It's the eve of my favorite month of the year, 30 Days of Biking, an April tradition of riding a bike every day for a month (more on that later). I'm about to attempt it for my 4th year, and I took some time to get some things ready today.
I usually give my bikes a good Spring cleaning every year right before April hits. I'd recently gotten a tune up on my everyday bike, so things weren't too shabby this time around. Still, after a camping trip last weekend, you can see my guy could still benefit from some love. No time like the present:
It looks like riding may be difficult with this setup
You may have noticed that there are no pedals on my cranks. I've sometimes taken those off during cleaning procedures, but this time around, I actually took them off to replace/upgrade them to something different:
The new pedals are on the bottom left, the old on the top right. The new ones include some removable straps that go over my shoes, providing a small amount of power on the up-stroke of pedaling. It's a lower cost alternative to clipless pedals, and though not as effective, it'll work better for my daily commuting scenarios (they also function as "regular" pedals when not using the straps).
After installing those, I got to work on cleaning. WD-40 actually makes a line of bike products that I have gotten good use out of so far, and the old standard is also good for cleaning and lubricating certain parts:
With WD-40 and duct tape, you could probably fix anything
The de-greaser sprays on a lot like shaving cream, and is essentially a set and forget application. After letting it sit for about 5 minutes, I sprayed it off with some water and my chain and cassette were clean as new (not the best pic, but you get the idea):
After re-lubricating the chain with some chain lube, he was ready to roll again. I did take him for a brief test ride today even though it was SNOWING ON THE LAST DAY OF MARCH, and all is in working order, just in time for tomorrow morning's commute.
I'm also using Spring as an excuse to finally bust out my new warm weather helmet that I got for Christmas (again, despite the snow falling outside):
I know it looks a little bland, but I chose this model for several reasons. One, it's made by Nutcase, who not only makes a good product but also has a cool logo:
I have to love it. It's the only one I have.
Two, it includes a brim (see above) that's actually on the lower side of the front of the helmet, so it will actually work to shield my eyes from the sun and rain (unlike every other helmet I've owned so far, which forced me to wear a baseball cap underneath). Third, I can decorate a neutral-colored helmet with pretty much any kind of sticker I want, including this hippy-dippy bike I picked up at REI:
And with that, I'm ready to roll for 30 Days of Biking 2019, and I'll encourage all of you to join me. If you're not familiar with the initiative, it's pretty simple and easy to do: just ride a bike at least once a day every day in April and share your experiences on social media. No mileage goals, no additional incentives other than getting outside and being on a bike at least once a day. That's the main reason I really like it, because it's basically a no pressure challenge (if that makes sense). As such, I usually don't set goals for myself during the challenge, other than writing 30 blog posts in 30 days. Piece of cake, right?
So, happy 30 Days of Biking, everyone! Let's ride...
No comments:
Post a Comment