The Isle of Arran is an interesting little place. Set in the Firth of Clyde, just off the west coast of Scotland, it contains rolling hills and lowlands in the south and rocky, gnarly highlands in the north. Pristine gravel forestry roads criss-cross the interior, often giving way to red-dirt singletrack, which often become a series of ruts going straight downhill, ending up at a beach, or in a bog, or onto the lovely paved main road that circles the island. It’s a perfect little package of bike-riding that tourist brochures like to remind you is “Scotland in miniature.”
Same for the weather. It might be sunny and warm when you head out on a ride, but 20 minutes later you’re faced with sideways rain and no visibility. Weather apps are laughed at.
I was planning to spend three weeks in Scotland using Arran as home-base, with day trips to Edinburgh, Glasgow, Oban, and the peaty island of Islay. I had to be ready for anything.
The first eight days of the trip was going to be spent riding bikes and tasting whisky with four close friends. We’d all recently turned fifty, and this was going to be an epic middle-age vacation. My wife and two other friends would join me for part two of the trip, which was less about bicycling and more about cultural and gastronomic adventures. And gin!
Finally, my time in Scotland was to wrap up with Grinduro, a 52 mile ride/race that was enjoying its third year on Arran. While the weather in late June into July was reportedly more predictable than the rest of the year, Grinduro itself had experienced the extremes in its previous two editions. The first year the race was held on Arran, the weather was, by all accounts, pretty horrible. Cold rain, wind, mud, and more rain. Last year, conditions were hot and dry and dusty. As I packed and planned, all of this had to be taken into account. Base layers? Windbreaker? Rain jacket? Arm warmers? Summer jerseys? Sunblock? All of the above? And then, of course, the inevitable question: “what bike are you bringing?”
Of the five of us arriving together to ride, two of us were bringing bikes with us from home and the other three were renting bikes in Scotland. Mike was bringing his Surly Traveler’s Check and some rando gear. He was planning a three-day road tour at the end of his stay that would take him up north around Loch Fyne and back down into Glasgow before flying home to Philadelphia. Stew found a nice gravel bike at a shop in Glasgow. Dave secured an e-MTB that could get him up the hills. Kris rented two bicycles — a mountain bike and a hybrid/road bike — from the local bike hire on Arran.
I have eight bikes, which pretty much cover any kind of riding I might want to do here at home. But which one do I bring to Scotland when all I know is that it will be varied? Fun 20-mile rides on gravel roads through the hills and forest. A circumnavigation around the island on mostly-paved roads. A couple of excursions with the local mountain bike club on their favorite singletrack. A race that promises a little of everything. And, since Mike asked me to join him on his three-day tour to Glasgow, a three-day, a mostly-road tour where I’d need to bring some clothing and gear.
So there I was on June 25, standing in line at Newark Airport with a backpack, a camera bag, and a rented Orucase bike bag containing my Chumba Terlingua Titanium. It was never really a hard decision. I knew I’d be bringing this bike all along.
Let’s get the specs out of the way. My Terlingua is set up 1x10, with a 40t ring on a White Industries crankset, and an 11-40 cassette with a Sram Rival derailleur and Apex levers. The brakes are Paul Klampers. The fork, which is a keystone in the bike’s versatility, is the Rodeo Labs Spork v2, which is wide enough to fit the 2.1” 650b Vittoria Mezcal tires I love so much, and is designed with bosses to fit a rando rack (Rawland Raidoverks, in this case). Back home in Philly, I ride this bike on long gravel centuries, I race it Thursday nights on Belmont singletrack, and I ride rocky, hilly MTB loops in the Wissahickon. I’ve built three wheelsets for the frame: the 650b with Mezcals that I took with me to Scotland, as well as two 700c sets. One is fitted with WTB Resolute which are my go-to gravel wheels, and the other runs a dyno-hub up front and Maxxis Re-Fuse tires, which is perfect for touring trips and urban/woodsy night-riding.
I bought the Ti-Terlingua pretty much the minute Chumba announced it late last year. I already had a titanium gravel bike, but it was somewhat road-oriented, and the Terlingua’s geometry is very similar to my custom single speed bike that was designed with cyclocross racing, road-rides, as well as singletrack in mind. The standover and stack was a little shorter than my previous gravel bike, the BB was 8mm higher, and most importantly, the sliding drop-outs allowed me to customize the wheelbase and chainstay length depending on what I want, for whatever I’m doing. I’m a single speed junky, so the possibility of that kind of nonsense is always in play as well, but for right now, it’s more about tuk’d, or not.
How did the bike perform? Pretty much perfectly*. Dirt, mud, gravel, rocks, road. It was great. Sure, I had to walk down one or two absurd descents while the Arran Mountain Bike Club was bombing down ahead of me on their full-suspension rigs. But other than a not-so-graceful dismount over the handlebars, I managed. Was there anything I’d change? No, not really. Though I did just place an order for a Shimano GRX brake/lever/derailleur set-up to replace my aging 10-speed components. The Sram Rival derailleur has almost 5000 miles on it over two bikes, and while I love my Klampers (I’ll always have them on my single speed), Shimano hydraulic is just unreal. I’m planning on many more miles over a lot more varied and unpredictable terrain over the next year, and whether they’ll be old logging roads in Central Pennsylvania, my local trails here in Philadelphia, or around a volcano in Iceland, I’ll be taking the Terlingua as my travel partner.
Thanks for taking the time to share your trip with us Brian! Brian is also a fantastic children’s book author and illustrator. One of our houses favorites! You can find his books here: Brian Biggs or IG @brianbiggs
*Pretty much perfectly, except for the exploded Crank Bros pedal at the beginning of the second day of the tour, in the middle of nowhere. This caused a minor panic before I found a bike shop eight miles behind us that sold me a cheap set of SPDs. Sigh. - Brian Biggs