Cool video
Malt flavored Muscle Milk tastes like cow shit. The end.
The fast way and the slow way.
If you spend enough time on your road bike you’ll get a flat. A flat can be anything from an inconvenience to a race ender. It’s always good to plan for the inevitavle, so it may be time to start thinking about building a flat pack.
A small back on the bottom of your seat can hold enough gear to prevent you from having to walk your bike, most likely in riding shoes, many miles to safety.
Here’s what I have in mine:
Specialized Mini Wedge
This tiny pack fits under your seat and holds a lot for its size. It has a neoprene tool pocket that I use to hold all the pieces of my traditional patch kit.
SRAM Mini Twist CO2 Inflator
Pretty much any small CO2 inflator will work. Many riders prefer them over a pump that straps to the bike frame because it doesn’t impact the weight or the feel of the ride. For my mountain bike I’ve used the Genuine Innovations Microflate Nano Mini CO2 Inflator and never had an issue – except I lost the inflator head on the trail and had to buy a new one. The SRAM inflator’s head is white so I’ll be less likely to lose it.
Two CO2 cartridges – One CO2 cartridge works just fine in a perfect world. It’ll put enough PSI in to your tires to get you to safety. But I’ve used more than one cartridge enough times (due to mistakes mostly) to pack more than one every time I ride.
Tube – Ideally you swap the damaged tube with a new tube and repair the damaged tube and let the patch cure while you ride. Regardless, you need a tube in your pack.
Tire levers – These are usually optional for mountain bikes because the tires fit so loosely, but they’re an absolute must for road bikes.
Fast Patch Kit
I’ve had mixed results with these on mountain bike tubes. The guy at the bike shop swears by them. This puts me on the fence, but I’m willing to give them a few more chances. The fact that they’re significantly faster than a traditional patch kit makes it worth the risk, but I’ll always bring my extra tube and traditional patch kit just in case.
Traditional Patch Kit – These typically come in little plastic boxes and have a few different sized patches, something to scrape on the tube to roughen it up, and some glue. I took it out of the box and stashed the pieces in the neoprene pouch to save room. Using these is pretty easy, but it takes a while for the glue to dry. But once it’s patched it’ll last forever so you don’t have to worry about it anymore.
$7 in cash – Seven bucks isn’t an amount I thought long and hard over. I just happens to be the amount of cash I had in my wallet when I packed my flat pack. It’s a nice gesture to offer gas money to someone if they give your desperate ass a ride to civilization. And if they refuse the cash, it’s a good amount to buy some beer while you work on repairs or wait for some to come pick you up.
$2 in quarters secured with rubber bands - Gas station air pumps take quarters. With the price ranging between 50 cents to a dollar, $2 gives you more than one go at it. The rubber bands hold the quarters together to keep the ‘jingle jingle’ of loose change from driving you insane.
Brass Presta Shrader Converter
The nozzles on gas station air pumps are usually pretty mangled, but even a pristine pump isn’t going to work on your presta valve without one of these.
And here’s a tip, free of charge:
When you repair a flat, it’s always good to run your hands around the inside of the tire to ensure that it’s free of thorns/tacks/nails. I’ve learned the hard way that failing to check the inside of the tire can lead to a second flat pretty much immediately.
Pretty cool video of a guy working on his skills at the Z-Dam in Richmond, Virginia.
Here’s an incredible story from Elite Feet:
The legendary story of Cliff Young is already known to many runners. If you’re aren’t familiar with it, you’re in for a fascinating read.
An Unlikely Competitor
Every year, Australia hosts 543.7-mile (875-kilometer) endurance racing from Sydney to Melbourne. It is considered among the world’s most grueling ultra-marathons. The race takes five days to complete and is normally only attempted by world-class athletes who train specially for the event. These athletes are typically less than 30 years old and backed by large companies such as Nike.
In 1983, a man named Cliff Young showed up at the start of this race. Cliff was 61 years old and wore overalls and work boots. To everyone’s shock, Cliff wasn’t a spectator. He picked up his race number and joined the other runners.
The press and other athletes became curious and questioned Cliff. They told him, “You’re crazy, there’s no way you can finish this race.” To which he replied, “Yes I can. See, I grew up on a farm where we couldn’t afford horses or tractors, and the whole time I was growing up, whenever the storms would roll in, I’d have to go out and round up the sheep. We had 2,000 sheep on 2,000 acres. Sometimes I would have to run those sheep for two or three days. It took a long time, but I’d always catch them. I believe I can run this race.”
When the race started, the pros quickly left Cliff behind. The crowds and television audience were entertained because Cliff didn’t even run properly; he appeared to shuffle. Many even feared for the old farmer’s safety.
The Tortoise and the Hare
All of the professional athletes knew that it took about 5 days to finish the race. In order to compete, one had to run about 18 hours a day and sleep the remaining 6 hours. The thing is, Cliff Young didn’t know that!
When the morning of the second day came, everyone was in for another surprise. Not only was Cliff still in the race, he had continued jogging all night.
Eventually Cliff was asked about his tactics for the rest of the race. To everyone’s disbelief, he claimed he would run straight through to the finish without sleeping.
Cliff kept running. Each night he came a little closer to the leading pack. By the final night, he had surpassed all of the young, world-class athletes. He was the first competitor to cross the finish line and he set a new course record.
When Cliff was awarded the winning prize of $10,000, he said he didn’t know there was a prize and insisted that he did not enter for the money. He ended up giving all of his winnings to several other runners, an act that endeared him to all of Australia.
Continued Inspiration
In the following year, Cliff entered the same race and took 7th place. Not even a displaced hip during the race stopped him.
Cliff came to prominence again in 1997, aged 76, when he attempted to raise money for homeless children by running around Australia’s border. He completed 6,520 kilometers of the 16,000-kilometer run before he had to pull out because his only crew member became ill. Cliff Young passed away in 2003 at age 81.
Today, the “Young-shuffle” has been adopted by ultra-marathon runners because it is considered more energy-efficient. At least three champions of the Sydney to Melbourne race have used the shuffle to win the race. Furthermore, during the Sydney to Melbourne race, modern competitors do not sleep. Winning the race requires runners to go all night as well as all day, just like Cliff Young.
Here are some videos of Cliff:
A nice behind the scenes look at the brewing process.
I always bring my cell phone on rides. In addition to being able to make calls, it’s good because I have the WeatherBug Elite application that has a great radar.
It lets me fine-tune my route based on where it’s actually raining instead of bagging the whole ride just because it’s storming in my area.
But sometimes knowing the exact location of the rain isn’t enough to prevent you from being caught in it. If it starts to pour it’s good to throw your phone in to one of these:
From what I understand, even though the Pelican 1020 seems air tight, these things aren’t technically 100% waterproof. So you can’t just hook it to your swim trunks and go free diving. But it’s very sturdy and waterproof/water resistant enough to ensure your phone doesn’t get wet during a downpour. I bring mine on bike rides, to the pool, camping and to the beach. It also doesn’t take up much room in my backpack.
mtb blog
Copyright © 2012 All Rights Reserved
Copyright © 2012 All Rights Reserved