WRIAD looms large

Last weekend was a bike build in the rain.  Today is raining again and I spent quite a bit of time packing, organizing drink mix bottles, etc.  Rain seems to be a curse laid on the weekends making long training rides difficult.  Sigh.  The bike still has not been ridden due to a stripped bolt in the crank spider.  That concerns me a bit as I wanted to burn the bike in better than that before heading out into the near-unknown.  Oh my.

With the parts on the way, I grabbed the Carve SS Pro and clicked off some laps in the local hills to the tune of 5 hours and 40 miles with maybe 5K' of gain over that.  I felt good enough at the end to do one or two more laps with no real suffering and then a couple more if I wanted to walk the steeps so I think I am decent shape.  Gotta love the cruel training partner that singlespeeds are.  They make you strong.  I do kind of wish that I was taking it to Moab, but it makes more sense to first-time it with gears and full squish.  Maybe next time?

SO...the parts should be here by Monday.  Then I can finish the bike and get it out for a couple of rides so things shake loose and settle in.  One good thing is that all the parts are proven.  Nothing is truly new except chains and such so that is in my favor.  If I cannot get it working well enough to be happy with, I will grab the Camber and use it.  Heavier, but proven in battle.  Hopefully though, I will be riding this:

I think I can get everything in the awesome Osprey Talon 22.  The new Escapist 30 would have been even better, but I shipped that to Guitar Ted to play with.  I will be carrying 2 100oz reservoirs and 4 bottles at the beginning.  Then, I will mix bottles of Fluid Performance mix and Clif Shot mix as I go along from one of the reservoirs.  The other reservoir will be pure water.  I also have Elete drops and Endurolytes to go along with all that.  It looks like temps could be into the high 70s.  Too bad.  I would have preferred temps in the high 60s to low 70s but there is no call for rain or wind, so I will take what I can get.

Besides the water and mix, I have an emergency bivy (fancy space blanket), a bike light for the first two hours of the ride (and in case something goes wrong and the day turns to night), 2 tubes, chain lube in a tiny sample bottle, the GPS, printed map, real food and trail food, sunscreen, and the dear to my heart iPod Shuffle.  Of course all the normal tools, pump(s), first aid kit, clothing as needed and a song in my heart.

That ought to do.

We are going to break up the drive by overnighting in St George.  That will get us into Moab in daylight with time to shop, grab dinner, cache some water at the park entrance if we care to and head out to camp at the bottom of the Mineral Bottom switchbacks.  It seems that the best way to do this is clockwise, getting the first climb and long dirt road/paved road section out of the way in the dark.

Then, we pay our money and take our chances.