Author: Cris Bloomfield

I don’t know for sure, but I imagine that Philippe Gaumont is about as popular as pork-pie at a Jewish wedding with the pro cycling peleton.

I did have a link to a load of photos from the Taiwan Bike Show of the 2005 Marzocchi fork line up, but the photos all seem to have been taken down now. So instead there’s this news, that Lance has a new bike for testing this year. The Madone SL.

The Madone SL is basically a different style Madone, which uses the same top tube and rear triangle as the Madone 5.9, but with what appears to be the down tube and seat tube of the Trek 5900 Superlight; this substitution most likely saves some weight over the standard Madone 5.9.

Photos and more on the latest OCLV fabrication over at Cyclingnews.

A few people have been doing a bit of running over the winter period to get in shape for the coming summer months. There’s always been a bit of debate over what the best way to keep in shape is, but here’s the answer:

Jogging burns more calories than the same amount of time spent spinning on your bike (about 10 calories per minute versus 8 calories per minute for a 150-pound person at a moderate effort). Running is valuable for maintaining fitness in the off-season; it delivers maximum cardiovascular benefits for your workout time–you can’t coast on your feet. If you’re sedentary, starting at zero fitness, any physical challenge makes you more fit for other activities. But if you’re already even moderately fit, train in the sport that you want to be good at. Training in any sport causes cardio-respiratory and muscle adaptations specific to that sport. To get fit for cycling, use your bike as your primary training tool. More at Mountain Bike Magazine’s site.

The quest for oil has it seems a lot to answer for. Some people refuse to fight for it, whilst others are dying to protect it. Now the development of oil resources is having serious effects on the migratory patterns of the very animals on which the expansion of white settlement in the US was based.

And more US-based joy. In the week that the Cheeseburger Bill was passed, banning frivolous lawsuits against producers and sellers of food and non-alcoholic drinks arising from obesity claims, there is a report from New Scientist that Americans are eating themselves to death: “soon poor diet and physical inactivity may overtake tobacco as the leading cause of death, according to a US government study.”

And to end an American influenced post, Big Jonny posted this up on his site a while back, this is the Immigration Game. It’s about push bikes and police cars.

Well Scotland was good. Three hours from door to door and we were there in time for fish and chips and a few pints in Dalbeattie. The locals were friendly, although most of the ones we met were difficult to comprehend, especially those drinking anti-freeze from pint pots and talking about Sea Bass and white knuckle rides.

The Belle Vue Bed and Breakfast (01556 611833) provided a great place to stay, with a friendly welcome just a couple of minutes from the centre of town and only about ten minutes from the entrance to Dalbeattie by bike. Of course it rained most of Sunday, but Conrad and I just rode it anyway because we’d packed loads of kit for any weather.

We managed to miss the famed slabs of the hardrock trail due to the signage, which probably isn’t a bad thing given any of the granite sections were pretty slippy in the torrential rain and neither of us fancied broken bones this weekend. After loading up the car it was off to Mabie, just twelve miles back up to Dumfries.

Mabie was a great surprise. More in the way of hills and even sections of very mature forest. The singletrack was fantastic, the wooden raised sections of the trail an interesting change and some fantastic bermed descents. I have to say I think this is my favourite ‘built trail’ so far. One thing’s for sure we’ll be going back.

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I made it up to Todmorden for my first Thursday night night ride of the year yesterday. Some good riding on some new trails, a bit of a social in the Tenth Muse afterwards and then on the way home was pulled over by the Police. I passed the breath test, but after a few swigs of whiskey and a pint, I was a bit apprehensive of the result. Glad I turned down the Tequila now.

Have I mentioned what a nice and very helpful bloke Shaun Murray of Aegis Design is? Well he’s been giving me a lot of assistance on a little web-based project I’ve been cooking up recently and I have to say I doubt that there is a better person to provide web hosting at the moment, so check it out.

Conrad and I are off up to Dalbeattie this weekend. I’m looking forward to a day of riding up in Scotland, but I’m not looking forward to the drive there and back. More news next week.

It might only be March, but yesterday details of some of Shimano’s 2005 line up for mountain bikes were released. Have to say there is nothing that exciting to be honest. They’re trying to push their axle mounted rear mechs a bit more and there’s a new groupset called Hone. Singletrack’s Mark Alker says it’s:

A new groupset aimed at the type of rider who doesn’t need the strength of the new free ride Saint groupset but wants something a little beefier than XT. Priced rather nicely around the LX level the Hone will boast ‘Flippy’ shifters, Hollowtech cranks, rapid rise rear mech, 203mm or 160mm discs and centre lock hubs.

