Category: Bikes

Tens of thousands of words and the odd blurred picture of fast moving vegetation rehashing one of two tenuous threads. Spliced together using random punctuation and alcohol.

Do you know what it is yet?

On By PhotoIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding, Photography13 Comments
Winter Project (3), originally uploaded by Alex Leigh.

Somewhere in this rambling pantheon of cast off idols is a 4th generation niche which fell so far from grace, Beelzebub himself may well be pedalling it through the gates of hell.

It was dispatched in that flag-nailing manner of “never again” that often secures nothing more than a petard* for one to be hung from. It’s in the bucket of lies which includes “I’ll never drink again“, “I’ll never send an email when I’m spittingly angry” and “That’s all the bikes I need, thanks”

The aftermath of the first night ride of the winter suggests that Roger is a little too sensitive to be flung through the grinding paste that makes up the trail surface this time of the year. The PA is too fat in terms of tyres and forks, the SX is an insane enough idea to have me sectioned, and I’m twitchy enough already which rules taking the DMR out.

Winter Project (2)Winter Project (1)

The answer is there for all to see. But with my normal niche chasing madness, I’ve carved out a further fissure. Much of this genre are pretty light because they are missing what I’ve come to think of as “vital components”. Not this chunky monster, hewn from the mountains of heavy, draped with kit that satisfies two from the three “cheap, strong, light” matrix. However, it was essentially free and lucky buggers can’t be choosers.
Winter ProjectWinter Project (4)

An explosion of this parts bin shows me missing only a set of brakes and some transmission gubbins. So there is a very good chance the green monster may make it onto the trails in the next couple of weeks. That’s about as far ahead as I can see – it may become a cherished if abused addition to the burgeoning stable or it could end up in the skip.

Do you know what it is yet?

* What the hell is a petard? Some sort of Nautical term? Pretty safe guess since half the vocabulary of this country is from the sea and the other half from Shakespeare. Or maybe it’s a mammal? I have been hoisted from this twitching gerbil. Then again, maybe not.

“There is something of the night about him”

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding3 Comments

A famous insult once speared into the political testicles of Michael Howard. The strident weeble – occasionally masquerading as a human being – known to us as Anne Widdicombe authored the quote and she should know. I cannot believe the RSC are every short of a dumpy witch for the blasted heath, whenever the self righteous dwarf is in town.

But to Mountain Bikers, riding through the five dank, dark months between summer and spring is almost a badge of honour. We embrace the darkness, the slop and the cold because the alternative is not riding and that’s just silly. I appreciate this is a bit of a volte-face on my part, but levels of randomness and abandoning previously cherished positions is all part of my charm. Even so, while bikes work fine in the dark, motivation is harder to get started. For two years, my expensive light and bucket full of excuses reduced my night riding to dull and chilly commuting.

Last night, all that changed. And to ensure it was a properly exciting evening, I chose to ride a partially broken bike in the company of the fifteenth fastest man in Britain, on unknown trails mired in post deluge slop. And all this with a light of questionable reliability powered by a battery stripped of its’ power through two years of a commute/recharge cycle. Did consider going the whole hog and blindfolding myself as well.

As I made my last will and testament and waved a tearful goodbye to my family, the last rays of light slipped behind the low Chiltern hills, and I was pitched into the black night. Which was thankfully illuminated – after a brief electronic burp – by a whitening arc of HID technology. Ennobled by this, the first road climb passed quickly for Dean and Steve and some more slowly for me with the seeping chill through my gloves distracting me from broken suspension parts.

Still this began to fill like a good idea right up until the time when we actually headed off road. A fateful juxtaposition matched a patch of slippy mud with an ill advised light adjustment. This sloppy event broke what little traction summer tyres can provide, and it was the bushes for me as my role switched from pilot to passenger.
A slightly embarrassing start to the ride but fairly representative of the next fifteen minutes as I slid about in a parody of control, trying to match the light with the trail and becoming ever more removed from my riding buddies. Their existence was occasionally verified by crazy light beams stabbing distant trees some miles away. It takes a while to tune into the rhythm of the night – in twisty singletrack, the light points one way and the trail another leaving you to swiftly re-learn the art of divining the corner apex from dimly lit shadows.

And while every MTB’r can ride in mud – it is in our fat tyred genes – sliding sideways on corner entry is a bit disturbing until you remember how much fun it is. Speeds are lower than daylight, but concentration is higher. Picking out barely discernible lines, trusting momentum over vision and dodging woody collateral hanging from unseen branches. It’s a full mind and body workout and all the more worthwhile for it.

