Hey everyone, It's been a while since my last post in the community and pretty much in general on Hive 😅 lately I'm having trouble getting everything done I want to do, which basically just means I like too many things and there are only 24 hours in a day of which I'd like to sleep about 7 of them and then there's work and family and a cycling hobby that takes up a lot of time as well! 😁

I've done quite a lot of distance last week, now I've added the Tuesdays as my third training day which is just an hour of training in the evening on a workday but it's another weekly 25 or 30k extra.

The last ChitChat post from the cycling community's account was pretty interesting, and made by TWO people - well done!

This post included a QR code to make a FREE hive account for any cyclists that want to join us, pretty neat!

Chit Chat!

So, in the past I was always waiting for the new chit chat post to be released but lately I've been running late with just about everything so I can for once just take the latest prompt into my post without waiting, every con has it's pro's and all that. 😃

Look for two or three motivational phrases related to cycling, reflect on them, and tell us how you live them on your rides.

Does anyone does this? I don't need to be motivated on the bike to be honest with you, it's all pure enjoyment and even in the indoor trainer I'm just busy with all the numbers on my screen. 😁

We know that around this time the Giro d’Italia is being celebrated — it started yesterday in Bulgaria and will end with the month in Rome. Tell us what you’ve seen and what you think about the different stages, the athletes competing, and the events that are shaping this race.

The start of this year was brutal with two big crashes in the first two days, today I've read another rider decided not to start because of the injuries he got from the crash. 😞
Imagine, training all year for this and it all stops because of something you don't have any control over...

Because I never watch main stream television, I can't watch the Giro live.. it's behind a paywall so it's just the 12-15 minute highlights made by Eurosport on YouTube for me, but again every con has it's pros - this way it saves me some time. 😋

Luckily the Tour de France IS being broadcasted on national television here that is free to watch, but we need to wait a couple of weeks for that, let's not rush the summer and enjoy every day before winter gets here again... Now I'm a cyclist I don't like the winters as much as I used to, cycling in the cold is just not as good as in normal temperatures.

The screenshots are from my rides in Germany, I'm currently working on the second video to be released on my YouTube channel which is doing better than I expected, at least SOME people are watching my content. I'll try to upload something new every other week - I've got a couple of idea's but creating good content is actually hard work! 😅

So far, I've got 18 subscribers so thanks for your support!

After our ride last Sunday, my daughter asked something about chain wear so I showed her how the chain wear tool is used and it turned out her chain needs to be replaced, it's past the 0.5% mark. I have recently bought a proper chain checker because I didn't want to trust the little AliExpress one, and my suspicion was right because the AliExpress one was still showing it was OK but the Parkside tool indicated the wear, right after I checked my own chain and to my surprise it's already worn as well, just after about 1300km!

That's what you get for buying a cheap chain 😏 it was just the standard Shimano Deore OEM model, good thing it was cheap indeed and I still have second one, but I already bought another one when it wears so fast.

When I bought my bike, it had a KMC chain on it, instead of a Shimano and I probably used it for too long as well because of the AliExpress chain checker tool, I did just under 3000km with that one so I'm back to testing out KMC chains again, it was more expensive so let's see how that goes.

More work, two chains I need to cut to the correct size (this time I'll use @friendlymoose's hang it on a nail tip) and I'll probably make some content while doing this as well because, why not. 🙂

So, it's 18:17PM now, it's been about an hour since I had dinner so it's time to get changed for an hour of cycling on the indoor trainer, get a shower and spend an hour with the family before heading to bed. There should be more hours in each day!

Good thing I have another long weekend from Thursday to Sunday but I already planned more work for myself, I'm going to get rid of the blue paint in the room my indoor trainer is in and tidy things up around it, it's the last part of the house that needs some love and now that I'm spending a lot more time there compared to only putting laundry in the washing machine and get it out again when it's done, I'll better make it look nice so I can create a video on that as well.

I've made a cool poster with AI that I'm hanging on the wall close to the indoor trainer, I think it's really cool! I told AI to use a blue bike just like mine, and it actually looks pretty damn good.

The 'Live Slow, Ride Fast' phrase is from a group of professional cyclists in my country that made the best dutch podcast about cycling in my opinion.

Hopefully, life gets slower again soon but it all is really just because of my own plans 😅