Category: Cycling

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Spring? and ‘Hope’fully normal training resumes !

New toys and the enjoyment of getting back into training after several weeks of disjointed riding were the feature of this week, with no competitions this weekend though the weather has shown that winter is nearly here.
My left knee now seems back to normal now, though I have found that perhaps I was irritating it by having my seat too high on various bikes, particularly my turbo trainer. On rest night next week I will get all the bikes out and a tape measure and try to optimise not just seat height but  for/aft position too. Most people who try my race mountain bike tend to comment it is very ‘long’ so in will be interesting to put some figures to it.

This week I finally received my new light a Hope Vision 4. This 4 LED light is one of the best on the market and as I got a good price through Ada I decided I’d give it a go. Although the weather forecast for Friday evening was horrible the ‘Berkswich year 2 dads ride’ went ahead and I got the chance to try out my new toy. One of the other Dads had his Chinese Ebay specials out for their first outing which looked very good value to but I think their lumen claims are a fair way off the mark. The Hope 4 was just awesome, particularly on low where the battery is alleged to last 30 hours. I used the full power on a couple of descents and immediately pulled a huge distance out on the two Simons, one an ex bmx racer who is normally all over my rear wheel.

The weather got worse and the mud and sand mixed with brake discs and chains was making horrible a noise but my noise got very loud on a climb out of the Sherbrook Valley. I stopped and eventually diagnosed it coming from the rear brake. Wheel removed showed the spring to be mangled up inside the caliper. After removal I tried to get the pads to seat but ended up riding home carefully with only the font brake. Lesson, a spare brake pad srping will join the little bag of spares and tools I always carry in my pack. For interest this now contains :
Chain Splitter, 2 allen keys, 1 tyre lever, 1 Tube, 1 Rear mech hanger, 2 SRAM power links.

With several good rides under my belt this week I am hoping to resume a full training schedule next week but have decided to lay of the running for a few more weeks to make sure I do not get any niggles returning.

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Event Report – D&W #1 – Hayfield

Up until Friday afternoon I was still unsure as whether to ride or not in this the first of the Dark and White Winter series. Following the discovery of my large bruise I have been struggling with knee pain, particularly where I had Osgood-Schlatter disease as a teenager. I think all the problems I have had, including the ripped muscle have been caused by the impact injury I sustained a month ago whilst running which perhaps I should have rested more before recommencing riding.
Anyway back to the event. Hayfield is one of those villages in The Peaks where the mountains rise on all sides, steeply to open moorland. Starts were early because of Remembrance Parades and we arrived in plenty of time. After chatting to a few people I realised that a good league score was not on the cards as local and national legend Nick Craig had decided to ride. I have only ridden the area around New Mills and Hayfeild once several years ago, but the riding is stunning and several tracks brought a smile to my face (well the ones that used gravity to my advantage did). I started off scrappily picking up the two controls to the east, but this was a mistake as it involved a lot of climb for so few points. I then didn’t spot a high pass near #5 which would have saved me another climb. My route to the 25 pointer #8 was a lucky pick though as the decent to #10 was a foul muddy track where I passed lots of people struggling upwards. The rest of the ride was fairly straight forward but towards the end I decided not to push my luck, particularly as I was tiring and didn’t want to get another niggly injury. Rather that coming in via #4 and perhaps being a couple of mins late I opted for the fast route down the main road. The decent was amazing, with the GPS showing I hit 41 mph at one point. I think the sporty Volvo hatchback that exiting the junction at the top of the pass in front of me had a shock through the bends with chasing him down in his rear mirror !

Another great event from Dark and White ( I only needed to get the descriptions out once) which I thoroughly enjoyed. Although  I only got 11th which would normally be disappointing, the quality of the field was very high and with the injury niggles I have had over the last month I feel quite pleased.

Results available here http://www.darkandwhite.co.uk/results/D&W%20Winter%20League%200910%20-%20Round%201%20-%20short.html

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Singlespeed !

