My setup is pretty heavy. What things should I absolutely change? (this was for two nights) Perhaps I need to simply bring less stuff.
by Twig_Scampi
My setup is pretty heavy. What things should I absolutely change? (this was for two nights) Perhaps I need to simply bring less stuff.
by Twig_Scampi
10 Comments
The banana. Cut it in half.
So did you use everything that you packed?
Yep. Look at some of the ultralight backpacking Youtube channels. You don’t need to spend a huge amount of money, but unless those panniers are filled with foam, you are really hurting your ability to go more places that are not down a flattish bike path.
That sleep pad is huge and probably heavy. I would look for something lightweight and inflatable. I spent $100 on a thermarest pad and its awesome- for comfort and packability
I think you should move the front panniers back so they are more inline with the fork. Having so much weight so far forward will get tiring to constabtly countering and swing around.
I don’t know what you should do with the weight as I don’t actually know what you are carrying in them.
I mean, although your foam pad looks like a big deal, I bet it weighs less than my downfilled Exped Dura LW (inflatable) pad at around 1 kg.
What you have in your panniers is what is really adding up.
You might be carrying a heavy tent, heavy sleeping bag, and heavy clothes. But those are just guesses, as I can’t tell.
Edit:
Yes, it seems a lot for two days, but your sleeping arrangements, cooking kit, and so on don’t weigh less on a shorter trip. They still weigh the same and have the same bulk.
On a short trip you get to carry less water less food, and probably less clothes. So you can take more fun stuff too.
Sure, you brought the kitchen sink, you could cut half that weight.
More importantly though I think that’s crazy aggressive position you have for a flat bar touring bike fully loaded with front and back panniers. Obviously aerodynamics are not that important to your set up, this looks like more bicycle touring than ultra racing; so maybe get a new stem with some positive rise (you have a negative rise stem here) and get those handlebars a little higher.
How you like the Blackburn Frame Bag?
That Banana will be mushy in no time
Shop second hand for an inflatable pad! You’ll save so much space and can then shift some weight around and even get rid of a couple of the panniers. Maybe instead of the front or rear panniers I would invest in either a carradice-style saddle bag or some ultralight dry bags to strap to the top of the rack.
You should probably bring less stuff. Unless you give us a list of your stuff its impossible to say.
Can we normalize lighterpack lists or some other option on here?