Category: Words

The first ride of the year today and a welcome return to the Gwydyr Forest above Betws-y-Coed. Thanks to Steve Makin and friends for the open invitation. Given the forecast we were exceptionally lucky with the weather and the excellent drainage on the Marin trail means it wasn’t a mudfest. Here’s a few pictures.

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Those are the words of team manager Fons Leroy, about his latest signing World Mountain Bike Champion Filip Meirhaeghe, who along with bronze medalist Roel Paulissen have signed contracts with the new Division III team Vlaanderen 2016, according to VRT Teletekst. Meirhaeghe, who rode for Domina Vacanze last year, will be the team’s top rider and will have the freedom to choose his own program this year. There’s more at cyclingnews.

The return of the British road racing scene? There are two new five day events on the horizon for 2004: Tour of Scotland (25-29th August) and Tour of Britain pro road race (1st-5th September). More news as and when.

For those wanting to know what’s happening on the mtb scene in terms of a US perspective, there’s a good review of recent events over at Mountain Bike Action.

There have been some issues with the site for those users still using Internet Explorer version 5x on there PC’s. Hopefully thanks to a rather useful solution this is no longer an issue.

This is the latest incarnation of rothar.com. Most changes have been cosmetic, hope you like the result. I’ve finaly written up my time in central Switzerland from a few years ago, you can find it in the escapism section . There’s been a few other little tweaks here and there too.

The link between mountain bikers and the environment is never far from thought esppecially when you’re out there in the countryside. The idea is investigated a bit further in this dirtrag article from Philip Keyes. “The Church of Rotating Mass”, what do you make of that? Maybe its a code by which many cyclists already live, others like Gaansari Cycles‘ Gary Boulanger still like a more traditional approach. It’s a big world and there’s room for all views.

On a similar note you may have heard about “Critical Mass” events in various cities around the world, well what’s it all about? The name “Critical Mass” is taken from Ted White’s 1992 documentary film about bicycling, “Return of the Scorcher“. In the film, George Bliss describes a typical scene in China, where cyclists often cannot cross intersections because there is automobile cross-traffic and no traffic lights.

Slowly, more and more cyclists amass waiting to cross the road, and when there is a sufficient number of them — a critical mass, as Bliss called it — they are able to all move together with the force of their numbers to make cross traffic yield while they cross the road. Critical Mass has a very different flavor from city to city; there’s a big variety in size, respect of traffic laws (or lack thereof), interaction with motorists, and intervention by police. If you want to know more about Critical Mass, find out what your local ride is.

Snow reports for this season are looking good, here’s the latest from the American East coast, which can be best described as epic. Whiteface, New York, has an 85-inch base, Jay Peak, Vermont, just scored a dump of more than 40 inches and Sugarloaf, Maine has a base of 62 inches. The snow keeps coming and the East keeps ruling it. Can you say, “White Christmas”? More at Freeskier.

Jimbo from sussex-mtb has been in touch and there’s now a link to the ‘site in the left hand column of the main page. Happy New Year.

Given what’s ahead over the next few days, this is likely to be the last post of the year and it’s been one hell of the year. There’s been travelling – two weeks in Switzerland, a week in Andorra and a week both Guernsey and Jersey. I’ve been riding in new parts of the country and have plans for more rides in more new areas next year. There’s been racing, albeit a bit of a disastrous one and riding with friends. All that and I’ve revisited some of my favourite routes.

Anyway here’s to good riding, good weather and good fortunes in the New Year.

There’ve been changes at work too and I think that we’ve been lucky enough to secure the services of a certain person known as sexmidget. Do the droid and the sexmidget have anything in common other than a penchant for singlespeeds and a shared surname?

The mountain bike website bandwagon is continuing to attract newbies. It’s a lot of work, a big time commitment and requires a certain element of dedication. Good luck to anyone giving it a shot. Anyway here’s a couple of the latest: Bikesandpies and the infamous Moonshine Bikes.

The second of the Revolution series isn’t too far off now and this is the latest on what to expect:

From: British Cycling
Subject: Revolution 2

The second event in the new Revolution Track Racing Series, brought to you by Face Partnership, British Cycling and the Manchester Velodrome, will take place on the 24th January at the Manchester Velodrome. Following the enormous success of Revolution 1, which attracted over 3000 spectators, the second Revolution will offer another great night of track racing.

Revolution 2 will focus on endurance races in the absence of the World Class Performance Sprinters (currently in Australia) who will be racing at Revolution 3 on 28th February. There will, however, be some sprint action with a Keirin competition squeezed in alongside Points, Scratch and Devil Endurance races. New for Revolution 2 will be a 1500m Time Trial, 1km Madison Time Trial and a 3km Derny Paced Pursuit.

