I thought I didn't have a lot for this year's edition of tried-and-liked. But once you get going, things add up.
Tried and liked
- Ortlieb Seat Pack (16.5l): For a bike touring adventure (see
below), I needed a big seat bag to supplement my front rando bag. The
Ortlieb works well on my tall low-trail bike with an almost level top
tube. However, I have juuust enough seat post showing to make it work. I also got to experience the droopy behavior that I had read about. It happens when the bag is not packed tightly enough (and you can buy accessory straps to prevent it). But my bike is tall enough that there is no risk of the bag touching the rear wheel
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Droopy seat bag
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- Bike touring the Alps. Went on an 11-day trips through the Alps with a
friend. We packed light and slept in hotels and it was amazing.
- Taking videos of rides: In prep for the Alps trip, I bought a DJI Action 4 cam and worked on my editing skills. Editing takes a lot of
time, but it's also a fun way to reminisce about your rides. Here's my
little YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@ride-or-pie
- Rene Herse Nuda mini pump: It's amazingly light and small, and it
worked well enough when I had a flat on my skinny tire road bike.
- Selling a couple bikes/frames: I sold a record number of bikes, that is, three, this
year. It felt good to pass on bikes that didn't get ridden/loved enough.
- Replacing the battery on my Wahoo Elemnt: Repairing things that are probably
not really meant to be repaired is very satisfying. The computer is five
years old now and I don't feel a strong urge to upgrade now that the
battery capacity has been restored.
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Wahoo surgery
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To be determined
- Ass Savers Win Wing fenders: I bought these recently and have had only
one or two wet rides to test them with. Easy to install, extremely
light, and they do seem to work.
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Ass Savers Win Wing fender
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- Chain waxing: I hopped
on the wax train this fall, with a cheap used crock pot setup. The process is not too bad and I like the
results immediately after waxing. But it seems that the drivetrain gets
noisy pretty quickly. I'm not sure if I can deal with the frequency of
rewaxing that seems to be required. Maybe fancier equipment would help? Probably not, though.
- Indievelo/TrainingPeaks
Virtual: A new-ish indoor training platform with a focus on racing. I
decided to give this a try instead of Zwift. I like the racing
experience better than Zwift so far, but it's still a small platform. So
often you end up racing against bots. The bots are implemented very
well, though.
