The ability to add fenders is very considerate when you're riding with others in a group in the rain. Also mount points for (extra) bottles or racks are always a plus.
Those are nice to have, but luckily can be worked around pretty easily for frames lacking mounts these days. Lots of decent temporary mud guard options if local climate doesn't require them year round. Racks too, although soft bikepacking seatpost bags are enough for most brevets. Best placement of the 3rd bottle has been interesting to consider: aero bars, under the downtube, behind the seat, jersey pocket, hydration backpack, or use 2 massive bottles. Options for these today are much better and more accessible than when I started.
I've been reading about randonneuring, and the first consideration I keep hearing about is comfort. People have successfully ridden PBP on Dutch commuter bikes, but everyone rode in the saddle for many, many hours. All day comfort is critical. That includes taking pressure off the hands to prevent numbness as the hours roll by. So I'd recommend a recumbent. While it's true they're inferior to a conventional bike because they can't be raced in IUC events, it's also true that randonneuring is neither racing nor IUC regulated. And you can't beat the comfort after a dozen hours on the road. I found a Rans Tailwind with 37-451 tires. Now I just need time to ride.
Hi Claude, recumbent bikes can be good choices for randonneuring for some people. The faster ones are preferable. We have a local group of Brompton Randonneurs proving anything is possible. For me, I have over 13,000km on recumbents with many of those from brevets up to 600km. I have a good one on hand now, but it is not built. My local riding conditions make an upright bike a much better choice. Rather than comfort, I prefer 'sustainability' as the key term for success rather than comfort. Aiming for comfort will guarantee disappointment on recumbents and uprights. For an upright bike, months and years of training build higher levels of sustainability. Recumbents shortcut that to an extent, but then so do aero bars on an upright. Good luck with your training and I hope you enjoy your time on the Rans. Are you targeting a brevet this year?
@@overbikedrandonneuring Right now I'm targeting 50 miles in one ride. I've never been a long distance rider and have to break the habit of going full out all the time.But I live in the San Diego area, which has a wealth of permanents to practice on. Unfortunately I only have Sundays free right now, and life consumes most of those. I kind of miss being young and having long hours to fill.
Yes, but also no. I have an optima Baron lowracer, which I have taken on a few brevets. While it is very comfortable, I find hauling extra gear to be a hassle on my recumbent. There just no good place to put it. On my baron, I have drilled holes into the seat to attach water bottle cages. On on the boom, I have a bag for two tubes, tools, and CO2 cartridges. Good enough usually for a day with steady weather and temperatures. But if it gets cold, rains, or goes into dark, this is where my Baron has issues. It's also horrible on gravel roads. All bumps and chipseal vibrations go straight to my eyeballs. In the rain, I cannot look down riding my recumbent. My seat angle has my head position look out and up. If it rain, yeah, it's close as I can get to being waterboarded. With a traditional bike, I have more places to put more gear, and my body absorbs chipseal and gravel roads bumps . Rain is usually no issue, and I can store rain gear and look down. Not fun, but I can ride easier in the rain. My uses for each usually depend on weather and road conditions.
@@timbazzinett2693 I think a Tour Easy is about the best thing for that kind of ride. Not having one, my favorite ride is a BikeE AT, with rear suspension. The front is so lightly loaded that I hardly feel the bumps and the rear shock takes care of the back end. I just turned 62. I don't think I'd like craning my neck either up or down. Gear can go in a pack behind the seat.
Few riders will ever generate enough speed to make wheel aerodynamics or wheel weight real issues. Far more important is rider comfort and the wider the tire, the lower the PSI is required. At lower pressures, the road vibration problem is much reduced. For serious rando rides, the widest and the most supple tire that the frame can accept should be used. Some of the rider doing PBP were using 42-48mm width tires. What you want is an enjoyable ride, not a survival experience.
Randonneuring can be completed on most any human powered vehicle. PBP looks to be a course with mild, rolling terrain, so Ellipti-Gos, kick board bikes, cargo bikes, and recumbent tricycles are fair play there, as are balloon tires. That doesn't mean they are best practice. My goal with this channel is to explore the best possible setup and strategies for a maximum probability of success. That absolutely includes comfort, but small efficiencies over 20+ hours of riding add up too. These are measurable benefits, even at our speeds, no matter how hard some retro lifestyle brands deny it. Less effort at a given speed means less fatigue, in a similar way fatigue is reduced by being insulated from vibration. More time saved from a quick setup means more sleep and safer cycling. Great comfort and high efficiency must both be pursued to this end. You may enjoy the companion videos to this one "Comfort = Improved Endurance Performance", "Sleep Strategies for the Randonneur", or my reviews for comfort components from Redshift and Vecnum.
As a recovering ultra-endurance cyclist, I strongly recommend building your rig around the widest and lightest super supple tubeless tires that you can find. At the lower speeds of endurance riding, the comfort benefits of deep sidewalls and lower pressures far offset any aero penalty even 48 mm tires may exact, especially considering the width of many carbon frames these days. The weight penalty is minimal, and the rolling resistance is possibly easier. The greatest obstacle is aesthetic, as such wide tires offend the traditions of road cyclists to an extreme. There are offerings from Rene Herse and Ultradynamico that are simply outstanding, and make even chip-and-seal roads delightful! I dare you to try them!
@@jamesrosar3823 Cheers, and thanks for the comment. I also think tires should be prioritized, but see it a bit differently. The various penalties of too large a tire and too low pressure are real and add up over hours and days. Instead, I support using the fastest tire for a given condition, weight, and average speed that is practical. It only needs to be wide enough to offer access to the pressure needed for ideal hoop stress for a condition. Decoupling rider comfort from the tire through minimalists suspension (Vecnum Stem, Redshift Shockstop Pro Seatpost is my current preference) allows for ~30-35mm tubeless tires with superior construction and performance to that of rebranded Panaracer choices. Ideal pressure for tubeless tires in the range will still be rather low. I am at ~57 PSI in a 33mm tire. Bike rides like a magic carpet. For what it's worth, I was using Rivendell Jack Brown Green tires 10 years ago since the RH markup is ludicrous. Panaracer makes pretty mid tires.
