Cycling Appreciation Thread

[vivster]

SvennoJ said:

vivster said:
Cool stuff. I'm currently looking into getting a new bike. Since my current one is 100% road I run into issues some times with bad roads and I really fear for my bike and my wrists. MY bike has zero suspension and I tend to keep my tires rock hard at 7 Bar. I have given up commuting because the roads and bike lanes to my work are just a nightmare for my bike. I've been looking at mountainbikes and found that there are quite a few hybrids between MTBs and road bikes, which is ideal.

It seems my ideal hybrid would be a Gravelbike that's made for comfort and endurance. Some broad tires and suspension in front and back would probably be enough to be able to go a bit offroad. My dream is to just start my trip and then drive in any direction using any road, take a break when I need and then just stop at a hotel whenever I'm too exhausted to go further. Bikepacking really is my jam.

Damn that's just over 100 psi, I keep mine at 80 psi back, 70 front. It's a hybrid though and the max rating for the tires (80 psi). I use Specialized Crossroads tires, 700 38c, good grip on any terrain. Front suspension is essential for your wrists. Still hurts with all the bad roads around here and after a long ride my arms and wrists tend to cramp up. (And my legs the next morning, yay for getting older)

I've used that hybrid bike on anything, very nice to be able to go from a mountain bike trail to get up to speed on smooth asphalt and back. The tires are wide enough for moderate gravel but will still dig in in loose sand and piled up gravel.

My decision process where to go is usually based on wind direction. Start out against the wind, wind behind on the way back.

115km small little tour lol :)

The fastest I did my 109 km route was 4h 15 minutes. I currently aim to go between 3 to 4 hours at a time, my knees are starting to get older unfortunately. I'm 46 now, 42 was about my peak year.

For my next bike I'm looking to go tubeless since there seem to a be shit ton of advantages, especially for a hybrid. I already know it's not gonna be cheap. Currently I'm estimating around 4000€ for the full package. Also looking into bigger bags since my current trunkbag is barely enough for a weekend trip.

A couple of weeks ago I did one of my favorite tours. It's 190km through slightly hilly fields and woods. All on pristine tarmac. Started a bit after 5am and managed to get back just before 3pm. I wasn't even feeling as if I was rushing but I was still surprised at the speed. Especially considering I had about 1000m total elevation.

Tomorrow I'm trying to beat my current record of 27kph average driving speed on a 100km+ trip, not too optimistic about it though. I really am not a good sprinter and I always take my time with hills since I prefer maintaining power output over maintaining speed. In the end the goal is to slowly increase my base speed to be able to do longer day trips. My goal is to comfortably do 200km trips in a timely manner and one day do a fun 250km trip. In the past year I have learned a lot about my own body and my techniques to conserve energy and refill energy at the right moments are getting a lot better. I learned that it's not about how much your muscles can do, but rather how good I am at replenishing energy, which can be done by stacking different kinds of carbs that have different times to get converted into energy. If you do it about right then you'll have a constant stream of ready energy.