Next ride

November has been a bit of a wash out. Not been on the bike at all and with Christmas coming up it's looking unlikely that I will be out until the New Year, weather is a bit rubbish at the moment anyway, windy... the worst kind for riding bikes.

Anyway, the snowboarding trip is fast approaching (end of January) and at the moment there's only me that's booked the flight. The guy that owns the apartment in Chamonix isn't going coz he's managed to get himself a job caddying on some golf tour in Australia but is giving me the keys, so might be there on my own. Plenty snow already, which is much better than last year by the looks of it.

Boarder Ridge - Cheviots

Must have been some army exercise on today because the place looked like Basra on a good day, squadies all over the place. Anyway, set off from the car park at the bottom of The Street and headed along the road towards the first climb. Bit of a push up here and at the top I came across a green tent with an HF radio anntena sticking out of it, no sign of anyone, just have been out practacing some bush craft.



The last time I was up here doing this route there were wooden duck boards over the marshy bits, they have now been replaced with granite slabs, very handy. I got to a section were there was a bit of water over top of the stones, you couldn't actually see the stone because the water was brown; one of the stone was missing and I went head first over the bars, the front of the bike disappeared, I small child could have been killed if they had fallen into that.

Carried on along the boarder until I reached the mountain refuge hut where I stopped for 15 minutes for lunch then carried on over the top towards the start of the downhill section where The Street crosses the boarder into Scotland. Just before I got to the top a Tornado jet flew right over the top of me, very low. The Street would have been great but there were too many gates, which you have to stop to open/close, I think that Clennal Street is a much better downhill than this and the approach to it is more ridable as well.

All in all not a bad day, bit cold to start with but the sun was out and it turned very nice later on.

Avoriaz 2007

A short video with a jump and a trip down the black run with Nico.

Home to Office

I got a bracket with the bullet cam, which I have adapted to fix onto the top tube of the bike. With this bracket the camera is very stable but I would only use this set up in the dry because if it’s wet you get a lot of spray from the wheels. Results look good, my next test will be to combine this with the bullet cam.

Gunnerside - Yorkshire Dales

Took this using a combination of bullet cam, Sony DV handycam and 5M pixal still camera near Gunnerside in the North York Moors.

I've done this route a few times now, the first time was during the Autumn Polaris last year. It has 2 really fast downhill sections, which I've got on this film.

First attempt at using bullet cam together with 5M pixal still camera in Kielder Forest. Used Ulead Video Studio to edit it all together.

The route that I took was the Bloody Bush cross boarder route that takes me over to boarder to Castletown.

Morzine 2007

A group of us went over to Morzine, skiing and snowboarding. I took a Tony Hawks helmet camera, a toy really, records low res video directy onto an SD card. Other video and stills were taken with Casio digital camera. Sound quality is poor, I think is this the tool I used to compress it, Windows Movie Maker.

High Street - Lake

The guide book for this route called it "Sever" and I wouldn't disagree with that, although I think that the weather must have a bearing on that, had it been dry for a week or so the going would have been far smoother. Anyway, here it is;

I started off from Patterdale rather than Hartsop car park because from Hartsop it's a climb straight away and I wanted to get my legs warmed up first. Patterdale gave me 2 1/2 or so miles on road first, which was nice. The bridleway from Hartsop to Hayeswater is ridable but can get a rocky in places but once you get to Hayeswater its a push up to the top of the High Street. The summit was very misty when I was there so I didn't venture all the way to the top.

From this point there was a good downhill stretch with a short climb to Loadpot Hill, which is a good place to stop for something to eat. In my view the run from Loadpot Hill down to The Cockpit is excellent, it was very wet on Monday, in the dry this would very very fast, it was only very fast in the wet.

From the Cockpit you take a sharp left and almost come back on yourself. This is a nice run and you can get up some speed (watch out for walkers, there seem to be all over the place). The bridleway runs out at Howtown and you get back on to road. This road climbs up and over the top of Hallin Fell, take a left onto the bridleway heading back to Patterdale. This bridleway is very rocky and I found that I had to push and carry most of way, again lots of walkers around here. The bridleway runs alongside Ulswater and is very pretty; I almost decided to take a swim but thought better of it. Anyway, I was glad to get to the end of this bridleway and back onto some actual ridable track back to the car.

In all I wouldn't say that this route was sever, not after the first climb anyway. It has something for everyone, climbing, fast grassy downhill, technical bridleway and some nice scenery. I think it would be much better riding it after a few dry days, the rain has not really stopped for a couple of weeks so the ground was very wet and boggy in places.

The Street (Round 2)

Jamie and Michael were up for it and ready to go on Sunday. Jamie came down to mine, loaded up the car and then went on to pick Michael up. "Running a bit late" said Michael that might have been due to the fact that he had only got in from the casino at 6 in the morning and we were supposed to be picking him up at 8.30. Never mind, he was ready when we got there.

Got to the car park in Alwinton around 10:15, Michael had to fix his puncher (before we had even started) so it was about 10:30ish by the time we set off.

