Mark’s Link – Vote Now
My stand-out link this week is to the story we ran asking how you intended to vote in the UK general election, principally because it was enormously wrong in the end. Although Singletrackworld is visited by around 1.7 million unique users a month, that doesn’t seem to make us representative of the population at large. But then ours was not the only poll that got it completely wrong. I don’t know what we can or should conclude from all this… Maybe your average Conservative voter is just not that into riding bikes.. who knows?
Barney’s Link – The Art of Balance
Not so much about the video, this (although it’s a cool little thing on its own terms), as the rider. Imagine you’d lost the use of your right arm. Some straps, a steering damper, and an insane amount of dedication might enable you to ride as well as Thomas Bannister can.
Chipps’ Link – BMC Reinvents the Softtail
I’m intrigued by the softtail bike that was announced on Saturday by BMC. Not that it’s a new idea – we did all that back in the 1990s (and assorted variations have appeared since the bicycle was invented). No, the thing that intrigues me is that BMC’s big plus point for doing it is that racers no longer need to run their tyres so soft in order to get a bit more comfort from their race bikes. It shows what a different world true top-end racing is. It’s all about speed without compromise and by running this (light, 1080g) frame, you can keep your tyres hard for where they’re needed to be fast; on the smoother bits of the race track, while still getting a little bit of cush and grip for the descents. Interesting.
