What kind of Idiot decides to.....

 Move....

 This kind?   

 

 

Lots of Movement though in life and I guess that is the win.  I happened to look back at my stats in the StravaLord this morning and what I noticed is:

Commutes, 73 days of commuting last year.  So far I'm on  62 as of today and by end of this month I'll probably be at 70 or so.  Will i hit 100 this year?  nah.   100 is 2x with only 2 weeks/4 commutes missed and while I ride in some nasty weather, between time off, holidays, school holidays etc.  I'd say 45 weeks of commutes at 90 is a  stellar goal.  Maybe I'll hit by December.  Maybe I'll go look at my goal at start of year.   

 Total Activities,  247.  I'm at 220 right now, generally with commutes being 2x per day and 1 wakefield and at least 1 other hike/mtb/etc at 6 a week?  I might get to 300 activities, from my current 220.   

Moves.  Hopefully the last for a while.  I've moved in my life, in MAJOR ways 18 times.  If I added some minor moves (not usually a house full of crap), it's actually close to 22 times.  With near a 50/50 split on my 30 or older.  Jeez.  Hopefully this next move does NOT lead me down the hoarder path with a bit  more stability.  Tools are hard though...Sigh.   Soo many tools.   

The Home Bar is wild so much stuff, I think it will be 2 trips to move.

The Bikes.  Oh yes.  So many bikes.  So many steps.  :P

Bike maintenance on the docket:

• Fred needs it's chain waxed maybe Thursday evening, prolly fri-yeah 
• Fred's front tire needs a Stan's Refresh - Friday for sure
• Grim needs a chain clean and lube, probably post ride Friday
• Grim time to Mount the Big Light on the MTB
• Fred also needs a saddle change
• Bike Fit for Fred - This month ideally 

Hiking this weekend again, prep for Lost River in October.  Wheee!  

Wait report?  Nope.  I currently am not in a relationship with my Scail.    Over due for sure, last one was towards the end of june.  Jeez.

Mid-sommer Chain Fun for Fred

 

Chain - 3 - Time to come off, 1141.7 Miles.  

• Originally on at 650 Miles - May 13
• Secret applied at 805 - June 5 - 150 Initial, Post 350 - 
• Limited wet/rain rides really does extend life 
• Removed for Clean/Re-wax - 1141.7 - July 29  - 492.6 Miles
• Chain wear at less than .20 still based on Gauge. 

Chain 1 - 550 Miles on it, re-waxed after cleaning on May 13.

• Put back on at 1142 Miles.
• Chain wear at less than .20 - nice!   

Need to Order Chain 4 to have 3 in rotation.   Sigh.    

 

Grimace is getting better, the old bars were a HUGE fix for my old man wrists.   Need to replace the bars this fall though.   Do i miss electronic shifting?  Not a ton, other than my thumbo.   

 

Fred still has fitment issues.  I may need...major changes, I'm about 1 inch/2.5cm/22mm short on reach compared to the ole CX/Cross bike Ichigo.   And thats with Fred also having a much lower seat to stem drop.

 

The rear tire need a HOT date with Stans.   After a bad commute loosing lots of air I pulled the tire on Monday and found barely any toobless juice.  (It was clear??!?!?!).  Wiped out, checked for major punctures with the finger and found none.  2.5 oz of Stans.  Shake and Bake.  I'd say loosing less than 1 psi a day.   Testing over next few days where it's travel and MTB.

Front tire next week.  

 1500'ish miles for the year so far, 1325 in last 6 months.  Not bad.  July numbers are down due to other commitments honest.   I'm sub 200 from missing a few commute chances due to days off and other work commitments offsite.   Oh well, re commit and push in August.   

 

Chain Maint - 807 on Fred.

 Fred got re-waxed with a quick treatment.  807 miles, so about 160 miles since it was freshly waxed.  It was pretty gnarly and I got a serious raining 2 weeks ago on riding.  And 2 long and dusty rides....

Maybe it's overkill, maybe it's Maybelline.   

