Life in the Bus Lane

After a promising start to the month, I only managed 17.5 miles in the last week due to a combination of work, rain, and helping Steve & Michelle move house. I managed to avoid the rain on todays quick ride, but ended up following it around and had to ride on wet roads for most of the route. I think the Cane Creek levers will be staying on the Langster, so it’s probably time to sell the Campag Record ones.

The Langster for 2006 looks nice, as far as I can tell it’s identical to this years, but black instead of carbon coloured. The US version is $100 more than the 2005 version, but the UK version is apparently going to be the same price as the cheeky imports available this year. If you’ve got £400 free, go and buy one, they’re ace.

The decorating continues apace, all the old wallpaper is gone, and 2/3 of the new stuff is up already. The garden slowly progresses as well despite us losing most of the decking and wood off the top of a transit van yesterday.

I popped down to the LBS today to settle my tab, and ended up coming away with some Cane Creek brake levers for the fixie, and a rather nice Nike wool jersey which was half price. The levers are now on the fixie for a trial period while I decide whether to keep them or the older Campagnolo Record levers. There seems to be a queue already for the Campag levers if I sell though.

Back to work tomorrow which is a shame. Still, it’s only for two days which isn’t too bad.

Courtesy of Guy comes webcam of the day. It’s strangely riveting.

The weather put any thoughts of a ride today on hold, it’s been raining pretty much constantly since I woke up, and when the rain has stopped, the wind picked up to take it’s place. The lack of riding will stop me doing 100 miles for this last week, but I have surpassed 300 miles for the month so far. At least the rain gave me an excuse to stay in and clear the hall/stairs/landing ready for the decorators who are starting tomorrow morning.

The Langster is slowly being pimped up a bit. It now has some previously-enjoyed Campagnolo Record levers, and will get some new calipers at some point. I’ll probably get some Centaur ones for the Lemond and move the Veloce ones to the Langster. The Campagnolo Carbon Record levers look nice, but probably aren’t practical for a bike I ride to work every day and lock up against a stone wall.

Unsuprisingly Lance Armstrong won his seventh consecutive tour today, the last stage was somewhat dulled by the rain, but the last day is always pretty much a formality anyway. Lance may not have been the greatest cyclist ever, but he’s certainly the greatest Tour rider.

And finally, happy birthday to Grant for today.

I wasn’t intending to ride tonight because the decorator was coming round mid-evening to pick up the keys and sort out colours and suchlike. However after an hour at home I was getting restless, so restless that I even cleaned the oven! I did use Muc-Off though so I didn’t lose all my bike-cred in the process. Ted arrived around 7 and somehow ended up leaving his PC with me for a few hours to tidy up, it left me just enough time for a quick spin on the bike whilst the computer was doing it’s stuff. I took the fixie out on the same ride as I did Monday but knocked 10 minutes off my usual time for the 15 miles by pushing myself to keep riding harder and faster. Unsurprisingly my legs ache nicely now, but it’s nothing that a bottle of SNPA or two won’t cure though.

Last time I rode the fixie it was making rather a lot more noise than it should really, so I spent half an hour on Saturday waving allen keys at it. I think the main problem was that Raoul had fitted a new chainring and hadn’t done the bolts up very tight. Rectifying that, along with retensioning the chain, and applying a liberal dousing of ProLink chain lube seems to have restored the bike to near silence.

Now I just need to fix the strange noise on the Lemond which I can’t quite identify.

I think I spent a bit too long in the sun this afternoon without a shirt on. Not only have I probably caused undue cruelty to the neighbours, but I’m now rather pink in places. No doubt I’ll be a bit sore later on.

The latest Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, is out today, which means that countless people will currently be sat on the sofa or deckchair working their way through the 600+ pages of the latest adventures of Harry and gang. Except for me that is, my copy didn’t arrive in the post this morning, so I’ll have to make do with Amateur Photographer instead.

It’s not quite the same though is it?

A quote from the front page of a website I refer to occasionally.

To use discussion forums, you must register for an account. This account is good for the entire website, but not for the discussion forums.

Or should that be 159 down, 141 to go?