A team sprint competition will also boost the action in the Future Stars racing, which proved just as popular as the elite races at Revolution 1. With several top British track riders now confirmed including Chris Newton, Rob Hayles, Paul Manning, Bryan Steel, Malcolm Elliott and Tony Gibb who is currently winning in South Africa, top quality racing will be guaranteed.

Final negotiations are underway to bring some international names to challenge our British boys so keep posted on http://www.cyclingrevolution.com. for more news. For full event information or to purchase advance tickets please visit the website. Alternatively call the information line on 0700 594 2579 (lines open between 9am and 6pm Monday to Saturday).

Finally there’s a refined version of the site in the bag that’ll be appearing in the New Year after I take the deco’s down. After a long wait, there are some new pictures of the FSR up in the bikeshed section.

Sending Christmas cards is a good way to keep in touch with people, but it always reminds you how long it’s been since you heard from them last. More often than not it’s been too long.

This is a link to the Park Tools website. Park make some of the best tools on the market. It’s just a shame their blue plastic tyre levers are crap. They bend, they snap and are generally far from the optimum tyre removing tool. They are however better than forks. So as everything else from Park passes testing, it gets the workshop seal of approval and is awarded a permanent link under the kit section.

Prompting alsorts of possibilities in terms of crap jokes based upon song titles, rockstar, Jon Bon Jovi, is to raise the profile of his sponsorship of a US-based Pro mtb team. Team West Virginia/Bon Jovi, will compete in state, regional and NCS races in 2004. There’s more over at MBAction.

“Silver cars are much less likely to be involved in a serious crash than cars of other colours, suggests a new study of over 1000 cars.

People driving in silver cars were 50 per cent less likely to suffer serious injury in a crash compared with drivers of white cars, the research in New Zealand found.

White, yellow, grey, red and blue cars carried about the same risk of injury. But those taking to the roads in black, brown or green cars were twice as likely to suffer a crash with serious injury”. More over at New Scientist.

Armstrong is now talking about riding the next two tours.

Campagnolo’s winter clothing line gets a quick preview over at Cyclingnews and Chris Currie talks about standardisation within the bike indutry over at Dirt Rag.

The Mountain bike market it seems is far from saturated and far from stagnant. There are still plenty of new bikes and brands developing within the market, most targeting niche markets where the bigger companies are less prepared to take potentially big risks.

Here’s a few of them, two British and one Canadian. First up On-One who have been around for some time and have a bit of an elite following in the Singlespeed sector of the market are planning a new range of bikes including this aluminium hardtail frame, a cyclo-cross bike for next season and possibly a long-travel inbred.

Then there’s Sheffield based Edge Bikes who have been making a name for themselves in the UK downhill scene producing bikes that have carried champions to the podium in this years racing. They do a range of bikes from full on downhill bikes through to lightweight full bounce cross country bikes designed to cope with the British winter.

Finally, there’s the Canadian based Knolly Bikes, the brain-child of Noel Buckley, who spent two years out of action with a broken arm designing a no-compromise, six inch plus travel freeride bike. Interesting use of a double linkage, which seems (in someways) similar to Specialized’s Demo 9, but in other ways completely different. Pinkbike have more news.

For those with a passion for fixed gear Singlespeeds, Hub Jub is there to meet your one speed gear requirements, offering a fine range of hubs and freewheels.

And if that’s not enough have a look at Dave’s Beer/Bike Ratio Training Plan.

I’m out of practice. I’ve forgotten some of the elements that make-up the ritual that is winter riding. When I first arrived in the Northwest, I was out riding pretty much every weekend and it was a steep learning curve as the weather worsened, as to exactly what kit you need to take with you.

You need more food than normal because you’re burning calories to keep you warm and to keep you moving, that and you need clothing to keep the elements out. Those are the easy things to get right apparently, the hard things it turned out today are remembering to take a spare set of warm gloves, dry woolly socks and a beanie to keep you toasty while you’re waiting to get the train home.

I borrowed the Epic Comp Disc demo bike for the day from Harry Halls and rode the Macclesfield Forest route suggested by NBT from IMBA UK. The weather was supposed to be good, but wasn’t. After the summer we’ve had I have absolutely no grounds to make complaints and had already decided I was going riding whatever the elements had to offer.

Intelligent suspension bike:
Forunately the none-demo models come in a more subtle shade of gray

Before the launch Specialized were very secretive about this bike. Afetre the launch there was a lot of press coverage and interest. During the test the Epic lived up to the hype. It’s a capable and a very suitable bike for racing and most UK off-road routes. It’s intelligent lockout turns the bike into a hardtail as soon as the terrain smooths out, but when you get to the off road stuff it seems like there is a lot more than the three inches of rear wheel travel.

With lockout on the forks too, it was easy to get the power down and motor the road sections, without feeling like you were carrying extra weight or that you were loosing power through the suspension. For the majority of UK rides it’s necessary to link in road routes to get to the next offroad section, so the ability to make this bike rigid is a great advantage.

