Bikepacking Gear

For weeks, I have been meaning to do a post on the equipment I have been using on my overnights, and that I will be taking on the race. Better late than never.

Obviously, less is more when you have to carry the gear 500 miles, but since this is my first attempt at doing the race, and I don't expect to set any speed records, I'm opting for a little extra safety in exchange for having to carry a little extra weight.

Having said that, I spent way to much $$$ this year purchasing a new sleeping bag and bivy sack to shave some ounces on my kit. The bed roll is where the safety factor comes in. The bed roll consists of a lightweight REI bivy sack, Golite down summer sleeping bag, and a thermarest neolight inflatable pad. I wouldn't call it comfortable, but it's not too bad. The bivy sack makes the setup mostly water proof, so in addition to using it for sleeping, it could double as an emergency shelter if I got caught in an extended storm. I say it's mostly waterproof, because the top head area of the bivy sack is mesh. In a big storm I would have to turn the whole setup over, or use my rain jacket to cover the mesh. The bivy sack is the obvious green sack in the picture below. Actually, the sleeping bag and sleeping pad are in the bivy sack. I experimented with rolling all of it up together, and then quickly ( before the sleeping bag expands ) slipping it into the handlebar pack shown in the second picture. This packing method make it very quick and easy to pack and unpack. I just pull the whole thing out and get in. Then I blow up the pad, and nighty night. Packing in the morning only takes a couple minutes as well, and is much faster than packing the three items in separate stuff sacks. All together the bed roll is a little more than three pounds.

I won't bore you with a full list of everything else, but it's pretty minimal.

Clothing: ( Not including what I'm wearing normally )

• Down Jacket
• Thermal tights
• Long Sleeve wool shirt
• Arm and leg warmers
• Extra bike shorts
• Rain Gear (Jacket and Pants )
• Hat and gloves extra pair of socks

Gear

• Small first aid kit
• Bike repair kit
• Spot GPS tracker
• UV Water purifier
• Lights for night riding
• Sunscreen
• Colorado Trail Data Book / maps
• Extra USB batteries, ipod, camera, GPS

In all, this weighs in between 12 and 15 pounds depending on whether you include the gear I normally ride with.

I find it interesting that the gear only adds 7-8% to the total weight including rider. So while it slows me down, it's not bad. However, the added weight which is mostly strapped to the bike, adds more than 50% to the bike. So the bike feels very different when riding technical sections, and REALLY heavy when I'm pushing it up scree fields or over big rocks.

I use a number of different packs that you can see in the second picture. All of these packs with the exception of the backpack are made by Revelate Designs, in Alaska. The backpack is a Golite hydration pack. The "Sweetroll" is the front handlebar bag containing the bed roll. The 'Gas Tank" is the small front top tube bag. I keep my camera, batteries, and electrolyte capsules in this. The 'Viscacha' is the large rear seat bag. This bag caries most of my extra clothing, first aid kit and bike repair kit. I also purchased a 'Feed Bag'. This is a small cylindrical bag, similar to a climber's chalk bag, that is strapped to the handlebars and stem, and can be used to hold bite sized pieces of food, or even an extra water bottle.

I have not yet discussed the food that I will be bringing. That can add another 3 - 5 pounds. If I have time, I'll do a post on the food before the race.

Everything packed

Everything on the bike

Lighting Systems Part 1

Some night riding will be required if I want to complete the CTR in the shortest possible time. I may not be fit enough to ride all day and ride a significant amount at night, but there may be days where I get a late start, or days when it makes sense to stop due to cold or dangerous weather. So having the option to make up time after dark is very desirable.

I have experience night riding just for the fun of it, and at races like the 24 Hours of Moab. I'm comfortable riding technical single track at night because even the older Niterider lighting systems that I own are extremely bright compared to standard camping headlamps that most people are use to.

However, the CTR creates some challenges for the typical high lumens bike lights. These lights use a lot of power, and therefore have dedicated battery packs that require hours of charging between use. If things are going well, there will be limited opportunities to recharge the batteries during the CTR. One option is to carry extra batteries, but the batteries can be very expensive, and are heavy. Some lights have multiple power settings that allow for up to 6-7 hours of use, but that probably wouldn't be enough to get through the CTR. Also, cold temperatures in the mountains could reduce the battery life.

So my goal is to find a lighting system that is as bright as what I'm currently used to ( roughly 500 lumens ) but that also has a low power option that will provide 15 hours of use or more when the terrain doesn't require as much light, like when climbing. In the past, high end lights typically had a detached battery pack that the rider stored in a pocket or backpack, and a power cord that ran from the battery to the light mounted either on the rider's helmet or handlebars. There now exist excellent lighting systems that package the battery and light into a single package. These tend to be lighter and have no cord to manage, but won't have the lumens or battery life of the external battery systems.

It turns out that these days there are a great many different light manufactures and models. It's not my goal to review all these systems, but you can check out this article on MTBR to browse the various options.

http://reviews.mtbr.com/2013-bike-lights-shootout

There is a lot of information in the above article, but it was difficult to determine which models had lower power modes. I decided to fallback to the incumbents, and go directly to the NiteRider and Light & Motion web sites.

The products that stood out for my needs was the NiteRider Lumina series. These lights are combined lights and batteries, range from 350 - 650 lumens,  have low power options with up to 18 hours of use at 40 lumens, and are quite light ( no pun intended ). These lights have a solid looking handlebar clamping system ( The 650 also includes  helmet mount ) that is much improved over previous handlebar mounts from NiteRider. To top it off, the high end 650 model can be purchased online for $118-$140. Considering that  my last lighting system from NiteRider cost over $400, this light seems to be a bargain. If they pass my field testing, I may just buy an extra and use it as a backup.

I purchased the Lumina 650 online for $104 and although I haven't used it for any technical night rides yet, it looks like it will work out very well. The 40 lumen mode is still very bright and the beam it casts is very good. I'll have a chance to to test it on some of the over night training sessions coming later in the plan. I have not tried using my GoPro at night, so I might try to capture the night riding experience in a video that I'll include in a follow up post.

http://www.niterider.com/lumina-650-2013/

Not this year

Clearly when doing a ride as long as the CTR you want to minimize the weight of your bike and your gear. Despite that, this is one piece of gear I won't be buying. Although I do have birthday coming up. :-)