There’s photos in this Singletrack article.

Perhaps more significant is the fact that Shimano have acknowledged the feedback they have received over their new paddle STI units and have created some new rapidfire units for next year at XT level spec in both silver and black. Bikemagic has the photos.

Mike Davis also has news of two new Rock Shox models for next year. The lightweight marathonesque Reba and a new light weight long travel single crown fork that will probably hope to give Manitou’s Nixon fork a run for it’s money. You can also learn more on the Rock Shox promotional site.

Without wanting to appear like a Lance Armstrong appreciation page, here’s the latest on what the most talked about cyclist on the world has planned for this year:

From: Cycling News
Subject: Armstrong to ride Dauphiné Libéré

Lance Armstrong has decided that he will ride the 56th edition of the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré, to be held between June 5-12. It will be the fifth time he has ridden the race, and the two time winner is attracted by the Dauphiné’s mountain time trial, which will probably be on Mont Ventoux. The only time Armstrong has not competed in the Dauphiné in the last five years was in 2001, where he opted to do the Tour de Suisse, again because of its uphill time trial.

There has been some money placed this year on the Armstrong/Ullrich battle for the Tour de France title and I have to say I think Lance is going to do it again.

Finally if you’re thinking about getting a bike frame resprayed take a look at the work of airglow. That has to be some of the finest work on the market.

The communication between Lance Armstrong who is acting as representative for the professional road racing community and Dick Pound of the anti-doping body WADA, has been hotting up and cyclingnews claimed the interview in which Lance gives his latest counter argument. Read the full text here and also find out whether we’ll be seeing Lance ride the Giro.

The Norfolk posse might be pleased to learn that the next Thetford Enduro will be on 18th April. Race format will again be two and four lap races running at the same time but this time with a slightly longer 10 mile lap. The same reasonable £10 entry fee will apply. Here’s the details.

Race Face is behind the third Ultimate Freeride Challenge which is now live. Another batch of riders pushing the limits, but who’ll arise to contest the likes of Tyler Klassen remains to be seen.

The Iditabike Invitational is over for another year and as Jon over at Just Riding Along reports there were a couple of Brits riding and they did well. Check out the custom bike and kit over on Alan Tilling’s website.

Despite the fact that it is now illegal, many motorists continue to use mobile phone handsets whilst driving. It’s going to be near impossible to police this policy, but there is little doubt that the legislation was needed.

I’m not sure exactly at what point in the learning curve it becomes necessary to be able to ask “Where is your bedroom? Is it upstairs?”. Perhaps you should be able to ask a name first. Anyway learn some Irish over at the weekly link and then try putting it to the test.

I sold a chaintool to Dougal McGuire today. I swear it was him. I have never had so much trouble or have spent so much time explaining to someone how something so simple works. I mean something like Stable Platform Valve technology or inertia valving – that takes a bit of intelligence to understand.

How a chaintool works doesn’t. I even resorted to using various analogies. It didn’t seem to make any difference though, he’d found the bike in a stream and was going to make the chain ‘tighter’.

This year Marzocchi responded to Manitou’s Sherman line of forks with a 6″ travel fork with a single crown. Now Manitou have upped the game with the unveiling of their new Nixon range of forks which includes a four pound SPV damped 6″ travel through-axle fork with an air spring. Singletrack reported their reviews a few days back, whilst you can read more over at Mountain Bike Action.

Talking of the mags, Mountain Bike have had the builders in and there’s a new look site. I found this and thought it was quite interesting – I rarely take my first aid kit on any rides. There’s quite a few spelling mistakes on there too and as I can’t see any e-mail contacts for them, they’re just going to have to find them for themselves.

AtomicZombie. Nothing to do with horror, but a lot to do with some scary metal work. I mean this is like a cross between a BMX, a shopping trolley and a luge. Mental. More on the main page.

Talking of which metal prices are on the up through out the global markets and this is going to mean a likely rise in bike prices next year. It’s all do do with a strong demand from China and the US for raw materials. Steel, Aluminium and Titanium bikes all look set to be affected, although whether composite based bikes will also increase in cost remains to be seen.

