Today's Ride

JasonWx wrote

Just got my new peddles yesterday

Did you go clipless?

I got big burly spiky flats..Nukeproof Electron Evo Pedals

I use to ride clipless....Just not my thing..

I need a new set.  Flats.  I had a pair I liked but they blew apart and they don't appear to be easily rebuild able.

I like a thin profile with a healthy edge chamfer.  I might just bite the bullet and go for the Spank Spikes - it's the best pedal my LBS carries.  I'm not quite crazy about the spacing of the platform out from the crank arm (it's kind of close) but I'm sure I'd get used to it.

I've looked at hundreds on the net and I can't decide.  I've at least tried all the ones I can get locally.

They weren't that expensive, so I just bit the bullet and bought them..I need a 8mm Allen Key ..

8mm allen.  Any auto parts store ought to have a 3/8 drive socket in that size.

Decent ride today.  2 weeks off the bike and I'm out of shape already!




Fuckin' shitty ass lake.  It's supposed to be making snow!



Trails were in the best shape they've been all year though.

Sweet ride here..

What's with the pictures?

Rode trails at thatcher park today. I don't think that I have ever ridden so late in December with great trail conditions. If I can't ski, at least I can ride.

The riding this weekend was sublime...If isn't gonna snow..i'm ok with the current weather..

+1 We're very fortunate that it's not 40 and raining, and the trails are in amazing shape around here too

Anybody riding the "gravel bikes"?   Looking at the Giant Revolt or AnyRoad each around $1k,  for mainly asphalt roads but also seasonal roads, rail trails, crushed stone etc.  Have a mt bike but not on trail much.  Thoughts?  

I ride a Specialized AWOL when I'm not on a FS mountain bike. I mostly like it. It comes with a weight penalty over racing bikes, but you get cush and confidence on less-than-ideal roads/rail trails with bigger, softer tires and disc brakes. It rides more like a touring bike with the geometry. I didn't get to test ride the Giants when I was shopping. On one hand, it makes me long for the efficiency of the race bikes I used to ride. On the other hand, being comfy on a six or seven-hour ride is nice.
Hope this helps.

Cool thanks timbly.  Looking  into options and this helps.

Not a lot of input on the gravel grinding but I started out one of my recent mountain bikes as a dual purpose bike with cyclo-cross tires, touring gearing, etc.

What I found out was I actually can ride just as fast with 2.4/2.2" fr/rr fast rolling xc tires on both gravel, pavement and hardpack and also have a very nice rigid trail bike.  I found a 2x10 gear setup that works for me (and I had it 1x10 at one time).  The only issue is chainline.  To make a bike like this you wind up using a poor chainline most of the time i.e. on the trails I'm using 1 through 4, maybe 5.  On the road I'm using 7 through 10, and dropping down to 1 for a longer climb.  I'm almost never in 5 which is my ideal chainline.  When I had the bike setup as a 3x10, I didn't use all the gears, except going down hills on asphalt, but I was cranking along with a much more efficient chainline.  With the 2x10 I don't really need the granny ring, but I need to stand to power through steep climbs, so it's more like riding a SS (but not nearly as hard).  That's only on trails though.  I can make it up any fireroad or paved road in 1x10 mode.  I was using a 38T front ring with the 700x41 tires and I think I could have good 1x10 gearing with a 36T front ring with the 29x2.2 rear tire.  My 2x10 is 38/26 and I've been using a 36-11 cassette all along.  FWIW on my dedicated MTB, I'm using a 30T front ring with a 36-11, and a 29x2.2 in the rear.  It's not enough gear for road riding but it's perfect for trails.

Anyway, I have these two bikes:

Green bike is "a little bit country,":



Black bike is "a little bit rock 'n roll.":



They are both the same medium sized Karate Monkey frames.

Green bike does everything for me from pavement to trail.  The black bike is a dedicated trail bike only.

Main differences are 100mm front suspension, lower gearing, tires and dropper post on the dedicated trail bike.

It cost me a little over $1200 to build the rigid green bike, but I had a few parts laying around and I've switched a lot of stuff to fine tune.  Building a custom bike is pretty easy, and fun, but it costs a little more.

Was tooling around on this at the LBS.



Seems like a hell of a lot of fun.

"absorbing."     do you miss not having the drop bars for extended road tours?  They seem like a plus in the gravel or cyclecross models.  

Mike,
Do you have a dropper post on your MTB?
I have been eyeing that too...
The new flats I got are great..It's like stepping on glue trap...

Hoser wrote

"absorbing."     do you miss not having the drop bars for extended road tours?  They seem like a plus in the gravel or cyclecross models.

I've always ridden flat bars, so not really.  My hands do get tired, I'd love a jones bar or something.  It's really easy to use something like that and only slightly more difficult to use a drop bar (the brakes are a little bit more involved).

Jason,

Yeah it's an old school gravity dropper on my hardtail.  It looks ugly as sin but I'm not out on the trails to attract mates.  It's dead reliable and easy to use and adjust.  Not much more weight than a standard post either.  I love it.  I'm still not a great 'bmx' MTBer, but this helps with the pumping, jumping and cornering.

Surly's are pretty nice bikes.  I've never ridden fat, but I'm a little bit biased against them because I'm into xcd skiing.

Some people hate Surly because they are kind of a hipster company and their frames are a little pricey for what they are.  Whatever, they make pretty nice frames that can do a lot of different things.  The Karate Monkey doesn't have ultra-new geo or all the touring braze ons, but it does everything really well.

I rode a Straggler, which is their cyclocross/gravel grinding bike.  Meh.  It's fine but the geo was not versatile enough that I'd have a one.  I'd rather have more of a MTB geo and adjust the stem and bars to suit the riding.

Seriously though I'd look into Salsa - my next frame will most likely be an El Mariachi.  It's really similar to the KM but has some other niceties.  They are higher price than Surly though.  Both are owned by QBP, but seem to operate individually.  Salsa is a little more high end than Surly IMO.

The Fargo looks to be what you are after, but without combing over the specs, I think it's fairly similar to the El Mariachi just with a different build, and I'm sure a El Mariachi could work with drop bars just as Karate Monkey could.

http://salsacycles.com/bikes/fargo/2016_fargo_x7