Today's Ride

[wynne]

A really nice ride today, marred by a strange incident with a dog walker. I'm riding uphill on 10ft wide bridleway. He's walking towards me, clocks me from about 200 metres away and moves to the left of track. I move to the far right of it to give him plenty of room. Just as I'm passing him he lurches across the track towards me, such that I have to swerve into the hedge to avoid a collision. Then he calls me a wanker and tells me i should slow down. It's a steep hill, i'd be suprised if i was going more than 5mph. It was really bizarre. He was probably in his 70s, clearly wanted a confrontation. Fool.

 

[wynne]

The weather report predicted a cloudy afternoon, so set out this morning at about 11am on the Airborne while it was still nice and sunny. Even so, it was a bit chilly, with the inevitable icy breeze once out of town.

It's been a busy week, with couple of demanding runs, so was determined to take it easy -- but with a good bowl of porridge with banana, honey and cinnamon sitting comfortably in my stomach, I felt quite well-fuelled and able to tackle a few local climbs in a relaxed manner. There was a distinct lack of motorised traffic which was most welcome.

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(Looks like my phone's lens was a bit steamy from sitting in my back pocket).

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Coming home into the wind was a bit of a grind -- according to the apps, it was about 8C, but there was a distinct feeling of snow on the wind, straight off the ski resorts west of us. But as the ride philosophy was to take it easy, this wasn't a disaster and I made it home before the clouds descended.

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40km, 450m climbing, about an hour and three quarters. Done and done -- now for tea, cake and a hot, hot shower.

I love reading your ride posts and weather reports from so far away, and seeing such a different landscape from the one I'm used to. Keep them coming!

 

[PhillB]

Don't think I mentioned it in this thread which I haven't posted in for a while due to being involved in an RTA last month. Cut off at 25mph, hit two cars, Bianchi totally wrote off and myself being prescribed tramadol from injuries which was definitely a shock to the system given I keep it pretty sober these days. Coming up on a month since it happened so I thought it was due time I got back out, was kind of dreading it since even sticking to bridleways/cycle paths you will have to use roads at some point and as I'm sure most of us will agree (especially if you live in the UK) it takes a long time to build road confidence and a small incident to lose it let alone a massive accident but hey 6am on a Sunday is about as dead as the roads will get.

Had forgotten how slow mtbs are compared to being on a roadie, blows my mind that if you go back to around Jan/Feb in this thread I was hitting 70 mile days on the Inbred. That being said I couldn't really put any good power down due to the bottom end of the cassette being too worn. I did put a new chain on to try and alleviate the skipping it was having after changing it back from SS but the old chain was at .75 and the cassette did about 2k miles including through a british winter so I suspect it's too far gone. Nice to be out but I think I'll be counting the days till insurance comes through and I'm back on 700c again

Well done for getting back out there

 

[PhillB]

Finally finished Cyril and had two rides today, the first was a short ride to Sainsbury for some burger buns for the BBQ. A few minor adjustments and I headed out later in the afternoon.


(Bar wrapping is not my speciality)



Had not planned to goto the park, but was having so much fun gliding along on this I kept going...


It was about 21C still - no real wind - park was quiet - as it always is on a Sunday evening. (Sorry for lame NDS shot!)

Then today's ride turned into Today's Walk as I got a puncture I'd not planned a longer ride so had no tools or spares... luckily only about 3km from home

Turned out it was a thorn.