This mornings sunny weather convinced me to go out on the bike today despite the poor state of the brakes and gears which I really should have spent the day fixing, but no, I thought I would go out for a ride and then have a tinker later when I got back.

This was the first mistake. The second was, after pootling up my namesake out of Sheffield and up to the top of Lady Cannings with the intention of going straight across the Houndkirk and down Jumble Lane and then onto Blacka, was to think to myself, hmmm, this last bit near the crossroads has been sanitised a bit and I fancy a jump or two, let's detour up the hill a bit and come back down to the crossroads.

I thought this despite the strange sound coming from the rear mech, and despite the fact that every gear change was taking a random time to complete. Can you guess what's coming next? Yup, that's right, change down approaching a couple of step ups, power on over the first, gears eventually decide to derail the chain as I reach the second step up, and ping, chain flies apart.

Oh well, at least it's downhill all the way home, so I point the bike toward Ringinglow – at least there's still the fast and furious bit at the end of the Houndkirk road. Then at the bottom bit of Houndkirk it appears the council have covered it all in sand, so no fun to be had. Still, that means I can carry enough speed to get me to Ringinglow easily enough… but not only that they've added a huge water bar (just about cleared with a last minute hop) and then a lot of very loose gravel between the two other water bars just before the road, so hopping them leads to a fair amount of back end slidage as I try to moderate my speed slightly before shooting out into traffic – apologies to the walkers I sped past, I had no idea how loose the surface was, I don't normally go sideways.

Got home the rest of the way on the road and through the park with a combination of pumping and not braking for corners, but not too much fun when you go wide on a left hander with cars coming the other way.

So, moral of the story? Well, fix your bike properly, maybe carry a spare chain or chain tool – and can someone stop Sheffield council "improving" everything they see?

Harumph. Off to watch Button mess up another GP instead. ;-(

I always carry a chain tool – its on my multitool – a topeak alien. a couple of sram links as well and you are sorted

Agree with TJ, I never leave home without the ability to repair a chain or a tube as an absolute minimum.

They have rather ruined that. They've also done the lower section of the track through the woods that comes out part way up there 🙁

just use plenty of back brake on the downhill to loosen it up and it'll soon wash away.

gutted! What is a water bar?

I usually attach a powerlink to my bike with a wrap of electrical tape just below the seatclamp. You always lose them in your backpack, and then you've always got on with you.

Paddy it's a small, shallow-ish trench across the trail to clear water without causing erosion.

i usually stick mine on the chainstay with an elastic band ….

it's a small, shallow-ish trench across the trail to clear water without causing erosion.

Although in this case it appears to have been covered with an upturned halfpipe and covered in earth.