But it’s more than that. The woods are a magical place at night; moths trapped in high intensity light beams, the almost oppressive silence of the trees and the stillness of standing mute, lights off, listening the happy sounds of nocturnal mammals killing each other.

The final trail home, transformed by a carpet of muddy leaves, was no longer a high speed, jumpy singletrack gem, more a committed power though mud sucking traction – but it’s still good and it’s still a prelude to beer. A fantastic evening then and one I’m keen to repeat until the mud eats the trails completely. But on examining my rather expensive, Californian designed full suspension bike it is clear this may not be the steed for winter hooning.

Obviously, you all know what that means. You will be unsurprised to hear I have a project bubbling in the witches cauldron.

Flaws to Manual

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding, Photography9 Comments

Took me a while to write this. I’d lost my muse, but found it once more when light dawned on the inside of the beer fridge. And once I’d started, I couldn’t stop which is the kind of sticky scenario that every boy who has passed through puberty can probably relate to.

So snuggle deeper into your comfortable office chair*, feast on a biscuit if that is your want and come hither to learn the dark secrets in the art of light.**

Firstly myths, debunking for the use of. Santa Claus was invented by Coca Cola, the tooth fairy is your mum and automatic is for the people.*** If you don’t believe me, Google for the first two and/or get some therapy, but hold fast to the last one because we’ll be giving it an extensive prodding with the sword of truth later on. But first this.

Continue reading “Flaws to Manual” →

Nutter

On By AlexIn Bikes, Other stuff4 Comments

Pontification has often been the mother of narrative on the hedgehog and, as such, much time has been wasted invested on a nailed down description of a “proper nutter“. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, it seems as if I may have inadvertantly researched the definitive answer.

After a couple of ‘relief’ beers (post appraisal, again I have achieved the grudging distinction of “borderline employable“), the prospect of a fast ride home under dry skies and double digit temperatures was something to be savoured as the train edged slowly northwards. There is a sense almost like cheating when you are deep into Autumn but the riding still feels like late summer.

As I was accesorising myself with all things bikey, a bloke – my age and height but about half my weight again – enquired what I was doing. Somewhat nonplussed on the not insubstantial grounds that I was a shorts wearing, courier bag carrying, helmet affixing fellow with a clear two wheeled bent, I gave him a facial burst of stunned hedgehog.

He explained “no, I can see you’re going to ride a bicycle but isn’t a bit cold and dark?”
“No, the bike has lights, I have clothes, it’s all good”
“Well how far do you go then?” he fingerly podged in my direction still examining me as if I were a composite of a crack victim and a screaming mentalist.
“About six miles”
“Does it take long?” he worried
Warming to my task “well it’s 21 minutes flat in calm conditions, add about 220-240 seconds for a westerly assuming it’s running at less than 10 knots. Hard rain can cost me a bit, cold a bit more until my legs are warm, anything over 20 knots and you could be up to half an hour unless it switches east in which case I’m a sail”

I was just about to cross reference rain type with tyre choice and explain the need to do such a calculation with pivot tables, when I noticed he had the look of a man having triggered an avalanche by throwing an innocent snowball.

So instead I asked “What about you, car I guess?” with a smug twang to my question
“Oh Yes, I live on the other side of Haddenham” he explained with a shudder as if his journey scaled unmapped peaks in distant countries
Confused I was all “but it’s a little village, that’s a mile at best, a lovely 20 minute stroll on quiet roads under streetlights, why would you drive? I mean, why?”

He was edging away now as the train slowed to disgorge us onto the platform. His eyes worried this way and that. The stab of the door release spoke volumes of his need to get away from this hippy, who might be about to eat his car keys and invest him with the power of the lentil.

Doors open, he’s waddled off with a worried look over his shoulder. But I was doing nothing more than a gentle amble. You don’t want to get too near to people like that. They’re madder than a sack full of frisky badgers.

Be vigilant – they may pass at first glance as normal. Don’t make that mistake. The nutters are everywhere.

Pans People

On By PhotoIn Bikes, PhotographyLeave a comment

Kids Riding (9 of 27), originally uploaded by Alex Leigh.

I’ve taken many – too many – pictures of the kids riding, most of which are collecting electronic dust in the murky archives of my hard drive. But inspired by last weeks photo course, I left the bike at home and, instead, chased them round the local roads with the big camera.