I was a bit sceptical about exactly how well the ‘brain’ would work, but like many people who have ridden these revolutionary nikes, I am now convinced by the design. It works brilliantly. The rest of the finishing kit reflects good value for money. I still dislike the current wave of Specialized grips, they’re too small and not at all comfortable for my big hands, but this years new Telluride saddle is a big improvement over last years body geometry razor bladesque offering.

The rest of the gear is good stuff with a mix of Shimano XTR and LX for gearing duties, sure stopping hydralic shimano discs and a great set of light weight and strong wheels shod with Roll X rubber. In all this is a very capable and dynamic bike, possibly the ideal bike for a person wanting one do it all offroader.

Anyway I took a few pictures, but given the weather they were never going to be much to write home about. There are a couple more up in the wallpaper section now.

I’ve been meaning to link the following website for some time but never seem to get around to it. This is the old skool track website about people riding fixed gear track bikes in cities. If that’s you they want to hear from you.

Twelve days to go to Christmas. Better get the decos up then. I’ve posted this before, but as it’s the right time of year, it’s worth revisiting a winter epic.

Apparently there are still people out there riding this years Specialized Enduro Expert, which came fitted with 8″ Shimano disc rotors. Fox Forx aren’t warranted against use with such big rotors, so if you know some one who’s got one and hasn’t had it changed yet, they need to take it back to their Specialized Dealer who should have the replacement 6″ discs in stock.

From Cyclingnews:

Fire 1 Bike 0

Southern California’s recent fires also claimed one or two bikes, including this titanium machine built by San Diego-based custom frame builder Bill Holland. Speedplay’s Richard Bryne took these pictures after the owner’s 3-storey house was consumed by fire. Imagine coming home to find that?

Toasted titanium?

The recently-molten blob underneath the bike is all that remains of the Campagnolo groupset. It’s not surprising that the frame remains more-or-less recognizable and the components are toast, though. Titanium melts at 1660ºC, aluminium at a mere 660ºC. There’s a reason supersonic spyplanes have titanium skins.

Lance Armstrong says his sole objective next year is to win the Tour de France for a record sixth time. “I’m more motivated to win a sixth Tour de France than I think I was to win five,” the American U.S. Postal rider told a news conference in Brussels on Friday. There’s more in this article over at Velonews.

I spoke to a good friend today who tells me that these are selling like hot cakes in some parts. Strange that.

We’ve had t’internet radio in’t shop for a while now. Beatblender from the listener-supported, commercial-free, underground/alternative San Francisco station Soma FM, is keeping us chilled, even when things have been getting frantic. It’s worth a listen.

Today was one of those days at work when you would rather have been trying to keep your breakfast down slugging up some big mountain in the middle of the wilderness instead. It was that good.

Some good things happened today, including the arrival of a package from Dirtrag full of stickers, socks and some back issues, which now means in conjunction with the latest editions of Singletrack and Stopadoodledoo, I have loads of stuff to read.

A link to this useful webpage about how to build a cheap recyclable bike box for taking your bike on the plane was posted today. It’s such a simple idea and looks like a cheap way to transport your bike safely. Compared to some of the professional hard case boxes on the market, which are in my opinion complete rip-offs, this appears great value for money.

The National Cyclocross season is already nearly at a climax, the big finale is this Sunday. This update from British Cycling sums up what to expect. Good luck to Barrie:

The Cyclo-Cross National Trophy series reaches its climax when the fifth and final round takes place at Abergavenny Leisure Centre on Sunday. The Senior series looks to be a straight fight between Barrie Clarke (Giant RT), looking for his eighth series title in nine seasons, and Under-23 leader Steven Roach (Rugby Velo).

Although Roach has beaten Clarke in two of their four Trophy encounters this season, few would bet against the Giant rider retaining his trophy on Sunday, two days after his 37th birthday. Clarke currently leads Roach by a mere two points following his out of form 15th place at Mallory Park, but has benefited from the fact that the likes of Hammond, Ellis and Jody Crawforth (Evans Cycles RT), all individual winners this season, have not contested the full series.

Dave from phased has asked me to post a link to the Russ Appeal, which is a charitable organisation which was created in order to focus the efforts of those wishing to contribute to the charitable bodies (such as the Air Ambulance service) that directly or indirectly support the mountain biking community.

I’ve created a link which can be found up under the good people listings, you can get to it from here too. He’s also asked me to post up the following:

Christmas is nearly upon us and no doubt you are all running round frantically compiling present lists and fending off mad Aunties asking you whether you would like a jumper or woolly hat knitted this year.

Its time to act fast in order to prevent the mass of wool masquerading as a jumper turning up under your Christmas tree, and we at the RUSS Appeal have the perfect alibi.