As @philhouck3560 wrote above, I quite agree with. The use of steel wheels on steel rails is maximally efficient, but neither of us would recommend that approach as actual roads and trails are much rougher. Indeed, in an ultra event, comfort and its preservation become paramount. At the turn of the prior century when solid rubber was the only tire available, there was a great deal of invention regarding means of suspension. Once the pneumatic tire became available, all of those tricks were outmoded, for their weight, expense, complexity and maintenance. I admit that I do use and enjoy a Cane Creek eeSilk seatpost, as it lets me enjoy a very smooth ride while having a proper 32 psi in my rear tire. When you say that your bike rides like a ‘magic carpet’, I have to ask: compared to what? I have 33 mm tires of similar construction to my 48s, and the sensation they deliver is nowhere near as delicious! The much larger contact patch diffuses specific irregularities, and the super suppleness makes conforming to these irregularities very elastic and efficient. I don’t see the trade-offs offsetting the comfort bonus, even if they do exist, which I contest. And what does optimizing “hoop stress” have to do with properly engineered tires and rims?
@@jamesrosar3823 Hoop stress is a measurement of the outward pressure of a whole tire. Tire diameter, thickness, and internal pressure are the key variables to calculate hoop stress. In an abstract way, you can think of hoop stress as "pressure relative to width". It is likely one of the core measurements used to develop tire pressure calculators used by Silca, SRAM, and Rene Herse. If you take 2 tires of equal construction, one wider than the other, and set them to equal pressure, the wide tire will have a higher hoop stress than the narrow one. As a result, the wide tire will ride more harshly. My 33mm GP5000S tires at 57PSI should have the same hoop stress as your 48mm tires at 39PSI if they were constructed the same. Equal hoop stress is theorized to result in roughly equal comfort, but I've not seen public testing to validate this. I hope to test it myself using my vibration test protocol. I expect wider tires to offer a small, but measurable advantage above simple hoop stress equivalence, but time will tell. The wider tire at same PSI but higher hoop stress will also perform faster in rolling resistance tests on smooth tarmac or laboratory drums, as shown by Bicycle Rolling Resistance. This effect could be used to falsely portray wider tires as faster rolling. When set to equal hoop stress, they will roll roughly the same, also shown by Bicycle Rolling Resistance tests. Hoop stress can be seen as narrow tires have higher max pressures than wide tires too. It takes more nominal pressure to blow them off a rim, but blowoffs will occur at more similar levels of hoop stress as wider counterparts.
All useful info. Thanks. I once watched an interview with Kristoff Allegaerts and he said that for endurance riding (which meant racing to him) the bike should be like a sofa. It was this he said was the key to him winning long.endurance races races like RAAM and IndyPAC.
The new Speedster 10 is a good looking bike with a lot of positive characteristics in geometry, standards, and general design. Be mindful of the cost savings taken by Scott when cross shopping. Both the Merida Scultura Endurance 400 and Giant Contend AR 1 offer carbon seatposts, while the Merida also has the real 105 crankset. At Tiagra levels, Merida offers hydraulic brakes while Giant offers a carbon seatpost. The best financial choice would depend on local prices and dealer support. I would be happy to ride on any of these bikes for a very long time with a set of fast tires.
Just got a second hand one of these and I am very very happy with it. So far I'm just doing daily training so no long distance rides yet - but I think it will work well for that when I get my own endurance up a bit.
nowadays endurance bike geometry is closer to road. Not sure if there are pure endurance bikes anymore. Gravel bike geometry seem to be closer to endurance ones. This is purely on geometry perspective.
I agree, new Endurace, Addict SE, and Defy are nearly race bikes. Domane and Roubaix still have endurance geo at least. Maybe a 2024 buyers guide would be useful.
I think it is just a way trying to justify the cost. But you have got to start from the basic geometry of endurance, then add more fancy things and ask for more money. I am currently trying to build one up from different parts since they are not available in one place, like gravel cranks and mountain cassettes to proper geometry. Cant go electronic because cannot swap parts. Kind of frustrating.
Excellent coverage, I enjoyed your videos. Glad I found this channel. Must say though I thought you could have brought some items you mentioned in your video about the effect of weight on randoneuring into this video also. For instance when discussing group set you never mentioned drive chain efficeincy. Its a minor thing. Excellent advice allround.
Thank you Mick, I hope this was useful for you. Those 2 factors are relevant to randonneuring performance, but not so much when buying a new bike. Chain efficiency is determined more by lubrication choices and maintenance habits than groupset choice. Zero Friction Cycling found tiny differences in chain performance, except for poor performing high end SRAM chains. Bike weight is determined mostly by budget, and I don't want to encourage folks to overspend for insignificant gains. Modeling shows the kilogram or so difference between bikes at a given price point doesn't affect time or effort much. I use 100kg as shorthand measurement for my system weight, so 1 kg is 1% of total weight. Climbing steeply at 250 watts, 1 kg = ~2.5 watts for the same speed, which only applies when climbing. Bike weight matters more when gearing runs out though. I believe these are discussed more in 'Randonneurs should ride fast bikes" and 'You are probably overgeared". Hope you can check them out when you have time. Thanks for the comment!
@@overbikedrandonneuringThank you for the detailed reply. I appreciate different videos are for different topics. Ive gone deep down the rabbit hole in watching various bike videos, in the last few weeks. Im in my 50s and have always biked. Anyways I found your advice one of the best, you find a perfect balance of tech and science whilst also making it digestible for normal non-elites. I was surprised your videos didnt have more views, friendly advice perhaps you need more product and graphics . You know play the game to get the hits. I think people who are flogging fast touring bikes are getting more hits, even thought their content isnt as good as yours. Im constantly amazed that alot of advice I got in the 80s and 90s on biking and training are still as relevant today, albeit now we understand the science behind that advice. Your videos seem to have more depth than many Ive watched, alot of hte others are just pics of peopel eating nice food and talking about htemselves and how great they are, they have lost the wonder and reason behind randoneuring in the first place. I have over a dozen bikes, I never sold any i ever got. Im on he look out for a touring bike that woulddo not only audax rides, but also be a training bike for a semi-urban with some trails environment. Im 100kg 6ft2. Bearing in mind weight of hte bike is important but also has to carry some weight. Any ideas, based in Europe . Good luck with the channel .
