Kayaking the sandusky with some new found friends

Kayaked the sandusky north from Tiffin Saturday after work, camped,got up this morning at 6am, road 60 miles with friends, now it's off to lunch before doing some lake kayaking up at cataba island. Good times.

Soda Pop Stop, a passion for business

via youtube.com

hard for me to summarize, but I just love the whole idea of this business. Guy takes a passion for soda pop and explodes a niche into quite a business.

Some Tour Divide Questions & Answers with Justin Simoni

via kentsbike.blogspot.com

Kent Petersen aka. Mountain Turtle's interview with Justin Simoni is absolutely the best single interview I've read on the tour divide. Justin attempted to do the whole 2700 mile divide route this year without taking any reroutes / alternates despite record snowfalls and nearly succeeded succombing to a taco'd wheel and shoulder injury only 120 miles from his goal. He was one of the many colorful characters that made the tour divide such an exceptionally great race to follow this year.

One small excerpt: "Q: Did you have any exciting animal encounters?

A: The most exciting animal encounters were the bear prints on the road up Flathead Pass - the first really snowed in pass. There wasn't one part of the track that wasn't covered in them. The forest is so dense up there, that all the animals take to the road to travel themselves. If there wasn't bear prints, there was bear scat, if there wasn't bear scat, there was the scattered plume of some animals fur or feathers from a successful kill. The pattern was sustained through the entire snowed in part. I didn't even have bear mace."

Michigan Woman Faces Jail Time for Planting Vegetable Garden

via takepart.com

It's sh*t like this Michigan. Sh*t like this. Be sure to watch the video. It's as unbiased as I am myself, but I think they got the sentiment right: "What would you say to people who would call this 'ridiculous'?"

What a waste of tax payer time and money and whomever decided to prosecute her should be straight up fired.

Bikerafting Alaska's Lost Coast: Yakutat to Glacier Bay.

via vimeo.com

Mike Curiak's video shakedown of their trip.

"Late June, 2011, I went on a little trip with Eric Parsons, Dylan Kentch, Doom Fishfinder, and Roman Dial.

We beach biked out of Yakutat and bear trail bumbled along Alaska's outer coast, then trailless stumbling and ocean paddling brought us into Glacier Bay.

We carried all gear and food from the start, drinking from fresh and glacial streams, cooking in driftwood fires, sleeping just above high tide."

Yakutat to Gustavus Coast‬‏

via youtube.com

Screw trying to summarize this up, just watch the video, preferably in full screen full 720p. One 20 second clip that will just blow your mind with its magnificence.

You can view more pics and read part one of the trip report here:
http://epiceric.blogspot.com/2011/07/yakutat-to-gustavus-coast-trip-part-1.html

Eric has been blowing my mind with his adventures since I discovered the videos from his "lost coast" trip: http://lostcoastbike.blogspot.com/

stand-up paddling 300 miles

A Hawaiian man completed what is believed to be the first ever crossing from the Big Island to Kauai on a stand-up paddleboard. It took five days alone at sea on his surfboard to cross the 300 miles of open ocean. He survived on dried foods and freshwater strapped to his board and slept on an inflatable mat that he’d tie to the top of it, occasionally getting awoken when a wave flipped his board and mat. He was treated for infected blisters on his feet, but was otherwise in remarkable condition. He wasn’t even sore - the hardest part, he said, was the mental anguish of spending five nights floating in the middle of the ocean on a surfboard.

via thegoat.backcountry.com

Another reminder that there are endless opportunities to push the boundries of human endurance in wild and wonderful ways.

Tour Divide, the most grueling bike race in the world

via pinkbike.com

I still can't believe that Kurt Refsnider blew away the previous record for the great divide by finishing it in 15 days, 21 hours, and 1 minute. Congrats Kurt!

Though I'm not even sure if this is official yet this is a full 2 days, 5 hours faster then Mathew Lee's seemingly untouchable finish of 17 days, 16 hours, 13 minutes.

To top it all off Jefe Branham came in just behind him at 16 days, 16 minutes while riding it SINGLE SPEED!

A large amount of riders are still coming in. There seems to be no news articles or summaries anywhere that can even remotely capture the excitment and stories and yet the TD race discussion on bikepacking.net is growing so rapidly I can't keep up. It currently stands at some 1,860 comments: http://www.bikepacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=2179.new

The tour divide has definitely gotten big this year with some 140 or so riders, but is still getting suprisingly little press which is fine by me. Maybe one day I'll get to ride it before it get's all grown up and the bar is so high one can't even hope to finish in the now much shortened (thanks to Kurt's new record) cut-off time.

Do the huge success this year it will no doubt get much bigger next year.

The best snapshot I have seen capturing the mistique of the ride has been by photog Devon Balet who posted some superb shots of the tour divide including a couple wonderful videos. They start to capture what a wonderful thing the divide is, but beware the second video. In it's own absolutely wonderful and superb way it also captures just how wild and crazy and un summarizeable the event is. This is not an event that has been polished and possibly cannot be polished for mainstream appeal. It's riders and their amazing stories are as varied and wonderful as any come. It's what I love about it.

monster-cross'r-er

Company Overview	Monster Cross. That beautiful bastard love child of the 29er and cyclocross spawned late one night after too much beer and way too much time. Monster Cross bikes are really nothing new and like any bastard child it takes a while to give it a name while you fight over custody.
Mission	To promote the safe and illegal use of these fine bicycles in racing, commuting, cross country touring, gravel grinders, and more. If the wheels will roll over it and your legs can handle it...go there.

