I just wanted to share that I finished the North Cape 4000 bike-packing event last Sunday, because TR was a big part of my training. The route went from Turin in Italy, via Lausanne, Paris, Oslo, Gällivare in Lappland, to the North Cape of Norway, at 71* N. I rode it with a friend and we approached it more like fast touring than racing, because we wanted to enjoy it, take lots of photos and just generally appreciate the places we were cycling through. We did about 200 km every day and took 23 days. I feel I’m really an expert on saddle sores and how to deal with them now. Happy to share my learnings 
. Or any other learnings about the event. Here’s a picture of me at the Arctic circle monument with another 700 km further north to go.
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Congratulations!!!
I’ve got the North Cape 4000 on my short “to do” list for the next few years, so I’m very jealous!
How were the temperatures as you approached the far north? And the wind and rain? Friends who have done some of the 1200K Audax rides up in Scandinavia have warned me that the weather can be very fickle. 
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Wow….that is really impressive! What a great adventure, congrats!
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Epic fun! Thanks for sharing!
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It’s really worth it! This year the weather was anomalous all round, but perhaps we have to get used to this. We had loads of rain in France and Denmark at times. Scandinavia also had the wettest July on record I think, and we had more days of solid rain heading north. We also just avoided storm Hans which caused serious damage in southern Scandinavia. However the far North had been dry for several weeks until we arrived (naturally we brought a rain cloud) and there were even forest fire warnings in place. The North was also really warm, with temps between 14 and 24 C. I think it could have been linked to the current North Atlantic temperature anomaly
So it was pretty mixed, and other years are probably colder.
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Wow incredible ride, Looks like a great event with a great route.
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Epic!! Congrats on completing it, could you walk us through your gear and get worked/didn’t work??
Below is my bike set-up. I was pretty happy with it overall. 32 mm tires, 50-34 chainrings and 11-34 cassette. My derailleur jockey wheel got totally gummed up from the rain and dirt and I think a grx derailleur or even full groupset would have been marginally better.
I carried a lightweight sleeping bag and bivvi which I used a few times. We didn’t plan on camping but a couple of times we stayed in basic shelters. I had two bib shorts with me in rotation, but otherwise only one set of clothes. You do need to take winter kit, but obviously it’s not possible to carry winter tights and jackets so I just had lots of different layers. Instead of leg warmers, I took leggings which also doubled up as off-the-bike clothing. Because it was so warm in the North, we bought some regular Lycra tights (pantyhose) in a supermarket and used these as an extra layer on rainy days. My Gore rain jacket largely failed but I think all rain kit will fail eventually, unless you wear plastic. I focused on keeping warm rather than dry. In hindsight, some waterproof socks would have been good because shoe covers are fairly useless too.
I’d say the tubes/tubeless debate is unresolved. I went with tubes and had 5 punctures in total. My friend went tubeless and ran out of sealant at one point so had to use a tube for a while.
I would have liked more space on the bike to carry food. At times we had to go 100 km or even 200 without being able to resupply. I had one feed bag on the stem but two would have been better. Many people also had a lightweight backpack with them.
But overall I was pretty happy with how things worked.
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Kudos!
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