@@mickhurley7305 Thank you for the kind words Mick. I wanted to make videos that fill that void in the long distance cycling space. I'd love to have better style and editing, but those demand time, resources, and skills that seem to be in short supply. The vlog style will probably also not be a big part of my future either, but I'll attempt something for my upcoming 600km. I never aim to be a super popular channel, but do hope to serve the randonneuring niche well. It sounds like a touring of modern gravel bike will serve you well. My friends over 100kg who also carry a load tend to prefer heavy duty steel frames, high spoke count wheels, and wider tires (35c for road) since mainstream bikes usually target ~75kg riders and light loads. Are you looking to buy new or second hand?
Good video but In respect to tire size, I run a 40mm under inflated because it's a damn site more comfortable than a 28 which is hard as a rock. Some people find they get on better loosing a few watts for the comfort of larger rubber. For races like the tour divide you're looking at treaded 2.1" 50mm tires.
Cheers, I rank tire choice more important than groupset, frame material, wheels, and pretty much anything in regards to performance. Road conditions and rider+bike weight determine what's best. When I spent some time (a week, 10 days?) on the Tour Divide course in New Mexico, I was on 2.4" WTB and was wishing for a tubeless setup to run lower pressure than I could with tubes. For road riding, my current 28c tires are tubeless and inflate to 30mm. I run 60-65PSI these days. My target ride is 600km in 40 hours, so comfort is really important. I added the Redshift Shockstop system which allows for a really comfy ride and a tire/wheel setup a small step down from that of a pro racer. If you are on rougher roads and/or a bit heavy, you are probably right where you need to be with a 40mm tire and low pressure. You might like my video on riding comfy bikes.
@@overbikedrandonneuring Yea for sure tire choice is definitely of fundamental importance. I'm liking your approach to this channel, it's about time we had a TH-cam version of the ride far website, focused on the niche and pragmatics of what you need to think about as an endurance rider. I'll definitely check out your comfort video!
Sorry to hear that. If you get plenty of mileage in per year, the undercarriage should be tough enough for a 200 if all else is sorted. Undercarriage toughness is quick to disappear after periods of little riding though. Is it problems on one side or both? 1 sided problems point to fit issues. I had issues last year that required a lower saddle height and a cleat spacer on one side which cleared everything up. I've found problems more likely when I am extra heavy too. If the problem is unsolvable, and you want to do randonneuring, consider a recumbent. They are great machines for ultra distance riding. I'll hopefully get a few videos on them made in the winter or next year.
I don't watch personal vlogs, but it seems they have collaborated. A presence in the youtube bubble carries limited value to me, but he has a wealth of professional experience. Looks like the second edition of his book was published, I may need to check it out.
@@philiprayner The very upright position may grow uncomfortable over very long rides due to all the weight on the seat and the necessary shape of a saddle for that position. Producing power for climbs may be harder and there will be a lot of extra wind resistance too. A more forward positioned bike will is a better tool for the covering long distances in a certain time frame. If those riding positions are problematic, some recumbent bikes are also good choices if set up well and give no back, shoulder, or hand pain.
You really lost me when you said we just need two groups - carbon or metal. Tubing, Ti and weight all within the metal category alone, can have huge impact on how your bike performs. I know this is an intro video, but can’t really just gloss over the variables here.
Having owned bikes of all 4 materials, I think mine is a fair take. Bike people seem emotionally attached to their metal of choice though. Metal tube (Al, Ti, Steel of various alloys) diameter, shaping, and thickness can be manipulated to achieve a desired ride quality through target stiffness while maintaining adequate durability. Your contention, which I agree with, is about how the bikes are designed, which is no fault of the metal category itself. Metals' characteristics do support particular wall thickness x diameters, which impacts weight, but do not demand specific qualities of a frame. Metals used in bike frames are more similar to each other than any of them are to carbon. This is largely due to having a similar specific modulus and somewhat similar specific strength despite different density. Steel is dense, which limits it to narrow diameter tubing to maintain adequate wall thickness, which should in turn result in the need for relatively more mass to reach stiffness targets of performance bikes. Classic horizontal top tube aesthetic common with steel bikes exacerbate steel's restrictions by making the frame triangles larger than needed. The requisite narrow tubing of steel with such a design results in higher frame weights and lower stiffness. Being noodly and heavy isn't required of steel though. The constraints explain the value of premium tube sets and butting that can minimize wall thickness and maximize diameter, and the role of custom builders who care for performance over aesthetics. Custom frames with compact geometry like those of English Cycles commonly come in around 1400g for disc brakes, and are reported to ride like modern bikes. Aluminum being less dense allows the use of large diameter tubing with adequate wall thickness to achieve target stiffnesses. This is best expressed only on the downtube and BB though, so that advantage is limited in practice. Only a few performance bikes like those from Low Bicycles have massive down tubes to use this material advantage, with the MK Disc at 1400g. Rather than aiming for the lowest possible weight, most aluminum bikes compromise with moderate diameter tubes and a bit more wall thickness to increase durability. The result is that common aluminum frames will have only a minor improvement in stiffness/weight over common steel, but are still built rather durably. Titanium is in the middle for density, so the compromises of steel and aluminum are balanced. The difference is still minimal though. With another optimized modern metal road bike, the Litespeed Ultimate at 1300g, we can see a pattern. The best designed metal road bikes end up about the same weight because the specific modulus and specific strengths require them to, so long as designers have optimized the tube choices around the material properties.
The drawbacks you talk about with tire width are minimal compared to actual efficiency and speed. When compared to comfort and how your body performs after a full day on the bike. Then all metals being the same. SMH you have no clue there guy.
Hi Alex, I'm not sure of your cycling experience of if you drink the BQ tea, but metal bikes can all be designed to give roughly equal riding characteristics with modern butting techniques and tubing choice. The quality of a metal bike's ride is dependent on design much more than material. Tendencies for steel bikes to use narrow tubing do result in noodly BBs sometimes, just like how supersize aluminum tubes make over-stiff bikes, but that is down to design and not a requirement of the metal being used. Have you owned somewhat modern bikes from all these materials? WRT tires, there will be some aero penalty to wider tires. Hambini suggests 1-5 watts at 30kph for 2mm increase in road tire size depending on wheel choice, while Swiss Side shows 3.6w increase at 30 kph on +10mm gravel tires. Not back breaking, but a possible inefficiency to eliminate. For rolling resistance, tire construction is more important than tire width, but truly fast tires with suitable tread thickness are just not available above 32c size right now. See www.bicyclerollingresistance.com/specials/grand-prix-5000-comparison which shows how when normalized for comfort, wider tires are merely as fast as the same tire in a more narrow size. Thus, if you can achieve the comfort and grip you want with a low risk of pinch flats or rim impact with a narrow tire, there is no advantage to a wider tire. Adding more comfort via suspension stem and seatpost like I reviewed in my most recent video allows for speed optimized tire pressure to be used, and potentially a more narrow tire while keeping the body as fresh as possible. Let me know if you would like more resources on these topics or have any questions.