Lots of riding, I was over 90 miles as of thursday in last 8 days.   Hoping to get 1 more good ride in this weekend.

Lots of Canal.  So nice riding upwards from just about anywhere above Lock 21 or at least Great Falls.

Call me the Movie Critic

 Solid Start of Year.   

 For 2026 so far:

 

A decent start, with June and vacation upon me I do wonder how many hours I'll get.   Do have a few things planned so hopefully a few good rides will push up numbers.

Fred is now at 762 miles on the Strava-dometer.   Once I get the saddle dealt with I think it is hugely more comfortable on long rides.  While the Saturday ride was 3 hours moving it was more like 330 total with some waiting for my partner.   Looking forward to a few legit 4-5 hour rides over the next several months.

Now with Betty disassembled and done and Grimace in place, I've really gotta sort and store all the spares I pulled from Betty.  After I finish my membership cleanup tonight, I may even take a partial day off this week to work on my storage area at home.   2 years and a LOT of the crap hasn't been touched/used since moving.   Old Shoes, Cloths, Tools, etc.   Gotta go.  Char even said that my house is more of a bike garage in the main room right now.  If my comics weren't hogging space I might move 2 bikes into where they are but, oh well.   

Herding Cats for organizing rides?  2 Thumbs Down.:)   

Mando and Grogu Movie?  2 Thumbs Up :P  - Fun, Adventure, Action, and a few deeper ideas.   

Send Help - Funny and gory and a great Sam Raimi flick!    

MTB Bars with 5/6Deg Sweep -  2 Thumbs Down,  old man wrists dislike. 

 Wait?  No idea, maybe a waiting on Wednesday.    

Chains Chains Chains

 I wanna break this rusty ca...err chain?

Been a bit, lots going on in life.  Lots of riding.  Lots of travel.   Lots of stuff.  Trailwork - 2x in last 3 weeks.   

For Tracking I've now officially put Chain 3 (New) on Fred.   Chain 1 since put back on at end of March had about 240'ish miles on it's original wax application.  But the rain on Monday wiped it out.  I debated cleaning and just applying Chain Secret to see how long it kept it going, but opted to just swap in a new and freshly waxed chain.  I guess if you have 2 chains that's what you do.  My actual plan is to get Fred up to 3 chains then I can probably go 4 months before processing and secret can be for quick waxes.

• Chain 1 - Used is at and the chain is at call it 550 miles.  240 Miles on Mar wax.
• Re-Waxed 13-May-2026
• Chain 3 - New - 0 Miles - Waxed after cleaning in April 2026
• Chain 4 - To be Bought in June

Fred is at 650'ish miles.  Felt like it should be more but mostly commutes and long rides home a few times.  

While in Orlando for things at the end of April I rode the HELL out of the ole Volpe.  Took it in for repairs to the bikeshop in Winter Garden.

Highly recommend the West Orange Trail, especially the Winter Garden area (slow due to tons of stops), the more northern end you can get going for longer sets for sure.  Also really dig The Backyard in Ocoee.  Fun outdoor food and beer hall!  Great food trucks.   Think I rode near 90 miles.

The volpe went in for new chain, rear shifting, cables and all the goodies.  With near 3K logged miles in 14 years it's due.  2 or 3 gears were skipping like CRAZY.   Never realized it was a 10 speed!  :)

So far Betty is holding up but creaking in the BB is the reality until I can replace it I guess.  So far it hasn't blown out/fallen out.  But so far only 1 weak WF ride.   

Big Ride, Little Me?!?

 So I've been busy at work, in last 2 weeks or so I've commuted into work 8 times in last call it 16 days where thats 2 or 3 extra over normal (usually 2x a week).  

Then I went on a decent ride after work.  The custis is REAL!   950 feet of climbing versus the 350 of my normal commute.   

 So this morning I got out my scale and weight in, post some water, post a cup of coffee, post some yogurt.

 

197.2.  Down almos 12 pounds since my last weight in when the work ship show kicked off 2 weeks ago.  Yes I'm down some skelly bone mass and some muscle mass, but thats a bit and my body water weight percentage?  Up near near 2.5% over my typical 55.  So I'm not super dehydrated.   Holy weight loss batman.

