The nights are drawing in. It’s almost twilight riding home now and with the leaves on the trees now all shades of autumn it feels like summer is officially over. That said it’s still quite warm, but I think in less than two weeks it’ll be time for roubaix base layers…
Manchester Student Newspaper Article with gratuitous photo of random attractive woman* in grey skinsuit. *Bike not models own.
So a weekend away produced a proper mountain bike ride. Unknown countryside, map, some recommended sections and a route picked without any local knowledge. The result was several hours riding, some good bits and some bits you’ll never forget. I’m not sure it’s a good sign that the first trail you ride is a muddy uphill climb, followed by a wet moorland summit into a waterlogged downhill where you have to pedal to go downhill, but either way it kind of set the tone for what followed.
The mainstay of the ride turned out to be several miles of hike-a-bike. After much more map reading than is generally necessary, the right direction was generally found, but there was no sign of any trail. The absence of a trail led to a session of what could be accurately described as bog orienteering, because the mission became navigating wet upland without sinking upto your waist in peat mire and taking advantage of any hilly bits to spot for the next fence/wall and gate. Basically the bridleway was signposted excellently at these gates, it’s just that no one other than cows and sheep can have used that trail in between them in about the last 18 months and it’s been reclaimed by the land.
Clambering through one particularly nasty bit, with a bike on my shoulder and pushing another I slipped and fell scoring a handlebar in the jaw and a chainring in the arm. It was a nice touch. The former made chewing Tangfastics interesting and the latter is going to leave a nice scar. On top of the that the fantastic bruises from the NDE earlier in the week made technical riding a bit tender, but in all it was a great ride and I’d do it again…
Massive thanks to Tim and Bee at Northumberland Bike Breaks for a great weekend – can’t wait to go back and get the guided riding in next time!
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.
…it’s been a long time!
I’ve decided that todays ride could have gone in a number of directions. I could have taken the cross bike out. I could have changed the tyres on the singlespeed and taken that, but the most appealling prospect was taking the Remedy out again and letting it rip. The time spent between getting up and setting off to ride was extended a little by having to change tyres from the downhill numbers it’s been wearing recently to some lighter weight treads. As I was ground uphill later I was glad I’d bothered.
From Glossop I had the intent of heading over Chunal and dropping into Hayfield, but a huge traffic tailback saw me take an alternate route via Charlesworth and the Monk’s Road. Thick pea soup fog on the tops meant that the early part of the ride out of Hayfield was a bit overcast. The white shooting cabins at the top of Middle Moor which are usually the point of reference for the turn down to White Brow were hidden in the gloom, so as I nailed it downhill I was hoping it was the right trail.
Turned out it was the right trail, and after hacking up and over Kinder and contouring around some cheeky bits, it was a hack uphill to reach Edale Cross from where it was time to hit Jacob’s Ladder. This is one of my favourite descents, now with a new added roll in and funnel chute at the top… I ran out of disc pads half way down, so just had to go even faster and try not to crash. After the down, there’s always an up, in this case Chapel Gate, which now has ruts 4 to 5 feet deep where the rain has washed away the trail.
The group of five trail bike riders who blitzed passed me on the lower flat sections were soon rediscovered pinned under their bikes, in the process of falling off them, revving the nuts off the engines (but going nowhere) or pushing, dragging and manhandling their bikes. It could be described as messy, but with all the heavy breathing, burning rubber and hot air, it could quite equally be called gay.
I’ve decided that the vast majority of trail bike riders are rubbish. When they come to anything remotely technical and they might as well be wearing pink ballarina slippers and a tutu for all the poncing about going nowhere fast that follows. So they can’t ride up technical climbs, can’t ride down technical descents, about the only time they’re quicker than a mountain bike is when the trails so wide and smooth that they might as well be on the road, which, it seems to me, means they’re missing the entire point of having something with big brakes, a powerful motor and masses of suspension travel…
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.
Just so you know, that godawful noise as I pass you is not my knees about to explode, it’s my commuter bike. I have destroyed another Truvativ bottom bracket. This isn’t a good thing – this one’s only six months old. I’d love to claim that it was the result of my raw, explosive sprinting power and brute strength, but the sad truth is that it’s probably my frame whih needs the bottom bracket cups facing. The entire drivechain needs replacing, so I think that there’s going to be some TLC spent on the bike before it heads into winter…
A few months ago I was contacted by some guys interested in beasting themselves over the Cape Epic route. They’ve been keeping a blog of their preparations. Check it out here. I’d hoped to be riding there again, but it’s not going to happy this year and as there’s so many other great places in the world to ride, I think I’m going to focus on looking for a new international challenge.
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.
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