Just the statement that all metals offer the same ride experience shows me you don't have much experience with metal bikes. Different steel quality with the same tude size rides completely different. Titanium is a whole separate discussion. Aluminum is stiff and buzzy no matter the tube thickness but it has gotten slightly better with unique tube shape, still feel more vibration that steel ot Titanium though. My argument about tire size is based around your body's ability to handle the punishment of a long ride. The benefits from added compliance from larger tires far outweighs any negatives. When on a rando ride you are loaded and already less areo so any aero argument is silly. Also aero matters more closer to 20mph and most rando riders aren't consistently rolling at 20 for long periods of time. Being loaded means to overall weight penalty of a few grams is less than 0.1% of total rig weight so, not really a factor. It is rotational mass but if I'm comfortable at 600km then I'm stronger through the whole ride. Roadies put out most of this data and they don't ride like a rsndonneur.
@@alexhelling4128 Comfort is a big factor, but so is energy output, rest time, proper fueling, and sleep. Riding a fast, efficient bike improves success in these areas. Tires are not the only avenue for comfort either. That is basically the ethos of my TH-cam channel and what I hope to explore more. Maybe other videos of mine would explain this better. My experience is that American and Canadian randonneurs prefer heavily laden touring type bikes and place less value on the efficiency of their machines. That's how I started randonneuring too as I was naturally influenced by American perspectives. Here in Korea, local riders almost exclusively ride road bikes and carry lighter loads which led me to reevaluate what really is best practice. Aerodynamic losses always happen and add up over 15+ hours no matter your speed. Ignoring them is silly. With a faster bike and aerodynamic management of carried items, you will spend far more time near 20 MPH even at the low power we randonneurs produce. I'll make it a point to make a video on bike bags soon. I agree that component weight is the least important factor, but a change in mindset could drop 10 pounds or more from total equipment weight based on randonneurs I know. Of course equal size tubing won't be the same across alloys. Adjust the tube diameter and thickness to your chosen alloy characteristics. Use butting. It's not magic.
I'm strongly influenced buy bicycle travel like @ultraromane, Jan Heine and, path less pedaled. To give some perspective of my POV, Definitely not "mainstream" thinking. I do travel as light as possible too. My biggest issue is well me, I'm about 100kg without much extra. I drop to maybe 95kg at the end of a longer tour or rando ride. I also live and ride through some ROUGH terrain often. So, I need some compliance or my laundry list of injuries make riding impossible. My philosophy is ride high quality steel and quality tubeless tires that are a minimum of 38 work best for me, usually 650b x 47.?? Are my favorite in the low 30psi range. Keeping to overall package as light as comfortably possible is a huge factor to ride quality in any ride. I've found on my 80km+ rides I'm faster overall on a steel bike with 650b x 47 than a carbon 700c x 32. After about the 50km mark I slow down because I'm uncomfortable. The gains seen over 400km or 1000km are astronomical. Ask yourself who sponsored the study you are looking at. Usually when it's hyping up carbon and skinny tires it's someone who benifit from you buying a new carbon bike. And skinny tires mean higher PSI so faster tire wear and more damaged rims. We haven't even gotten into traveling with a bike, boxing and flying with a bike, or repairing damaged frames. Ask yourself if you are being led by the bike industry and marketing. Because the average rider just getting into randonneuring would benifit much more from comfort. I'm over racing and that's a huge reason randonneuring appeals to me more than gravel or bikepacking races. We agree that a big part of that is not carrying so much stuff but it appears that's all we agree on. We have very different philosophies on riding and that's what makes our sport so amazing. So many different ways to enjoy the experience. Hopefully, some day we are at the same brevet and can ride together for a bit while discussing this issue.
@@alexhelling4128 I get where you are coming from. Would be great to compare and contrast on a ride. As I mentioned in the video, heavy rider on rough surfaces will probably want 35c or larger tires, and that sounds exactly like what you do. Check out the Redshift Shockstop or similar products if you need more comfort. FWIW, I usually ride and buy metal bikes even if carbon is more comfortable and light. That's a balance for each rider to choose, and price plus impact resistance of metal is a safe choice for me. But I often swap back and forth. Next bike is likely carbon. My background is in marketing (BA) and my current work is in education (M.Ed). When I was teaching at university, a major part of my work was preparing students to analyze academic work for quality and bias. As such, I take a critical lens towards published works, and skepticism towards commercial works. I attempt to find trends before presenting information. For each source you see in my videos, there a few more agreeing sources not mentioned if that information is available. I hope to synthesize good info and put aside that chaff. I also love the work Russ does at PLP, but he does his best work when he stays away from technical issues. His mindset is a valuable one in the bike media space, but not fully applicable to randonneuring. Jan helped develop this middle ground between pure racing and MTB, but BQ is a classic example of content marketing (i.e. The Furrow by John Deere, Jello Recipe books). It carries a strong bias towards his products and uses a wide range of fallacy, appeals to cognitive bias, and tests designed to support his products like good content marketing does, so readers should use caution. He's built a community, aesthetic, and belief system around it, so it seems to have worked well. Nothing wrong with that, but something to be aware of. Happy trails!
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The ability to add fenders is very considerate when you're riding with others in a group in the rain. Also mount points for (extra) bottles or racks are always a plus.
Those are nice to have, but luckily can be worked around pretty easily for frames lacking mounts these days. Lots of decent temporary mud guard options if local climate doesn't require them year round. Racks too, although soft bikepacking seatpost bags are enough for most brevets. Best placement of the 3rd bottle has been interesting to consider: aero bars, under the downtube, behind the seat, jersey pocket, hydration backpack, or use 2 massive bottles. Options for these today are much better and more accessible than when I started.
