Very strange thing happened to my new road bike on Saturday... this is a new S-Works Venge ViAS Disc I built up last month so that I could have something to ride/train on other than my Shiv. Anyway.. the bike was pretty much perfect and I had about 150 miles on it so far. I have a long (200 mile) ride coming up this weekend and decided to take the bike in to the shop to get fine tuned and I needed some carbon paste on the seatpost and I didnt't have any at the house when I built it. Anyway.. the guys at the shop call me an hour after I dropped it off and ask "what happened to your new bike?.. what did you do to it? It looks the carbon is gouged and the crankset it bent" I was very confused and thought WTF.. it is a brand new bike, everything on it is new without a scratch on it. They then tell me the area around the BB is beat up pretty bad (like I dropped the chain) and that something in the crankset/rings is bent (they later verified my Quarq spider is what is bent.) Then I remember when it happened... Sat I was on a ride and just headed down one of our local paved urban trails and for a split second the crank bound up then released ( I was in the big chainring, I wasn't shifting.. the chain didn't drop). It was a familiar feeling/sound.. the same as when a rock gets caught between your tire and frame on low clearance bikes (happened on my old Transition all the time)… I have lots of little groves from rocks and things. Anyway.. I figure what is what it must have been, it was just a split second of binding and since I felt it in the crank I figured it was the rear wheel. New bike so still learning its quirks and while I thought I had plenty of clearance on my 26cc tires it seemed reasonable a rock got jammed and cleared out. It was clearly something stuck and sounded bad but it cleared so didnt' stop.. bike was working fine but I thought I might have scratched the frame where it meets the wheel. Got home cleaned up the bike (it rained a little so needed a good wipedown) and didn't notice and damage at all and didnt' think anything of it. Well it turns out (at least the theory is) that a rock somehow come off my front tire at just the right angle and wedged itself between the spider and the frame for about one rotation. The frame took a beating but it isn't to bad and the shop doesn't believe there is any structural issues.. just some gouging and lots of missing paint. The bottom bracket is true and the chainrings themselves seem straight.. but somehow the impact/force of the lodged rock managed to slightly bend one of the arms on my Quarq (the one for Specialized cranks) power meter. That seems almost impossible without seriously damaging the frame but that seems to be the result. Everything was perfect prior to the ride and now there is a wobble being caused by the spider. :-/ Just one of those "thing happen" but I was curious if anyone else has ever heard of a rock getting caught and causing that type of damage (again.. on nice clean tarmac.. not off riding on gravel.) End of the day the frame seems fine and a hell of a lot worse could happen out riding my bike... but just a crazy event to happen to a brand new bike. Guess some days this sport is expensive. Hoping to have the bike back together before my long ride on Saturday.

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Team Zoot