Early Morning iPod Ride. (In Lake Garda)

The alarm clock wrenches me from a particularly pleasant dream and its 6am. Early morning ride o'clock. Dark chocolate for energy and caffeine content is consumed. Slighty whiffy kit on. Pack and bike sorted the night before so we are away with minimal faff. The happy go lucky voice of Thom York is in the headphones.
Half hour spin up cyclepath dodging the sparse joggers as we go. Nausea stabilizes. More upbeat tunes on the iPod.
Through Dro as it wakes up, then off road up towards the lake. Tiniest mistake on one of the numerous short yet steep technical climbs and i'm pushing. Nausea rears its ugly head. The fizzy water I mistakenly bought not helping. Take turnoff and head down the singletrack to the lake, missed it out last time, shame as its a bit good. Chilli peppers rocking. Wake up crusty climbers cheeky camping by the lake.
Take 5 at the lake, take photo of nice cliffs, retrace tyres tracks back to turn off. Keep trucking north. Front wheel nearly washes out on corner, properly awake now. Metallica rarrrrr! Exit out onto farm track.
Through Petramurata. Climb up above the road. Back onto singletrack. Look left, my word that's a drop. Down the fast and loose bit saying 'ciao' to the smiley Italian bird pushing up the hill.
Climb up the last proper climb of the day, mess up one section and have to push until it smooths out a touch. Beasties are Super Disco Breakin'. My god I smell. Superfast fireroad descent, mess up that frickin corner again. Back onto the last singletrack section. Last and eviliest technical climb, not cleaned yet. Not going to happen today. Last singletrack descent, the really good one, pretty much pin it even the nasty drop off into rock garden goes surprisingly well with just clacking the pedals once.
Scare some lycra glad germans coming up the good descent. Odd bunch.
Back on to cyclepath, spin back, feel smug and tired.
Dodge germans roaming in packs. Shockingly high lycra quotient.
It's 10am.

too wet

it was too wet for pictures on saturday.
sunday was a missed opportunity!

Coedy Carnage

Well Coed-y-brenin lived up to expectations especially on the Carnage front...

I arrived at Ian's a wee bit before 5pm on Friday, bikes were loaded, Alan showed up, more kit was stashed in Ian's Volvo and before long and after just one more cup of coffee we were speeding towards Wales in the Silver Bullet.

Our tea stop was in the next village west of Welshpool where we stopped at a great family run chippy and consumed fried food a plenty.

We arrived at the Camping Barn called Cae Gwynat 9ish and settled in for the night having unloaded the Volvo and opened the beers.

Just as we were running low on beer Pat rolled up in his Campervan with a couple of six-packs of beer which were opened immediately.

Midnight rolled around, everyone was getting sleepy but The Swisser and his mate Dave hadn't shown up yet, it was decided that they had stayed in Telford overnight. It wasn't like they could have gotten in touch with us as there is pretty much no mobile signal in the valley. So we zipped ourselves in our sleeping bags and headed for the land of nod.
At 1:07am (yes I looked at my watch), Lex and Dave stumble into the camping barn. swearwords were uttered by not much notice was taken. Good job we forgot to lock the door.

It turns out Lex had plugged the postcode of the Camping Barn into his GPS (which the web link Ian sent out to everyone, said very clearly not to do) and was sent wildly off course and had been driving about in the dark for an hour and a half looking for us. Ha ha.

Ah well, the next morning, after a cup of coffee we were off and riding with a minimal amount of faffing and heading straight to the Coed-y-Brenin visitor centre for breakfast. After Brenin Breakfasts all round we headed out (after I fell down the stairs in the visitor centre - an omen?) into the rain to tackle the Brenin Beast, 46km of welsh trails.

The first hour or so passed uneventfully apart from Dave having a minor tumble jarring his back and heading for the carpark.

After a short steep downhill, a quick stream crossing and steep pitch up, Pat found himself on his back in the stream having fallen down bank having been unable to unclip upon stalling on the pitch. The hilarity.

The next normal wet service was resumed until on a steep downhill with water flowing down the trail, Alan had a minor off and I had a proper over the bars incident and came off with a bruised hand, bruised man boob and grip that no longer has an end on it.
/it gets a bit hazy from here on in.../
More slippy slidey fun until we got the half way cake stop and cake and hot drinks raised spirits.

We chugged around the rest of the route, enjoying the climbs and enduring the descents. Or vice versa.