I've been reading about randonneuring, and the first consideration I keep hearing about is comfort. People have successfully ridden PBP on Dutch commuter bikes, but everyone rode in the saddle for many, many hours. All day comfort is critical.
That includes taking pressure off the hands to prevent numbness as the hours roll by.
So I'd recommend a recumbent. While it's true they're inferior to a conventional bike because they can't be raced in IUC events, it's also true that randonneuring is neither racing nor IUC regulated.
And you can't beat the comfort after a dozen hours on the road.
I found a Rans Tailwind with 37-451 tires. Now I just need time to ride.
Hi Claude, recumbent bikes can be good choices for randonneuring for some people. The faster ones are preferable. We have a local group of Brompton Randonneurs proving anything is possible. For me, I have over 13,000km on recumbents with many of those from brevets up to 600km. I have a good one on hand now, but it is not built. My local riding conditions make an upright bike a much better choice. Rather than comfort, I prefer 'sustainability' as the key term for success rather than comfort. Aiming for comfort will guarantee disappointment on recumbents and uprights. For an upright bike, months and years of training build higher levels of sustainability. Recumbents shortcut that to an extent, but then so do aero bars on an upright. Good luck with your training and I hope you enjoy your time on the Rans. Are you targeting a brevet this year?
@@overbikedrandonneuring
Right now I'm targeting 50 miles in one ride. I've never been a long distance rider and have to break the habit of going full out all the time.But I live in the San Diego area, which has a wealth of permanents to practice on.
Unfortunately I only have Sundays free right now, and life consumes most of those. I kind of miss being young and having long hours to fill.
Yes, but also no.
I have an optima Baron lowracer, which I have taken on a few brevets. While it is very comfortable, I find hauling extra gear to be a hassle on my recumbent. There just no good place to put it. On my baron, I have drilled holes into the seat to attach water bottle cages. On on the boom, I have a bag for two tubes, tools, and CO2 cartridges. Good enough usually for a day with steady weather and temperatures. But if it gets cold, rains, or goes into dark, this is where my Baron has issues. It's also horrible on gravel roads. All bumps and chipseal vibrations go straight to my eyeballs.
In the rain, I cannot look down riding my recumbent. My seat angle has my head position look out and up. If it rain, yeah, it's close as I can get to being waterboarded.
With a traditional bike, I have more places to put more gear, and my body absorbs chipseal and gravel roads bumps . Rain is usually no issue, and I can store rain gear and look down. Not fun, but I can ride easier in the rain.
My uses for each usually depend on weather and road conditions.
@@timbazzinett2693
I think a Tour Easy is about the best thing for that kind of ride. Not having one, my favorite ride is a BikeE AT, with rear suspension. The front is so lightly loaded that I hardly feel the bumps and the rear shock takes care of the back end.
I just turned 62. I don't think I'd like craning my neck either up or down.
Gear can go in a pack behind the seat.
Helpful, informative and easy understanding! 100% agree with you 👍
Really great content. Informative, easy to understand and well presented. Thanks!
Thanks you very much, I hope to you found it helpful. Looks like you are well set with your Lynskey. Happy riding!
Few riders will ever generate enough speed to make wheel aerodynamics or wheel weight real issues. Far more important is rider comfort and the wider the tire, the lower the PSI is required. At lower pressures, the road vibration problem is much reduced. For serious rando rides, the widest and the most supple tire that the frame can accept should be used. Some of the rider doing PBP were using 42-48mm width tires. What you want is an enjoyable ride, not a survival experience.
Randonneuring can be completed on most any human powered vehicle. PBP looks to be a course with mild, rolling terrain, so Ellipti-Gos, kick board bikes, cargo bikes, and recumbent tricycles are fair play there, as are balloon tires. That doesn't mean they are best practice.
My goal with this channel is to explore the best possible setup and strategies for a maximum probability of success. That absolutely includes comfort, but small efficiencies over 20+ hours of riding add up too. These are measurable benefits, even at our speeds, no matter how hard some retro lifestyle brands deny it.
Less effort at a given speed means less fatigue, in a similar way fatigue is reduced by being insulated from vibration. More time saved from a quick setup means more sleep and safer cycling. Great comfort and high efficiency must both be pursued to this end. You may enjoy the companion videos to this one "Comfort = Improved Endurance Performance", "Sleep Strategies for the Randonneur", or my reviews for comfort components from Redshift and Vecnum.
As a recovering ultra-endurance cyclist, I strongly recommend building your rig around the widest and lightest super supple tubeless tires that you can find. At the lower speeds of endurance riding, the comfort benefits of deep sidewalls and lower pressures far offset any aero penalty even 48 mm tires may exact, especially considering the width of many carbon frames these days. The weight penalty is minimal, and the rolling resistance is possibly easier. The greatest obstacle is aesthetic, as such wide tires offend the traditions of road cyclists to an extreme. There are offerings from Rene Herse and Ultradynamico that are simply outstanding, and make even chip-and-seal roads delightful! I dare you to try them!
@@jamesrosar3823 Cheers, and thanks for the comment. I also think tires should be prioritized, but see it a bit differently. The various penalties of too large a tire and too low pressure are real and add up over hours and days. Instead, I support using the fastest tire for a given condition, weight, and average speed that is practical. It only needs to be wide enough to offer access to the pressure needed for ideal hoop stress for a condition.
Decoupling rider comfort from the tire through minimalists suspension (Vecnum Stem, Redshift Shockstop Pro Seatpost is my current preference) allows for ~30-35mm tubeless tires with superior construction and performance to that of rebranded Panaracer choices. Ideal pressure for tubeless tires in the range will still be rather low. I am at ~57 PSI in a 33mm tire. Bike rides like a magic carpet.
For what it's worth, I was using Rivendell Jack Brown Green tires 10 years ago since the RH markup is ludicrous. Panaracer makes pretty mid tires.
