Evening Ride before an All-Day Ride

After a light rain of and on the last couple days it got fairly clear last night, and with the cool air, I just had to take a small ride. From my place I headed down to Skunk River Cycles to see what they had for bike shorts. I also thought I'd better check on the gel selections. Since I rode the Surly down there, I had them check my Der. I couldn't quite figure out what's wrong. I think the big problem is I need a Single Speed front chainring. But I think having them straighten the hanger (one tool I don't have) helped a little. I might just have to adjust my chainguide to make sure the chain doesn't slide off when in the tallest gear. After Skunk River I took off to Ada Hayden, trying to take it easy and enjoy the evening. Probably road for a couple hours, maybe 20 miles or so.

I am trying to ready myself for a long day of riding tomorrow. Paul has a pretty good route picked out again, most of which I rode last time I ventured out to the county roads of Iowa. Luckily I also got a new tire, a Ritchey Speedmax Pro. So new gear, and loads of Power Bars, and various energy gels should leave me no excuse for goin riding tomorrow. Weather looks warm, but probably will catch some light rain. After various spouts of rain this last week, it'll be interesting to see what the gravel is like. I think one of main problems is figuring out what to wear. Since they're starting so early, 6am! I'm not sure what the weather will be like. I'm thinking of wearing shorts, a jacket, a couple gloves and socks. But it'll be very difficult to figure out the right mixture of those. Hopefully I can figure out how to pack it all into my camelback. I bought a big thing of gatorade, maybe I'll throw that in my camelback. Anyway, it's fun learning how to set it all up. Hopefully I make it:)