R O T H A R . C O M

Three days. An enormous amount of calories burnt and consumed and much fine Welsh real beer sampled and approved. We made it and battled through four seasons of weather over the hours of riding involved. It was a real adventure for all the right reasons. The big question is what do we do next year instead? I’m currently thinking that the much discussed traditional British Coast to Coast is favourite, but maybe with a twist…

Here are details of some crazy mapping project that is happening in Manchester. I wonder if they have invited any of the bike messengers to participate. I suspect that would be an interesting exercise.

I suppose I better clean the bike from the Wales trip.

Update (August 2006):

Photos from this trip are available in this gallery, added after the Singletrack magazine article of this trip was published.

The Trans Wales trip starts on Saturday morning first thing. We have the maps, we have everything in place. Originally this is the kit I had outline to take. Riding gear for three days namely:

3/4 length pants or baggies (depending on weather on 1st day)
Merino t-shirt.
Merino mid layer.
Waterproof shell.
Merino socks.
Winter boots.

Carrying in rucksack:

Beanie
Pertex Gillet
Microfiber trousers
Merino t-shirt
1 pair of socks
1 pair of pants
First aid kit + survival blanket
Standard trail tools (pump, PR kit, multitool, xc lube) + spare chain and 3 tubes total.
Maps & compass
Wash kit (toothbrush, toothpaste & showergel)
Notebook & pen for trip notes
Digi Pocket Camera.
Camelbak bladder
Food

Now the weather has turned and it’s properly warm and like summer I’m not so sure. I think it’s better to be safe than sorry, but you never can tell what the weather is going to do.

I am thinking that I need some more stuff to put up on the walls and I like some of these. Just trying to work out which ones look best. Talking of arty things. If I was any good at photography (like Dan), I’d be seriously interested in the Red Bull Illume competition. It has a seriously amazing prize up for grabs…

On a computing front it is interesting to see some of the Apple Mac Kit that Micrsosft are running in their R&D labs. Check it out. 150 Mac Minis… that’a ace.

Tyrrell is still trying to convince me to do the Cape Epic. We’ll see if he’s so keen after Wales has beaten him this weekend.

Had a couple of email too. Chris sends word from Norway:

From: Chris
Subject: Greetings from Norway

I am still here
nearly a year and a half later living the laid back Norwegian
lifestyle and getting in plenty of time on the slopes during the
winter and hopefully plenty of time on the singletrack this summer.

I have been keeping up with your antics though the regular updates on
rothar and see that you are riding more and more with the guys from
singletrack. The mtb’ing out here had been limited so far what with
finishing off the PhD when I first arrived and being carless it meant
limited riding around Bergen which is like the highlands of Scotland
on steroids its either fireroad or full on DH, I have scoped out the
norwegian cup DH course near the city centre after watching some
footage of racers walking section and thinking ‘lightweights’ I was
shocked to see that the course looks un-walkable in places so they
were doing well to walk it!

As a result (of having no car and the lack of riding buddies for mtb
action) most of my riding has been on the road both commuting and
recreational. However the fixie (did you ever see the low profile
late 80’s track fame I had set up for the road with the top tube that
sloped significantly down to the front?) albeit nice to ride is a bit
of a handful on some of the local climbs (12% ers) so I am in the
market for a decent road bike.

Ben is back on line up in Scotland too. Sounds like he is riding true to his word and getting in some great trails both on the burly beast and the DMR. Now all I need is a long weekend in Scotland to catchup. When are the mozzies on holiday?

From: Ben
Subject: HowdyBoyo

Ey up mate.

Wanted to send you a mail as I was a little tipsy when I saw you. Was good catching up though. Was a bit of a hectic visit to manchester so sorry for not getting in touch, wasn’t personal, I just tried to spendtime with my wee brother, don’t get to see him much.

Anyhoo, Not a huge amount to report, just that I’ve been doing as much riding as I can. Getting right into xc stuff (well thats what i call it – I do ride a trailstar….), the red run at glentress is dope if a bit worn. Gonna head back and teach the black route a lesson,
hopefully there’ll be no snow this time – It happened again, its a personal curse obviously. Just ordered some Flat crowns for my triple 8’s, finally It’ll ride a bit less like a harley.

