Zero punctures: tyres with kevlar layers are pretty sturdy nowadays
One armrest of the triathlon handle bar broke off, could be replaced 230km later
Two legs hurt afterwards, actually already from day 4 onwards, after the two faster days in southern Sweden with average speeds over 30km/h the thighs got pretty tired.
Three kilos were lost on the roads, my weight before was 76kg afterwards 73kg
Five Power Bars provided additional fuel, one for each day, none on the first two days
Seven days of riding, one in Finland, three in Sweden and three in Germany
28.05km/h was the average speed on the whole trip
57 hours of net time on the bike
650 EUR was the whole trip including ferries, places to stay for the night and the flight back to Finland
1599km from Nastola Finland to Ansbach Germany
Arrived at the final destination save and sound. The last day was quite good to ride, although the legs were tired and they were happy to hear that it’s the last day. Other than for those guys, who ride the Tour de France. If I’m not mistaken, they go beyond 3000km in those 14 days, which means pretty much double the distance than this Nordic - Central European tour. No wonder they sometimes need some special powders in their drinks. My breakfast this morning wasn’t too bad either. A multi vitamin tab dissolved in water, a magnesium food complement, an aspirin (the short nights, let me wake up with a slight headache) and the rest of the previous day’s Power Bar. With this dope it was hop on to the bike to get to a place with real breakfast. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
In the morning, I was close to call it quits and look for the next train station. It just was no fun to ride. Water from above, a drizzling rain set in. Water from below, the streets were wet and my bike wheels started to act like sprinklers with a lot of water ending on my back. About 35km it stayed like this. Only in Seesen things got better, way better. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
Riding alone is only half the fun. Stefano’s knee didn’t get better. The pain krept up into the thighs, we decided it’s better for him to quit and take the train, unfortunately. The stakes were too high, it could have harmed his marathon training and Berlin preparation schedule. After all Stefano’s damn close to go sub 2:30h.
Still, in the fight against cars and trucks, it would have been helpful to be two. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
The last of the three Sweden days saw me riding in the southern tip of this fine country. I hate to say this but everything in the landscape and countryside looks a tad nicer than in Finland. Well looked after farms and country houses and less dense forests. The southern tip then has a lot of history, stone houses and barn buildings that might have seen the fights between Swedes and Danes in Gustav Wasa’s times.
With Stefano still stranded in Linköping in the morning, I rode today’s leg alone. Getting out of Växjö was tricky, the main road that connects east and west is a motorway. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
Today it happened, the big disruption - Stefano’s knee. Some minor indications already yesterday, it hurt a bit while riding but not badly and no swelling or so. We started to ride in the morning and quickly had quite a speed, average around 30km/h. But the knee started to hurt so badly after about 80km that Stefano decided to take the train to our anticipated destination for the day, Älmhult. We parted outside Gamleby, Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
Stockholm is horrible to go through by bike. Especially if you’re not local and planned the route based on major ways to get out of the city. The signage of the cycle paths leads you constantly to the other side of the road or far away from it. At the end we opted to hop on the dual carriage ways with our bikes. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
250km and 8:55h later (net riding time) we arrived in Turku. The pictures and videos of this day (above) are placed on the map in the Sports Tracker service, link provided in the side bar.
The highlights of the day in summary. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
The bike tour that starts on Monday 22.06. is covered live via the Internet. You can track where are any minute on the Nokia Sports Tracker. You’ll see our current position on a map, together with speed and heart rate information. Well never mind the latter, I don’t expect readers to go totally excited by looking at my heart rate. 
More interesting however could be the pictures and video snippets that we’ll take. Those will be minutes later available. A link to the Sports Tracker live feed here. Select from the “Latest workout” section the workout that has the “NOW” label in the Date information. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
When going on a bike trip, there are two options. Either you go riding a bike or you go carrying luggage. Since we wanted to preserve the fun of riding fast bikes and and not towing up each hill at least 25kg, we opted for the former over the latter and are traveling light. When the water bottle’s filled, it’s the heaviest single item and weighs as much as the rest of the stuff. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bike tour
