I've long wanted to ride my bike to the Oregon coast from Portland and this weekend I'm finally going to give it a go. I've been fine tuning my bike since the 200 mile in 2 day STP ride and I think I'll be pretty comfy for most of the route. The route I'm taking is just over 70 miles and I'm hoping, with stops, and what I'm told is a 6 mile uphill section (oh boy!) I can get to the coast in 8 hours.
Recent adjustments/tweaks include switching out clipless pedals for pedals with cages so I can try and avoid the very dependable mile-30-toes-falling-asleep situation that has come up on every ride 30.01 miles and longer. I haven't tried a long ride with my new pedal setup but I'm hoping it works out ok. I read an interesting post on the Rivendell site about the myth of clipless pedals and how they don't equal more efficient pedaling. We'll see how it goes.
The other big change was swapping out my drop bars for moustache bars and a cool hack for them I found on the internetz which involves putting on dummy brake hoods (is that what they are called?) for a couple of different hand positions. I have been riding with this set up for a few weeks and the more upright position the dummy brake hoods (is that what they are called?) provides is really comfy after a couple dozen miles. So, big ups to the dude on the internetz who I got this idea from.
Next big step will be getting the music together and on the iPod shuffle. I'm feeling like there is going to have to be some purchases made as I am pretty burnt out on all the stuff I've had in the heavy rotation lately. Any suggestions? I am at a complete loss as to what I might want to load up for the ride. Hip Hop? I was thinking about some RJD2 and the new GZA? Mind you, this is going to probably be an 8 hour ride so I'm going to have lots of time to just pedal and listen.
Maybe I need to load up a few free form jazz exploration double or triple LPs?
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