Originally Posted by
Machka
Have you done your practice weekend tour yet?
And as for learning mechanical skills, check your local REI, LBS, University/College, or Touring club ... many of them offer courses.
And ignore whatshisname ... he'll wake up with a very bad headache tomorrow, will be grouchy all day at work, and won't remember posting here at all.
Thanks for your suggestions. I greatly appreciate all the support from so many bicycle enthusiasts! When I pick up my LHT in a couple of weeks, I will start riding out to Caswell Memorial State Park, which will be about 40 miles round trip. I plan on making that my practice run at least a couple times a month.
Also, I will be hitting the Dry Creek Trail a couple times a week, with my LHT fully loaded. Plus riding around town a few extra miles, I can easily get in 30 miles each trip to Dry Creek.
I've found some good hills for training (short though) near Dry Creek. There just aren't many hills around here, so these will have to do.
I recently joined our local bicycle club (Stanislaus County Bicycle Club), and plan on going on longer day rides. I hope that I will soon be able to make the day ride up to Knights Ferry, which is about 64 miles round trip from where I live! That will be quite a ride for me, but I'm up to the challenge!
I will have a cadence monitor and a separate heart monitor on my new LHT, so I can work on that too ....