Comedy rotating grips added an extra level interest to the proceedings. But zip tying them to the bars seemed to help matters.

Back at the bunkhouse people got warm and dry and the pub was invaded. The Tyn-y-Groes served up fine ales and mediocre food but extra baskets of chips for the Lees boys kept us happy. A few carry out Leffe's to see us on our way and we were all asleep by half eleven.

The next morning we were greeted with blue skies, so we got ourselves down the road to the visitor centre in record time and were waiting for the cafe to open. More brenin breakfasts allround and four of us were of to ride the Tarw trail (formally known as the redbull). Pat headed home after breakfast as his back was sore after his spill the day before. The trail was ace, just the right length for a morning ride, lots of good singletrack, very quiet with most riders seeming to ride on the other side of the valley. Two minor incidents,Iann snapped his chain and Lex had a proper off on a wooden bridge. The last section of trail was probably the best bit of singletrack I rode all weekend.
Back to the cafe for a quick piece of cake and a cold drink (not that we had any choice, they had run out of water again) and then back to the barn to shower and get on the road.
Once loaded up we were speeding back to the midlands stopping only to fill up with snacks from the spar in welshpool.
Back at homeI i put the washing on and then collapsed.

Carnage count:
Dan: bruised hand, two bruised hips (one from falling down visitor centre stairs), bruised man boob (possibly with cracked rib)
Ian: bruised knee
Pat: bruised forearm, bruised back.
Lex: bruised forearm

Fried breakfasts eaten:11
Kilometres ridden: 60 or so

Ace weekend!

We're all off...

to Coed-y-Brenin! We're all excited apart from those who have the lurgy and can't come.

We're going to spend the whole weekend riding bikes (woo!), drinking beer(woo!) and eating (double woo!)

Stand by for photos and report on Monday.

If you're in Coed-y-Brenin this weekend we are very sorry, I'm not quite sure what for yet but its always best to get apologies in, in advance.

Roadtrip Rules...

We're heading to the newly renovated Coed-y-Brenin trail centre this weekend.
Now as much as I like weekends away biking with mates there are a few rules that if followed makes life so much pleasurable for everyone involved. The following have been gleaned by bitter experience.

1. Lycra is not to be worn as an outer layer before midday. If you have a hangover you really don't need to see that sort of thing. Any outer Lycra is frowned upon.
2. Chill out. If there is a big group, you'll be covering ground slower than normal. Just chill out.
3. Be self sufficient. By all means share tools with a mate but no one like a tube/pump/tool/snack scab. Having said that next time I'm taking a couple of 99p Decathlon tubes and charging people 10 quid for when they inevitably flat. That'll pay for some cake.
4. Don't be stinky. No one likes a stinker.
5. Take of your fullface helmet in the cafe/car. You look like a retard. No really you do. Yes you, you window licker.
6. Stop whinging. Or the abuse will worsen.
7. Breakfast foods must not include tuna. Or pasta. This wrong on so many levels. Just the thought makes me wretch.
8. No patching of tubes whilst on the trail. Bung in a new one, don't make your mates hang around for you. Unless you've run out of spare tubes, in that case see Point 3, much cheapness.
9. Don't bring a daft bike. 40lb freeride bike on an allday epic XC ride? Don't be daft. Singlespeeds are fine as long as you have the leg power/speed to get up most hills and keep up on the flat bits. I may be flouting this rule this weekend but I managed to get round the Skyline Trail at Afan Argoed on the one speed without too much hassles despite the daft grips.
10. Don't be a faffer*.

i've been at the photoshop again....

The slippery slope of pimpery...

Now for along time I've been the kind of guy who eschews the expensive end of the bike market.

To quote Keith Bontrager:
Strong, Light, Cheap - Pick Two.

I picked cheap and strong. I'm very much a Titec and Deore kind of a guy. Or at least I was...
The singlespeed frame came with something alarmingly beautiful. A Phil Wood EBB.

Nice isn't it. The machining on it is exquisite in a engineering geek kind of a way. Bear in mind this will be mainly hidden in the bottom bracket shell and will have holes worn in it by the set screws. Plus mine has extra holes machined into the sides to add extra pimpness and save weight. Dribble.

This weekend I broke a seatpin, luckily my genitalia remained intact but the ride finished before it even got going.

