Joe Appa 35 miler ride report: Thumbs up!

[Bill Lindsay]

My ride to the office is ~35 miles and ~3000ft of climbing along the crest of the East Bay Hills, El Cerrito to Castro Valley and down through Hayward to Union City.  I used my 55cm Joe Appaloosa for the ride today, and it was delightful.  It was probably my longest ride ever not using drop bars.  It also was probably the longest ride of the last 35 years on 170mm cranks.  I'm a 172.5mm zealot, and I can feel the difference.  I'm not going to claim that 170s ruin my knees or anything like that but I definitely can tell they aren't 172.5mm arms (or is it my imagination?).  

I'm super pumped about my current front load setup.  It's centered on a Nitto Big Front Rack, a Wald Huge front basket, a large Sackville Shop sack, and a pair of rear Sackville Backabike panniers.  The rears fit on the Big Front Rack like they were custom made for it.  I didn't carry a ton of stuff, but I did carry my change of clothes, laptop and some documents for work.  Too bad Riv is out of stock on the backabike bags, because that's a sweet setup.  

No extra charge for the wild turkey in the background.  Sharp eyes will notice that I've upgraded to a Deore XT rear der.  I did that mainly because I've grown to prefer reverse pull, particularly with friction shifting, and I had a reverse pull XT in my stash.  

Descending on the Appaloosa was a blast.  I sometimes did the escape velocity racer tuck with my hands on the hooks of the Choco bars.  I blew past a roadie on one of the descents.  It was a very timid roadie, but the 'Loosa descends really well.  

In summary I definitely think this bike is in play for my next tour.  I'll load it down more and do a few S24Os with it in the Springtime.  

Bill Lindsay

El Cerrito, CA

  

[Ryan Fleming]

Nice...it seems like you don't dislike the chocos. I'm getting the normals and I'm dying to try them out...I plan to flip them down as you have. I suspect  the Appaloosa will make a dandy touring bike too....love that mustard colour!

[Daniel D.]

Nice looking setup.  man $2100 for the adventurous...

[Lungimsam]

Capital front loading!!!

[dougP]

Thanks for the report Bill.  The long wheelbase / chainstay seems a success for downhill speediness.  Great that it handles a front load that well.  With the back of the bike available for even more stuff, this looks like one you could load down & leave town with a lot of stuff.  One of the draws of my Atlantis was long chainstays but it ain't even close. 

dougP

On Wednesday, March 16, 2016 at 1:31:35 PM UTC-7, Bill Lindsay wrote:

[Bill Lindsay]

I've installed two rear racks on the Appaloosa.  

R-14 top rack + saddlebag -- This was fine, but then the bike is too wide in the booty to fit in the bike locker, so I switched to:

Nitto Big Back Rack -- This was also OK, but I think the LongBoy version would fit a little nicer and would be easier to level without CRAZY long stays.  Also the V-Brake noodle hit the stays (gently, not really interfering with braking).  So I took that off also.  

What I've concluded is that my front end is dialed, and gives me pretty huge capacity, and that I can treat rear loading like overflow.  Whether I go back to the R-14 or shell out the big bucks for a LongBoy Big Rear remains to be seen.  

[dougP]

"Also the V-Brake noodle hit the stays (gently, not really interfering with braking)"

I had this same problem on my Atlantis with Tubus Cosmo rear rack.  Solution was to move the left side strut to the inside of the hourglass eyelet.  There is enough lateral adjustment in the stay mounts on the rack to keep everything parallel.  The assymetry of one strut mounted inside & one outside drives a couple of friends nuts.  Loads of fun.

dougP

[René Sterental]

Love the front loading configuration and so glad you're enjoying your new bike!

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