolate... CHECK

Engine fine-tuned... STILL PENDING!

Economists and policy makers have a new calling...

2012-01-03T11:41:00.000-08:00

...and that can be succinctly summarized by this notice put up by a frustrated World Bank employee (not me) in the men's locker room at work where the showers are perpetually broken:

So the calling is simple: fix the world economy or forever remain stinky!

I think this is the perfect strategy to get us out of recession :)

Bittersweet Return to Racing

2012-01-01T06:47:00.000-08:00

After two years away from racing and one and half year of not being able to run at all because of my knee, I lined up for my first post-surgery road race yesterday, Dec 31, 2011, the Pacers Fairfax 4 miler. I ran together with Evan and Adela from Team Z and we met some other Z'ers out there too.

I really didnt know what to expect and what my body was capable of. Just a few months back I was lying in a hospital bed, unconcious, having my knee surgically repaired from years of abuse. Back then if you had asked me if I would be running by December, let alone racing, I would have laughed in your face.

So at one level I felt incredibly lucky just to be able to run again so soon, but at another my competitive spirit wanted me not only to run but to run fast. In hindsight, this strategy was rigged for failure. I only started running again without a mental block about me knee in mid-November or so, and most of my workouts have been slow endurance building runs. I have been doing some speedwork but thats a huge work in progress.

So it came as no surprise that I didn't run fast. In fact, my average pace of 7:58 for the four miler was slower than my previous marathon pace!

Maybe it was the 8 miles I ran in the morning, maybe it was the hilly course, maybe it was the blisters on my feet that I was nursing, maybe it was the killer strenght circuits I had done the previous day, but then again 7:58 is really slow for a 4 mile race.

Let me provide a little background. I used to be a fast runner, with a respectable 3:10 marathon PR. Back in the day, I was also super fit from hiking and mountaineering and doing crazy debilitation and peak-bagging treks involving thousands of feet of non-stop mountain climbing in unfavorable conditions (see here and here for some examples of what I call fun trips). So, basically I had quads of steel and could hold a high HR threshold for hours.

But years of doing the above and not training systematically led to cartilage damage in my left knee. I stupidly ignored many of the warning signs early on and kept running through the pain and swelling. It caught up to me eventually and stopped me literally dead in my tracks. I was out on a training run in Rock Creek park one day and thats basically when my knee said it had enough. I couldnt even walk. I had to call a friend to come pick me up and bring me home. That was about 2 years ago!

Months of physical therapy, surgery, and post-surgery recovery followed. Prior to stepping on a treadmill in September 2011, I had not run even 50 meters for about 18 months.

Fast forward to present day, I am really glad that I am an eternal optimist. Being able to run and race again pain free is the take-away victory for me from this race. I want to be a fast runner again and I am very competitive, so if anything, this bittersweet return to racing will fuel my drive to train harder and to train my high-end speed more rigorously. I hope to lean on Team Z coaches and teammates for guidance and support along the way!

How to improve your Power to Weight ratio

2011-12-22T23:03:00.000-08:00

You've probably heard pro cyclists talk about power to weight and other fun terms like "Vertical ascent per minute" or VAM for short. Your PW ratio basically determines your VAM, ie how fast you climb a vertical distance per minute. Having incredible power doesn't win you the tour de France, rather having great power and low weight does! Surely Jan Ulrich could put out more raw wattage than Lance, but Lance was significantly lighter and hence faster uphill.

All of this to say that I have been on a quest as of late. And that is to improve my PW by trimming off some unnecessary pounds. With diligent nutrition and training, I am down from 175 and 16 percent body fat to 156 lbs and low singe digit body fat. Needless to say I am stoked. Hope I haven't lost significant chunks of power in the process!

Letter from my Cervélo R3

2011-08-26T20:16:00.000-07:00

Dear Owner,

It has now been a year since you bought me, so its an appropriate time for me to express some of my thoughts and concerns. First, some of the positives:

- Thank you for taking such great care of me, even at the expense of spending time with your family and friends. Nothing makes me feel more wanted than a nice foamy bath every week. Make no mistake though, I'll happily crush any competition with dirt and mud on me, but being clean makes me feel sexy.