On return home and after a quick hour and a bit on the roadbike to at least get some riding in, the search for a new seatpin began. 27.2mm in diameter, black and at least 400mm in length. Online stores were scoured. Something strong and cheap was looked for. No joy. hmm... Something reasonably priced? Like a Salsa Shaft, nope. My favorite Ireland based bike emporium had 2 suitable options a Race Face job in black with a weird clamp (fifty five pounds to you , sir) and a Thomson Elite. Sixty Pounds. For seatpin. I've never spent more than twenty five quid on one before.

"Buy" button hit. A smidge over twenty four hours later and it was in my sweaty paws. It's a bit nice and I have been eyeing up the Thomson stem...

This might be quite expensive.

ps: I would like to thank the dog walkers who use Martinshaw Woods for leaving large numbers of Dog Poo landmines there. There is nothing like a quick coating of dog poo to bring your biking buzz down.

downtown street race

A new event on the calender, the twentyfourseven downtown street race in bridgnorth, shropshire....





yes, that is cardboard. but don't worry, it was protected by a layer of sellotape...

Today I'd rather be...

cruising around a city (a nice one like Vancouver or Christchurch would be good) on a bike, any bike, chilling at Cafe's and drinking fancy coffee. Not sitting at a desk waiting for the phone to ring with a sore knee from where I fell off my bike at low speed last night.


My knee better be better before the weekend or I will not be happy.

10 Things to do before I die...

In no particular order...

1. Solo 24 hour race - properly this time.
2. Transalp/Trans Rockies - The Transwales just doesn't seem to have the same cache for some reason.
3. Race the Grand Divide - Absolutely daft idea.
4. Take a long Cycle Touring Trip - at least a month, somewhere amazing.
5. Take a big long USA MTB roadtrip - Moab, Crested Butte, Idaho, all those places I've always dreamed of going.
6. Ride BC and The Canadian Rockies - hang on I've done that. But I really want to go back...
7. Ride Europe's sweetest singletrack - I've done lots of it this summer but there's always more...
8. Take a Western Spirit Trip - they are the daddies when it comes to Biking holidays, widerness camping, gourmet food and unbelievable riding.
9. Leadville 100 - pain in large quantities in Colorado Rockies.
10. RAGBRAI - Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. 10,000 riders ride across Iowa. Good times.

photoshop

a bit of a change for today's picture.....

messing about with photoshop last week and came up with this.

click picture for a bigger version.
my next project is portraits of my riding buddies with their bikes (but not necessarily on them). you'll see....

Big Day Out...

I found myself down in South Wales over the weekend, so after walking up Pen-y-Fan on the Saturday Pat and I headed over to Afan to have a crack at the 46km Skyline Trail.
After a brief faff and a quick trip to the bikeshop to grab some essentials we were off.
I took my only Mountain bike, the rigid singlespeed (silly idea?) and Pat was on his Kona Coiler.
The first climb out of the valley at Afan is always a shock to the system but on the singlespeed it was unusually bad, going from cold legs to sharp uphill in about 30 secs. Once I had wrestled my breakfast back down into my stomach and got into a rhythm it was fine.

The skyline takes in some really nice singletrack and some long-ish fireroad sections, normally fireroad = dullsville, but the views are stunning so its all fine.

The route basically follows an alternating fireroad singletrack rhythm and we continued around the loop ignoring the bail out routes.

After 25km pats legs were getting knackered and crampy but frequent refuelling kept his cranks turning.

After 30km my hands were very sore from the pounding they were getting on rocky singletrack and the ergon grips not getting on with my weird hands) I decided to try out. You can have them back Mike. The grips that is not my hands.

The last 20km were really hard on my arms and hands, I was barely able to hold on, on the downhills, JuJitsu stretches helped a bit.

Pat punctured on the last descent and my pump malfunctioned so he had to walk the last downhill, lesson learn't take two pumps.

A late lunch at the DropOff cafe helped ease the pain in Pat's legs and my arms.

It was a great epic ride.

Daft Commute home...

Decided to drop in our friends MikeT and JudeT, who have just got back from honeymoon, on the way home from work.

Had a cuppa and talk about this and that and before I knew it it was half six. The ride back from theirs got a bit sketchy with the rapidly failing light.

As I had my "don't run me over" lights on rather than my "oh, theirs a rock/pothole" lights on, the descent down off Beacon Hill towards Woodhouse Eaves at 30mph was a bit sketchy...