Kids Riding (1 of 27)Kids Riding (8 of 27)

Just about everything Seb teaches works well enough to encourage you to practice. Slow shutter speeds, odd angles, pre-focussing and tight tracking digitally downloaded quite a few shots I was pleased with.

Kids Riding (27 of 27)Kids Riding (4 of 27)

Still the kids’ll gimp for ever when they are in shot and it’s significantly easier to improve the hit rate of good v rubbish when the subject is moving at about 1/4 of the pace of a fast rider.

Still, I’m happy to take that as a starting point 🙂

Play Misty for me*

On By PhotoIn Bikes, Other stuff, Photography, Pretentious nonsense, Road Riding3 Comments
Misty Commute, originally uploaded by Alex Leigh.

From the 21st of September, night displaces day and dark replaces light. Autumn, with all its’ decay and death, symbolises the changing of the guard between bright colours and inky blackness. Chasing light away, as the wounded animal it has become, is the switch flick of GMT plunging this seaswept Atlantic island into perpetual darkness for three long months.

Something to look forward too then, along with the commercial parody of the long debased religious myth that is Christmas, wind, rain, gloom, doom and – to bottom it all – trails below the water table. And yet before the storms lies a windless lull of a two tone world – impenetrable and moist as daybreak pushes feebly westward, and then blue, crisp and really quite agreeable as weakening sun rays burn away the fog.

This makes commuting a bit of a bugger.

4.1 degrees is not motivating weather. But set off we must, uncomfortable in heavier clothes and half blind from refracting light beams dissipating against a nebulous but impenetrable wall. Today a bike piloted by memory and internal gyroscopes is quicker than meandering cars, and their too powerful headlights groping at the darkness. But it doesn’t feel safe; if they can’t see the road, what chance they notice a one foot wide by six foot tall mobile statistic, whose dimming lights emit nothing more than a ghostly halo.

Riding scared, I ran away onto unlit side roads where looming dog walkers – zombified by the fog – lurched in late surprise as the hiss of damp tyres warned of my approach. The fog tamps down sound as well as light and little of each escaped to stimulate the senses. I was reduced to 3/4 speed, straining eyes and ears for pain giving obstacles and cranking peripheral vision to separate the murky green edges from greasy tarmac.

Soft rain sizzled off clothing, sweat beaded under now a too warm jacket and still cold breath merged instantly with the clamping fog bounding my world. But only once did the journey go bad, when frontier stones – guarding a tended lawn – loomed large like dirty ogres teeth ready to chew up this knight in shining lycra. A fast shimmy, as wet grass plucked away traction from slick tyres, and a desperate course change saw us plot a lucky line back onto the blacktop.

I fear there may have been collateral damage in terms of carefully planted perennials. Certainly as the station emerged fromunder fuzzy streetlights, it became apparent that the bike was considerably more shrubbery accesorised that it had been twenty five minutes previously.

But there was a feeling of worthy which is not earned during the summer. A flapjacks’ worth of extra effort, a coffee double-shot of not taking the easy option, a warming winter pint coming back the other way. Still a thousand times better than taking the car.

* I hope Seb doesn’t see this photo. Technically it’s all over the place. Compositionally it would blow a randy goat. In my defense, the camera was on my phone, the temperature was still bloody chilly and the bloke on the platform thought I was stalking him.

Full Wets

On By AlexIn Bikes, Road Riding1 Comment

Did anyone catch the Rookie F1 Brit aquaplaning his low slung rocket at 200 MPH, on slippy tarmac occasionally rising above a deluged skid pan? No? Me Neither, that’s not what this is about. Oh sure, the barely-long-trousered wunderkid has skill, balls and attitude in spades but to hell with him, I’ve been getting wet.

Full Wets means Summer is over and Winter is coming. Out with the Gortex covered shoes, shorts and jacket, power up the big lights, dig out the longs and fix an expression of extreme stoicism on your fizog.

And then get in the car and drive to the station. Still ample time to get jiggy with the moist button in London tho.

With wet comes dark and splashing through Hyde Park last night, I noticed there were no other bikes within spitting rain distance. But that’s because I’d forgotton about the special breed of night rider – the ninja cyclist. Dresses entirely in black atop a black steed and – another scorpion pit offence – wearing dark sunglasses. Only when the whites of his eyes were briefly illuminated did the proximity alarm start mentally dinging like a bastard.