- Thank you also for pairing me up with some nice company. Mr. Shimano was kind enough to send over a speedy drivetrain, and the Zipp brothers seem to be the talk of town (eat your heart out Schleck brothers.. pfftt!). Ms. Fiz is generally nice too but seems to eek (ik) a lot under your umm... healthy posterior. She's also been complaining of that "wood" you get while riding me...

Unfortunately, I have not much else positive to say. Now for my concerns:

- I must say I am quite disappointed in you as a rider. The bar my aunties and uncles set, crushing the competition at Paris-Roubaix and up Alpe d'Huez, is very high and quite frankly you are nowhere even close. Please grow some bigger balls, and while you're doing that please don't quit your day job...

- Please stop riding me for your "zone 1 and 2" workouts. Its really not ok with me to be passed by mountain bikers and tricycles. What an embarrassment! Mr. Fuji will happily be your ride. Take him out next time for your girlie spins.

- Please stop being a cheapskate and purchase a slim, streamlined, preferably aero bike wedge to store the Zipp brothers' spare tubes and air. Mr. Fuji has been complaining that my ass looks too big and it hurts my feelings.

- While I understand that you are not made out of carbon fiber (not everybody is perfect), it does trouble me how feeble your bones are. I did not appreciate sitting in your living room for months while you were apparently recovering from knee surgery. Bottom line is I am meant to be ridden, so please don't do that again.

- Lastly, please shave your legs regularly. At least you can pretend to be a real cyclist.

Sincerely,
Your Cervélo R3

My Retül Bike Fit Experience

2011-08-22T12:13:00.000-07:00

We're all pretty good at naming our favorite bike makers, and if lucky get to own and ride our dream bike. One aspect that many of us pay relatively little attention to is a ~~proper~~ optimal bike fit.

I have now owned my "delight on two wheels", a Cervelo R3, for about a year and have been riding it on the standard fit the shop provided. Granted the bike fit pretty well, but on longer rides I felt my shoulders and back starting to hurt a bit. One option was to just suck it up and keep riding, but given that I just had knee surgery for a completely preventable running injury, I was determined to be kind to my body.

I did a bit of online research and came across the Retül dynamic bike fit system. Instead of taking fit measurements while the cyclist is at rest or analyzing two dimensional video, the Retül system captures realtime 3-D measurements while the cyclist is in motion. These measurements are taken under different stress levels, from easy efforts to hard pulls, so any changes in form can be detected. The data are then combined and immediately displayed in an easy-to-use software interface. The fitting expert and rider can then use these numbers to discuss and implement changes in the bike fit.

On paper, this sounded like a great idea so I looked around for a local fitting expert. There are a few shops in the area that offer the service, most priced in the range Retül recommends and one quite outrageously priced about twice as much. I was most intrigued by Revolution Cycles in Clarendon that has a Physical Therapist with a doctorate degree as their Retül fit expert. Having experienced knee problems significant enough to require surgery, a trained medical eye watching over my movements on the bike was a huge plus. I checked out the website and turns out the PT is part of Fast Track Physical Therapy, which has a close relationship with my new triathlon team, Team Z. I was sold!

Steve Berkey, the DPT fit expert, was very responsive to my emails and I showed up at the shop for a 2.5 hour fit sessions this past Saturday. Steve quickly setup my bike on a trainer that sat on a revolving platform (so measurements can be taken on both sides), and was kind enough to have some fans going to keep me cool. All the measurements were going to be recorded on his laptop, which in turn was hooked up to a large TV screen so I could also see and review the numbers.

We started out by talking about my riding aspirations and I told Steve that I loved climbing (though not particularly good at it!), but was also interested in seeing whether my bike could be fitted with TT bars so I could get more aero in triathlons. We discussed the possibility of switching out my regular seatpost for a Profile Design Fast Forward seatpost, which would put me a in more forward position conducive to time trials.

However, Steve cautioned that the R3 isn't really meant for aero bars since the natural geometry of the bike puts the rider further back on the machine so we'd be fighting the geometry in order to get a comfortable aero position without hyper-extended arms. Of course anyone can slap on aero bars on the bike but this would eventually mean a very uncomfortable riding position (think plank pose!).

