The Single Speed Century Report: Part 3

The Pofahl early on into the Single Speed Century

Note: Today closes out the Single Speed Century Reports. This part will deal with all the technical and gear aspects of the ride. Also, stay tuned for a special "Barns For Jason" post to follow. 

Okay, so all you single speed freaks out there are probably wondering about my gear choice on the Pofahl. Honestly, I didn't remember what it was. Not until after the ride and I bothered to count the teeth on the chain wheel and cog. That's because on this bike and my Karate Monkey, which is also set up for gravel travel, the gearing had been figured out years ago. I just quit thinking about it after I figured out what I liked ten years ago.

So, I have an oddball set up since I was of the mind that an odd/even gear combination was best. Not sure why I thought that, but that's what I used to always strive for back then. So, on the Pofahl I have a 90's era Race Face 110 BCD crank set which has 180mm length arms. I found that the old BMX brand QBP tried starting up years ago, Big Cheese, had a 37 tooth ring. So I bolted that to the front and I run a Surly 18T cog out back. I believe I have a 38T X 17T on the Karate Monkey. At any rate, that ends up being in the low 60's for gear inches, depending on the exact diameter of my wheel/tire combination. 

The old Pofahl was really making a lot of strange noises by the end of the Single Speed Century. It could be the hub, which I think maybe has a pawl hanging up. It could be the bottom bracket, which seemed to creak at times. It could very well be the seat post clanking on the inside of the seat tube, which is a thing with this bike. But the bottom line is that single speeding is hard on equipment and maintenance needs to be done on these bikes just as much as on geared ones. It's just different things that need attention. The wheels are Industry 9 hubs and spokes laced to Bontrager Duster rims, by the way. These hubs are at least 10 years old, maybe older. The bottom bracket is a UN-55 Shimano cartridge unit.

 The Vittoria Terreno XC 2.1"ers were really a positive outcome on this ride. They have a profile that allows for a better roll over on loose, deeper gravel, and these tires fly on harder surfaces and pavement. You can read my review for Riding Gravel here.

My goal was to go as light as I could with other gear. I sweated over the choices, but in the end, I made maybe one bad call. Everything else was spot on.

For the bike, it meant cutting back on perceived water need and resulting cages or bags. I ended up using the Bike Bag Dude Garage Top Tube Bag which held all my food, tools, and a spare tube, along with my small credit card wallet and money. Oh! And a mini pump was in there as well. This helped me to not have to take a seat bag, which would have been a problem with this bike since I had a water bottle mounted back there.

I stuck with the three bottle strategy since our longest stints would be around 40 miles. The weather was cooler than late Summer when water is at a premium, so I felt I could get away with less. I did. Barely. This meant I could have gone with just that, but I felt a Chaff Bag from Bike Bag Dude would come in handy, and boy! Did it ever! It ended up being a stowage for discarded clothing used earlier in the day. I should mention the lights, although I only needed them for about an hour, hour and a half max. I used a Lezyne i1100 LED head lamp with a Bontrager Flare R tail light high on the seat post and a CygoLight LED tail light mounted to the seat stay above the brake caliper. I also had some cheesy bungee cord mount flasher on the front in white. One of those you see often at bike shop check out counters. I've no idea who made it, maybe Blackburn?

So, as far as the clothing went, I also wanted my choices to be versatile there as well. I ended up going with a vest/arm warmer/leg warmer set up since it was cooler in the morning. My theory was that I could shed the leg warmers and vest once the Sun got up and temperatures got around 70°F. The arm warmers are also Sun protection devices, and I've used them in that role several times in the past when I knew I was going to be under the Sun for many hours. I also used some full finger gloves in the morning hours as well. The Chaff Bag became important when the gloves came off and the vest had to come off. Both items easily went into the Chaff Bag. The leg warmers went in a jersey pocket.

The rest of the clothing consisted of some Endura Pro Elite bibs, an Endura base layer, a Bike Rags wool jersey, and a pair of Twin Six wool socks. I wore Shimano shoes and a Bontrager Starvos WaveCel helmet. Under the helmet I had my Iowa Wind and Rock Buff on. Glasses were Bolle'. I had zero issues with any of my clothing with the exception of the leg warmers. I have no idea how anyone keeps those up. Those came off early, and now I know I probably could have done without them. Oh well......

For food I had Justin Almond Butter packets. I also carried some Ibuprofen and SportsLegs pills but never used them. (They were there just in case and ended up being a mental support thing, kind of) I also carried my Olympus TG-5 and my Apple iPhone. The only other electronic device was my Lezyne Super GPS unit. I ended up recording just shy of 102 miles, but I did not include the ride to and from, so I probably had about 106 - 108 on the day. GPS says 5738 ft. climb for the day. Pretty good when the first 25 and last 25 were pretty flat.

That should about cover things, but of course, if anyone out there has questions on gear, apparel, or nutrition shoot me a comment. Thanks for reading! And a big shout out to my friend  Jeremy Fry for being the good motivator and the designer of that killer route. I'd ride that again! (Maybe on a geared bike this time!)

Next: The special Barns For Jason- The Single Speed Century Edition post.