I set my self two targets this month, one was to do 100 miles in four days (I only decided on that one yesterday), and the other was to do 300+ miles in the month. Well as of 5 minutes ago I’ve done 102.5 miles in the last four days, and a shade under 159 miles in the first 12 days of the month. All being well I’ll manage remaining 141 miles in the next couple of weeks leaving me a nice buffer at the end of the month.

Still bloody hot out though.

A long hot day in the office today, slightly tempered by opening all the doors and windows, then turning all the fans on. Once home it was time for a quick change then straight back out on the bike. I took the cross bike tonight and did about 24 miles out to Bradford on Avon and back, although my legs didn’t really like the last few miles home, probably something to do with having done 75+ miles in the last three days. I’ll try and pop out again tomorrow night to see if I can make it 100+ miles in four days. I’ve got a vague intention of doing 300+ miles this month, something I’ve never quite managed, however it’s somewhat dependent on the weather remaining favourable.

After riding nothing but fixed gear bikes for the last week or so, it was a bit of a culture-shock to get back on a geared bike again this weekend. A couple of quick road rides took me to 50 miles for the weekend, which isn’t too bad particularly as it was rather hot today. I’d probably have ridden more, but Friday night was a wedding reception for a cow-orker, and there was a free bar, something we all took full advantage of. This of course has some unwelcome repercussions on Saturday morning.

Hopefully the nice weather will last for a bit longer so I can get some decent rides in after work this week.

I headed out tonight on the fixie to join Ian for part of his ride home from work. When I got there the John’s Bikes express was about to leave and we were meant to be part of it. Luckily I wasn’t the only one on a fixie as Will was riding his, however mine is somewhat undergeared for fast riding on the flat, particularly considering the fact that Simon, Ian, and George were on far more sensible geared bikes. After chasing the leaders through town at speeds approaching 30mph, we eventually settled for a slightly less bonkers 20mph on the cycle track towards Saltford. Good job it was a slow ride as apparently they are usually a lot quicker.

We eventually left George at Saltford as we peeled off onto the roads, Ian and I headed up Double Gravity out of Saltford while Will and Simon braved the dual carridgeway into Bristol. After leaving Ian at the top of the climb I took the gentle route back to Saltford and home along the cycle track.

The Langster is still great fun to ride, although I’ve taken a major dislike to the saddle, something which I’ll rectify this weekend.

I couldn’t decided whether to title this entry "Red Red Wine" or "Lost in France", so I picked something else instead.

Yesterday we made a break for the continent to stock up with red wine. I now have 14 cases of the stuff stacked up in the hall waiting it’s rightful place in the cellar. Hopefully that’ll keep me going for a few weeks.

I took the Langster for a proper ride on Sunday, I only did 14 miles because I wanted to get back to watch Le Tour on the TV. The 38/16 gearing seems about right, slightly spinny on the flat but just about low enough to cope with riding up Double Gravity. The only downside of the bike is that the riding on the hoods is pretty uncomfortable as the levers are quite narrow, however I’ve ordered some new Cane Creek SCR-5 levers which are much more substantial and more Campag-like in their shape.

Golf tonight, that’ll be why it’s raining yet again.

And many many more nights I suspect.

26+ hours of The Comic Strip Presents.

It’s the first Saturday in July which can only mean one thing. It’s the start of the Tour De France. No prologue this year to warm things up as it starts with a fully-fledged 19km time-trial stage. My predicitions for the race: Armstrong will be top-5 today, but probably not first, and if he completes the race you’d be silly not to expect him to be in first place.

No proper riding today due to iffy weather and the impending Eurosport marathon TV session. I did retape the bars on the crosser and oil a couple of chains though.

Big news of the week, thanks to Raoul I’m now the proud owner of a Specialized Langster. Raoul bought it a few weeks ago, changed the gearing from 48/16 free, to 38/16 fixed or free, and then decided he didn’t really get on with it and so sold it to me at a bargain price, particularly nice as it still looked pretty much brand new. It wasn’t precisely what I wanted as as fixed-gear road bike, but it cost about as much as I’d have paid just for the frame and forks of my main choice so it was a no-brainer decision really.

So far I’ve only ridden if for 12 miles or so but it’s fantastic fun to ride. First time I sat on it it fitted like a glove, it’s a slightly harsh ride but that’s to be expected from a full aluminium frame/fork. The 38/16 gearing seems fine so far but I haven’t ridden it up any steep hills yet.