The first few miles is all road but does have some climbs, Jamie was not a happy bunny where as Michael was like the Durcell bunny, literally sprinting off into the distance. Both me and Jamie suspected that his girlfriend had given him some beta blockers or something (her being a nurse and all that) to perk him up a bit, seemed to do the job anyway. After about 1/2 hour Jamie was flagging but kept on plodding on.

Past the farm house and through the forest, which Michael out front, I waited for Jamie to catch up then a little way up the track found Michael lying on his side, bike on top of him with his foot caught in some branches, luckily he wasn't on his own or might have had to nor through is leg to get free.

The half way point was fast approaching and with the big push Jamie wasn't looking forward to it at all but managed to get there about 1:30, which was a bit of a shock to him because he told his wife he would be back for 2!

Through the forest and onto the downhill bit, by this time Michael had come off a few times, his bike being made to scaffolding poles with zero suspension wasn't as easy to control as a full suspension bike.

The downhill was as good as it always is, I just wish that there wasn't so many gates to stop you from enjoying the full 4 miles of downhill in one go.

Back at the car and Jamie vowed to come back when he was a bit fitter. Watch this space!

S-Works Stumpjumper

I've been looking at the Stump Jumper for a while now and saw a 2006 S-Works carbon frame in a local bike shop so I decided to buy it. The thing had been reduced from £1800 to £1200 because it was last year's model. My bike was already in the shop getting the new XTR ST-M975 break/shifter put on.

The shop said the bike would be ready on Friday, I said that I would pick it up on Saturday. I was actually in the shop on Friday with Geordie Git, he wanted some panniers so that he could ride his bike to work putting his precious laptop in the pannier rather than in a rucksack on his back, the bike was ready and the guy wheeled it out. Nice, but I noticed that the dust caps where missing from the tiers, also the Garmin cadence thing has not on the new bike and the magnet from the rear wheel was missing.

Went back after work to pick up the bike, dust caps and magnet were still missing, which I pointed out. The guy was sure they weren't on to start with but that is bollocks, why would I take the dust caps on the tiers? Anyway, he put new ones on and gave me a magnet off the shelf.

The next problem I had was that the bike would not fit on the car rack, it was raining and I couldn't be arsed with adjusting the rack so I just put it in the car, together with the old frame.

Hexhamshire Common

I’ve ridden this route before but it was very dry then and hadn’t been raining for a while unlike today. It had been raining for about 5 day’s non-stop so I expected to get a bit wet. Started off from Whitley Chapel, a small village just outside of Hexham, at the time I got there most people were going to church so parking was a bit tricky but managed to find a spot. The first section is all road for a couple of miles, which is good because it gets you warmed up for the first off road section. This part was very wet and was more like riding up a stream than a bridleway. Once up the hill I was constancy dive bombed by birds that must have had their nests close by. Across the moor towards Sinderhope and a really fast downhill on farm track first then tarmac, you can easily get 40 mph at this part. Before I reached the downhill section I took a bit of a tumble, front wheel getting stuck in the mud and going straight over the bars, luckily I landed on my face, so no damaged done.

Once down on the road you simply follow it for about 3 miles until you reach the bridleway sign at Fell View. It’s a push up the hill unless you’re super fit. I stopped halfway up to have something to eat then continued to the top where I found a group of walkers sitting down taking a break, said hello but they never replied! From here it’s a mixture of that yellow dolomite stuff and single track pete, again very wet; had another fall here, bike wanted to go one way and I wanted to go the other. This section is mostly downhill and after the push up to the top I was pleased of it.

From here I could see the road back to Whitley Chapel and a few people gathered at the bottom on horses so I slowed down, once pasted the horses it was a fast ride back to the car.

The Street

Planned to go over to the Cheviots with Jamie and Scottish the other Sunday, Jamie and Scottish both cried off so I went up on my own. The weather wasn’t that good but it wasn’t raining when I left home. Got there about 10:30, there were a couple of guys in the car park getting ready to go out, didn’t take me long to get the bike off the car, ruc-sac on and off before they had even got their bikes off their own cars… SJF. About 3 mile down the road before I turned off on a farm track that ran up the Valley towards Middle Hill farm. This is fairly flat and easy riding but the route runs along side the river and in some parts is only 12 inches wide with a steep bank down to the river 20 feet below. Past the farm and a short run through the edge of Kidland Forest, by this time there was a fine rain falling. At the end of the forest over the bridge a bit of a push but what goes up must come down, only problem was that there were a few walkers on the other side that stopped me from bombing down the hill, what a bastard.

Following the down hill to the river I crossed earlier, over the bridge and a big push to the edge of Kidland Forest but this time straight through the middle. At this point I stopped for something to eat and cracked open the meatballs, the problem was that they were supposed to take 15 minutes to heat but but after 10 the water was still cold so I had them cold, couldn’t be arsed to wait. Anyway, poured most of the water out of the bag and headed off through the forest. After about 10 minutes had to stop because the bag in my pocket was burning my leg. Anyway, it gave me a bit of heat because by this time I was fairly wet. After the forest it was pretty much down hill all the back the Alwinton, really good downhill, in fact about 4 mile of grassy, bouncy downhill (full suspension is a must have). Back at the car when into the loo and got changed into dry cloths and headed home.