Life in the Bus Lane

I’ve not ridden the Inbred much lately, prefering to take the cross bike out, or rely on the bouncy plushness of the Craftworks. However I felt like a change tonight. I’d forgotten just quite how much you have to spin on a singlespeed, my lack of progress did get a bit frustrating for a while until I decided to just sit back and enjoy myself. Despite the lack of gears I still did my usual loop quicker than normal.

Now it’s time to relax with a bottle of wine in front of a copy of On Any Sunday.

Bought a new one-man tent from Argos yesterday for £15. Looks quite good although I’m lacking a garden to erect it in, so can’t give a definitive statement as to it’s quality or usefulness. However for £15 I can’t really go wrong.

We’ve bought a new web filtering gizmo at work, it cunningly blocks onefuckingspeed.com on the grounds that it contains pornography. Not sure where they got that idea from, especially as it doesn’t block the other URLs which point to the same site.

At last the week has ended. A mixed bag of weather over the last few days, gales and torrential rain two days ago, and a glorious summers day today.

Highlights of the week include England being knocked out of the European Cup, maybe we’ll get to see some proper news for a change. The Craftworks is also back up and running, although the chain is a tad too short to run 36/32. It got a bit stuck earlier necessitating manual intervention. Hopefully I can find some spare 9spd links for it.

Tomorrow sees Barbara and Jamie getting married at 2pm, no doubt followed by copious quantities of alcohol at the reception. Sunday is therefore dedicated to having a hangover.

I shall partake of a small training session tonight, mainly because there is a fresh bottle of vodka in the freezer begging to be opened.

The Craftworks has regained it’s forks again. The damper cartridge came back from Mojo, total cost £17, the turnaround time was 44 hours from me dropping it off at the post office, to the postie trying to deliver it back to me today. I seem to have cured the lack-of-travel problem, although whether that it due to the correct oil lever, or the new fork seals, I can tell. Due to the weather and other committments, the test ride will probably have to wait until next Monday.

Apparently there is a package waiting for me at the post office in town, I suspect that it’s my damper cartridge back from Mojo.

Shame the weather this evening isn’t exactly conducive to bike riding, given the heavy rain and strong winds currently afflicting us, more akin to late autumn that the beginning of summer.

Actually, on reflection, it’s exactly like a normal british summer.

My damper cartridge has been fixed and should be back with me within a couple of days.

Apparently it’s only cost £15 for the part and £2 postage. Bargain.

Mojo must have woken up, or more likely got back from their morning test ride.

We have delivered your item
Your item with reference ZU246429318GB has been delivered

Hmm, apparently no-one was available at Mojo to take delivery of my damper cartridge this morning, so it’s been taken back to the nearest Royal Mail office.

That’ll no doubt scupper plans for a quick return.

Brainiac on Sky One just did a test of the non-newtonian properties of custard by filling a swimming pool full of the stuff, then proving that you can walk on it. Definately inspired and eccentric TV. Why are there not more programs like this?

I finally rang Mojo who reckon that it should only be a couple of minutes work to fix my damper cartridge, and it should only cost £20 or £30. Royal Mail permitting they should get the damper tomorrow morning, they hope to turn it around the same day, so I may well get it back in time for a ride on Wednesday evening.

Went to service my Fox forx earlier as I think I’d overfilled them with oil last time, and managed to overtighten the fixing nut and broke the bottom off of the damper cart. Bet that’ll be expensive to replace.

Panaracer Cinder 2.25″ tyres are quite nice. Rigid forks are less nice on hard rutted tracks.

Going back to work after just over a week away is always a bit of a shock, but I seemed to survive today with no major problems. Two day weeks are particularly nice though.

There is a new Pixies track out called “Bam Thwok”. No idea what it sounds like, but it’s bound to be good as it’s by the Pixies. [update: it's fantastic]

Find rude place names near where you live, not a particularly good selection round here though.

Well I’m home, and in one piece as far as I can tell. I’ll backfill the blog with all the gory details tomorrow I expect. However Glentress is still ace, the Fort Bill DH track is ace, and Innerleithen is also ace.

In fact, bikes are ace.

The last day of proper riding in Scotland.

