I took a very short (10.5 mile out ’n’ back) and easy cruise today, riding gingerly for fear of causing another flu relapse — so far so good; we’ll see what tomorrow bring — because it was a nice day — tho’ chilly — and I didn’t want to wait another day off the bike.
Since I’ll very likely not ride tomorrow, that brings the total miles for 2025 to 2,383.2 including “riding” the dog. This would easily have been over 2,500 had I not been sick twice this month. The other 2 low mileage months early in the year, then the gradual improvement in fitness, meant that I didn’t really start putting in decent (for me) miles until May or June. Extrapolating from the second half of the year, even with only 155 miles so far this month, if I had ridden all year at the second six-month rate, that would have been close to 3,200. Not a great deal compared to many riders, but 3K is my comfortable personal goal. Anyway, we’ll see how next year goes. Because I wanted to take it easy, I rode the Roadeo — it feels like cheating, having multiple gears and a freewheel. It’s funny: I find that many-cog cassettes make riding easier, not only because you have hill gears and downhill freewheel, but because you can fine tune the cruising gears for just the right ratio for small changes in wind and incline, as I can now do with the 14-32 that replaced the 11-32. I’m surprised how much *apparent* energy I save — or, let’s say, how perceived effort drops — when you can shift from a 76” gear to a 72” gear, after which comes the 68” gear, instead of having to drop from the 76” to the 68” as with the 11-32 cassette or, on the fixies, from 75” to 68” or 72” to 65”. At any rate, it did seem delightfully easy to pedal. Lastly, for the Roadeo: I swapped the very nice Carradice Zip Roll for a new Barley. The Zip Roll t 3 liters is just too small for the very frequent end-of-ride grocery stops, and the 9 liter Barley is just right for ad hoc shop stops, with side pockets just big enough to hold the rather bulky (incl 2 tubes and 4 fl oz of OS) tool kit, leaving the main compartment free to just barely accommodate a gallon of milk. Carradice quality has varied greatly over the years. I remember the first Nelson Longflap I bought from Rivendell circa 1995: the real old-school quality, with thick, stiff, tightly woven, highly waxed duck, cloth lining, thick, supple leather, including a thick leather scuff pad; those earlier bags would literally hold water — I tried it. Quality went downhill, with much lighter but still coarse duck, no lining, duck scuff pad, and cheaper leather. This new Barley has lighterweight canvas — but no lighter than my Sackville’s — and a duck scuff pad, but it’s nicely lined, and the leather is back to the original quality. I do prefer the old heavy cotton tiie tapes and cotton duck side security flap arrangement over the nylon drawstring necks, which IMO are less convenient for containing overflow than the old method. Of course, Carradice has never matched Riv’s bags’ quality — I’ve owned about 8 Riv bags — but then they charge less. Here’s to a good 2026 to all RBWlisters. Patrick Moore, who is about to pop some (very efficacious) Chinese medicine pills and potions to prevent another relapse, in ABQ, NM. -- Patrick Moore Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Executive resumes, LinkedIn profiles, bios, letters, and other writing services ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *When thou didst not, savage, k**now thine own meaning,* *But wouldst gabble like a** thing most brutish,* *I endowed thy purposes w**ith words that made them known.* -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/CALuTfgv%2BYsVK%2BcoD_EE1Ugckv8UbQBW4QUtxa4TBAu%2B_5z6Wpw%40mail.gmail.com.
