ComedyPilot
Secret Lemonade Drinker
- Location
- The Kingdom of Yorkshire
How big is your bike?
Apps for planning a ride?
- Thread starter clocKwize
- Start date
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I plan routes and people, lots of people, give them marks out of ten. I'm not always successful - it took three goes to find the right way in to Paris - but, overall, the people that are daft enough to follow me around the UK or France think they're ok.
My start point is to decide what kind of road is appropriate to the ride. In England as far north as (say) Lincolnshire, B-roads are the best bet, and it pays to reduce the number of turns, and, in doing so, make it a smoother ride.
1. Big map - google maps at large scale. Join two points with the walk option. Don't touch the bike option. This will tell you how long the ride is going to be. Worth the five minutes because if you're looking for a seventy mile ride and it turns out to be fifty or ninety you can quickly change the start, the destination or throw in an appealing diversion
2. OS map or streetmap http://www.streetmap.co.uk/ for size and character of the roads, gradients, heights, likely 'getting lost points'. I stick with google maps in France because the Michelin series are usually out of date, but I mark up Michelin maps to carry with me.
3. Back to google maps and investigate every road and every junction on streetview. Ask yourself how busy the road looks and whether the right turn is sensible.
If I need to carry a map with me I do the Michelin map thing or screenshot the google maps or streetmap bits in to Powerpoint and then overlay it with dashed lines and instructions. You don't need to do it all at large scale - just the bits that might confuse you.
None of this gives you 'stats' for climbs, but, to be honest, I think those are just sad.
My start point is to decide what kind of road is appropriate to the ride. In England as far north as (say) Lincolnshire, B-roads are the best bet, and it pays to reduce the number of turns, and, in doing so, make it a smoother ride.
1. Big map - google maps at large scale. Join two points with the walk option. Don't touch the bike option. This will tell you how long the ride is going to be. Worth the five minutes because if you're looking for a seventy mile ride and it turns out to be fifty or ninety you can quickly change the start, the destination or throw in an appealing diversion
2. OS map or streetmap http://www.streetmap.co.uk/ for size and character of the roads, gradients, heights, likely 'getting lost points'. I stick with google maps in France because the Michelin series are usually out of date, but I mark up Michelin maps to carry with me.
3. Back to google maps and investigate every road and every junction on streetview. Ask yourself how busy the road looks and whether the right turn is sensible.
If I need to carry a map with me I do the Michelin map thing or screenshot the google maps or streetmap bits in to Powerpoint and then overlay it with dashed lines and instructions. You don't need to do it all at large scale - just the bits that might confuse you.
None of this gives you 'stats' for climbs, but, to be honest, I think those are just sad.
biggs682
Touch it up and ride it
- Location
- Northamptonshire
obviously the wrong kind of rainOh, cr@p! Looks like I stuffed up big time, then!I've ridden my < 1 year old $4500 Specialized carbon road bike in the rain several times. Each timeI got home and upended it for cleaning, water would flow out of it
. Doesn't seem to have melted the bike, though.
Hacienda71
Mancunian in self imposed exile in leafy Cheshire
- Location
- Wilmslow, Cheshire
Ah, that is why @400bhp tends to plot routes through fields, down footpaths and other interesting topographical features.
Hill Wimp
Fair weathered,fair minded but easily persuaded.
Map my ride for me. My battery still hasn't run out on a 60 mile ride.
Peteaud
Veteran
- Location
- South Somerset
ride with gps for me
or a map
or a map