We headed off to Innerleithen about 10am and were soon lost. Gray managed to locate a map in the depths of his car, and we were soon back on track.

The facilities at Innerleithen leave a little to be desired. One portaloo with no toilet paper, and no drinking water available. A quick trip up the road to the shops solved the latter problem.

The route starts out with a 9km climb up onto the top of a moor. There is a little downhill bit in the middle to alleviate the boredom though. The final part of the climb zigzagging across the moor was actually quite good fun, the first climb that I’ve enjoyed for a long time.

A quick descent off the top of the moor led us to a climb back up to the top, then a more narrow descent back down again.

Highlights included the first “black” section which involved a lot of rocky steps, and the final descent back to the carpark with lots of rocky drops, loads of rolling banks, and some fast swoopy bermed descents. If it wasn’t for the couple of unridable (by me) rocky drops, it would be by favourite descent every, however due to those drops, Sidewinder/Dead Sheep Gully at Afan still takes first place.

A final trip to the Hub for another Hubba Bubba breakfast, this time with added chocolate flapjack, and it was time to wave goodbye to Gray who was heading home as we headed back to Cowdenbeath after stopping to pick up “bribes” for Jen.

Pictures

Sunday was meant to see us riding part of the West Highland Way know as the Devils Staircase, however the weather conspired against us. The wind had picked up and all the hills around us were shrouded in heavy cloud. The visibility where we would be riding would make it unridable.

Gray needed to visit the A&E in Fort William to get his arm checked so we popped up to do a stop of shopping. We wandered round the bikeshop again, resisting the lure of bike bits, and wandered along the main street popping into outdoor-type shops along the way. I came away with a DVD and a mahoosive bag.

The drive back to Cowdenbeath was unremarkable apart from the rain. We waved goodbye to Gordon just after the Green Welly Stop.

The evening was spent in the local pub. The downside was that they had the footy on, all the drinkers were very vocal in their support of France, and Gray, Olly, and myself were the only English people in there.

The chairlift at Fort Bill is only open for bikes between 10:45 and 14:45, so we decided to get there nice and early. We eventually left the cottage around 10:30 and stopped off in Fort William to pop into the bikeshop for protection. Olly couldn’t find a fullface helmet he liked that fitted, and I couldn’t find one big enough. One of the downsides of having an overly large head.

We finally arrived at the DH course and got all our kit ready and headed off to buy a day pass for the chairlift. The ride up took 15 minutes or so, and all too quickly we were at the top. There is a 10 minute walk to the top of the course, then it was time for some fun.

A brief course summary.

Pedally bit. Really rocky bit. Then a mix of pedally stuff and really rocky stuff. Cross the fireroad and into the woods for some ace rooty stuff, then out into the open for some jumps and doubles, then a very very steep slope down to the end. I walked quite a bit off the stuff down to the fire road, then rode all the rest.

Once at the bottom I went straight back up in the chairlift with Gray, spotting Olly on his second run down as we passed the middle of the course.

The second run was better. I rode more than the first time, and made it down in 15-20 minutes or so.

Once at the bottom Grant decided not to do a third run and I didn’t fancy doing a run on my own, so we headed off to the cafe. Gray and Gordon managed a third run, and Olly managed four, but was quite battered and bruised by the end of it.

Once we’d refueled in the cafe we were too tired to ride any more so we reloaded the cars and wandered up to the 4X course to watch some locals clearing the drop and the jumps with ease.

After popping into Safeway on the way home the evening passed in a blur of beer, burgers, and wine.

Pictures

Friday meant Fort William day.

We loaded up the cars and headed to a McDonalds for breakfast. We were meant to be meeting Gordon at 10:30, so we left McD’s at 10:00 with 2 hours drive ahead of us. We arrived 90 minutes late, and stocked up with food, then headed onwards to Glen Coe. We located the cottage, unloaded the cars, then reloaded them with bikes and headed of to Fort Bill some 20 miles further north. Parking up we unloaded the bikes again and had a potter round. We checked out the chair-lift times for our DH day, then had a quick play on the 4X course. It’s quite big and scary in places.

