80’s MuddyFox RoadRunner - Definitely NOT Mr Blobby inspired

Teaser for now - this turned up in the post from the good people down the road at Planet X (when did the collect in store option disappear on their website? Still, I took advantage of the 20% off saddles last week).

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So it all started when I spotted this thread a few weeks ago... viewtopic.php?f=2&t=384380&p=2847192&hilit=Free+muddyfox+pathfinder#p2847192

After a bit of a discussion via PMs the deal was struck (seemed like a pretty one sided deal to me...). I left work in Leeds late one evening and arrived across the border in darkest east Lancs even later, after stops for diesel and to top up the coolant in my old T4.

A brief conversation revealed that the decoupage work was not the pride and joy of the previous owner but that the bike had been donated to a local charity and decorated as some sort of arts project with young people, following which he’d ended up with it. Something of a relief as I don’t wish to offend anyone, but it doesn’t form part of my long term plans for the bike.

So the long term plan involves the lovely pink SAN Marco Regal (been looking for an excuse to buy one for a while) and then stripping the frame and forks and getting them powder coated a matching shade of pink, - remarkably like the early Muddy Fox Aluminium Pros.

The drop bars on it feel insanely narrow so will be switched for a set of Midge bars I bought years ago in a crazy Planet X sale (for a fiver).

PS - driving home to Sheffield I had nearly made it up the hill out of Glossop on the Snake Pass, in the middle of the night, when I heard a loud pop and was immediately surrounded by a big cloud of steam... I guess the low coolant earlier had been a warning of bigger issues. Had to roll halfway back down to get any mobile signal to call the AA, got towed to garage near home (AA guy was a mountain biker, so talked bikes all the way bike)
A week and a half later I finally got my hands on the bike, once i’d had a new radiator installed. So now the real work can start...

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So after a bit of scraping off paper and glue in the sunshine this afternoon I revealed enough of the original decals to realise it was actually a Road Runner. Must admit to being slightly disappointed after researching this model - i’d seen the yellow paint and hoped it was an explorer. I had been fairly sure that the suggestion it was a pathfinder was wrong, but not worked out what it actually was instead.

Think it’ll ride a lot better with the extra width of the midge bars (how do people ride 38cm drops, even on road?)

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Always had a bit of a thing for drop bar bikes, whether it’s early Cunningham bikes or Jacquie Phelan’s Phoenix. These were bikes I saw pictures of when I was getting into mountain bikes, back when this muddy fox was produced, then just when the idea seemed dead along cane Tomac, beating people in world cups on drop bars- he may have decided against it after a season or two, but it forever proved to me that you could still shred on curly bars.

A few years later I raced the inaugural Strathpuffer race (solo) on my S-works M2, set up for the event as a drop bar single speed, and have been toying with the idea of building up something that kind of combines all these thing.

The chosen pink is based partly on the old Muddy Fox Alu pro, partly on Jacqui’s bike and partly just on a desire for a pink bike. The stars have aligned this far, so just need to crack on and get it built now...

So the plan was to bring this out on the peaks ride at the weekend - there's clearly no way it's ever going to be powder coated pink and 'prettified' in time for this, but tempted to get it thrown together in a gloriously ratty mash-up of styles and bring it anyway.

Long term plan is here:http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=385762 -maybe on day.

Some evenings in the garage planned this week I think....