A bunch of time on the hardtail meant that I wanted a moment to reacquaint myself with the wider bars and softer ride of the bigger bike, so I stopped off on the way to Bristol to get a big open space ride from the historic standing stones of Avebury. It was clear that things weren’t great already as the dropper post started slipping on road sections, leaving me hoiking it up like a woman in slightly over-sized tights every few minutes. Otherwise I got a sunny, windy ride on open tracks before driving on to Bristol for the night.
The next day with no extra preparation I drove on to Wales to get in some climbing ahead of the day of riding downhill on Saturday. Ambitiously I approached a ride which started with a loop of the Blorenge. The climb up to the top is brutal by any account, on road and then tracks, followed by a cruise across the top and an awesome singletrack descent which throws in a bit of beautiful riding with views that are much, much better when you can see them.
After the first loop the ride went back through the village where I’d parked and then out on roads towards the Black Mountain. I started the road section with trepidation and tired legs. Having committed I wasn’t going to turn back and dragged my way up the road then a push up the steep rocky track to the moor on top. All of this led to a flowing dipping run over the shoulder of the hill and down back to the road for a grind back to the car, via a pork pie, pasty and crisps from a garage.
Saturday was a day where a slipping dropper post wouldn’t matter as the seat post would be slammed all day, however there would be other problems at the Forest of Dean. Slippery trails and roots were the order of the day after each ride up in the minibus and the first few runs were tentative but fun. As the day went on we probably got better, as we dialled in the trails, but still found them technical, especially as the rain made everything even more challenging. Maybe I should have run a softer fork or tyre but I, for one, struggled to get comfy.
Before long it became clear that things would get harder as my rear brake stopped working altogether. To make up for missed riding I cruised out onto a lap of the cross country loop, as my downhill runs were clearly over. It turns out that even cross country downhills are pretty sketchy with only front wheel braking so it was a distinct challenge.
So, with all plans of riding on Sunday abandoned due to a broken bike I drove back to London and ordered a bleed kit for the brakes. While I waited I gave the seatpost a strip and rebuild with fresh grease and a new remote cable. To my great surprise this worked well and the bike was waiting by the end of Sunday with a working dropper post that didn’t slip. Once the kit arrived this was added to with surprisingly easy brake bleed and working brakes. To celebrate I went and rode the other bike over beautifully dried out fields above Ware in the bright Spring sunshine.
Feeling very accomplished I could only finish off the weekend with a hot summer-style morning on the BMX track, finally getting the courage to nail the first three doubles, jumped one after the other.
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