Local road ride in the glorious winter sun and salty roads

 

The heat wave has gone and we are back to overnight rain which froze during the early hours but the sun came out = a bike ride. With the weather so good I decided to take out my road Creo. The roads were drying out nicely leaving them pure white with salt but still plenty cold salty spray from the back wheel where it was shady. This is a local road route in a figure of eight and I only use the same stretch of road once for approx 20m. The roads were mainly very busy with traffic with a good few very close passes. This is why I like mainly off road rides now or going out first thing Saturday or Sunday morning before it gets too mad on the roads. On the plus side some were passing with more than 1.5m gap and at a reasonable speed. I did not stop that often for photos but there are a few below inc the route - 32.5miles with 2300ft of climbing in 2hrs 7 mins, enjoy and hopefully more soon - 

A road spin around Teesdale - Barnard Castle / Middle in Teesdale / Mickleton etc

 

It has been a good few years since I have had a road ride up this neck of the woods. I did a circular loop out of Barnard Castle to Middle In Teesdale then back out to Barney way. As ever there was not a lot of sun and most of my riding was overcast, cloudy, windy and cold'ish. There seemed to be loads of traffic on the log road out of Barney for some reason and they were flying! It was quieter once I turned out of Middleton In Teesdale and head back through Mickleton, Cotherstone etc. The roads were dry which made a difference and no road salt. Plenty steady short climbs on the loop of  20 miles - 1600ft. Below are a few snaps from the ride, enjoy and hopefully more soon - 

A rather warm local loop taking in two of Co Durham's old railway lines

 

I was totally unprepared for todays heat wave, I had my full winter kit in the van and the temperature was reading 17 degrees on the dash! One thing for sure the forecasters got the wind speed right - gusts of up to 40+mph. That is why I picked this local loop as it is mostly lovely and sheltered from any wind. The snow drops have come out and the daffs are not far away. I took the old railway line from Bransden Den to Bishop then from Bishop to Spenny with a short interlinking road loop. Below are a few snaps from the ride, enjoy and hopefully more soon- 

First ride on the 700c wheels and Croxdale woods have been ripped up and ankle deep in mud with MX bikes, typical! 

Specialized Creo Gravel - DT Swiss Wheel size swap + Cyclist Magazine

700c set up

If you follow my blog you will know I have just sorted out my tyres on the DT Swiss 27.5" wheelset but I was thinking about swapping back onto my DT Swiss 700c wheelset when I was descending back down the C2C from Parkhead last week. It has been a long time since I have used my 700c wheelset on my gravel Creo. I just love the 27.5" x 2" set up. Anyway I dragged them out of retirement and injected some fresh Stan's into the tyres and pumped them up. I have now put the 27.5” wheelset into storage for a while, see how I get on with the skinny 700c wheelset, should be a lot faster but a lot less comfortable. 

27.5” / 650b set up

I also dragged out my 2nd set of 650b x 2" wheelset and re inflated the tyres and gave the wheels a clean. Not sure when I will use these again but might swap the tyres over onto my carbon DT Swiss wheelset for the summer as the tread pattern is no good for the winter / muddy conditions. 

Last week when I was in Sainsburys which is not very often! I had a look down the magazine isle and bought Issue 136 March 2023 edition - £6.45. Hopefully I will find some time to thumb through the articles and have a read.