Tag: equipment

Cycling Tour of Big Sur / Central Coast California

In May 2017, the Mud Creek Slide came crashing down on Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) in California, turning an 80-mile section of highway with no exits into two separate 10-mile and 50-mile dead-ends. As bad as that sounds, the details made it even worse. Additional slides and a bridge failure isolated the tiny and beautiful …

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Mud Bogs and Seaweed Clumps

I like to call my fat bike a surf bike. It is not a perfect name, but it conveys what I like to do with it, which is ride on beach sand. A properly set up fat bike can ride along the beach all day in the right conditions. What are the right conditions? One …

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The Strand On the Los Angeles Coast to Sycamore Canyon Overnighter, July 2015

The Plan This is another throwback blog of a ride I took a while ago.  The route was simple: to ride the entire length of “The Strand”, continue along  Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) to Point Mugu State Park and camp at a Sycamore Canyon, then retrace my route back the next day. [activity id=338607581] [activity …

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Tour of California 2017 Stage 7 By Moto

The time had come to once again follow a stage of the Tour of California on my motorcycle. I have done this once before: Stage 6 of the 2010 Tour, following the tour from Palmdale to Big Bear CA. I will put up a retro blog about that soon. When I say “follow”, I don’t …

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The Math Behind A Wide Range 2×11 Drivetrain

Rear derailleur of a wide range 2x11 speed drivetrain.

I recently modified a mountain bike that came with a 2×11 drivetrain. It was nice, but I wanted a wider gear range. The result was a 10/42T 11 speed cassette paired with a 40/24T 2x crankset. I can hear the cries already: “A 24×42 granny gear? That’s madness!” “You will never get shifting to work …

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Daejeon’s Expo Park, Korea / Smart City Region Bike Ride

During a recent stay in Korea, I took the opportunity to ride one of my hotel’s loaner bikes around the neighborhood. Cycling affords an intimacy with your surroundings as well as the ability to cover ground like no other option. The neighborhood I was staying in was near the site of the 1993 World Expo, …

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Interbike 2016 Report

I decided to make a short visit to Interbike this year. They have customer appreciation day now, and I am appreciated I guess. This is not meant to be some exhaustive industry report of Interbike, you can get that from various magazines and such. This was just me having fun. I made the decision to …

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Chino Hills Overnighter / Bikepacking / Sub-48 Trip Part 2

This is a continuation of my previous blog entry about this ride, located here, as you might guess by the title. If you are scrolling down the blog you probably want to skip down and read in order. This picks up in the middle of day 1 of a two day ride. This was my route, …

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A 29 Plus Ride Along The Ocean Bluffs And A Few Repairs

It was time for a shakedown ride of a pretty new set of chainrings and chain on my 29 plus. The coast had recently been battered by a big storm, ripping away much of the beach, and in some cases, all the beach and frontage parking lots. [ride id=568740764 map_width=”500″ map_height=”500″]

Dixon Lake Overnighter Bikepacking Trip

After much planning and anticipation I did another local overnighter tour/bikepack trip, this one staying overnight at Dixon Lake in Escondido, CA.  Strava tells only part of the story, of course Day 1: Day 2: I went on this overnighter on the last two days of 2015, which might be symbolic somehow but I really …

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