Touring - 40 Flats to DC ride

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090118/ts_alt_afp/uspoliticsinaugurationcycling

Ok, we get it. A lot of us don't buy into his politics, and think the guy is a leech, and spent a good portion of his "ride" riding in the back of a pickup. Now please stop turning the touring forum into a subsection of P&R.

Ok, we get it. A lot of us don't buy into his politics, and think the guy is a leech, and spent a good portion of his "ride" riding in the back of a pickup. Now please stop turning the touring forum into a subsection of P&R.

I didn't, you just did.

We've been seeing a lot of optimism in the papers, nice to see good news for a change.

Also nice to see more attention paid to cycling.

Forty flats for that distance is an order of magnitude higher rate than I've had cycle touring, e.g. I crossed both Europe and Asia with only one flat.

I'd be curious if there was some diagnosis and categorization of likely causes, e.g.
- little wires from truck tires on interstates?
- goatheads?
- glass?
- construction debris?
- problems with patches made or procedures taking tires on/off?
- ??
What caused these flats and what was done to address the causes as they were identified?

Also, related info like what tires were on his bike.

It is rare that I've seen rates as high. A friend of mine did a ride across the US on a southern route in 1998 and had 18 flats, but that went way down after he stopped riding on interstates in Texas. He was running into little wires from shredded truck tires. I also once was on a local Saturday club ride where we went through some nasty patches of goathead thorns and in total had 12 flats that day for 5 cyclists. The highest number I've had in a single day once was 3 in a single day when cycle touring in Nova Scotia - but in general it seems like I'm an order of magnitude less than Ryan encountered so I'm curious what was causing those flats.

700 X 23's on Ryans bike

Yeah, I agree, 40 is a lot of flats. I hate flats with a passion, so I think it's worth taking the extra precautions to avoid them: better tires, an anti-flat liner between the tire and the tube, and making sure your tires are properly inflated at all times. No matter what you do, flats can happen; but if you're getting that many, something's probably wrong.

700X23 are race tires, pretty much. It sounds like the flat rate that can average on RAAM, for example. The sections where the riders have to ride the interstate shoulder created the highest flatting rate, sometimes 4 a day. That's part of the reason that extra wheelsets are carried and as many as 100 spare tubes, because of the lightweight, thin walled racing tires.

<Administrators hat on>By the way, let's keep the politics out of this and maybe limit the discussion to technical aspects. That way, we can maybe keep this thread actually on topic.
I don't care about Ryan's politics. I don't care if he pedaled every inch of the way or if he got the occasional ride along the way. Every persons tour is their own, to execute as THEY see fit. remember that and this thread can continue peacefully and productively.</Administrator hat off>

700X23 are race tires, pretty much. It sounds like the flat rate that can average on RAAM, for example. The sections where the riders have to ride the interstate shoulder created the highest flatting rate, sometimes 4 a day. That's part of the reason that extra wheelsets are carried and as many as 100 spare tubes, because of the lightweight, thin walled racing tires.

Agreed, about the racing tires getting more flats, but it still sounds excessive to me. We had about 21 flats between 3 people on a bit longer tour. Is the ST more hazardous to tires than the TA? Interstate shoulder and places with goat heads were the worst for us. Perhaps the ST just has a lot more of both.

Another thought is that if he failed to find and remove the offending object, one incident could result in many flats. Also if there was a rim or rim strip problem it could result in many flats.

Could well be, yeah. AZ, NM and TX is definitely Goat Head country, and the summer heat causes may truck tire failures as well, so there's a lot of shoulder debris on any road that the big trucks run along the shoulder, mostly very small bits of wire from the tire strands.

Also, a significant portion of the practical routing through this country is pretty much limited to Interstate shulders because there isn't really a practical alternative route in many cases.

Ok, we get it. A lot of us don't buy into his politics, and think the guy is a leech, and spent a good portion of his "ride" riding in the back of a pickup. Now please stop turning the touring forum into a subsection of P&R.
Whether you like his politics and methods or not, a rider touring getting national press is a good thing for bicycling and touring. I respectfully disagree with our moderators that discussion should be limited to the technical aspects, but agree that the politics and personal stuff should be left out.

Whether you like his politics and methods or not, a rider touring getting national press is a good thing for bicycling and touring. I respectfully disagree with our moderators that discussion should be limited to the technical aspects, but agree that the politics and personal stuff should be left out.

I'm just trying to reduce the opportunities for flames.

Whether you like his politics and methods or not, a rider touring getting national press is a good thing for bicycling and touring. I respectfully disagree with our moderators that discussion should be limited to the technical aspects, but agree that the politics and personal stuff should be left out.


There's one problem with this though. At what point do you separate the person (Ryan) from the "cause" he was promoting. While it was a bike tour, that's the personal aspect. As to the "cause", of gathering people, and raising awareness it was the methodology that many objected to.

There's a news story in how someone can use Obama's name in order to obtain goods and services for themselves that is separate from Ryans so called accomplishments. I will say for a fact that some mainstream media outlets are aware of these threads and were following before and after they were censored (and there's no other word for it). What was a lively discussion and offered differing viewpoints was manipulated in and of itself by the blatent excising that occurred.

I can see that it ain't gonna happen. Closed.