Website	http://www.MonsterCrosser.com http://monstercrosser.wordpress.com ahttps://twitter.com/Monstercrosser

via facebook.com

mmeiser says: "It's about cyclocross bikes that cross dress as 29r's and the people that love them." :)

Road shifters on a Salsa Fargo?

Going STI shifter, wondering what others think

I've been diligently looking for an alternative to bar end shifters for about two years now and it just so happens I've scored a sweet mismatched set of used Durace / Ultegra STI shifters which should be absolutely perfect for the job. Obviously I'll have to use a cable doubler, but it should be lighter, quicker shifting, no need to take my hands off the bar in singletrack and so many more advantages.

Indeed the only disadvantage I can think of is it will impede bivy roll space a little, but with my bikepacking gear now so well dialed and my frame bags so big (XXL frame) I only ever use a bivy roll in winter.  

Ironically my road bike, a salsa campeon with a compact double has pretty much the exact same setup already! :)

Specifically I was doing a road ride on my Campeon here in Ohio called the CFC (Columbus Fall challenge, 17,000 vertical feet, 200+ miles, 2 days,one of my favorite organized rides) and I needed the extra gear so I put an XT long cage derailleur and a 34-12 on my road bike opposite my compact 50-34 cranks. It worked flawlessly and brilliantly. In fact it worked so brilliantly that I've kept it that way. Indeed I've dialed in the low cogs for road riding cadence and can hang with even the fastest group rides with the local area clubs (avg 21/22+mph). So, I actually know the setup will shift flawlessly. I've already put at least 3k miles on it.

Inversely I have on multiple occasions run rapidfire with ultegra and durace derailleurs with no issues. I should state this is 100% 9-speed. Can't speak for the 10 speed stuff at all.

So... about the only thing I don't know is how well the braking will work with a cable doubler and what cable doublers one might recommend??

Mud? Some people have brought up the mud issue, citing the inability to micro-adjust shifting or turn off the indexing like you can with a bar end shifter. But technically most people run Rapidfire shifters on trips like the great divide which has no friction mode and not even half clicks like the STI triple shifter. I have run rapidfire, STI and bar end shifters for years (albeit STI never off road) and can't think the STI shifting will be anything but a huge plus even in the mud.

Durability? The thought has come to mind that the STI while more protected then the bar end shifters could be susceptible to taking a major hit (i.e. on a tree) and/or be more susceptible to mud/rain/wear long term wear.  I guess only time and experience will tell.

Why not bar end?

Doing technical midwestern singletrack I've come to the conclusion that I hate bar end shifters on my fargo. Love the fargo, love bar end shifters, just not the combination. Indeed on my onroad / backroad Cross Check touring bike bar end shifters are awesome. However the fargo is a singletrack beast capable of even the most technical singletrack and all but downhill, even with drop bars. But my fargo mine as well be singlespeed for the shifting capability of bar end shifters in technical trail riding. One cannot simply remove their hand from the bar in technical riding, reach down and slap the shifter into the exact right gear before returning the hand to the bar. Especially when the left shifter is not indexed. God forbid one should need to shift but left and right shifters at once.

Furthermore with a woodchipper bar with it's flaired drops the bar end shifters are extremely exposed. Indeed on my first major trip with it last year (TransWisconsin) I dropped my fargo on its side and busted the right bar end shifter. When laid on its side or dropped the bike simply does lay/land on the bar end shifter. Even if turning the shifters inward toward the bottom they're still very likely to take a hit if the bike is dropped or falls over. THis is not even to mention the knee issues with bar end shifters and technical singletrack.

So! What do others think? Anyone have any experience?

300 Miles of Gravel Trailer on TransIowa

via vimeo.com

ultralight cook kit, 2oz stove, 2.3oz pot, .6oz mug/bowl

Geeks vs. Jocks: How Geeks are Winning the War of Public Opinion - ABC News

57 percent of Americans consider being called a geek a compliment.

44 percent of Americans would prefer to be called a geek.

22 percent of Americans would prefer to be called a jock.

66 percent of respondents aged 18 to 34 consider being identified as a geek a compliment.

39 percent of respondents 65 and older consider being identified as a geek a compliment.

17 percent of Americans self-identify as a geek.

82 percent of Americans say they believe it is more acceptable to be a geek today than it was 15 years ago.

Opinion Research Corp. surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults 18 and older May 4 to 8 on behalf of Modis.

via abcnews.go.com

we are all geeks when it comes to different subjects, the medium is the message and the internet's message is that there is finally a mass media with the capacity for the huge range and variety of human interest and knowlege. Chances are if you have a passion, no matter how obscure there are at least a dozen people if not hundreds who share that passion. Furthermore general / broad interests that were once the basis of popularists media like telivision, newspaper and radio create a generic landscape that fails to connect individuals while further defining our interests can lead us to more meaningful interactions with others. The internet turns the fame and popularity model of these traditional media on their ear and rewards the obscure, the learned, the just plain geeky by connecting such geeks with their peers.

On the internet you can not only be the fat tuba player from nebraska, but you can be the brilliant fat tuba player from nebraska and the internet will love you for it.

Bikepacking circa the 1950's

PathLessPedaled - Our First Year of Travel on Vimeo

via vimeo.com

looking for slackware video editing techniques as I wait for my laundry this morning. Today's lessons come from Russ Roca. He's a master of editing in my book. A professional photog who combines his photos into extremely simple yet very effective videos. This video is basically just a slideshow with some highly creative photos and some well chosen music.