Rode the newer dh at innerleithen when we were in the area. It rocks (even in snow), the
jumps are sooooo sweet, the nice wee drop into the chute down across the fire road into a big jump then doubles. I could stay there all year.

Finally got myself a descent digital camera, so I’ve been playing with that. No real riding shots yet, when it doesn’t rain I’ll get it sorted. But I did update my blog – been meaning to do that for a while! Kinda mainly landscape shots, but check it out if your bored.
Anyway, just wanted to say hullo. We should meet up at glentress sometime (unless you wanna get a dh bike!), would be a good laugh. Right I’ll shut up now.

Enjoy youself mate and see you soon.

Ben.

It’s all built up. Thanks to everyone who helped out with bits. Photos here.

Popped into Harry’s tonight to get some bits and who’s there? No one other than Ben down from Scotlandchestershire. Cool to catch up with him. Check out his blog over at West Coast 100. There’s even some photos of Dunoon! It looks like an ace place to go riding and that’s for sure.

Finally finished building up the Harry Hall frameset tonight. Put it on the scales and was staggered to see it weight in at 20lb. Damn that’s light. I thought it was going to be a lot heavier than that! I’ll take some pictures and post them up soon.

Woo! I have a road bike again. Quite excited about it. Just trying to work out where to go for a ride first…

For about the last nine months I’ve been putting up with a less than wonderful car. There was an engine problem in which the car was fine under normal driving until it was floored or even asked to accelerate moderately fast. The symptoms were that the acceleration was hesitant with loss of power and then it comes back on tap in stops and starts.

At first I assumed it was a fuel starvation issue, but running injector cleaner through the system and several full tanks of Optimax didn’t have any effect. Then I suspected a turbo/airflow related issue and a vacuum leak.

I replaced the main turbo hose and the two intercooler pipes with Samco silicon hoses and put in a Forge DV. This seemed to make it better, but the fault was still there. Not long after one of the speed sensors went on the front nearside front wheel so it went into Audi Macclesfield to get that fixed (ABS and ESP warning lights had come on).

The dealer spent two hours looking into engine problem for which i wasn’t charged, but they couldn’t see anything obvious. A diagnostics check revealed it was pulling more air in than normal so they suspected that it is a vacuum-related problem. The turbo tested fine, no other errors came up on the VAGCom or what ever else it is they use to check such things.

The head technician suggested that it could be a brake servo vacuum leak. He said this is a common fault in S3s. It certainly wasn’t something I have come across on the web and neither had any of the guys over at RS246.

The technician also noted that the brake pedal felt ‘spongier’ than it should. Apparently the brake system works off the same vacuum system as the engine and the proposed solution was that the car went back into the dealer for further tests at the diagnostic labour rate £85 per hour. They will need to get the car up on the ramp drop the engine out and test it fully. If the brake servo was found to be the fault replacement, a replacement is £300 for the part plus the associated labour. Probably looking at £1000 all in.

I wasn’t too impressed with this verdict and decided to try some of the suggestions that were made by other owners’ First up was a new Mass Airflow Sensor, which made absolutely no difference. Not long afterwards the car was up for it’s MOT and was whisked into the Car Care Centre in Padfield.

I asked for them to investigate the engine fault too. This is a great Independent firm that I have used before with previous cars.

They hooked up to a diagnositics computer that read the ECU memory and this identified a misfire as being logged. Audi were out of coilpacks, so he put in a new set of plugs and it completely transformed the engine. Closer inspection reveals that the plugs have probably not be changed from new. That’s 65K on a set and they were looking very worn.

Really miffed about:

a) Audi claiming to have run a diagnositics test and having missed this simple thing.

b) The car having done 65K and never having had the plugs changed (from what I’ve read this should have been done at 20K and 40K, but probably wasn’t because they’re difficult to get at).

c) The fact that the service also revealed that the rear disc pads were changed, but the discs weren’t – but needed to be – when it was last done. That’d explain the shoddy braking as they are very ‘lipped’ on the inside surface.

I’ve been up to the Yorkshire Dales before, but as with the Lake District, I’ve never ridden there. I decided in the New Year that I was going to get at least one ride in at both this season and when it was suggested recently to make a mid-week trip up towards Malham, I wasn’t going to turn it down.