As @philhouck3560 wrote above, I quite agree with. The use of steel wheels on steel rails is maximally efficient, but neither of us would recommend that approach as actual roads and trails are much rougher. Indeed, in an ultra event, comfort and its preservation become paramount. At the turn of the prior century when solid rubber was the only tire available, there was a great deal of invention regarding means of suspension. Once the pneumatic tire became available, all of those tricks were outmoded, for their weight, expense, complexity and maintenance. I admit that I do use and enjoy a Cane Creek eeSilk seatpost, as it lets me enjoy a very smooth ride while having a proper 32 psi in my rear tire. When you say that your bike rides like a ‘magic carpet’, I have to ask: compared to what? I have 33 mm tires of similar construction to my 48s, and the sensation they deliver is nowhere near as delicious! The much larger contact patch diffuses specific irregularities, and the super suppleness makes conforming to these irregularities very elastic and efficient. I don’t see the trade-offs offsetting the comfort bonus, even if they do exist, which I contest. And what does optimizing “hoop stress” have to do with properly engineered tires and rims?
@@jamesrosar3823 Hoop stress is a measurement of the outward pressure of a whole tire. Tire diameter, thickness, and internal pressure are the key variables to calculate hoop stress. In an abstract way, you can think of hoop stress as "pressure relative to width". It is likely one of the core measurements used to develop tire pressure calculators used by Silca, SRAM, and Rene Herse.
If you take 2 tires of equal construction, one wider than the other, and set them to equal pressure, the wide tire will have a higher hoop stress than the narrow one. As a result, the wide tire will ride more harshly. My 33mm GP5000S tires at 57PSI should have the same hoop stress as your 48mm tires at 39PSI if they were constructed the same. Equal hoop stress is theorized to result in roughly equal comfort, but I've not seen public testing to validate this. I hope to test it myself using my vibration test protocol. I expect wider tires to offer a small, but measurable advantage above simple hoop stress equivalence, but time will tell.
The wider tire at same PSI but higher hoop stress will also perform faster in rolling resistance tests on smooth tarmac or laboratory drums, as shown by Bicycle Rolling Resistance. This effect could be used to falsely portray wider tires as faster rolling.
When set to equal hoop stress, they will roll roughly the same, also shown by Bicycle Rolling Resistance tests.
Hoop stress can be seen as narrow tires have higher max pressures than wide tires too. It takes more nominal pressure to blow them off a rim, but blowoffs will occur at more similar levels of hoop stress as wider counterparts.
All useful info. Thanks. I once watched an interview with Kristoff Allegaerts and he said that for endurance riding (which meant racing to him) the bike should be like a sofa. It was this he said was the key to him winning long.endurance races races like RAAM and IndyPAC.
Cheers, Kristoff is a monster rider. The more I ride, the more those words ring true.
Scott Speedster is a great Randonneur all rounder. Throw on 28c tires disc break version is almost perfect for. Anything.
The new Speedster 10 is a good looking bike with a lot of positive characteristics in geometry, standards, and general design. Be mindful of the cost savings taken by Scott when cross shopping. Both the Merida Scultura Endurance 400 and Giant Contend AR 1 offer carbon seatposts, while the Merida also has the real 105 crankset. At Tiagra levels, Merida offers hydraulic brakes while Giant offers a carbon seatpost. The best financial choice would depend on local prices and dealer support. I would be happy to ride on any of these bikes for a very long time with a set of fast tires.
Just got a second hand one of these and I am very very happy with it. So far I'm just doing daily training so no long distance rides yet - but I think it will work well for that when I get my own endurance up a bit.
nowadays endurance bike geometry is closer to road. Not sure if there are pure endurance bikes anymore. Gravel bike geometry seem to be closer to endurance ones. This is purely on geometry perspective.
I agree, new Endurace, Addict SE, and Defy are nearly race bikes. Domane and Roubaix still have endurance geo at least. Maybe a 2024 buyers guide would be useful.
I think it is just a way trying to justify the cost. But you have got to start from the basic geometry of endurance, then add more fancy things and ask for more money. I am currently trying to build one up from different parts since they are not available in one place, like gravel cranks and mountain cassettes to proper geometry. Cant go electronic because cannot swap parts. Kind of frustrating.
Very helpful and informative
Thank you Matthew, I am glad you think so.
Excellent coverage, I enjoyed your videos. Glad I found this channel.
Must say though I thought you could have brought some items you mentioned in your video about the effect of weight on randoneuring into this video also.
For instance when discussing group set you never mentioned drive chain efficeincy. Its a minor thing. Excellent advice allround.
Thank you Mick, I hope this was useful for you. Those 2 factors are relevant to randonneuring performance, but not so much when buying a new bike. Chain efficiency is determined more by lubrication choices and maintenance habits than groupset choice. Zero Friction Cycling found tiny differences in chain performance, except for poor performing high end SRAM chains. Bike weight is determined mostly by budget, and I don't want to encourage folks to overspend for insignificant gains. Modeling shows the kilogram or so difference between bikes at a given price point doesn't affect time or effort much. I use 100kg as shorthand measurement for my system weight, so 1 kg is 1% of total weight. Climbing steeply at 250 watts, 1 kg = ~2.5 watts for the same speed, which only applies when climbing. Bike weight matters more when gearing runs out though. I believe these are discussed more in 'Randonneurs should ride fast bikes" and 'You are probably overgeared". Hope you can check them out when you have time. Thanks for the comment!
@@overbikedrandonneuringThank you for the detailed reply. I appreciate different videos are for different topics. Ive gone deep down the rabbit hole in watching various bike videos, in the last few weeks. Im in my 50s and have always biked. Anyways I found your advice one of the best, you find a perfect balance of tech and science whilst also making it digestible for normal non-elites. I was surprised your videos didnt have more views, friendly advice perhaps you need more product and graphics . You know play the game to get the hits. I think people who are flogging fast touring bikes are getting more hits, even thought their content isnt as good as yours. Im constantly amazed that alot of advice I got in the 80s and 90s on biking and training are still as relevant today, albeit now we understand the science behind that advice. Your videos seem to have more depth than many Ive watched, alot of hte others are just pics of peopel eating nice food and talking about htemselves and how great they are, they have lost the wonder and reason behind randoneuring in the first place. I have over a dozen bikes, I never sold any i ever got. Im on he look out for a touring bike that woulddo not only audax rides, but also be a training bike for a semi-urban with some trails environment. Im 100kg 6ft2. Bearing in mind weight of hte bike is important but also has to carry some weight. Any ideas, based in Europe . Good luck with the channel .