A desperate wrench of the bars was almost enough to avoid impact and absolutely enough to unclip a previously pedalling foot. What follwed was a lung emptying ‘whuuuffff’ as my – until then – silent assasin exited over his bars and the rather louder curse of a man stopping a fast rotating pedal with his ankle.

It took me a while to find the fella. He was reposed in a handy bush, earphones still installed and groping around himself as if searching for a missing limb. But in fact he was fine – if a little stoned or pissed – as demonstrated by a drawled “hey man, that was RUDE’

I have no idea what this means. It is the street language of young people and, frankly, if there going down the Darwinism route of stealth commuting in a city of a million cars, then it’s a dying language. I fetched him out of the schrubbary, spent a comedy thirty seconds attempting to separate black night from black bike and sent him wobbling on his way with a shake of this grizzled yet wise old head.

Which hurt almost as much as my ankle after a phone based injury I may share with you tomorrow. This morning I woke with a club foot and stumped around in a dark bedroom trying not to wake my wife. This is exactly what happened once the difficult combination of a limp and no light navigated me unerringly to a toe stubbing interface with the foot of the bed.

I’m clearly getting old. Only today I was musing whether it was socially acceptable to set off the fire alarm so as to see how short one of the Girl’s skirts are. I was coming down on the affirmative before a realisation that this was unlikely to provoke a favourable reaction during appraisal times next week.

This time I’m taking the chicken

Commuting Mojo

On By AlexIn Bikes, Road Riding2 Comments

Somewhere is this crowded, dirty capital city, I lost my commuting mojo. I am continually losing stuff nowadays; keys, sunglasses, one glove, the plot – what Americans call “having a senior moment“. I like to think that, in fact, it is because my mind is too highly trained for the minutiae of life, and aside from being a wheeled Alvin Stardust, it’s not really much of a concern.

But this was different, it crept up on me starting with a certain listlessness before rapidly escalating to failing to race when challenged, and not hissing at Hinged Harry And His Bicycle Clips. I used to love commuting but it has been on the slide since that chastising incident involving the simultaneous awareness of a red light and an angry policeman. Lately I’ve been looking for excuses not to bother – even contemplating a return to the horrid tube.

Commuting without competing is boring – if I’m not racing, I’m trying to slash half a second off a virtual time trial or improve my trackstanding or some other such nonsense. And for competition, you need to have your muscles spiked with white hot anger, driven on by rage and sustained by a certain bloody mindedness.

Tonight, I suffered what I’m thinking of as a Samuri as this seems to happen to him on almost every ride. So dickhead roars past and immediately turns left, no signal, no chance of stopping. I slam on the binders and slam into his front wing, not hard enough to fall but scary enough to trigger a solid 30 seconds of invective to his many and varied shortcomings including the one in his trousers.

And then I realised lately I’d become a little craven when faced with the daily them and us conflicts. Feeling second class, first with big wagons, then taxis, then scooters and occasionally other cyclists. Not folders tho, it hadn’t plumbed those depths just yet. But not now, the righteous fire was well and truly lit. This nearly accident was a catalyst converter putting me smack bang back into the game. Pulling a few deep-breath-go-now moves felt good, as did sprinting between red lights, but still not running them.

I am seemingly alone in this nod to traffic deference. The police are handing out£30 penalty fines like sweets in the playground. But it’s more about crowd pleasing than deterrents. One guy tho particularly caught my attention; road bike, rucksack, lairy SPDs, half upholstered in Lycra and half in big hair. Any more “look at me” and he’d have been a ringer for Posh Spice.

He cruised through every light regardless of colour, traffic situation or pedestrians assuming a red light mean they could safely cross. My frustration was tempered by the internal radio being tuned to Top Gun “I’m not leaving my wingman” as twitching legs were desperate to give chase. The ying and yang of light sequencing gave him no obvious advantage and I finally caught him outside Queenies house. And I had a plan. Retuning to 5-Live football analogies and ludicrously comparing myself to the pint sized predator that is Michael Owen. Permanently injured, lost a bit of pace, written off by everyone and more than a little pissed off.

I got the jump with my microscopic knowledge of phasing and then slowed right down. Quick personality flip.

/Top Gun Mode on
“What are you doing”
“I’m slowing down”
“You’re doing WHAT?“*
Top Gun Mode off/

He cruised past like a smug Fozzy Bear with his skinny tyres and fat head, but like I said I had a plan; on the shoulder of the last defender, timing is everything. Curve out from the inside and sprint like a bastard giving it the big berries. He never saw me coming as I disdainfully, dispatched him into the top corner. He did see me go tho, as I cut inside a bus, sucked in elbows so not to clip the metal hedge and then skipped into the Hyde Park Traffic chaos during a five second red light amnesty.

