How to bikepack without gear

Welcome to the Bike Bulletin. Touring the best cycling content of the week.

As always, reply directly to this email. I love reading all the thoughtful replies.

—Sam

Here’s what we have today.

• 🌎 A worldwide riding challenge

• 🏙️ City: How street layouts shape your cycling

• ⛺ Bike Trip: Bikepacking without buying gear

• 🎥 Film: Graham Obree documentary

• 🎮 Entertainment: A game about Toronto bike lane removal

• 🗞️ News from this week

RIDE ON MY RADAR

The Rapha Festive 500

Join thousands of crazy people all over the world in riding 500 km over the final 8 days of the year.

Here’s what you’d be getting yourself into.

• 500 km (311 miles) from December 24th to December 31st

• Any way you like: trainer, tricycle, penny farthing

• Anywhere you like

Why? That sounds horrible.

• Bragging rights

• Strava badges

• An excuse to get outside (and away from the in-laws)

Read more, and join the challenge on Strava.

From the City

How Street Layouts Shape Your Cycling

Manhattan (on the left) is neat and tidy. Nearly every street is oriented in the same direction, and block sizes are identical.

Boston (on the right) is the opposite. It’s like a child threw Hot Wheels tracks on the floor and said, “That’ll do”.

The science term for this is “entropy”. In Manhatten, the streets are orderly and systematic. The network has little entropy.

In Boston, the streets are random and curvy. The network has high entropy.

Entropy describes how disordered a system is, and that matters for city planners and cyclists.

Grids have several advantages:

• Simpler navigation

• Predictable design decreases conflicts with cars

• Short end-to-end routes

• More accessible for new cyclists

But hairballs have some too:

• Organic traffic calming (fewer straightaways to speed down)

• More irregularities for creative transit planning

I have a great time weaving through the mess of Boston roads on my daily commute, but it comes with a series of challenges. We work with what we have, and the street network entropy is a reason why some cities are more work than others.

Read Geoff Boeing’s paper here.

BIKE TRIPS

How to Bikepack Without Buying Gear?

Bikepacking takes you to lovely destinations, keeps you healthy, and has a low impact on the environment. But getting started can be expensive.

Bikepacking on a budget means letting go of some luxuries. It’s about the journey, not the dynamo hub-powered LED taillight conversion kit.

Step 1, have a parent who’s been bikepacking since the 70’s. Step 2, borrow their gear.

That’s how I first got into it.

If you don’t have generational bikepacking wealth, here’s how to do it:

• Bike - it doesn’t matter if you don’t have the perfect bike. Thomas Stevens rode the whole U.S. in 1884 on the Penny Farthing (before there were paved roads!). You can do it on any bike.

• Repair - Multi-tool (I have the CrankBrothers M17), 2 tubes, patches, portable pump, 2 tire levers.

  • Learn how to fix a flat before you leave! (Park Tool’s tutorial)

• First Aid - mini gorilla tape, emergency blanket, pain relief, Vaseline (for your butt 😉)

• Sleep - tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad.

  • I’ve done tours with a $25 Walmart tent and had a great time. I’ve also done tours with a $350 tent and had a great time. It’s not the price that makes you happy.

• Camp - headlamp and toilet paper. You don’t need fancy cookware.

  • I used a $9 backpacking stove (also from Walmart) for years.

  • Bring a fork from your silverware drawer

  • Have a small metal pot for cooking (and eat out of the pot)

• Clothes - Layers, rain gear, padded shorts, sandals for camp

  • If you can ride around town any time of year, you don’t need new clothes.

  • Don’t bring duplicates. Clothes take up a lot of space. For example, I usually bring one camp shirt and two bike shirts.

• Electronics - lights, phone charger, and a portable charger.

  • I use the Anker powercore 20100 mah portable charger. That battery capacity gives me 5-7 phone charges.

  • Solar charging doesn’t work well unless they’re stationary in direct sunlight for hours.

• Nutrition - Eat carbs. They don’t need to be $8 Maurten Gels. Fruit snacks and candy are about the same. Glucose + Fructose = energy.

I recommend buying a back bike rack and panniers, but you don’t even need those. I’ve carried a big backpack with all my belongings. Yes, my butt and wrists hurt by the end, but it was still fun.

WHAT I’M WATCHING

Obree (2018)

What happens when an amateur cyclist on a homemade bike beats the best of the best? Graham Obree had a unique riding style and an incredible career. He broke cycling traditions, so UCI made him pay (and not financially).

Watch on YouTube

WHAT I’M PLAYING

Loser Lane

Doug Ford, the Premier of Ontario, recently passed legislation to rip up three of Toronto’s bike lanes.

The Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act (ontario.ca) has three terrifying clauses:

• (a) municipalities are required, in certain circumstances, to obtain the Minister’s approval before constructing bicycle lanes or to provide the Minister with information relating to existing bicycle lanes;

• (b) the Minister is required to remove specific bicycle lanes in the City of Toronto; and

• (c) the Lieutenant Governor in Council may order the removal of other bicycle lanes in certain circumstances.

Artist Marie Flanagan made a simple game to simulate cycling in Toronto. It’s impossible. I survived 13 seconds.

Play Loser Lane

• $3B - $8B. The proposed 25-year budget for San Antonio’s bike network. (sabikenetwork.com)

• $0.89B. The expected global Bikepacking Bike Market size in 2032. Almost double from the current $0.51B. (businessresearchinsights.com)

• 28 mph (45 kmh). The max speed of e-bikes in California. CalBike is calling for regulation to stop illegal e-motorcycles. (Streetsblog)

• 250 miles (402 km). The distance of Florida’s coast-to-coast paved trail. It is 88% complete. (floridadep.gov)

• 3568 miles (5742 km). The distance added to the U.S. Bicycle Route system in 2024. It now totals 23,186 miles (37314.25 km)! (Adventure Cycling Association)

• 30. The number of accessible trails and sites in Boulder, Colorado. More improvements are planned for the next 2 years. (boulderreportinglab.org)

A Note From Sam

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