@@mickhurley7305 Thank you for the kind words Mick. I wanted to make videos that fill that void in the long distance cycling space. I'd love to have better style and editing, but those demand time, resources, and skills that seem to be in short supply. The vlog style will probably also not be a big part of my future either, but I'll attempt something for my upcoming 600km. I never aim to be a super popular channel, but do hope to serve the randonneuring niche well. It sounds like a touring of modern gravel bike will serve you well. My friends over 100kg who also carry a load tend to prefer heavy duty steel frames, high spoke count wheels, and wider tires (35c for road) since mainstream bikes usually target ~75kg riders and light loads. Are you looking to buy new or second hand?
Good video but In respect to tire size, I run a 40mm under inflated because it's a damn site more comfortable than a 28 which is hard as a rock.
Some people find they get on better loosing a few watts for the comfort of larger rubber.
For races like the tour divide you're looking at treaded 2.1" 50mm tires.
Cheers, I rank tire choice more important than groupset, frame material, wheels, and pretty much anything in regards to performance. Road conditions and rider+bike weight determine what's best. When I spent some time (a week, 10 days?) on the Tour Divide course in New Mexico, I was on 2.4" WTB and was wishing for a tubeless setup to run lower pressure than I could with tubes. For road riding, my current 28c tires are tubeless and inflate to 30mm. I run 60-65PSI these days. My target ride is 600km in 40 hours, so comfort is really important. I added the Redshift Shockstop system which allows for a really comfy ride and a tire/wheel setup a small step down from that of a pro racer. If you are on rougher roads and/or a bit heavy, you are probably right where you need to be with a 40mm tire and low pressure. You might like my video on riding comfy bikes.
@@overbikedrandonneuring Yea for sure tire choice is definitely of fundamental importance.
I'm liking your approach to this channel, it's about time we had a TH-cam version of the ride far website, focused on the niche and pragmatics of what you need to think about as an endurance rider.
I'll definitely check out your comfort video!
Just found your channel awesome
Thanks! I hope you find it useful.
@@overbikedrandonneuring absolutely
I can't ride more than 200km (8 hours) without destroying my undercarriage. No combination of chamois, cremes, bike fit seem to help.
Sorry to hear that. If you get plenty of mileage in per year, the undercarriage should be tough enough for a 200 if all else is sorted. Undercarriage toughness is quick to disappear after periods of little riding though. Is it problems on one side or both? 1 sided problems point to fit issues. I had issues last year that required a lower saddle height and a cleat spacer on one side which cleared everything up. I've found problems more likely when I am extra heavy too. If the problem is unsolvable, and you want to do randonneuring, consider a recumbent. They are great machines for ultra distance riding. I'll hopefully get a few videos on them made in the winter or next year.
good job
Isn’t Phil Burt the guy that pays Katie Kookaburra for the occasional bike fit related infomercial?
I don't watch personal vlogs, but it seems they have collaborated. A presence in the youtube bubble carries limited value to me, but he has a wealth of professional experience. Looks like the second edition of his book was published, I may need to check it out.
how about a cruiser bike with upgraded gearing ?
Do you mean like a beach cruiser, similar to a Dutch town bike?
@@overbikedrandonneuring yes like a townie if you upgraded from the 9 speed to a three by front and a larger gearing on the back
@@philiprayner The very upright position may grow uncomfortable over very long rides due to all the weight on the seat and the necessary shape of a saddle for that position. Producing power for climbs may be harder and there will be a lot of extra wind resistance too. A more forward positioned bike will is a better tool for the covering long distances in a certain time frame. If those riding positions are problematic, some recumbent bikes are also good choices if set up well and give no back, shoulder, or hand pain.
You really lost me when you said we just need two groups - carbon or metal. Tubing, Ti and weight all within the metal category alone, can have huge impact on how your bike performs. I know this is an intro video, but can’t really just gloss over the variables here.
Having owned bikes of all 4 materials, I think mine is a fair take. Bike people seem emotionally attached to their metal of choice though. Metal tube (Al, Ti, Steel of various alloys) diameter, shaping, and thickness can be manipulated to achieve a desired ride quality through target stiffness while maintaining adequate durability. Your contention, which I agree with, is about how the bikes are designed, which is no fault of the metal category itself. Metals' characteristics do support particular wall thickness x diameters, which impacts weight, but do not demand specific qualities of a frame. Metals used in bike frames are more similar to each other than any of them are to carbon. This is largely due to having a similar specific modulus and somewhat similar specific strength despite different density.
Steel is dense, which limits it to narrow diameter tubing to maintain adequate wall thickness, which should in turn result in the need for relatively more mass to reach stiffness targets of performance bikes. Classic horizontal top tube aesthetic common with steel bikes exacerbate steel's restrictions by making the frame triangles larger than needed. The requisite narrow tubing of steel with such a design results in higher frame weights and lower stiffness. Being noodly and heavy isn't required of steel though. The constraints explain the value of premium tube sets and butting that can minimize wall thickness and maximize diameter, and the role of custom builders who care for performance over aesthetics. Custom frames with compact geometry like those of English Cycles commonly come in around 1400g for disc brakes, and are reported to ride like modern bikes.
Aluminum being less dense allows the use of large diameter tubing with adequate wall thickness to achieve target stiffnesses. This is best expressed only on the downtube and BB though, so that advantage is limited in practice. Only a few performance bikes like those from Low Bicycles have massive down tubes to use this material advantage, with the MK Disc at 1400g. Rather than aiming for the lowest possible weight, most aluminum bikes compromise with moderate diameter tubes and a bit more wall thickness to increase durability. The result is that common aluminum frames will have only a minor improvement in stiffness/weight over common steel, but are still built rather durably.
Titanium is in the middle for density, so the compromises of steel and aluminum are balanced. The difference is still minimal though. With another optimized modern metal road bike, the Litespeed Ultimate at 1300g, we can see a pattern.
The best designed metal road bikes end up about the same weight because the specific modulus and specific strengths require them to, so long as designers have optimized the tube choices around the material properties.
The drawbacks you talk about with tire width are minimal compared to actual efficiency and speed. When compared to comfort and how your body performs after a full day on the bike. Then all metals being the same. SMH you have no clue there guy.