With an improvement in strength on the hills this winter’s training goal, coach Ada has decreed that I should get a singlespeed mountain bike. Not wanting to spend much money as I need a new race frame this year I decided to try and build it from bits.
Bringing together all my spares, old bits and Cath’s bike I started to think of how perhaps I could end up with not just a singlespeed but a bike better suited to Cath. Cath has been riding an ancient steel framed Diamondback Apex which we bought second hand from a friend at least 9 years ago. It has early air front suspension , V brakes and a very old school long framed design. It has always been too long for her and we have tried various stem and handlebar options over the years to help shorten it.
After much prevaricating I decided to build Cath a decent bike with all the best bits and hack the rest into a serviceable singlespeed for me, lucky Cath! Merlin Cycles, near Preston, had a great deal on their 2004 aluminium frames, complete with headset and seatpost – £99. Caths new bike was built around this and has the following spec: 15 inch Merlin Frame (new), cheap FSA chainset (new), XT rear mech, Deore front mech, Hope XC / Mavic 819 wheels (tubeless), Magura Julie disk brakes, Rockshox 2004 SID team, and various original bits of finishing kit – not bad for £160 + old bits

On to the singlespeed then. After various conversations and web research I settled on a conversion kit from Charlie the Bikemonger.  ( who I can reccomend highly) They have some great videos
       

showing how to bodge a singlespeed using a cost effective kit which Keith Floyd style seems to involve drinking beer between tasks. The kit consists of some spacers to use on an existing Shimano freehub, two cogs (16 and 18 tooth), new shorter chain bolts, an 1/8 chain and a chain tensioning device to make up for the frames lack of sliding dropout all for about £40. STX RC V brakes (1995), XT 110 bcd 5 arm 18/36 chainset – (1992), XT / Mavic wheels (1995 ish) and the yet unidentified front air shock completed the setup, however much to my dismay the diamond back was just too small (15 inch) to be comfortable and the seatpost was just too far past its max, it also was in desperate need of a new headset. After the first build I gave in and again visited Merlin to get another one of their 2004 Malt frame deals, this time with a bottom bracket thrown in rather than the seatpost, and moved everything across onto it, only to find the old air shock headtube to be too short. A work colleague kindly gave me a very old set of spring / elastomer Manitou forks which although very soggy fitted but it was obvious that they were just too soggy to be of much use.
An evening of web research led me to try boiling the elastomers on the stove and replacing of the fork oil with Castrol GTX ( much thicker) which has more or less made them serviceable again. Fantastically luck did eventually catch up with me and I didn’t need a chain tensioner to start with, the chain fitting perfectly, but after 3 or 4 rides the stretch on the chain and lumps and bumps has had it off a few times so the tensioner will be going back on soon.

First impressions of singlespeed riding is I love it and would ideally like to build a modern spec quality singlespeed at some point to make things more comfortable but for the time being my thrown together budget bike should do the trick.

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Dark & White Enduro – Sherwood Pines

Sherwood PinesAdrian from Dark and White had spoken to me earlier this year about their first foray into Sherwood PinesEndurance MTB racing. He had thought of holding it on Cannock Chase but in  the end decided on the safe  bet of Sherwood Pines. I nearly didn’t race. Id had a niggly knee injury following my fall a couple of weeks ago and to top it all I got a cold in the week before. I finally made the decision late on Saturday after a couple of test rides on Fri / Sat but unfortunately this meant leaving Caths parents at 6 to get over in time for race start at 10 sharp.

 
 

