100k here we come
Been playing around with some adjustments to the 29er this week in preparation for Michaux. This is a long one. 100k (that's 62miles if you didn't know) of pure Pennsylvania rocky and hilly terrain.
Recall last race in Michaux my hands became blisters by mile 10. Making some changes this time around:
Found some large volume tires (29x2.2) to provide some form of shock absorption from the rocks. The front fits in my fork but the back doesn't fit. I think the tire is out of round on the rim. In other words. I didn't do a good job setting the tire on the bead for I was too focused to seal the bead with Stan's (yup. no tubes, I hate tubes). Since then I've played around with reseating the bead and double checking rim roundness and trueness. One small spot on the tire is rubbing on my rear non-driveside chainstay. Going to cut the knobbies down tonight and that should fix it. All in all, very little room in both the fork and rear end for such large tires (after all, why would you typically want to run such a large and heavy tire anyway?). If the weather and terrain was wet I wouldn't even bother with these tires for I'd do some damage to the frame with mud and small corkcs.
Oh yeah! Did I mention how much I love these Ergon grips? The smaller diameter is perfect. Even though I've got large hands I had trouble holding onto the bars whilst descending with the larger diameter Ergons. Bar ends.... What are those? I haven't had bar ends in years. Well, they are a godsend on a singlespeed. New hand position. Better upper body leverage when out of the saddle attacking the climb. Pure bliss!
Tires are covered now. Grips are covered now. bingo.
Last thing is gearing. All season I've been on 34x20. Went to 34x21 for last night's ride. Felt good but the climbs weren't as steep as we're going to see in PA. Ran the wheel inches for various combinations of chainrings and rear cogs today at work. Will make a commanding decision on Saturday which gear ratio I go with.
This is going to be fun!
Recall last race in Michaux my hands became blisters by mile 10. Making some changes this time around:
Found some large volume tires (29x2.2) to provide some form of shock absorption from the rocks. The front fits in my fork but the back doesn't fit. I think the tire is out of round on the rim. In other words. I didn't do a good job setting the tire on the bead for I was too focused to seal the bead with Stan's (yup. no tubes, I hate tubes). Since then I've played around with reseating the bead and double checking rim roundness and trueness. One small spot on the tire is rubbing on my rear non-driveside chainstay. Going to cut the knobbies down tonight and that should fix it. All in all, very little room in both the fork and rear end for such large tires (after all, why would you typically want to run such a large and heavy tire anyway?). If the weather and terrain was wet I wouldn't even bother with these tires for I'd do some damage to the frame with mud and small corkcs.
Oh yeah! Did I mention how much I love these Ergon grips? The smaller diameter is perfect. Even though I've got large hands I had trouble holding onto the bars whilst descending with the larger diameter Ergons. Bar ends.... What are those? I haven't had bar ends in years. Well, they are a godsend on a singlespeed. New hand position. Better upper body leverage when out of the saddle attacking the climb. Pure bliss!
Tires are covered now. Grips are covered now. bingo.
Last thing is gearing. All season I've been on 34x20. Went to 34x21 for last night's ride. Felt good but the climbs weren't as steep as we're going to see in PA. Ran the wheel inches for various combinations of chainrings and rear cogs today at work. Will make a commanding decision on Saturday which gear ratio I go with.
This is going to be fun!
posted by dougyfresh at 8:08 PM
2 Comments:
What model ergon grips are you using?
I believe I'm running the GC2s in team green, size small and with the aluminum bar ends.
Try this link:
GC2 grips
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