Why not get Auntie to order you a brand new, custom printed, one-off Jo Burt T-shirt? We still have a number left to sell and they will make the perfect Christmas present for you, your significant other, your biking mates or evening mad Auntie Ethel herself.

Each shirt is printed front and rear with a full colour design created by Jo Burt exclusively for the RUSS Appeal. We had 250 printed and WILL NOT print any more so this really is a limited edition T-shirt.

It gets better. We’ve had ten of these T-shirts signed by Jo himself , They are going to cost a little more and will be available on a first come first serve basis.

100% of all monies received for T-shirts goes to the Air Ambulance, which means that as you hit the slippery winter trails they’ll still be someone there to rush you to hospital should it all go wrong. We hope you never need the Air Ambulance, but please remember they are entirely funded by charity.

Shirts are available in medium, large and extra-large sizes and can be ordered online or by calling the lovely Carol on 01296 747080. Every shirt ordered before the 19th of December should reach you in time for Christmas.

Standard shirts are priced at £27.50 and signed shirts minimum £50 each. These prices include postage. So, get on the phone/interweb now and order one now. Bring some Christmas cheer and put a little bit back at the same time.

Finally, when you’ve opened your Christmas stocking and found a nice 2004 diary inside why not turn to August and pencil in the weekend of the 7/8th for the Ride for a Flight 2004. Phil Harrison is planning all sorts of additions to next year’s fundraiser, including something for all of you freeridy/downhilly types! Further details will be released in due course.

Issue 12 of singletrack arrived today. The latest installment is another fine publication from the Todmorden based team.

Nicole Cooke is the Welsh Sports Personality of the Year and deservedly so. This season Cooke became the youngest ever winner of the women’s World Cup and the first Briton to achieve the honour.

This years Mountain Mayhem, once again sponsored by SAAB & Salomon, is moving to a new venue, this time it will be on the classic Malverns course. Singletrack have posted up an article here.

A general listing of all 2004 events is now available from the Numplumz site.

Sodarace, which started at the end of November, is to construct a two dimensional creature that can travel over a certain type of terrain in the shortest possible time. Take a look at the website here. It’s this weeks recommended link.

Does this website look crap on your computer? I need to know. Currently I have found one version of Internet Explorer which some how manages to make a right hash of interpreting the CSS scripting. Genius.

More Ears Than Gears III took place this week end. I wanted to go, but couldn’t. there are loads of photos and reports in these threads from Singletrackworld:

– salsaboy’s – flyingpieman’s – sofaking’s –

How cool are these saddles? It’s like an aramid fibre string vest (sort of).

Some of you might remember Big Dave who was posting updates from the Gulf in the run up to the recent US invasion, erm I mean, liberation, of the Iraqi people. He’s now back in the US and doing some good work within his local community.

Lots of people have been asking about financial donations. Since this is only my first week on the job, I’m still trying to gather my wits. Here are some better ways to help get more bikes to kids in El Paso, TX. Direct financial contributions should be sent to:

OPSANTA
P.O. Box 16270
Fort Bliss, TX 79906
(915) 568-1010

Be sure to indicate on the check that you want the money spent on bike tools or parts. Sometimes the PX gives us huge discounts on bicycle stuff. They sent us 150 pre-built bikes. The quality of these builds was questionable, but we could not keep parents from taking the ones we didn’t get a chance to check. It was like fingernails on a chalk board. I’m also in the process of opening an account with a wholesaler. So a direct contribution will be of greater impact.

If you want to help the local bicycle dealers by giving the program a gift certificate or credit card authorization for a specific amount, here is a list and description of our closest dealers.

Dyer Cycle
4501 Dyer St.
El Paso, TX 79930
(915) 566-6022

This shop is our closest. It specializes in lawnmowers and other gas powered lawn equipment. It does have a large selection of low-end parts. They have a good selection of tubes and kids tires as well. Their prices are fair.

Franklin Mtn. Cyclery
4601 Hondo Pass
El Paso, TX 79904
(915) 757-8585

This shop is a one-man operation that specializes in medium quality road and mtn. bikes. Talk to Darrell. He has a good selection of parts, tools, tubes, and other stuff regularly needed by cyclists. His prices are good and the shop is not far from post.

Vinci Bikes
8900 Viscount Blvd.
El Paso, TX 79925
(915) 594-8778

This is a nice and pretty new shop on the East side of town. It specializes in quality mtn. bikes and high-end road bikes. They have lots of high-end wheel sets and other chi-chi stuff like that. The shop is not too far from us, but it is further than the other two. If you habla espanol, talk to Robertini. He’s very cool and more than willing to help us out.

All the other shops in town are fantastic and they support us, but they are on the West side and it is like driving to another city. However, we will not turn down anything.

Thanks, SGT David Wilson
OPSANTA Bike Shop NCOIC
Cyclist, USA