Dark and white EnduroThe drive over the peaks at dawn was gorgeous and of course there was no traffic at all on the road. The start involved a 400 metre run Le Mans style to our bikes. Although we were issued with a map at registration the course was marked with tape and signs along its length but having it on the map board did help antipate the climbs and turns. I tucked in in about 5th place for the first few laps and rode mostly on my own. Half way round the second lap I started to lap the slower riders, including one nutter on a Unicycle and a couple of kids who were doing fantastically. It was great to see a young girl riding with her dad in an enduro (and ride the whole 4 hours) I then started to make inroads into the 4 in front of me and pulled past one rider. However after 3 hours on my 5th lap I started to feel the beginnings of some cramp. I quickly got more liquid down me but it was too late and I ended up off the bike for about 5 mins walking, stretching and generaly leaping about in agony until the water did its stuff and the pain subsided. I knew I was in trouble though with an hour to go. I got most of the rest of the 2 litres I was carrying down me and grabbed a cup of water as I started the last lap. Towards the middle of lap 6 it happen again only worse. I stretched and walked and then cOutdoor Designs Dry Bag - Prizearried on gingerly picking very low gears on the climbs trying not to trigger a spasm. Unfortunatley on the last climb I was caught by another rider and pushed back to 5th. I just couldnt get any power onto the pedals without cramping. The last climb out the way I really went for it to try and get 4th place back and although I pulled a lot back I was pipped by 20 secs.
I ended up 5th overall and 3rd in class about 15 mins down on fellow MTB team member Killian lomas. The prize giving was good with prizes donated by Outdoor Designs and a local bikeshop http://www.hikebikeandride.com – I got a dry bag, which Ive always wanted !
I enjoyed the event and the lap was about the right length but Sherwood pines is punishing with very few long descents where you can recover. The si timing boxes round the course will add something to the results analysis and of course reduce the chance of cheating by shortcutting but with higher numbers there would be a queue for punching. I thing there should probably be a box on a stake on each side of the track perhaps. Well done Dark and White for trying something new.
Stats – 4hours 15 mins -6 laps – 82 km – 800 metres climb

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New ‘Giant’ sculpture on the chase

During a ride today I came across this new sculpture at Birches Valley, next to Swynos at the start of Follow the Dog ! Im sure it is the Giant logo from memory, which would make sense as they are sponsoring the new trails on Cannock Chase. Its lots of bike bits joined together and is worth a close look if you are there. Some of the chain rings look in quite good nick !

Riding up through Tackeroo there seems to be lots of Clixbys signs out and new singletracks seem to be appearing all the time. I can see Cannock Chase turning into the biggest trail centre in the country with the number of chimneys within an hours drive !

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‘Source’ hydration packs.

One of the major sponsors at the World MTBO Champs in Israel was Source, a manufacturer of bladder drinking systems and sandals (yes sandals, a strange product combination).
I have tried various bladders over the years and had settled on Platypus up until now, together with my Ground Effect resevior dog sac.
All competitors received a complementary 3litre WXP Tech bladder together with a talk about how to survive the Israeli summer temperatures. The bladder seemed very good with a detachable feed tube with a special close off valve, a great opening system to make filling easier and claims of no lingering plastic tastes and easy to clean.
The competition rules stated that all competitors had to carry at least a litre of water so a bladder hydration system or 2 water bottles were needed. After the model event I realised my existing sac though great in UK conditions on long races, was just too big covering too much of my back overheating me. Impressed by the free Source WXP bladder I bought a Source 2 litre Spinner sac and tried it on the long qualifier. It has good space for a tube, pump and tools plus two handy mesh pockets for gels and bars.

To cut it short I was very impressed. The 2 litre Widepac was very simple to fill and the quick connect hose fitting made threading it through the sac really easy. The sac sat snuggly on my back and the delivery of the liquid perfect.
On the four races I have used it on so far it has performed very well and I would recommend it as an alternative to the other major brands particularly as it seems to have a lesser price point.
Source do a complete range of sacs from the light weight racing Spinner right up to the 25 litre Whistler.
http://www.source-vagabond.com

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Globecycle – James Bowthorpe – Last few days

World Record attempt for Parkinsons Research


James Bowthorpe (Brother of Tom who I was at school with) left London on the 29th of March to try to break the World Record set by Mark Beaumont for cycling round the world. He is also raising money and awareness for Parkinsons Research.
His route wound its way through France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Poland Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, India, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada, Portugal and Spain and is now in France on the last leg of his trip.

