Broken

"Broken; we are broken." Thus spake Tears for Fears. And, thus say I. But my break is most unusual.

I've been riding Easton Vista wheels with VeloMax V3 hubs. These are the OEM spec on my Cervelo R2.5. They've been great wheels for three years. Then, recently I noticed a little play in the wheel. I figured I'd check the bearings or something soon to correct it. But kept forgetting.

Last Saturday I started a little wheel maintenance, changing out the gear cassette. After removing the gears, the freehub dropped to the floor. This was unusual as it had never come off before. I attempted to screw it back onto the wheel, but saw no threads! It was then that I realized that I had a broken axle and the quick-release skewer was all that was holding my wheel together.

I decided it best to not reassemble the wheel at that time, but to work on a repair or replacement.

At first I checked a few spots for new wheels, chainlove.com and neuvationcycles.com were the two I most fancied. However chainlove didn't pop any wheels up for me, and despite the competitive pricing, I was still taken aback at the pricing of new wheels even from Neuvation. So, it was on to repair, with marginal hope.

I've been talking with Easton this week, and they have been most helpful with the purchase of replacement parts, since the two-year warranty I didn't know about has expired. Their help means that I don't need to purchase a new set of wheels now, unless I decide that I really want to. Instead, I spent about $15 on a new axle and around $45 on a new freehub (as mine was showing some damage, which may have been caused by the snapped axle or some other thing). Once those parts -- which shipped today -- arrive, I'll rebuild that hub and be ready for some sweet late-season cycling in the crisp mornings and temperate evenings.

I'm so looking forward to it.

However, I now totally can't justify a new set of Zipp 808 wheels, particularly with a power meter attached.