Hi Alex, I'm not sure of your cycling experience of if you drink the BQ tea, but metal bikes can all be designed to give roughly equal riding characteristics with modern butting techniques and tubing choice. The quality of a metal bike's ride is dependent on design much more than material. Tendencies for steel bikes to use narrow tubing do result in noodly BBs sometimes, just like how supersize aluminum tubes make over-stiff bikes, but that is down to design and not a requirement of the metal being used. Have you owned somewhat modern bikes from all these materials? WRT tires, there will be some aero penalty to wider tires. Hambini suggests 1-5 watts at 30kph for 2mm increase in road tire size depending on wheel choice, while Swiss Side shows 3.6w increase at 30 kph on +10mm gravel tires. Not back breaking, but a possible inefficiency to eliminate. For rolling resistance, tire construction is more important than tire width, but truly fast tires with suitable tread thickness are just not available above 32c size right now. See www.bicyclerollingresistance.com/specials/grand-prix-5000-comparison which shows how when normalized for comfort, wider tires are merely as fast as the same tire in a more narrow size. Thus, if you can achieve the comfort and grip you want with a low risk of pinch flats or rim impact with a narrow tire, there is no advantage to a wider tire. Adding more comfort via suspension stem and seatpost like I reviewed in my most recent video allows for speed optimized tire pressure to be used, and potentially a more narrow tire while keeping the body as fresh as possible. Let me know if you would like more resources on these topics or have any questions.
Just the statement that all metals offer the same ride experience shows me you don't have much experience with metal bikes. Different steel quality with the same tude size rides completely different. Titanium is a whole separate discussion. Aluminum is stiff and buzzy no matter the tube thickness but it has gotten slightly better with unique tube shape, still feel more vibration that steel ot Titanium though.
My argument about tire size is based around your body's ability to handle the punishment of a long ride. The benefits from added compliance from larger tires far outweighs any negatives. When on a rando ride you are loaded and already less areo so any aero argument is silly. Also aero matters more closer to 20mph and most rando riders aren't consistently rolling at 20 for long periods of time. Being loaded means to overall weight penalty of a few grams is less than 0.1% of total rig weight so, not really a factor. It is rotational mass but if I'm comfortable at 600km then I'm stronger through the whole ride.
Roadies put out most of this data and they don't ride like a rsndonneur.
@@alexhelling4128
Comfort is a big factor, but so is energy output, rest time, proper fueling, and sleep. Riding a fast, efficient bike improves success in these areas. Tires are not the only avenue for comfort either. That is basically the ethos of my TH-cam channel and what I hope to explore more. Maybe other videos of mine would explain this better.
My experience is that American and Canadian randonneurs prefer heavily laden touring type bikes and place less value on the efficiency of their machines. That's how I started randonneuring too as I was naturally influenced by American perspectives. Here in Korea, local riders almost exclusively ride road bikes and carry lighter loads which led me to reevaluate what really is best practice.
Aerodynamic losses always happen and add up over 15+ hours no matter your speed. Ignoring them is silly. With a faster bike and aerodynamic management of carried items, you will spend far more time near 20 MPH even at the low power we randonneurs produce. I'll make it a point to make a video on bike bags soon. I agree that component weight is the least important factor, but a change in mindset could drop 10 pounds or more from total equipment weight based on randonneurs I know.
Of course equal size tubing won't be the same across alloys. Adjust the tube diameter and thickness to your chosen alloy characteristics. Use butting. It's not magic.
I'm strongly influenced buy bicycle travel like @ultraromane, Jan Heine and, path less pedaled. To give some perspective of my POV, Definitely not "mainstream" thinking. I do travel as light as possible too. My biggest issue is well me, I'm about 100kg without much extra. I drop to maybe 95kg at the end of a longer tour or rando ride. I also live and ride through some ROUGH terrain often. So, I need some compliance or my laundry list of injuries make riding impossible.
My philosophy is ride high quality steel and quality tubeless tires that are a minimum of 38 work best for me, usually 650b x 47.?? Are my favorite in the low 30psi range. Keeping to overall package as light as comfortably possible is a huge factor to ride quality in any ride. I've found on my 80km+ rides I'm faster overall on a steel bike with 650b x 47 than a carbon 700c x 32. After about the 50km mark I slow down because I'm uncomfortable. The gains seen over 400km or 1000km are astronomical.
Ask yourself who sponsored the study you are looking at. Usually when it's hyping up carbon and skinny tires it's someone who benifit from you buying a new carbon bike. And skinny tires mean higher PSI so faster tire wear and more damaged rims. We haven't even gotten into traveling with a bike, boxing and flying with a bike, or repairing damaged frames. Ask yourself if you are being led by the bike industry and marketing. Because the average rider just getting into randonneuring would benifit much more from comfort. I'm over racing and that's a huge reason randonneuring appeals to me more than gravel or bikepacking races. We agree that a big part of that is not carrying so much stuff but it appears that's all we agree on.
We have very different philosophies on riding and that's what makes our sport so amazing. So many different ways to enjoy the experience. Hopefully, some day we are at the same brevet and can ride together for a bit while discussing this issue.
@@alexhelling4128 I get where you are coming from. Would be great to compare and contrast on a ride. As I mentioned in the video, heavy rider on rough surfaces will probably want 35c or larger tires, and that sounds exactly like what you do. Check out the Redshift Shockstop or similar products if you need more comfort.
FWIW, I usually ride and buy metal bikes even if carbon is more comfortable and light. That's a balance for each rider to choose, and price plus impact resistance of metal is a safe choice for me. But I often swap back and forth. Next bike is likely carbon.
My background is in marketing (BA) and my current work is in education (M.Ed). When I was teaching at university, a major part of my work was preparing students to analyze academic work for quality and bias. As such, I take a critical lens towards published works, and skepticism towards commercial works. I attempt to find trends before presenting information. For each source you see in my videos, there a few more agreeing sources not mentioned if that information is available. I hope to synthesize good info and put aside that chaff.
I also love the work Russ does at PLP, but he does his best work when he stays away from technical issues. His mindset is a valuable one in the bike media space, but not fully applicable to randonneuring. Jan helped develop this middle ground between pure racing and MTB, but BQ is a classic example of content marketing (i.e. The Furrow by John Deere, Jello Recipe books). It carries a strong bias towards his products and uses a wide range of fallacy, appeals to cognitive bias, and tests designed to support his products like good content marketing does, so readers should use caution. He's built a community, aesthetic, and belief system around it, so it seems to have worked well. Nothing wrong with that, but something to be aware of. Happy trails!