James is nearly home and will be back in Hyde Park after his amazing journey on Saturday 19th September.  The schedule for the final day is as follows:

Breakfast 7.00am in Portsmouth ferry terminal café
Roehampton gate café, Richmond Park, London. 16.00
Depart Richmond Park 16.30
Arrive Hyde Park (Hyde Park corner of Serpentine lake) 18.00- 18.30

he is inviting people who ahve kept track of his progress to join him at the finish in Hyde Park

James will have broken the world record by an incredible three weeks.  
Keep following James over his final few days on www.whereintheworldisjames.com and check the blog for any updates for his return.

www.globecycle.org

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Malham Show Trailquest

We arrived in Malham on Friday afternoon where I stayed in the youth hostel so I could get an early start as we were flying out to France on holiday from Liverpool Airport on Saturday early evening. After a nice walk up Gordale Scar we ran for the car as a huge thunderstorm  cascaded water everywhere and nicely wetted the ground for the Trailquest the following day, organised as part of the Malham Show. The show is a traditional country show with everything from punch and judy to livestock competitions, classic tractors to cake weight guessing.
I got first start, and taking note of the very strong prevailing wind decided to head out west first. I wobbled on the first checkpoint as it was marked in the wrong place on the map but the control description, ‘ford’, picked me up and I perhaps only lost 30 secs. There was then that inevitable gruelling climb out of Malham village up onto the high moor that characterises this picturesque area.

Now time for my rant…..
 
I never found #14, a 30 pointer on a non existent track junction but on an obvious bend. According to my GPS I spent 12 mins cycling, then running up and down the track hunting for it, navigating using the farm, contours, tracks etc to no avail. I eventually gave it up as a lost cause when 3 further people turned up and couldn’t find it either. Apparently it was hidden on a wall some 50 metres from the track when a few eventually found it.
Fighting the headwind I carried on very annoyed. #18 was a little hidden #10 was ok but even using an ultra-safe approach to #12 climbing from the north I spent 10 mins hunting around trying to find it. By this time I was really really angry. Id spent the best part of £100 to get to and enter the event and had dragged the family up to a very soggy show to take part in for me a very important decider round of a national trailquest series which I was at that point leading. To lose 22 mins in a 4 hour race is annoying if everyone is in the same boat but many competitors headed East first and due to the blowy wet conditions never made it round to the two dodgy controls.
I nearly chucked in the towel and headed back but the scenery and riding was good so I carried on. My original route round #26 ,#19 and back through #22 or #50 was now going to be very tight so I decided to just hoover up everything I could get to on the way back in a very inefficient manner and finished 13 mins early.
I ended up 11th, way off the pace but splits show only Liam Corner 6th was the only other in the top placings to suffer the dodgy controls. Bryan Singleton did very well on the vets to get round my intended loop in the time available after having similar problems to me, but his fitness on the hills is just awesome.
So should I put it down to experience and just think bad luck, No ! It is a national series, controls should be fair for all competitors. There is no explanation or apology on the website – a week later just a set of skewed results that will be used in a national league that for me has just lost all credibility. It might sound like sour grapes because of my result, but I would be having a major moan even if I had won the event in fact packing the car up later I saw many people searching round Malham trying to find #1 which was marked incorrectly on the map all looking very frustrated.

Trailquesting in general has always had a bad press from Orienteers due to inaccurate maps and poorly placed controls but it is possible to put on consistant fair events using the quality of mapping available from the OS with some corrections if needed, which Dark and White, NYMBO, XCC and Open 5, manage to do most of the time.
There is a golden rule in adventure racing and trailquest organising which is only plan and put out controls using the race map and don’t hide them.

If I’m available I will goto this years AGM and support the TCA chairman who I know has been trying to get the quality of controls placement better for several years and see if a consensus can be reached on a way forward in reducing the number of mistakes to a minimum. We also need a consistent approach when mistakes do happen so that competitors do not feel so angry which I know from chatting to others I’m not the only one on this occasion.

Rant over

By the way Malham is a beautiful place to visit and I gather that the Malham show is well worth a visit if you are in the dales over the bank holiday weekend next year.

results available at http://www.malhamdale.com/Malham09.txt