Return of the Son of Tim's Blog

I did a small amount of riding last week, about 30 miles in total, just to work and back.  But the cool crisp mornings of early in the week turned very windy by the end. 

I was down in Bristol again this week and took my bike again.  We did another nightime ride round Leigh Woods.  I managed not to break anything this time.  John had sent me a new chainring and when I compared it to the old one, I think I know what helped bend it.  The old one wasn't a shimano one and the little notch that tells you where to line up the rings was about a quarter of a tooth out compared to the new one.  When I shifted under pressure, I think the chain didn't engage cleanly.

We rode a different route this time, but it was still good, mostly singletrack, mostly winding through the trees and mud, but some rocky bits.  It was obvious where our respective comfort zones were.  The others, who ride through trees and mud and roots mostly, were away for those bits.  The only time I kept in touch or occasionally made up ground was over the really rocky stuff that is more like our usual Lake District rides.

One problem was that my lights are good for about 1.5 hrs.  Unfortunately we were out for about 2.5 hrs.  By the end, I had to ride in front of Dean with his lights shining past me to light the way.

We then met up with Karl, who hadn't made it down to Bristol in time, and spent a pleasant evening reminiscing about our mountain biking exploits over the years.

I got out on my bike.  Only for a bit though.

I took my bike down to Bristol again and this time actually got out to ride it.  My friend John and I rode out from the city centre to meet a friend of his at Leigh Woods.  I hadn't even got out of the city before I trashed my little ring.  I did a particularly poor down shift, didn't quite engage the teeth and folded an inch long section of the ring.  No more little gears for me.

It was dark and muddy in Leigh Woods, but great.  John's friend took it very easy, but I still suffered.  It stayed fine for most of the ride.  I managed to stay fairly near the others, but got lost on several occasions when they went out of sight and I couldn't see they trail.  Amazingly, no-one was injured, or even had a remotely serious crash.

We finished in light drizzle, but by the time I had ridden back to town it was throwing it down and I was soaked.  I dumped my bike back in the car and headed to the hotel.  I turned a few heads in reception, muddy and wet.

But at last I've done some mountain biking this year!

Tim

I took my bike down to Bristol last week, with the intention of going out to Cwm Carn one evening.  We settled on Tuesday night, only for it to rain pretty much all day and well into the evening.  Heavy, very wet rain.  So Karl and I cried off.  Joe and Ric went and got pretty muddied up, soaked and frozen.  Ric says he was changing gear with his palm on the way home, his fingers too cold to do it.

So my bike did 400 miles, all in the back of my car.  I'm down again in a couple of weeks, so maybe then.

I did get out on my bike this weekend.  Liam wanted some stuff from town, so I rode in with him, to show him the back way.  In all we did 25 miles.

He asked me on Friday night is I could have a look at his bike cos the gears were jumping again.  I found the cause pretty quickly, a 4 inch by one inch piece of cloth jammed in the sprockets.  Once I'd pulled that our and removed about two tons of dirt from the derailier jockey wheels and the chainrings, things were fine.  I did notice that the front brake block was down to the bare metal.  "No wonder the brakes squealed" was Liam's response.

We got the tandem back on Thursday, so hopefully we'll get some time out on that this year.  We had planned to go out today, but it has rained all day.

Cheers

Tim

A bit late, I know, but no less well meant.  I haven't touched my bike since I got back from Bristol, having ridden Cwm Carn.  Not strictly true, I took it out of the car and put it, dirt and all, and put it in the garage.  I've just been and cleaned it up in preparation for doing Cwm Carn again next week.

We got no bike related Christmas presents this year.  The closest was these for Jayne.

I am in the processes of deciding what events to do this year.  A few of the guys are signing up for Harlech Triathlon again.  I think I will probably do it, cos its quite a nice friendly event.  There is a 50K mtb race in Wales in March that Joe is thinking of.  There is also a 24hr at Grizedale but it is the week after Harlech.  I would struggle to do both and if the other guys do Harlech, I won't get a team together for the 24hr.

Other than that, I've got no plans.  I've put on loads of weight and am a right fat git at the moment.  I've got to get back into the habit of running and swimming.  I'm paying £200 a year for a swimming pool membership I've used four times. 

On an entirely unconnected note, I got an iStuff radio transmitter.  This is a short range FM radio transmitter with a headphone jack.  You plug it into the headphone socket of an iPod or other music player, select a frequency on it and tune your radio into the same frequency.  Then your iPod plays over the radio.  Its fantastic.  I am a big Radcliffe & Macone fan, but their show goes out when I am doing other things quite often.  So I use the BBC listen again facility to listen at the weekend on my laptop.  Using the iStuff, I can move round the house without having to worry about wires and speakers.  The range is only very short, but works from anywhere downstairs to the radio in the kitchen.  If I get it sorted, the DVD/Surround sound player in the living room has an FM radio receiver, just no aerial at the moment, I can get it playing through that!