The ride started with a big climb out of Settle and then spread out across the moors with a loop around Malham Tarn. Unfortunately a navigation cock-up (racing ahead down the hill from the only person who knew where we were going) led to an erroneous descent into Malham. As Dave and Sharon had turned off and gone the right way ahead of us at an earlier puncture stop, we had to retrace our steps and a 150m vertical gain climb marked with double chevrons on the map proved to be a complete beast on the Singlespeed back up.

Photos from the ride are up here…

New disc pads arrived for the geared bike today, but the singlespeed coped easily with the riding thrown at it today. I’m still not sure what to take to Wales…

Worked late at the office tonight and left just as the big black rain cloud that had been blowing in from the Wirral all day finally arrived in Manchester. The result was getting a royal soaking in about 30 seconds and a good test for the very orange 17 seconds jacket. After a few rides in the stereotypical April weather I’m really impressed. It’s kept the elements out and seems to breath much better than the Goretex XCR I’m used to. I think it probably needs a longer test, but the first impressions are excellent.

Gary Fisher watch out. Simon and Nick have a cunning plan. Quite why the bearded old hippy didn’t think of it first I don’t know. Clear demonstration of Britain leading innovation. Nick has the arguments.

From: Tyrrell
Subject: Virus Warning – Please Read
Warning! There is a dangerous virus going around. It is called WORK.

If you receive WORK from your colleagues, your boss, or anyone else, via e-mail or any other means, DO NOT TOUCH IT!

This virus wipes out your private life completely. If you should come into contact with WORK,put on your jacket, take two good friends and go straight to the nearest pub. Buy the antidote known as BEER.

Take the antidote repeatedly until WORK has been completely eliminated from your system.

Chilly says we’ve been accepted for the Bonty 24/12. New race, new venue, new team mates. It’s going to be ace.

I can’t remember the last time that two days riding occurred back to back. Well that’s not strictly true. Riding to work doesn’t count and really Wuthering Bikes did fit the bill, but this was the first time in a long time I have been motivated to go out and do some epic riding.

Saturday was a trip down to Tim at Sideways. Didn’t stay long, because I was just dropping off a wheel and a pair of forks for servicing. The plan was to go out riding in Macclesfield and it was a chance to get some tips on directions from him. He did try to persuade me that given the weather I’d have to be mad to go out in the rain, sleet and hail that had characterised the drive down.

Not only that but there was a near road rage incident with an arrogant bastard in a car on Talke Road. We had a disagreement over who had right of way and once I’d backed up to let him past he gave me a good old evil look which I intuitively countered with an up yer kilt two finger salute. That didn’t seem to go down to well and he then tried (for comedy value) to back down the road at speed in pursuit. It didn’t last very long. He almost crashed into a wall and then as another car was coming he probably realised that the whole thing made him look like he had a very small penis.

I ended up turning down Tim’s offer of fine coffee, reading The Outcast and enjoying good conversation and a bit of banter. Tim can be found blogging here. and sped off cross-country to Macc Forest. I parked up at Trentabank and then rode up and through the Forest and then down Wildboarclough. Then it was up past Clough House and Crag Hall and then over Tagsclough Hill past Heild End Farm. Then it was down through Greens and towards Flash Bottom.

From there it was a case of skirting up and over Wildstone Rock and dropping down to Far Brook and following the bridleway up to Hawk’s Nest. From there it was up to Knotbury, after which it was a case of dropping down towards Three Shire Heads, but rather than turning down towards Panniers Pool, I climbed up the road out of Blackclough and then feeling a bit disorientated, ended up taking the trail that contoured around to Reeve-edge and Danebower Quarries, from where it was a case of making a dodgy wade-across-and-try-not-to-drown crossing of the River Dane in full spate.

This followed an earlier bloody-hell-these-rocks-are-slippy and it’s-a-long-way-down crossing of the waterfall rim near Hawk’s Nest. Ironically this later encounter with the funnelled precipitation of the surrounding hills actually warmed my feet up for all of about 30 seconds – not much comfort really as shortly afterwards it was back to having feet like blocks of ice. As has recently been pointed out, winter boots are great at keeping your feet toasty until they get wet inside after which they’re not particularly fabulous even with nice merino socks on.

