The Spring season is upon us. It has been raining for several days and a gap in the clouds gave me a chance to ride for a few hours. For my sixth Century ride on a recumbent trike, I decided to make some modifications for this Spring riding season. I had been using the stock Marathon Racers on my Catrike Expedition CTE 3385. These tires are not speedy, so last season I had swapped them out for Duranos for Century ride use. The Duranos, although light and fast, give a rather harsh ride, which begins to sap strength after about 50-60 miles, especially on Suffolk County's rather dodgy East End roads. This season I decided to try Schwalbe Kojaks: bald, light, and voluminous. The tires mounted rather easily with finger pressure on the stock Catrike rims. These tires have a suggested PSI range of 55-95, and I decided to try them at 80PSI. These tires were comfortable on my 25 mile test ride.
I found these tires to be 2-3 MPH faster while cruising, excellent handlers, and not at all fazed by the wet conditions. I even rode on wet grass with some acceptable slippage.
The second modification for this Spring was to rep
lace the stock 30T inner chainring on my FSA triple. Wanting a little more advantage for serious climbing, I put on a Dimension 26T 74 BCD triple inner chainring. This required dismantling the crankset, which I accomplished on my virgin run thanks to some guts and YouTube. A slight adjustment of front derailleur the inner limit screw was easily done, and I was in business. I think that I will enjoy some steeper climbing this season with about a one gear advantage. This combo gives me about 17.5 gear inches to work with. All in all, the Kojaks plus the new inner chainring should serve me well on my sixth Catrike Century, the Long Island Bike/Boat/Bike on June 5, 2016.
