As usual, week three was typically boring except for two mechanical problems. His small chainring lost three of the five bolts and became distorted. Rafael did get his small chainring replaced, but had to ride about 26 miles out of his way to find a shop that could do it. It's a good thing he had it fixed, because he has been fighting hills ever since.
And now he is facing another POSSIBLE mechanical problem. He has a new sound generating out of the rear hub. It is there while he is coasting, but not while pedaling, even gently. Sounds like a problem beginning in the freehub, so he will have it checked out in the morning. I had him do a spoke check, and all of them felt uniformly tight, with the right-hand ones being slightly tighter, as they should be. The noise is there when he picks up the rear end and spins the wheel, but not when he pedals it.
I will call Josh, at Atlantic, tomorrow morning to see if he has any more ideas to add. Anybody else got any ideas?
Today, he rode to make up some of the lost time from the chainring repair. While eating breakfast, he struck up a conversation with a family that saw his rig. They invited him to their house for a 4th party. When he got ready to pay his bill for the breakfast, it was already paid by the family! The man was also a printer at Random House, and said he may be able to connect Rafael with one of the publishers for his photo book. Good things just keep on coming!
As you can see from the pics today, he got to meet a guy who restores old WWII military vehicles. So cool! Hmmm! Maybe he could finish the tour in a Sherman tank? No more troubles with heavy traffic or nuisance drivers!
Other than this new little sound coming from the rear hub, all is going quite well. Like I've said before, once he gets into his routine, everything is actually boring, (unless you like watching pedals go round and round) until he posts his pictures from the day's ride. Then, there's lots to see!
I've been pretty tied up around here the last few days and haven't had time to post here (BROL). Tomorrow I will start week four (on BROL) and will also keep you up on what we find out about that noise.
He has about 80 miles until Philadelphia, and thinks it will take him about two days because of the hills. There's one bike shop about one mile off his route early tomorrow that he will stop at in the morning to see if they can track that noise. Will let you know what they find as soon as he calls me about it.