Bells and whistles? No, just bells. It’s the law (or will soon will be…):

From: Bikebiz
Subject: Does April 30th ring a bell to you?

By that date British IBDs should have completed stock checks to make sure the bicycles in-store are fitted with bells. The daft new law kicks in on May 1st and despite the Association of Cycle Traders asking for time for existing stocks to be sold first, an extension was refused.

That bells will soon need to be fitted to the majority of adult bicycles at the point of sale in the UK is well-known, but the ACT believes there are still some points that need clarified.

“There seems to be a lot of confusion amongst retailers, not least of all the date when it all kicks off,” said Anne Killick, the ACT’s national secretary.

“It must be stressed that these are changes to the BS regs and will apply to all cycles from May 1st. The responsibility for compliance stretches across the whole supply chain including importers, manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers.

The new bike is near complete. Well except for a few bits like a front mech which is on order and a bottom bracket which I haven’t picked up yet. Oh yeah and the frame – guess that’s going to hold things up a bit. Anyway the rather elusive Marathon SL travel conversion kit is now complete. Now I just need to get in the workshop, strip them down and get these 85mm units in..

Available form you friendly local LBS

Finally, there’s a couple more wallpapers up here.

It’s been over a year since I started the site. I’m happy with how things have turned out. Thanks to everyone who’s lent support and encouragement over the last twelve months. Thinks look set to continue.

Given the Irish origin of the site name, I’ve decided that there isn’t enough Irish content so I’m going to try and redress the balance a bit. This is the Irish Cycling site, a bit like Cycling News, but with a more celtic influence. It’s probably the best way to keep up to date with the Irish road scene, but there’s mountain biking stuff on their too if you want to keep tabs on Glyn O’Brien, Robin Seymour, Jenny McCauley, etc.

And also on an Irish theme: Bicykills? Definitely scope for a Manchester based version of this site. Anything left unattended between Friday night and Monday morning is likely to receive ‘the treatment’ from the Yates’ tossers.

Italian sprinter Mario Cipollini will return to what is likely to be his last Tour de France this year after his Domina Vacanze team were given a wild card by the event organisers on Friday. There are a few reports about, but this one pretty much says it all.

The Chelsea Pedalers Bicycle Polo Club? It’s a sport open to both men and women, check out the photo galleries and are those purpose built bikes? Maybe we should get the couriers onto this. Fixed gear bikes, handling skills….

And finally Volvo have been putting a rather controversial advert on the TV and at the Cinemas recently for their S40. Did 32 families buy the same car on the same day in a Swedish town? Find out a bit more here.

The Sleepless in the Saddle entry form has been sent off. Jed and I are returning for another crack at the pairs race. And the Saab Salomon Mountain Mayhem is to be tackled again, the entry form was downloaded and sent off this morning. This time the original team is reforming under the rothar.com racing banner and for some of us it’ll be our third mayhem marathon. Now we’ve just got to wait to see if we’re accepted.

I took the Stumpjumper FSR test bike out on yesterday’s ride with Conrad. There has been a lot of hype about the new Specialized design and I wanted to test it out. The first thing that strikes you is that it’s a long bike for it’s size, no doubt a product of it’s race orientated hardtail namesake. The bike I rode was a medium (17″), but with an adjustment of the lengthy Thomson-a-like seat pin and a quick change to a 12cm rather than a 9cm stem and it was of similar setup to my FSR.

disappointing

Differences stop there. This is a light bike with Fox air shocks front and back and can be fully locked out. It’s also has a low centre of gravity due to the swagged top tube, but this isn’t all good. The bottom bracket height is low due to the short overall length of the Fox shocks, which means it doesn’t take much to be grounding the pedals and cranks on even relatively flat surfaces. This annoying trait makes pedalling on bumpy downhills a rather off putting experience and riding in ruts near impossible.

Mud clearance isn’t fantastic either and isn’t helped by the Roll X tyres which although excellent all rounders, seem to like to cling onto mud. The lightweight design also doesn’t aid torsional rigidity. Powering on off camber surfaces, or out of ruts and the back of the bike seems to be pointing the wrong way. Conrad reckons there was a fair amount of this ‘crabbing’ going on, so tracking is a definite issue.