 

Fun ride other than the 3 big climbs.  Last 2 miles of WOD is a shit show of people walking and riding badly.   Then 4 mile run is a mess with the construction/etc.  Then MT vern from airport upto the bridge by FDT KCenter, especially near the airplane watching space is a mega shit show of stupid people, stopping, standing and crazy ivan turns (hunt for red october reference).

But also may explain general tiredness last few weeks besides the stress.  Maybe lightest since maybe early 10's.   I've been at 200 or just a hair below a few times in past few years.

Wow.  

I'm off to eat some Bob's Oatmeal. 

It's all about the Bibs

 So first, I don't heavily identify as a Mamil.   But underneath?  Sigh.

 

So in riding once you make that jump to longer/regular rides eventually most sane people make the conversion from say Sport Underwear to some sort of padded bottoms.  In the 00's?  I had shorts with a washable padded liner.  For my short commute to work, it wasn't necessary (2.5 miles) but longer rides in the generally warm bay area?  Yah, especially on the MTB trails.

Later in the DMV region in the late 00's as I upped my riding especially in the early 10's I finally went from shorts to bibs and my posterior was rarely exposed (Yes I come from a LONG and illustrious line of folks who should be plumbers or cable repair/install based on how well pants cover the crack...sigh).   

So over the say 2010 to 2016 era as I was riding more and riding as part of a team for CX I bought bibs and some full kits for race days.  But after years, this year I decided to finally ditch 3 of my oldest bib sets.  They were doing more for friction than preventing friction/padding.  So i got recommendations on FB.  Lots of good ones.

 So I bought:

The Black Bibs w/Pockets - Good Pad, Nice to have pockets.  Wonky seams on the back especially for those pockets, a tad small in the legs for my spuds.   But overall nice material, and a pad I could see fine for up to 4 hours, no problems.

Primal Bibs with Omni Pad - I think a potentially better pad than the Black Bibs (and others).  Nice material.  Leg grippers that aren't too tight for me in the XL size.  No pockets.  Boo.  I think these will be my 6 hour set of bibs or so for longer days.

NeoPro - A decent pad.  But not a fan of the suspender material.  And in these ones I really might need an XXL if I ever ordered another set unless my legs magically shrink. Tight leg grippers but the one thing i do like is how the leg grips are setup/work versus the gel/silicon bands being exposed in all the others.  I probably need a longer ride in them to really get a feel for it, maybe today after work.

I'm probably going to order 1 more pair of the black bibs next month and I've already ordered another pair of Primal but with the next level of pad (helix).  But of course they sent that set Fedex and they hate my building as no doorbells and no one to sign.  

Final Gripes

• Powermeter battery seems....loose and so every few days - no more power meter on Fred.  Pull it, adjust....Back in Action.  Maybe a piece of tape to help hold battery in?
• Bars - I over rotated when I fixed them last week, they need a few degrees rotation down to a more flat position rather than the 2-4 gentle up level of current.  
• Saddle - Still need to get a better fitting saddle then eventual do a full bike fit.   
• Fendoors - I still need to figure out Fenders for Fred also.  With later April now being forecast for more rainy I need to get serious.   
• Chain Tracking System - Methodology to track the use of my Waxed Chains on Fred and Betty.   

 

Waxing 

Oy, on the subject of waxing....your chains.... I'm now on all 3 bikes having waxed chains.  Fred now has 2 chains in full hot wax dip rotation and Betty is on her 1st waxed and maybe willl have a 2nd chain in rotation.   It's SO much cleaner that not getting chain gunk on legs/pants/etc is still amazing.   But I'm really curious on how it will impact life of chains.  As a big guy I'm hard on them.  On MTB my last chain went for about 600 miles before being too stretched to not start causing wear.   And not sure on Fred either, I need to put the current chain on check soon actually.  It's got about 300-350, though only 100-120 are waxed.   

 Off to grab some Pizza for lunch then crank some writing for the remainder of the afternoon.