Bike: Spot
Route: Steppingley figure of eight
Playlist: New Wave Faves
Not the most exciting route, and with the clay and clag more like resistance training. Still, the singletrack section was sketchy fun. Maybe I should have fitted mud tyres to the geared Spot or just gone out on the singlespeed, which is suitably equipped 12 months of the year.
Vintage Spot
Bike: Spot
Route: Reverse Pig Farm with added cheek to finish
Playlist: Metal
First ride of the year. I encountered cheeky trail riders on the bridleway riding to their not so secret play spot. I rode some cheeky footpaths and everyone, everyone, I met was walking a dog. Not one of them was on a lead. I don’t normally ride the same bridleways on the bike as I do on the horse because, well, good horse-riding bridleways aren’t generally good bike-riding bridleways and vice versa. But tonight one of them was the best way home. Met two horse riders on the way.
Now if I was typical of the commentards on the Singletrackworld forum these days I should have been bitten at least once and later died of an apoplectic fit at the abuses of rights of way going on. Yet I had no problems and everyone was friendly and cheery. My suspicion is that attitude begets attitude and there’s a reason so many of the folk on that aforementioned forum have difficult encounters on the trails. Just saying like.
The photo per ride trend continues into 2012. I’ve made a note to start carrying the UltraPod so that they’re not just Panda shots.
cheeky chalky
Bike: Spot
Distance: 1 hour 30 minutes
Playlist: Rock
With a day off to attend to horses feet and a visit to the farrier the morning was free. As this is supposedly the busiest time for observing deer fights I decided to ride to Woburn deer park and capture some stag versus stag ruckus.
Stud
Turns out the deer are pretty boring, and as the sun rose they just carried on eating. This fella above appeared over the horizon for a gander at the does, but none of the other stags took exception to him and it all remained fairly calm.
Nowt left but to do the daily shop.
Bike: Spot
Distance: school and sweet shop
On Wednesday after sorting out the farrier I had to pick up my nephew from pre-school. Time being tight I rode from the stables to the school, then walked him home from there. He was disappointed that I had a bike (even though I was wheeling it), but he didn’t.
One of the great things about not having your own kids, but having nephews and nieces is the chance to spoil them, have fun with them, but once they are sufficiently wound up hand them back. In my role as wicked uncle I have already bought my nephew a Scoot, which he loves.
Earlier this year we bought a trail-a-bike. He was terrified until he actually rode it, but he wasn’t quite big enough to fit it comfortably. Since then he’s grown a little, and it was arranged with his mum that on Friday I’d pick him up from pre-school with the trail-a-bike.
What a hit.
Not only did we ride home, we had to do three laps of the houses, and then Kirsty suggested that we ride to the shops. Now the shops are only a brisk 5 minutes walk away, so off we went. The shops are also up the hill in the village. Kirsty came along too and all I could hear behind me was an excited child chattering away about how he was the best at pedalling and to go faster. Coming back down the way he was screaming at me to go faster and we had to race Kirsty home the last two-hundred yards with me feathering the brakes to make sure it was a dead heat.
He’s now planning how he could get to his dads in the next village with me carrying his bags on the handlebars.
Bike: Spot
Distance: 1 hour 30 minutes
Playlist: Unplayed in the last four months
The rescue cat, dude*, who hadn’t been seen for four nights turned up this morning at 7am. I was alerted by the shovel nosed cat noises as he troughed all the food he could inhale. He has since slept, stolen a whole chicken breast, and slept. He was tired, thin and wet. He’s currently asleep, dry, and rotund. I have a theory that he disappeared to travel through time to the return feast.
It’s just a little prick
In the intervening days the family had put up posters all around the village, and over the fields and woods and into the next village. I have spent hours walking round the woods and fields. I didn’t discover the missing cat, but I did discover the abandoned jump spot, and some nice potential singletrack. Today, as the posters are no longer required, I used the bike to get round a little faster to remove them all. And to check out the singletrack potential. There isn’t a great amount of it, but I could probably put together ten minutes of trails just 400 yards from home. Just need to get out there and ride them so that they get some definition.
So good news all round really.
* you can call him El Duderino if you’re not into the whole brevity thing.**
** Yes it is.
In September 1991 I walked into Warlands Cycles in Blackburn with most of my September pay packet and walked out with a discounted 1991 GT Karakoram. A bike that weighed 30lbs in stock form, six of which were frame alone.
Rather frighteningly this shopping experience dates the bar ends currently on Kirsty’s Spot as they were the first upgrade. Closely followed by SPDs. Shamefully copying Jason Shackleton I painted them to match the frame. Next came Onza Racing Porcupines, and then three months without beer to save up for the big upgrade…
Early adopter
Look at the SPDs. Actually, don’t
Yep, those are Hope mechanical disc brakes. Batch two. Freshly fitted at the factory, which was still at Hope Mill on Skelton Street in Colne, and full of odd parts like custom mini gearboxes.
It didn’t stop there and I ended up with Pro Circuit front forks, Flite saddle and a Royce titanium bottom bracket (which still runs smoothly today in my Dave Yates) to try and make up for all the weight I was adding. Rapidfire pods gave way to thumbshifters running cack-handed under the bars, that one was Brants fault, before finally settling on Gripshift. To whom I have stayed loyal since; at least where gears are concerned.
