Category: Words

On Sunday some bloody idiot received a torrent of abuse. I was riding at a fair pace in the middle of my side of the road because I was about to take a right turn towards home. It’s a leafy suburban road with lots of parked cars and a 30mph limit, but that didn’t stop muggins, who hooted at me and then over took giving me a look of the evils. Quite what he was intending to achieve with this little manouvre is anyone’s guess, but I decided I’d ask him at the set of lights he’d then had to screech to a stop in front of.

Interestingly he made the perhaps unwise decision to wind down his window. Which only made the vitriolic torrent of abuse that then poured forth from my angry lips a lot louder for him than it would have been from behind the relative safety of 4mm of glass. I don’t think I’ve had a swearing out burst like that in some time and a litany of profanties about said driver being the illegitimate child of a pig dog and likening him to womens gentitals through vulgar phrase certainly made me feel better, even if it did have passers by left jaw dropped and staring. Fact is he was a 100% cock not so much for the stupid overtaking, but for conducting said move at a junction whilst simulatneously smoking and holding a mobile phone.

Now I’m not sure if what happened tonight is some kind of bizarre karma or just plain luck, but tonight I had a Near Death Experience (NDE) for the first time in a few years. I’d picked down the commuter again today because after buzzing into work on the Ti Deluxe yesterday, I fancied a quicker ride in today. Ride in was fine and so was most of tonight’s. One minute I’m jamming along with the flow of traffic, buzzing past wing mirrors and keeping pace with the cars, next minute something has gone very wrong.

At first I thought the chain had snapped, there was that sudden loss of drive that when you’re flying along suddenly destroys your balance. Next thing I’m straddling the top tube and doing a tank slapper all over the front of the bike, I’m seriously out of control veering across both lanes of traffic sideways. I remember thinking that the only thing that could make this worse was being rear ended by some of the traffic behind me or ending up in the oncoming traffic lanes. I’d like to claim it was Ryan Leech-esque bike handling skills that saved me from eating tarmac, but I suspect that lady luck had more than a little say in my fate.

Somehow I didn’t go down. I kept that bike upright and finally managed to bring it to a stop. Hobbled off it and dragged it over to the pavement. Damage assessment part 1: sore inner left thigh and arse cheek and mangled right calf. Damage assessment part 2: snapped pedal axle. Damn that’d do it.

Eventually I spot the pedal body and finally get a chance to extract it from the middle of the carriageway. Stop for a minute or two to calm down a bit and get the wind back in me. No one stopped to see if I was okay, which was nice. Eventually figured I’d try some single pedal action and made it about 500m before I worked out the rear tyre was punctured too. That’s be me walking home then.

Reckon that was as close a call as I’d like for a while – I feel lucky the Ti axle sheered so cleanly, I’ve about four contact points from the loss of control in my right calf – if it had broken and left a more jaggedy metal stump, I’d be writing this after a trip to A&E (which was conveniently on the way home). Had a nice brew and a chat with Jon and Paula tonight which helped take my mind of things a bit. Their son Alex has generously offered a bike for a friend this weekend which is fantastic. The commuter’s off the roads now until I get various bits sorted out. Wiggle have emailed me to say the Truvativ BBs still aren’t available and that’s just rubbish.

Plans for riding today had to be change en route and what had been planned as a blast around Penmachno turned into a session around Delamere. Tyrrell and I rode out for the first time in ages and I even found some new bits of Singletrack I hadn’t tackled before so it was an interesting ride. Rode the Ti Deluxe for the first time since March and as you’d expect it feels totally different to the Remedy. It’s just feels so fast and agile, whereas the Remedy almost feels like you have to really put effort into things.

Had to clean both bikes after the ride today as I’d just run out of time last weekend. I’m going to have to order a new stem, because at the moment they’re sharing the same one and the same set of pedals and while swapping the latter isn’t an issue it’s just a pain having to swap stems. To add to the recent electronic catalogue of disaster, my work Blackberry has now packed up and seems dead to the world…

First ride of the year into work with gloves this morning. I guess that’s a little earlier than last year, but there’s a cold northerly blowing and it’s a bit parky outside. No idiots tried to kill me today, but I did almost contemplate the use of one of my special stickers on the Police Riot Van that pulled out infront of me last night on the way home without indicating…

Getting the bikes ready for winter. Not much needs doing, but the commuter is still off the road waiting for bits. One thing that really annoys me is when you order something because a company says they have it in stock and then once you’ve placed the order they then tell you that they don’t. That just sucks.

…don’t put your iPod Shuffle through the washing machine in the pocket of your riding shorts. It’s drying out now, but I reckon that it’s 50/50 as to whether it’ll live to ride another day.

This morning I decided I would forego the pleasure of riding a bike which sounds like it’s about to spew it’s bearings all over the side of the road in a black oily mess. The days choice for the bike to work was the ‘cross bike, which by all reasoning should be a sound choice with it’s sporty position and gayer wheels. Pumped the knobblies up so they were as firm a firm thing and headed off. Almost immediately I notice the stems not quite straight and the saddles a bit lower that I like it, but there’s no point stopping to adjust them now.

