This is because I neglected my duty to go for an actual bicycle ride. I hadn’t ridden the mountain bike since Christmas Day and felt like this wasn’t enough for any self-respecting bike blogger. You can see my riding here:
Yes, I did go round in circles a bit, and this was because of the Bike Park, which I played on for a while, hopefully looking for someone to pay this time.
It’s about time I went on a ride and wasn’t able to post some wintery picture on here, in my opinion, however Chicksands was decidedly snowy. The sandy ground was reasonably ridable, although the snow made finding the trail tricky, and climbs slippery. Where it was clear or frozen it was reasonably fun, with a spot of mud at the lower ends.
I am dreaming of a dusty ride in the sunshine.
Anyway, this wasn’t really the point of Monday’s ride. It was very much a test ride. There were new parts to check and old wobbles to revisit in time for the better weather when it comes. I can conclude that I still have a headset wobble to iron out and I am not very good at setting up rear mechs, and that mine needs some attention to make it shift smoothly both up and down the block. So there’s a project for this week.
More to the point it was time to check out a new bike rack, as I’ve taken the option to mount the bike on the roof now and wanted to find out if it would destroy my fuel consumption, or be different to drive with, let alone being awkward to load and unload at rides.
This part of the test was a resounding success and I’m a convert to an excellent Thule roof-rack system. Even if I will be checking the car’s reflection a lot to be sure it’s all still there.
Elsewhere you might have seen Chris Froome at his old “ride a team mate off the race lead” game in the Criterium International, which probably makes the prospect of the summer races even more exciting. It got Sky a powerful 1-2 and did highlight his strength, but I just don’t quite buy Richie Porte’s happiness and willingness to let him go.
While the road pros and me seem to be battling appalling weather all over the place, in Africa the seven-day Cape Epic took place on just those dusty, sunshiny trails I want to be riding. The Guardian has pictures to make you jealous.
Closer to home, in London an outdoor public bike workshop has been launched to allow people to sort out those irritating bike problems as they go past. This is a great idea, but we need more before it will be completely useful. At the moment you’re relying on breaking your bike in one part of Bankside, but a network of similar workshops would be great.
Finally I promised to get more hipster here and I think this new video from British Sea Power covers it:
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