The Radavist

Practice makes perfect. After a string of late starts, mishaps and consequently even later evenings, our group pushed through the sleepless nights, finally hitting the road before 8am. It took a while, but so it goes in brevets like this. 2100km in 177 hours is no walk in the park, yet it doesn’t have to be a panicked sprint either. There’s a balance to be achieved and oftentimes, it takes a bit of on-the-bike rehearsal.

At a certain point in brevets like this, it becomes a game of catch up. You’re either catching up on sleep or mileage. Think of it as a scale. On one end is hours slept and the other, mileage ridden, with events on the road either adding to, or subtracting from the balance. In our rider’s case, mechanicals on the third day made for a long night in the saddle.

In the world of brevets, or randonneuring, Paris Brest Paris is probably the most infamous, with its total length of 1200km and massive rider roster. However, if you travel further north in Europe, something more sinister awaits. The Sverigetempot is a ten year old, officially-sanctioned brevet, totaling 2100 kilometers. It begins on the Sweden and Norway border, in a small town called Riksgränsen, which can barely be categorized as a town, it’s more of an outpost. From there, a small group of riders have either 144 hours or 177 hours to make it to the southernmost point of the country, Smygehamn. Along the way, there are checkpoints, or control points, at which point the riders will have to have their brevet cards time-stamped at designated places as proof of their mileage. There are other rules, such as there is no roadside assistance allowed and the riders are to be self-supported. While the organizers will transport a bag from the start, to the finish, every entrant must carry their clothing, food and water on their bikes. The countryside offers many hotels and hostels for shelter, so luckily, no camping equipment was necessary, allowing for lightly-packed bikes, with one thing in mind: efficiency.

Over the years, we’ve all really strived to make the content and the characters here on the Radavist unique. It’s been a slow process, but as I’ve just spent a week sifting through the site’s archives from 2016, I can honestly say this has been our best year yet. These year-end recaps are always a joy to collate, as it allows everyone here at the site, as well as the readers to look back and relive some our favorite moments.

2016 was busy. Very busy. In fact, the archives are almost twice as long as the previous year’s, which were almost twice as long as the year’s prior, making editing the site’s content into a digestible post challenging. We’ve omitted bicycle reviews and Beautiful Bicycles for obvious reasons, leaving only ride, travel and shop visit Reportage as the meat of the gallery and storyline. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did and I’d like to thank everyone for making this site, well, rad! That includes you, the readers and the commenters. I couldn’t ask for a better community.

Before things get too sappy, read on below for the Radavist’s 2016 Year in Review.

As you might have noticed in the previous two galleries, not a lot of riders in the Sverigetempot are on traditional randonneur bikes, or even touring bikes. Rather, many of the participants are on carbon fiber road bikes, with a few select modifications to their components and of course, bikepacking bags. While there have been many excellent examples of bikes on this trip, I managed to photograph three in particular from the riders in our troop: Johan’s Focus, Daniel’s Roubaix and Johan’s Venge. Each have very similar specifications in terms of gear range and tires, but as you’ll see, are built to be lightweight, long-distance rigs.

Riding in Sweden’s Sverigetempot Brevet
Words and photos by Johan Björklund

In 2012 I thought about riding the Sverigetempot for the first time. I had never done it before and so I didn’t know what I was getting into…

During our journey along the Sverigetempot, we had a few riders join in for bit of riding. One of which was Patch, a local who met our group on the last day’s journey. Patch showed up in this fluoro Rapha jersey and this rusted road bike, built with mis-matched parts and older aero bars. It immediately caught my eye, even in my groggy state, which was heightened by a fresh knee injury from the evening before (I clipped my knee cap on a rock while sprinting to set up a photo).

The story behind this bike was pretty rad, considering the bike’s current state. To summarize, one of Patch’s friends was beginning to build frames, so he helped Patch braze this bike together. Over time, it broke, so he repaired it and in that time, it’s been his go-to bike, taking him on brevets and tons of road miles. After a mishap, he ended up with mismatched wheels, which, I might add, really work here. The patina has come from years of riding it raw, through Swedish winters and the frame bag dons patches of both victories (like the Sverigetempot completion badge) and personal mantras.

Patch is a designer, a person who usually controls details and aesthetics yet this bike seems to have designed itself. That, to me, merited a photoset.