Jumping Forward to go Back!

Hey there faithful readers. Sorry (again) for the continued absence from writing…life has a way of getting in the way sometimes. I guess, maybe I should just quit promising any regularity in my posting of the golden wisdom that comes from these here fingertips….yeah? OK, deal. From now on, I will post when I post. No pressure and no promises.

Cool.

Today’s nugget of bike love is this: I believe I am going back to riding like I did before I bought my RSD Middle Child. That’s right, ya heard me…back to the slow (sometimes fast), fun, fully rigid, sandal laden, love of climbin’, outside coffee havin’, hammock layin’, picnic havin’ riding of a few summers ago. But hold on a sec, before I write this out, and let the thought in my head become the beautiful, opinion riddled, often offensive pearl of wisdom that I am sure it will be….I need to remind you, that I loved this way of riding. Although it had some down sides, it didn’t have many. And even if it did, I could overcome them because the benefits far, far outweighed these few downfalls. I wrote about this type of riding a fews times before like: here, and here. I had, originally, experienced a lot of fear while making the decision to jump to this style riding…read my thought process back in 2015 here and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

I really don’t know what to tell you. I just want to go back to the way I rode in those blog entries that I mentioned. But, I know what you are thinking….Ron, weirdo….When. Will. It. Stop. I don’t have the answer for you. Sorry. What I can tell you is that I will continue to do what I enjoy in spite of what others think I should be doing….and as long as I am not hurting anybody else, that should be A-OK. Right? Right.

So I have already pulled the trigger on a new frame and I am in the process of building up a new bike. For this new bike, I am trying to build a bike that will give me mostly, almost all, of what I had with my Surly ECR…

…with a little of what my RSD Middle Child was to me.

This new bike will be more versatile than both of the bikes above. I will be utilizing quite a bit of the existing parts off of the RSD to transfer over to the new bike. I will do a build post when I get the rest of the parts in the mail. I’m only waiting on the front end (fork, bars and stem). I love building up bicycles. And I am especially excited to build and ride this new rig. Just to give you a peek at what is to come…below is the build list….check it:

Frame: Esker Cycles Hayduke steel hardtail in Ranchera Red
Fork: Surly Krampus Fork (black)
Headset: Wolf Tooth Components ZS44 
Bar: Tumbleweed Persuader Bar (raw) 
Stem: Thompson 70mm x 0 degree (maybe on this length)
Grips: Ergon GE1 EVO 
Wheels: Sun Ringle Duo Roc 50mm wide 
Tires: Teravail Coronado 27.5×3.0 (set up tubeless, obvi)
Brakes: Shimano XT M8000 4 piston disc hydraulic (2x180mm rotor)
Shifter: Shimano XT M8000 11speed 
Rear Derr: Shimano XT M8000 w/clutch
Crank: Race Face Cinch 175mm
Bottom Bracket: Race Face Cinch
Chainring: Race Face Cinch 28t
Cassette: Shimano XT M8000 11 speed (11-46)
Seatpost: Ritchey WCS 31.6
Saddle: Brooks C17 black
Bottle Cages (3): King Cage Iris (stainless)
Down Tube Cage: Widefoot Liter Cage (stainless)
Computer/GPS Mount: K-Edge Gravity Cap

More to come on this awesome build!! I am super stoked to get this bike up and running.

In the meantime, I have been on the Haanjo EXP again, trying to drive less and do my errands again on my bike. It’s been nice….to ride more, even if it isn’t some giant epic ride ALL of the time.

The bike, if we could all try to remember is a really viable, everyday, form of transportation. There is so much to benefit from riding your bike EVERY time you can….not just loading it up on the car, getting all geared up to ride a kick ass local trail…be it paved or dirt.

Something to think about.
Go ride your bike. And look out for the build post coming shortly. #grantpetersenismycopilot