Second set of traffic lights on the way to work and some one tries to kill me. Never one to wait in traffic and having ridden the same road to work for the last four years I know the light sequence inside out. When you know the timings you can be off the line from the lights as soon as they change, which was exactly what I did this morning. This would have been fine except for the stupid cow in the small green car that jumped the red lights coming from my left and then turned right across the junction…

I think it’s only the fact that I was concentrating on looking out for numpties, that I was centre line riding and I’d gunned it from the line that I didn’t end up through her windscreen with several thousands pounds of bespoke and beautiful bike acting as a ground anchor between the tarmac and the front of her car. Having spotted her special move coming at me, I stomped the pedals and swerved and she just missed me. After that, nearly mowing down a still hungover student staggering down the cycle path using the railings for upright stability seemed pretty run of the mill.

Went to Coed Llandegla today to get a proper riding fix in. Predictably the drive out to Wales today was in Glorious sunshine, but as soon as I reached the trailhead, the weather turned and I ended up getting wet. I managed to forget my lid on the way there, so took this as a sign that it was time for a new one (i’d only been thinking this on Wednesday as I left work). The Xen must be about six years old now, the padding is falling apart and the Roc Loc’s held on with Zip ties. The Alps was its last outing as it has now been replaced by a rather sharp Fox Flux.

Despite spending a good deal of the ride wishing I had the waterproofing properties of a seal, it was great to do some riding. I rode the masts loop that Neil and Lardy had shown me, branching off from the main Llandegla loop comprising of the red run with all the black sections. The Remedy was great on the jumps, but you know that you’ve really got to pump the bike through the jump sections of the Black run to get the most out of it and keep off the brakes. Probably one of my best runs yet today.

By the end I was feeling the weight of the Alpine downhill tyres and their super tackiness and not having had enough to eat. I’ll be taking Neil’s advice and putting some lighter tyres on for winter trails riding from now on. After some grub at the visitors centre, it was back in the car to drive home and the sun comes out again and it’s a glorious evening. Typical.

In my mispent youth, I became quite proficient at destroying tyres on my mountain bike by skidding them through to the carcass. The trail protection and IMBA types out there will be aghast at the very thought of all this wanton trail destruction. People like me give mountain bikers a bad name… whatever. Rest assured most of my sideways moments were saved for tarmac. The route in those days was down an old military road. Very long, very straight and punctuated with several sets of lights. If as you approached them the lights had the poor manners to change to red, then skidding to a stop, finishing exactly on the white line of the junction, wasn’t just the challenge it was the law.

Soon there were a few of us hooning about trying the same gag. We’d pray for damp conditions, ideally just after rain when we could most effectively put into action one of the several variations. There was the distance skid, which involved judging speed, road conditions and weight over the front wheel to see how early you good lock up that rear wheel and start sliding. There was getting the bike properly sideways, speedway style. Then developing that to get a proper fishtail slide going from left to right and back again. Front wheel skids took a lot of practice and some balls, but the aim was to do what ever it was and just stop sliding as your front wheel stopped on that front line – that said if you went in too hot a nice stoppie and endo on the line was a great finishing piece.

In honesty, it’s clear that antics 15 years ago haven’t died a death. Skids aren’t just for kids – some one’s got to show them how it’s done and so I’m still frequently found to be laying down a black strip of bike  rubber just before a set of traffic lights. This morning was one of those days with perfect conditions, just wet enough to get a great slide on, get that rear end right out with some opposite lock and then ease up just a bit so that by the white line it’s come back and you can move into trackstand mode. It was great…

…getting to work and having the building fire alarm set off by someone smoking in a toilet while I was in the shower wasn’t.

Crazy skidding action over at Fearless Gearless.

Most mornings I get the lift up to the 14th floor and the office on my own, but today I bumped into Tyrrell. With water still running off my jacket, he asked how the ride in had been. The answer was predictable really – wet.

Despite getting a good soaking, I went onto explain how it had all been made more interesting by some lack of lane discipline. At the end of Upper Brook Street, the road becomes three lanes wide at a set of lights. There’s the left lane which is left turn only into Grosvenor Street, there’s the centre lane that goes straight on(ish) and up onto the Mancunian Way towards Liverpool and there’s the right hand lane that goes straight on to the bends of fury.

The challenge from the previous set of lights is to get from the left hand lane, to the right hand lane in what is usually quite fast moving traffic. To the uninitiated it’s undoubtedly intimdating, but if you can maintain a fast pace you’re going the same speed as the traffic, so it’s no big deal – certainly no more risky than centre line riding. Anyway no problems with that today. Rocked up to the set of lights in the right hand lane to go straight on, a silver 3 series BMW comes up along side in the middle lane, lights change, off we go.

As you cross the junction the single right hand lane going straight on branches into dual carriageway after a section of hashed markings. So as you cross, you move over into the left hand lane of the road. Except today as I did this, I felt a waft of warm air on my left leg and looked down to see the front wing of the BMW. Quick glance over the shoulder, he backs off and then as he over takes me, gives me the stare. Gives me the stare? That’s right, it’s my fault you can’t drive isn’t it? Why all of a sudden are there lots of dickheads on the road? Am I becoming Samuri? Have a load of people from Leigh recently been employed in Manchester?

I don’t know what’s going on, after almost doing a Fingers Kershaw job on my left hand index finger on Sunday cleaning the commuter, it’s clear my mind is somewhere else. Yet the ride to work is usually done at a cracking pace where I’m busy focusing on the traffic, the timing of the various sets of lights and looking for potholes, so that there’s not much time for the mind to wander. Going to be extra vigilant from now on.