With these goals and limitations in mind, I hopped on the bike and Steve started attaching the Retül sensors on my right side (each side is measured separately). The sensors are basically the size of a quarter, strung out on a thin cord, and attach to your wrist, forearm, arm socket, hip socket, knee, and shoe. They attach with small Velcro stickers and are fairly easy and painless to put on and remove. Data from these sensors are then wirelessly transmitted to the laptop.

Once all the sensors were attached, I truly looked like bionic man on a bike (note this picture was taken a bit later in the testing as the sensors are attached to my left side and I am noticeably tired!):

The fit process can best be described as a series of testing, adjusting, re-testing, re-adjusting, and so on till the most optimal fit is achieved. The Retül system combines years of research on efficient body positioning and joint flexion to come up with recommended measures and angles. The fitter can then make adjustments on the bike to try and get within a variance band of these optimal numbers. Such micro-adjustments are simply not possible with the naked eye since the angle at rest is different than the angle in motion (for example, moving slightly forward or back on the saddle changes the angles at your knee joint, hip joint, armpit, and elbow!).

Steve had me warm up for a bit and then took three 15 second measurements under increasing stress levels. Interestingly and luckily, my form did not change much with increasing stress, which was great news! However, my knee angle (i.e. angle between the top leg and bottom leg measured at the knee) was a little bit low (i.e. by a few degrees), so here Steve is adjusting my saddle height by bringing it down just a millimeter or so to increase the angle.

Steve also noted that I was a bit overextended on the top part of my body, and lowering the saddle would help in that regard too. He moved my saddle forward as well and just to boot, he added a small spacer under my handle bars to bring them up just a tad.

I immediately noticed less tension in my upper back and less weight on my arms under this new position. I couldn't believe that such a tiny micro-adjustment could have such a noticeable impact. But I knew the real test would be on the road on an extended ride. I had a 40 mile ride planned with Team Z the following day so I was excited.

Back to the Retül testing, the output from the testing was displayed on a large flat-screen TV and was easy for me to read:

The most interesting part of the testing came when we switched the sensors to my left side. See the blown up image of my testing data below. The columns are a bit misaligned but the second column, "01_right" is my baseline measurement for the right side and the last column, "05_right" is my final position on the right side before we switched to the left. The most valid comparison between left and right is between the last two columns, that is the final position on the right vs. the baseline position on left which was measured before any further adjustments.

Focus on the orange oval first. Holy mackerel! On the right side, my knee is 2mm forward of the foot, and on the left my knee is 26mm BEHIND the foot (i.e. -26mm). This is a substantial imbalance. Several theories could explain this:

(a) My right butt cheek is bigger than my left butt cheek so I am naturally misaligned. Nope, my butt is perfectly symmetrical, thank you very much.

(b) There is some internal misalignment at the joints or of the bones, which is causing my body to rotate towards the left. Here is where having a PT doing the fit really helped. Steve did a quick exam and concluded that I am not misaligned.

(c) I do not sit symmetrically on the saddle. This is most likely the culprit and Steve agreed.

So we decided to lower the saddle a tiny bit more to try and get the numbers on both sides more aligned. We couldn't move the saddle any more forward as it was already at the most forward position possible.

On the knee alignment, the golden rule is that the absolute value of the knee offset should not be greater than 10mm. My baseline offset was 2mm + |-26mm| = 28mm, and hence way way off!

By lowering the saddle a couple times, we managed to get my left-side offset down from -26mm to -18mm (the blue circle). Lowering the saddle any further would jeopardize others measurements so we stopped there. We decided to forgo the Fast Forward seatpost option as this would not move my knee forward enough to really benefit from a TT position, and it would worsen some of my other numbers. So why jeopardize my road bike fit in favor of a so-so kinda ok TT position.

And that was it, the sweet spot -- the most efficient fit for my body on my bike. It wasn't perfect but it was my most efficient, injury-preventing position.

So the fit was done and I hopped off the bike and grabbed an energy bar and some water. Steve finished tightening all the bolts on the bike and I thought we were done.

