Monday, August 10, 2009

Back on the Mountain Bike Again... again...

I guess two blog posts this year isn't that bad. I could do worse. ;)

I'm now up to 5 mountain bike rides for the year. I had a great ride yesterday on mixed trails... Washington and Old Dominion bike path (Paved), Fairfax Cross County Trail (Mixed single track, double track, paved and gravel) and Laurel Hill Regional Park (Singletrack).

It feels really good to be back on the mountain bike after very few miles on it in the last 2 years. I will be doing more of that and hanging the road bike up for a few months. Fixie and MTB for a while. I need a change.

Since I'm not driving at all, I need to work out how to get to the trailhead. Sean's been great about driving me when I need, but I can't do that all the time. It looks like White Industries double/double set-up will be my weapon of choice. 34 and 36 tooth chainrings combined with a 16 and 18 tooth cog on the freewheel. That gives me 36x16 gear for the roads and 34x18 gear for off road. That should work well. Cool thing is that I can use the same chain length for both. Those White Industires folks are very smart people.

Dr. Einstein broke his stem while adjusting it last week. I used the 5.5nm torque wrench instead of the 4nm one. D'OH! I'm a moron. Oddly enough the stem held through a 60+ mile ride yesterday. Lucky for me.

Other updates need to be made. My 4 year old Avid Juicy 7's need to be replaced. All the hardware is rusted and the brake lever pivot is worn so that the levers move around a lot more than they used to. I could overhaul them, but I think I might just get new ones.

As usual, I ramble.

Later!

Pete