Fortunately I survived the crossing and then enjoyed the hike and bike climb up the access road back onto the A54 before heading south and taking the turn off for Sparbent. As with the last time I rode this area, what should have been a great descent was marred by a rather icy headwind. Despite this eventually the trail led down to the waterfall at the head of Cumberland Brook from where it was a case of taking a left down to Clough House. Back on to the tarmac and then a slog up Wildboarclough, back up the climb near Chapel House and down back though Macc Forest to the car.

Sunday saw more rain, hail and sleet in Manchester. Despite this I was determined to go out riding and I managed to convince Tyrrell that it was a good plan. We headed down the M56 and there had been so much icy stuff falling out of the Sky that the motorway was white and everyone was doing 30mph. About fifteen minutes later as we made it onto the Cheshire plain it was blue skies and we were blessed with a spectacular spring ride which was the first outing this year that was warm enough for shorts.

We headed into Snowdonia and parked up at Betws-y-Coed before riding the Tarmac Climb of Death up to the Marin trail. It’s been a year or two since I’ve ridden the whole trail and it’s changed a lot in that time. In all it seems to be wearing well. The Deluxe gobbled up everything it had thrown at it and T’s Stumpjumper was rocking. I think the standard tyres (Fast Track Pros) probably aren’t the greatest things in the world and probably contributed to a spectacular crash on one of the many hairpin corners.
Any I found this biking site the other day and found it had some interesting stuff on it… check out totally spoked.

Photos of the little Explosif are up here…

This is one of the best things I’ve seen for ages. As musicthing.blogspot.com reports, the after-school percussion group at Minnetonka High School, Minneapolis, rehearsed for months and can now play two tracks from DJ Shadow’s ‘Endtroducing’ album. The music was arranged by 25 year-old geographer/law student/vibraslap enthusiast Brian Udelhofen, who teaches the group. The Shadow Percussion Project page links to this amazing video [65mb WMV] of the group’s live performance in May 2005. They play ‘Building Steam with a Grain of Salt’ and ‘Changeling’.

I spent most of the evening building up the Explosif I picked up from C&G in Liverpool irst thing on Saturday. It’s come back looking very fine and tomorrow I’m going to finish it and get some photos taken and posted up on the site. The paintwork is immaculate and the chaps at C&G deserve a big shout for their efforts. You can find them here:

C & G Finishes
The Old Railway Station 274b, Smithdown Rd
Liverpool Merseyside
L15 5AH
Tel: 0151 734 3088

A big thanks is also due to Gil at The Cycleshed for the custom graphics, eBay for a bargain frame and to everyone at Harry Halls for their help and patience. It’s too small for me to ride properly, but it looks like it’s going to rock.

Wound up playing another game of rugby on Saturday afternoon. It was possibly the muddiest game I can remember, but i think everyone had a good match and it was uplifting to play with some really talented and experienced team mates. My back held up and even the following day when it was fairly tense, there wasn’t that niggly feeling that it was on the verge of going. It’s a big relief.

France is treating a certain Alaskan Pup well:

From: MacPuppy
Subject: News from Vercors

Please excuse the blanket broadcast e-mail …. but were now properly back online after a bit of radio silence. And some of you possibly havn’t heard much from us for a while.

The first alpine winter seems to be coming to an end as someone flicked the switch from winter to summer last weekend – it went from -10 to +20degC in a week and the snow has gone with it. Were sure it will be back again for a few days before summer kicks in properly but our local ski tows stop this weekend so we’ll be putting away the skis and dusting off the bikes.

I’ve put a selection of pictures from the past few months up on the web here.

BIG NEWS !!!!! we have signed a compromis …. which basically means were now buying a house or losing a lot of money if we pull out. It’s right in the middle of our village….

Makers of classic bike bits, Brooks have some new stuff out and have been spinning some publicity about them. Their pictures and press release can be found on their website. There’s information on their new products, including Brooks’ Leather Bar Tape for road bikes and their newest sports saddle, the Swallow Classic. Not really my thing. I mean they’re about as comfortable as Sheldon’s Real Man saddle.

Nick Wallis has been running a WordPress-driven blog for a long time and I like what he’s done with the right hand side links. There are also some classic posts on their including the classic Die Wikipedia, Die! 32:16 also links to Sentenced to Life a BMX movie trailer. It looks fantastic and there are some subtly outrageous tricks and fast riding in there.

Chilly, Tyrrell and I are getting ready for Wales. Counting down the weeks now. After that it’ll be time to start thinking about the Alps.