The fox forks were the usual excellent performers, whilst the new Triad rear shock was excellent in pro pedal mode, but seemed to blast through the travel too quickly when set at fully open, so might benefit from revised compression damping. The rest of the bike performed flawlessly and it certainly makes a good cross country day bike. I just can’t help thinking that an Enduro is better suited to northern England riding.

My overall verdict was one of disappointment. Either I just had a shocker of a ride with this bike, or magazines like Mountain Bike Action have got this bike completely wrong in their reviews. [Note: The comments expressed in this review seem to have been a bit controversial and haven’t been liked by some at Specialized for obvious reasons. Having spoken with many others that tested this bike or have ridden other Stumpjumper FSRs I am not alone in having experienced issues with this latest design].

The ride was the longest of Mike Pearce’s from his guide book to the Peaks and Derbyshire. Starting in Monyash, it takes in a large loop of the countryside, heading north to Chelmorton, through the stunning Horseshoe Dale, around the limestone quarries and through Longnor, before dropping down to Sheen and crossing the River Dove to Hartington. From there it was through another hidden limestone valley (Biggin Dale) and up onto the Tissington Trail and past Arbor Low back to the car.

More snow overnight. I woke up this morning and thought I was in Helsinki.

There’s been some rationalisation of the bike collection recently. The M5 is next to go and is currently completely disassembled. There’s something new on it’s way and I’ve calculated how to make the parts going back onto it over two and a half pounds lighter. It’s going to be a sweet race bike.

The first UCI points of the mountain bike season were up for grabs recently with an event held in Cyprus. Most of the big names were there and American Journal, VeloNews has the coverage.

Whilst IMBA-related things seem to have a renewed level of enthusiasm here in the UK, PinkBike has news that in USA, a successful partnership is set to continue:

Subaru of America, Inc . recently renewed its support of the acclaimed Subaru/ IMBA Trail Care Crew through 2006. Launched in 1997, the Subaru/IMBATrail Care Crew program has led more than 1,000 trail projects, trained more than 35,000 people in sustainable trailbuilding techniques and logged half a million miles of coast-to-coast travel in its official Subaru vehicles.

The award-winning program includes two full-time, professional teams of trail experts who travel North America year-round, leading IMBA Trailbuilding Schools, meeting with government officials and land managers, and working with IMBA-affiliated groups to improve mountain biking opportunities.

What’s IMBA? Well this poster has the answer.

This month has gone quickly and the discussion about this years big races has been growing. Entry forms for Sleepless in the Saddle are already out. Now it just a case of deciding what to do and who with.

Cars, love them or hate them they’re everywhere. There are a few of those ridiculous Chevrolet built Hummer’s around Manchester, which just goes to show there are some people with bottomless wallets. Even that Clarkson (who has been in trouble recently) didn’t like them. He and I’m sure a few others will be amused by this tongue-in-cheek website…

Cars are also probably the reason behind these statistics published by the Sustrans as part of their latest copy of the National Cycle Network Map. Part of the problem of course is changing the attitude of the majority about bike use…

There’s some interesting stuff coming out for the new season. New shoes from Italian footwear specialists DMT and Lance has a new weapon to help him in his campaign for this years Tour Yellow jersey, a new purpose built Trek TT bike. There are more photos on the Trek Bikes site. Any money on those wheels actually being used in Le Tour?

In a follow up to a report I posted up a few weeks ago, Bikebiz reports that the world doesn’t seem to have gone completely mad just yet:

Shanghai back-pedals on bike ban threat

Police chiefs in the bicycle-dense Chinese city had been planning to lever bikes off the streets in order to fit in more cars but the Shanghai city government has now said it has no plans to limit cycling and is, in fact, planning to build cycle routes. But is this a ploy to ghettoise cyclists in the run-up to the World Expo, due to take place in Shanghai in 2010?

According to the Shanghai Daily News, Wu Jiang, deputy director of Shanghai Urban Planning Administrative Bureau said “The bicycle is still a premier transport tool in the city.”

Shanghai has a bicycle population of 9 million and rising, but increasing prosperity in China is leading to an ever growing appetite for privately-owned motorcars. If Western cities are designed around the automobile, then so should Chinese cities, goes some official thinking.

In December last year, Shanghai police chiefs mooted plans for banning cyclists in downtown areas and on major arterial roads. Law-breaking cyclists were to also face tougher fines. To date there has bee no ban and Shanghai’s cyclusts continue to flout traffic laws with impunity.