The Witches Trail then beckoned to us, the first part was a singletrack climb and a bermy descent. Then after a fireroad section there was another singletrack climb, followed by more fireroad. The first proper descent was wet and rocky, so was mostly walked, then we headed along to the bombhole. Olly and Gordon took a couple of runs each, Olly got a bit sideways over the top but recovered, then Gordon tried the same and didn’t come off so well. He ended up going off to one side of the track, then dropping back into it on the corner and crashing headfirst into a pile of rocks. Watching the crash I had visions of ambulances and broken bodies, but he survived with just two stitches to his upper lip which was quite miraculous.

Spirits dampened, we headed down the fireroad and back to the cars. Gordon went straight back to the cottage, collected Gray, and went back to A&E in Fort William, Grant and I stocked up with Pizza and munchies for the evening.

A few hours laters, the walking wounded returned, and much pizza was eaten.

Pictures

Time for my second visit to Glentress. We met Gray in the car park and promptly made a beeline for the Hub cafe for cheese and ham toasties, and a mug of coffee. Suitable refueled we headed out on Grants custom Red with a hint of Black route. We stopped off briefly at the skills area for a quite potter around, then carried on our merry way. The route was much as I remembered it from last year, a couple of bits were new, but it was still all good fun. We headed round the red route as far as the Ewok Village where we spent a fair while watching Olly play around on the north shore type stuff. My first run nearly ended in disaster so I played safe and resorted to wielding a camera instead of a bike.

The next section we did was Double-X from the black route, we then finished off with The Wormhole, then the final sections of the red. As with last year I was quite tired by the time we hit the last descent and almost wrapped myself round a tree. However the Hub cafe beckoned again and we were soon sat down enjoying a Hubba Bubba breakfast, washed down with more coffee.

After a wander round the bike shop, we threw the bikes in the car and headed up to the skills area and the freeride run for a bit more playing. First run down I chased Olly, and Grant and Gray followed on. Gray managed to wash out on a flattish part and cut his arm quite badly which put a bit of a dampener on things, so Olly and I did one more run without pedalling, then reloaded the cars and headed home for beer and quiche.

Pictures

Lots of driving today. Why did they put Scotland so far north?

400 miles and 8 hours after leaving Bath, I arrive outside an empty house in Cowdenbeath, Grant is still at work. Eventually Jen gets home with the kids and lets two strange blokes into the house. After Grant returns we stock up with beer, hop on the bikes, and head off to the quarry via the chip shop.

We sit around eating fish and chips, and drinking Stella, enjoying the evening sunshine. A quick play around in the quarry and we start to head back. We take a quick look at the secret shore and decide it’s unridable by us, then we take the fun route back down the hill. The ride down is over all too soon leaving us with a road ride back home. Tomorrow is Glentress though which should be fun.

Apparently one hospital is now barcoding patients to reduce errors in dispensing drugs. Probably won’t stop them chopping the wrong leg off though.

Get well soon to Guy who got knocked off his motorbike at the weekend and will be laid-up for a few weeks with a broken foot.

Not the most lucrative of nights. We managed to come away with four cans of Grolsch (me), one bottle of Mosel wine (Rob), and one-third of the Away Spares cup (Dave the Captain). In the end we came fifth in the league, slightly better than I expected to be honest. Better luck next year.

Tonight is the presentation night for the skittles league I play in, usually a fairly drunken affair, then tomorrow I’m out on a stag-do for the afternoon/evening. No doubt copious quantities of alcohol will be imbibed, and so Sunday will therefore be dedicated to hangover recovery.

Luckily I only have two days at work next week, then I get to spend a week riding bicycles in the sunshine, and almost certainly drinking more alcohol between rides.

Disc brakes don’t work very well when the pads wear away. Other than that, it was a good ride this evening, a gentle 12 miles or so, replacement pads are now fitted, and spares have been ordered as the front ones are looking to be nearing the end of their life.

The car also passed it’s MOT with flying colours which is good, especially for my bank account.

The new boss is getting a signing on fee worth about half a pint.

Where has the time gone? It feels like someone has stolen a few months from the beginning of the year.

However my computer assures me that it’s the 1^st of June today, which means car tax, MOT, and Scotfest in 8 days. Then before you know what’s hit you, it’ll be July, or possibly even August at the going rate.