That my frizzy friend is how you run a red light.

Somewhere is this crowded, dirty capital city, I lost my commuting mojo And somewhere in my head I found it.

* The ability to remember entire dialogue tracks from movies seen some fifteen years ago is a skill I feel I could have used more.

Is that really a trail bike?

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding, Photography1 Comment

Peaks September 2007-52

A query oft posed by disbelieving strangers on viewing the chunky authority that is the SX Trail. Because the porky object in question (that’s the bike not me in case you were in any way confused there) is often propped against a handy dry stone wall, half way up a mountain-lite, the response is generally a slightly wheezy affirmative.

Yet if you’d asked this same deluded, yet loyal owner that very question about three pm on Sunday, the answer would have been a firm no. It was one of those rides where you’ve overestimated your ability and underestimated the hills. The weather was just starting to close in a little and we’re were running out of energy, enthusiasm and – if the weighed down, slow pace continued – light as well.

Peaks September - Dave Pic # 3Peaks September 2007-33

Derbyshire County Council should really install appropriate signage as you enter the hills “Welcome to the Peak District, where the local climb is 1 hour and five minutes“. Starting with hope at Hope, the first climb up the broken road to Mam Tor is about that before a plunge of insane rockiness down the boulder field of Chapel Gate. The lack of corners on a trail such as this is a welcome relief as you hang on for grim death and idly wonder which part of you would explode first, were you to be catapulted onto one of a million spiky rocks. Trying to actually steer the bike around this graveyard of stone would be a skill to far for me.

Peaks September 2007-32Peaks September 2007-22

And then more of the same for the next five hours, thirty three miles and five thousand five hundred feet of uphill slog and downhill lunacy. While woody singletrack is the drug of choice for many mountain bikers, plummeting down and through glacial eroded valleys and zig-zagging over rutted moorland is MTB Crystal Meth for others. I’m equally rubbish at both as demonstrated when my friend Tim came past on a hardtail. At the time, I was pedaling desperately to reach ramming speed but even so…. it’s not about the bike then.

Peaks September - Dave Pic # 2Peaks September - Dave Pic # 1

By late afternoon, we still had around an unlucky thirteen miles to go, much of it up and over sustained vertical geography including a road climb out of Hayfield that would be mildly unpleasant in a car. Turning off onto a dirt trail at last, it seemed we’d swapped dull tarmac for energy sapping wet grass. Hauling the SX around this kind of stuff can be a bit of a chore, but because it’s so ludicrously competent when cashing in gravity credits, I don’t really mind that much.

Peaks September 2007-54Peaks September 2007-51

The last descent back to Hope is the multi-pitched Cavedale. Starting grassy, quickly morphing to rifled ruts spinning you pinging over drops, before throwing up a rocky slip road to the lineless challenge that has me beaten every time. I nearly didn’t get there either with tired muscles failing to reign in whoopy over-exuberance and a drift to within an inch of a dry stone wall at ‘fuck me that’s going to hurt‘ speed came close to ending the ride early. And possibly quite badly.

Riding days like this strike a discordant harmony when compared to much of the rest of your life. Work, Family, Stuff is generally a compromise, give a little, take a little and – sometimes – bend over and receive one for the team. It’s all subtle posturing and decisions by consensus, but when you’re miles from bloody anywhere, that approach is going to get you nowhere fast and certainly not home.

Stripped of social niceties, you just have to get on with it. The good bits are better and the bad bits a little worse. Expanding your mental horizons while pushing hard on the cusp of the adrenaline/fear barrier is not place for crowd pleasing choices. But that’s a pretty good place to be and when I finally give up Mountain Biking, I don’t think anything will ever take its’ place.

Like painting the Forth Road Bridge..

On By AlexIn Bikes, Site StuffLeave a comment

… updating the bike page is a full time job. The Turner has gone up North but any hopes it had of being put out to a restful pasture are to be dashed. My friend Andy Shelley has added significantly burly hardware to ensure it survives the rigours of a weekly ragging around the Peak District. How the hell he’s made it weight 32lbs I do not know, unless the braking system has been upgraded with an anchor.

What few bikes I own are catalogued here

It’s a pretty poor collection now I’m sure you’ll agree.