Potteries Classic, Trentham, 1993*
By 1994 I fooled myself that I was good enough to go custom and I bought a Dave Yates and the GT languished before eventually being donated to a student to take to college.
Warlands cycles closed down in 2009. It was no longer my LBS, and many of the forumtards these days are only after the cheapest deal they can get from an online retailer. Thank you Mr Warland for starting me on a cycling journey that I am still travelling.
* Even not so young readers may remember this as the original venue of SITS. Damn those monkeys.
Bike: Spot
Distance: 1.5 hours
Playlist: Iron Maiden
After discovering *another* puncture in the rear tyre of the Hunter the swiftest option to getting out was on the geared Spot. Fettled gears so they worked and spent as much time as possible in the big ring.
I went for the redneck look and was shunned even by other mountain bikers. I think that’s a good cycling tan I’ve got there.
Redneck rockshox
Bike: Spot
Distance: 3.5 hours
Playlist: 101 Punk & New Wave anthems*
More amazement at the differences in the way ostensibly similar bikes feel, and I always thought I “just rode”. The geared Spot today, which has shorter chainstays and stiffer finishing kit than the singlespeed version and don’t I know it.
Having gears meant I could push myself all the way with no relaxing. Hurty, hurty, hurty.
Then I boiled the rear brake fluid on the wooded singletrack downhills – not a fault of the brakes just a reflection of the age of the DoT fluid which is probably contaminated with water by now. You know how that goes. Brakes boil and start to bind, binding causes fluid to boil, which increases binding. It was like resistance training even on the downhills. And after two-and-a-half hours of pushing on every trail I felt the impending blood-sugar fall that heralds hitting The Wall. Cue wobbly diversion to the nearest newsagent for a much needed sugar rush. By the time I got there I couldn’t even spin the rear wheel for a revolution by hand.
Not a speederbike, a speedy bike
Taking my time to quaff** a large bottle of Irn Bru – don’t worry, I tempered the GI with some starch in the form of a large bag of crisps- had it spinning freely again. While the orange fluid worked it’s magic I rode the hour home with that aching leg feeling you only get when you’ve pushed it too hard too early in a ride. Still, it’s a feeling you get for about twenty hours of a twenty-four hour race so I’d best get used to it.
My reward for todays hurt was a top up of the cycing tan lines, a cool shower and barbecue in the horses field. Tonights choice of post ride beverage, Brugal and Coke.
* Elise: “How many songs are on that?”
** Normally only Vikings and Germans quaff, but I was really thirsty
Tandems
They’re two of everything.
Two wheels. Two seats. Two riders. Too long (Heh. Even slapping 29er wheels in there makes cock-all difference to wheelbase so you might as well take advantage of the ability to roll). Too big. Too heavy. Too hard to look after. Too big to store. Too fast.
Too much fun.
If singlespeeds are the epitome of simple cycling – no parts to break, no maintenance, and no brainers to ride – tandems ought to be their nemesis. But there’s something about tandems which makes them attractive too, especially the absurdity of taking them off road.
On an off-road tandem suspension is not just a nice to have, it’s nearer an essential. Start with decent front forks and suspension post. Then move on to long travel front forks and full suspension. Face it, there’s no way you can get that front wheel off the ground on it’s own and the world tandem bunnyhop record is still about 4 inches. Obstacles need to be tackled head on.
Lots of gears aren’t a marketing hype, where tandems are concerned. They’re essential. Bottom gear needs to be tiny tiny for the hard work of lugging the weight of the behemoth and it’s crew up the climbs. Top gear on the other hand needs to be absolutely huge to cope with the speeds the weight of the behemoth and it’s crew can accelerate to on the downs. When you understand that a half decent crew can spin out 53-11 on the flat with knobblies you’ll see why.
The biggest tyres you can lay your hands on for grip, and dare I say we’re converts to tubeless on them too?
Then to bring the whole thing to a halt you need brakes. Big brakes. Having burnt out Magura hydraulics and turned discs blue we know which we prefer. We like being able to lock the rear wheel of a laden tandem whilst towing a BOB trailer full of gear. Or at least the captain does. The squeals from the stoker as the whole contraption threatens to jacknife can be funny too…
The best reason for riding tandem is whenever you do any riding that involves riding in pairs. Instead of riding 50 yards apart all day you can’t help but ride together. The captain should wear a backpack full of goodies which the stoker can reach into at demoralising moments – such as the bottom of long climbs – unwrap, and feed to the captain. The stoker can map read at 40 mph hands free. The stoker can take photographs without stopping. Hey! All this talk of not stopping. What’s with that?! Well we’ve found we spend more of our non-riding time in the pub instead of stood in the countryside.
At least the timing chain is singlespeed :-)
Inspired by the recent Tandem Freeride Invitational we pushed our way up Garburn Pass at the weekend and giggled our way back down. I think it was with relief at not dying.
Caution. Middle Aged IT Managers GET OFF NOW*
We made the mistake of building Kirstys geared Spot down to an insurance limit. Since I started stealing it for bivvies I’ve been putting that to rights. A Chris King headset from Tim at the weekend was the final upgrade. After eight years the bike is finally finished to a standard Kirsty is happy with.
And, yes, that does include eggbeaters.
* and come back when you can ride properly