But not so! The coolest part of the fit was yet to come. Steve grabbed this wii-remote type probe and started poking my bike in different places. After a minute I realized he was electronically measuring my bike fit dimensions. This was way cool. Every time he touched the probe, a screen would pop up on the TV display with a real-time image of my bike. This is how it looked:

And here is Steve with the probe:

At the end of this process, I had my entire bike fit dimensions clearly illustrated in an easy-to-read printout:

How is this useful, you might ask? Well for one, you always have your optimal fit measures in hand. Suppose your saddle slips or you have to swap out stems or handlebars, you know what positions to set.

Second, and most useful for those of us who travel a lot, these detailed fit measures can be a great tool to setup a rental bike in far away places. Most places you go there is bound to be a decent bike shop, some that rent road bikes. You can send this pdf file to them in advance and they'll setup your rental bike to exactly match your fit. How cool is that!!!

Obviously having your own bike is the best option, but you do have to lug around a large bike case and pay hefty airline fees. For short trips, remote locations (where only small aircraft fly), or traveling with family, this seems to be a really really good option.

Most of my travel is for work and I tend to hit multiple countries in the same trip. I have been willing to lug around my large bike case and pay airline fees because I love the feel of my own bike. Now I can very closely match that same feeling for the same price the airline charges for carrying my bike (the Retül cost me $250). Note the Retül is a one-time fee and bike case fees are recurring every time you travel.

The last part was testing out the fit on the road on a long ride. I signed up for the 38 mile Sunday ride with Team Z and got to the start a bit late. This meant that I had to catch up to my group for the first few miles. My pedalling felt very smooth and I didn't feel any pain in my shoulders or back despite having to hammer in the beginning. I finished the 38 miles very satisfied with my bike fit.

I would highly recommend a Retül fit with Steve. For me, it was $250 well spent.

Here is my shortlist of Retül's pros and cons:

Pros:
- Dynamic fit -- dialed in by how your body moves on the bike rather than by how it sits
- Specific bike fit measurements
- Great way to optimize fit on rental/spare bikes

Cons:
- None really. The only thing I can say is that perhaps your regular bike fitter got it right or very close. But, there is always potential for tiny improvements which can add up over time to help prevent injury and/or improve efficiency.
- A bit pricey... This will vary from person to person, but for me this was a great bang-for-the-buck. Just the peace of mind from knowing I am positioned as efficiently as I can be is worth a lot.

Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

2011-08-16T10:48:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am a bit of a bike geek and when it came time to upgrade my bike last year, I spent an inordinate amount of time researching and test riding a number of different frames. In the end, it was a close choice between the Trek Madone and the Cervelo R3, and I chose the R3. Apart from being a super compliant, climber friendly bike, it happened to be on clearance and I grabbed it while it was hot. I even got me some Zipp 101's with the money I had left over because of the lower price. Here is what my ride looks like (though not the best place to take a picture)

But this post is not about the R3 itself, but rather a simple little piece of aluminum that prevents my $2,000+ frame from turning into junk in a blink of an eye. Yes, folks, I am talking about a chain catcher. This $40 widget attaches to your front derailleur (some models even attach to the bike frame), weighs a few nanograms (ok, 10g to be exact), and prevents your chain from dropping off the smaller chain ring.

Basically, this 10g of minuscule weight could have netted Andy Schleck the 2010 Tour de France (for those who have been living under a rock, refer to the famous chaingate incident).

For us non-pros (amateur racers, weekend warriors, recreational cyclists, etc.) who have saved up for months to buy our dream carbon bike, this simple device is a godsend. There is only one thing worse than having your chain drop in the middle of a hard climb making you lose all momentum and sight of your group, and that is having your chain drop, get stuck in your frame, ruin your paint job, and potentially gnaw off the bottom bracket area.

Granted the chance of irreparable frame damage is small, but knowing that your chain will not drop no matter how crossed your gears are when you shift is priceless. Ever since I installed this widget, I feel more confident and secure on the bike and don't have to rapidly move up gears before down-shifting on the chain-ring.

For all these reasons, the chain catcher gets my vote for being the best thing since sliced bread. Here is what it looks like on my bike.

Notice how you have to focus hard to even find it!