Ready 4 Girona

What I had in mind for August got changed, now I’m going to Girona instead. 5 days of vacation hopefully with great people, awesome roads and good coffee.

Fixed my bike yesterday with new 28mm Specialized Turbo Cotton tires and a new white Fizik 2mm superlight bar tape (the best) so now it’s beautiful and ready to see the sun.

If you are in Girona, Spain and want to ride with me Monday-Thursday, write a comment. So far no plans than enjoying. On my dreambike, let’s see how good it is on real roads in some heat 🙂

FMB Sprint2 XL graveltubulars

When I first started to think of the build for my S-Works Diverge I thought of a pair of Roval CLX disc tubulars with 36mm A.Dugast Pipisquallo tubulars on. Later I got a set of clinchers and the plan got changed. Got a set of cheap tubulars from China and a set of Challenge Chicane from a friend.

But yesterday Bikerumor got my mind going again showing this:

a 3T Exploro with 40mm FMB tubulars. Everyone who talked with me about tubulars knows how much I love FMB. Both their roadtires and their cyclocross tires is absolutely the best I’ve tried.

They have made their regular 33mm diamond thread in 40mm, protected them with latex and made the tires of my dreams:

I have to get a pair when they become available and I think you should too if you want to go fast on gravel. Like you can with an Specialized S-Works Diverge or 3T Exploro 😀

add friends

Slept without setting an alarm today, first time in a long time. Took my time to get up, to eat breakfast and thought of my day which wasn’t planned. Thought of riding my bike, maybe on my winterbike with a friend I haven’t met in a long time. No answer made me think even of riding on the trainer, or not at all. Maybe just go into town for a coffee being casual.

Then it all got saved by Emil who just wanted an easy spin around the cx loop, great for my sore legs that didn’t work today. Felt hard but great to do a little spin at Erstavik:

Ended it all with panncakes, talking about etap, Spain and how many people it was at Le Mond. 🙂

Map and stats: Strava

Did all I could to be pro to cover up for my legs today. Glasses like Ted King, clothes like Veronica Larsson, bike like Christoph Sauser and riding gravel like Fredrik Kessiakoff 😉

Trick or Gravel

Selfiegame went strong on todays ride. 3-4h gravel for everyone from Le Mond was announced. Started like this:

Then we hit the gravel with smiles like if it was dry and the spring came

Awesome weather and with some fast and some slower sections, sometimes we had to get off or just wait for friends:

We also rode into the mist before coming to the gunfire with big guns.

mostly riding nice gravelroads in the sun:

Turning around before Häringe slott back to Stockholm, got up some speed to Västerhaninge and then it all went into pieces. People started to long home and the group got split into 3 groups riding and 1 group taking the train. I rode with David who got to see a very tired and low on energy Jonas. Had to take a gel with less than 5km to go to Le Mond as I couldn’t ride straight…

But all in all an amazing day. Feels in my heart and my legs. My bike managed it all great even with me getting it all dirty

Thanks to Emile for pictures and to all who joined for a great Saturday ride 😀

Map and stats: Strava

Sunshine rider

When it looks like this after you cancelled the first plan and slept 20min longer than the 2nd plan you don’t regret getting out. Around 0° C today but so beautiful and just perfect for riding a bike along the water. Rode out to Älgö and around before work and just enjoyed, not so fast and just me and my Diverge, and the sun 😀

I can really recommend getting out when the sun is out, and absorb all the d-vitamins when it’s mostly just dark.

Map and stats: Strava

Campagnolo brakes

This isn’t so common on this blog, rimbrakes… And pretty heavy ones too. But when looks, function and price comes before weight it end up like this. Sold my Engage brakes that was 130g lighter as they wheren’t feeling that good and didn’t suit my Colnago perfectly. My C40 demanded Campagnolo Skeleton brakes.

And while Potenza is a cheap group I think the brakes looks pretty good 🙂 Satisfied and the bike is ready to be used again (after winter passed).

Fornstigen on mtb

There is the dry part of todays mtb ride. Being back in the forest for the first time since July felt really fun. Was really wet and muddy and I’m not so good at it but still fun and I got some extra confidence with the new Specialized Ground Control tires with Gripton 🙂 got guided by a great couple of friends as I never been there before and it’s always more fun riding with friends 🙂 Not so many pictures as I mostly tried to hold on to my handlebars and get safely over the roots and up the hard short climbs 😉

It was also my first ride on the new Specialized Epic. Borrowed a testbike from work that got a bit dirty…

It may have been better with a Camber or something but I prefer the Epic. It’s a racebike and pushing on the climbs is super fun. Used the rear brain just for transportation today as it was a lot of roots and the damper works better fully open like all do. And there is something going downhill on an epic compared to for example a Stumpjumper with dropper post. It’s great to train on such bike but riding an epic with high saddle makes you feel a bit more skilled 😉

Fornstigen was great, except when I hit a tree in the end with my body, felt like a flipper ball.

Riding mtb in the mud is something different than riding on road or gravel, such a bigger effort for the complete body and I can really feel that now. Was tired after last Sunday’s ride but more tired after today’s ride, and not just my legs but upper body too. Should do this more often 😉

Ended like this at Le Mond:

Empty, so tired I didn’t had the energy to ride my Diverge home after washing the Epic at work afterwards, rode an e-bike instead to be able to get home 🙂

Map and stats: Strava

SCS adventure

Stockholm is surrounded of gravelroads, some of them are surrounded by Stockholm. Christer and Johnny found some new roads, shared with Magnus who fixed Johan as a Garminguide for todays ride. Me and Viktor joined and helping making it an adventure:

Everyone had the best bikes and smiled more than the hills where steep 😉

My Diverge tackled every obstacle better than its rider too 😉

Not every day I got use of 44-42 but that’s the good thing with it and new roads, ready for everything 🙂

Map and stats if you want to do the same awesome ride: Strava

Recap

I’m alive, still even without any blogposts. And missed Le Peloton this week both cause I have had a cold and I been doing rehab those days. Just commuting to work and it’s not so much to write about.

Except Tuesday-Wednesday when I borrowed a new Specialized Turbo Vado 6. An e-bike hybrid with 350Watt and 90Nm up to 45km/h. Going uphill in over 30 without any effort was really nice 😉 Was a bit slow getting back on my S-Works Diverge for double the price making 8km/h less in average on my commute.

No matter which bike I used I enjoyed the new cycling path from Ektorp 🙂 Nice to get some space and not have to share space with cars or pedestrians.

Now this weekday it’s time to ride my bikes for real again, more on that after the rides 🙂 Hope you all had a better ridingweek 🙂

The Dutch mountains

Cafécycling on Ekerö/Färingsö today and 21,6km headwind on the way there for me. The wind continued and it was like riding in the Netherlands. Headwind, tailwind and sidewind and cyclists all over the place.

2 pictures showing I was in the front today, maybe the only ones as it was really hard with 38mm graveltires when the others more or less had roadtires, and where i better shape. Klas attacked so much he and Peter took a detour and still got ahead of us. Petra seemed to be in top shape, Jimmie attacked me on the small climbs and Emil tried to keep it steady on the front.

Mostly it felt like this for me:

Trying not to get too dropped. Or trying to not bonk:

It was hard, but we all made it back:

Misery isn’t a word for todays ride but it was very hard. Happily I had a nice tailwind back home from Le Mond and I got to see the best of my bike, really like it when it’s purple:

Map and stats of my suffering: Strava