BRAN Gravel: Decisions Made

 It is getting closer to crunch time and the bags need to be packed up. Decisions need to be made. Last week I wrote about bike choice and for myself, it came down to two bicycles.

The Salsa Cycles Fargo Gen I is a crowd favorite. I posted an image on Facebook and Instagram of that bike and it got a lot of views. It would be the "People's Choice" bike to take on BRAN for the gravel route. 

This may not be fair, as I did not post a similar image of the Black Mountain Cycles MCD.  The bike may have received as many views as the Fargo. I can only say the two bikes got a different take here on the blog as commenters seemed to lean toward the pink machine instead of the venerable veteran choice. 

And the MCD is actually the bike that is going to Nebraska this time. I thought about this a lot, but a couple of things came to mind which swung the pendulum towards the BMC. One of those has to do with tires and what I heard randomly at work last week. 

A man came in to the Collective who said he was from Northwestern Nebraska. We got to talking about things and the subject of goat heads came up. In case you are unaware, goat heads are round-ish, smallish thorny bombs of doom and can ruin a bicycle ride in a hurry. 

The man said that in Western Nebraska this year the goat heads are at a higher level than normal. He suggested to not even roll my bike through grass out there. And he strongly suggested I run a tubeless set up. 

Of course, both my bikes under consideration are tubeless currently. However, only one has puncture protected tires, and that is the BMC. I just mounted both sets up within the last few months, but I will inject just a little extra goop into the Schwalbes before I go. Plus I will take a Stan's DART tool, extra sealant, and valve cores. 

I also mounted my XTR 11 - 40T cassette which is paired with my 46/36T crank set. This gives me two gears of 1 to 1 or lower which should be enough to get me up any hill I encounter out there. As I (vaguely ) recall, the hills aren't super steep, but longer than we have out here in Iowa. The elevation profile on Ride With GPS also suggests this with climbs of a mile to a mile and a half in some places. 

You may be wondering if my GRX derailleur will actually work with this cassette. While Shimano does not suggest that it will, if you carefully choose the correct chain length and use the B tension screw you will find it shifts in and out of the 40T cog quite nicely.  I even still have a little B tension screw sticking out beyond the derailleur, but I wouldn't push the capacity any further than 40T and expect great shifting. 

 So, there is the bike I am taking and how it will look. The water carrying capacity is great. I have low enough gearing with fast enough road gearing to suit me. The Schwalbe tires roll excellently on pavement and there will be paved sections of this ride nearly every day significant enough in length that this will make a difference. 

There is a Redshift Sports ShockStop Pro stem on this bike which should help take the zing out of the gravel. The Ritchey Design Venturemax carbon handlebars will help as well. Their flattened ovalized top section will be a nice respite for tired hands on long climbs. 

Now I have to go through my tool roll and top tube bag to see what I do or do not have. I may need to get rid of some stuff as well. Otherwise this is it. Now on to packing the rest of the gear up!