Brass Monkey Prep

Just starting to get the kit together for this Sundays Brass Monkey. Just need to service the bike now.

Local BMX vid with me in it!

Visit the page from my links

222 - My arms ache now..

It was one of those rides, long, hilly and my arms ache! from shoreham to Stanmer for some singletrack lushness and back. started at 2:30 so gt back in the dark. It's incredibly beautiful on the STW at dusk. I'll post a route map and altitude graph later.....

186.3 well not really! slilly light stops my computer working....

It's the night of the regular Brighton night ride. Good turn out and a fun pootle up the hills. Still snow on the ground too!

Ride was far to short however and if I hadn't racked up another 11 getting to and from the ride start/finish, it would have been lame!

But, I have no idea how far we did actually go as my cheapy DX light seems to stop my cateye sigma wireless computer working once the batteries run down a bit. somthing to watch for the future....

170.5 - New forest spin

Woke up nice and early to get out and do some miles in the New Forest. Not much here but a good place to spot deer, 7 herds all with males growing antlers.

Was very pretty first thing with the mist sitting in the valleys.

This horse was very interested in me too....

I didn't know forests needed fire exits either.

New Ali 16T cog!

Here is my nice new soon to be very worn 7075 ali 16T cog. It's just been fitted and will have it's first outing on Sunday in the new forest. i wonder how long it will be on my bike?

My nice steel one is a little mucky but in great nic still. it's going in the tool box for another day. The ali one has a 10mm wide base to increase freehub life and power transfer. 1 comment so far is that it'll wear like wood.

133.5 miles - this is not going well yet...

Well last Saturday was the local shop bike ride. Though id tag along as it had been a while since I had been a social ride.

Snow was very very deep whcih led to much dithering and not much riding! i have never been out so long and not gone anywhere! Still if you managed to get past the mince the riding was good fun and fast, lots of grip and very pretty settings.

Quantocks, Cardif to Cwmncarn total now 113.8 miles

2 ace days on the Quantocks reliving the trails and remembering the ones that no longer exist, either due to neglect or wopping big trees that have grown. lots of ice, fast frozen trails and a huge grin factor.

Next a trip from Cardiff over some big hills to Cwmncarn. Richard showed me his hme trails which put any sinbgletrack the South Downs have to offer to shame. On arrival at Cwmncarn, there were only a few clues to what was in store for us. the higher we climbed, the more snow we saw. up top it was still laying thick, but was days old. where this was compacted, it became a bob sleigh run rathern than a mtb track.

The trip home was uneventful mainly due to the easy route taken to help with my fatigue and the fact that my frony brake completly stopped working at the top of the Cwmncarn, fully rigid decending there with only a rear brake was interesting....