You can go to the pub. No you can’t. Not yet, but you will. You can queue at Primark. You can probably go camping. You can go to places, but the loos will probably be locked when you get there. You can’t go to Durham, but you can go to Bournemouth. But please don’t.
Who knows? All we know is that you’re still allowed to ride bikes, the countryside is mostly open and those brambles and nettles are poised to re-take it if you don’t get out there and whack them into submission with your elbows and knees.
The sun has been shining. It might not last forever (hey, it’s British summer, what did you expect?) but we hope you’ve been making the most of everything while you can. And even if the pubs are shut still, there’s nothing to beat a chilled can of something tasty pulled from a rucksack at the top of the hill. We wish you distant cheers for this weekend. Oh, and in the meantime, let’s see what lockdown-busting goodies have been zipping through the letterbox this week.
Orange Five Evo LE
- Price: £5300
- From: Orange Bikes
The Five Evo is one of the first 2021 bikes that we have seen from Orange. The bike launches today alongside the larger wheeled Stage Evo, but Andi has spent the past few weeks on the 27.5in Five Evo to bring you his impressions here. Orange developed the Five Evo to see what was capable on a bike with a short-travel suspension platform but geometry that would normally seen on a larger bike. Reach on the large frame is 485mm, the seat tube angle is 76 degrees and the head angle is set at 64 degrees with a short offset fork. Although longer in reach than a standard Five, the Evo is actually slightly shorter in top tube length thanks to the steeper seat tube. Travel on this bike is 130mm on the rear, and 140mm on the front and the build kit of this LE model uses choice components from Hope, Burgtec, RockShox, Shimano and SDG.
Marin Rift Zone 1
- Price: £3195
- From: Marin Bikes
This minty beast is the 2020 Marin Rift Zone 1. It’s a carbon-framed trail bike that’s intended to be long, low and aggressive, whether you’re chasing seconds, or just your pals to the bottom of the hill. It uses Marin’s MultiTrac suspension at the rear for 125mm travel, with a Marzocchi Bomber 2 up front with 130mm of trail soaking. It’s come in for an upcoming magazine test, so stay tuned!
Brooks Brick Lane Panniers
- Price: £165.00
- From: Extra UK
Ready for a big shop! No pub bike is complete without means to transport beer these days, since pubs aren’t actually open. They attached to the rack with four buckles and have a bungee on top for your pineapples and watermelons.
Evoc Capture Hip Pack 7litre
- Price: €100.00
- From: Evoc Sports
For the cameraman that doesn’t like a sweaty back, this Evoc Capture hipp pack has enough room for a DSLR and several lenses. There is a front pocket for all your little bits, and a pull out rain cover to protect your precious cargo from splashes. We’re sending this off to James Vincent to put it to the test on his local Lake District trails.
Canyon Eject Hydration System
- Price: £27.95
- From: Canyon
Designed with small frames in mind, the Canyon Eject Hydration System is two 400ml bottle side loaded into a cage that has some handy hooks on top to load your tube, pump etc. onto.
Singletrack ‘Lockdown’ Organic Tea Towel
- Price: £12.99 (With discounts for Singletrack Members)
- From: Singletrack Shop
We are pretty damned pleased with the cover of the latest issue of Singletrack (available here… link… https://singletrackworld.com/shop/issue-131/) and what better way to capture this cover for posterity than the great British tradition of sticking it on a tea towel? It is big, it’s organic, and it will dry your plates. If you are the sort of misguided soul who thinks they do not need a tea towel, we suggest you take a marker pen and add a chap with an arrow in his eye. You can then hang this on your wall and call it a tapestry.
And now, to sign off, one of the most evocative songs about still, restless, red hot June days: Big Dipper by Cracker
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At last! I was just about to go all Rainman WHERE IS MY FGF DAMN I NEED MY FGF WITH MY BLACK COFFEE AND SCRAMBLED EGGS BEFORE READING ON CALL AT THE REGISTER AND THEN WORK WHEREIS MY FGF!
And then after mashing frantically the F5 key it showed up in the site…
All good now, please carry on…
@slimshady Are you OK? 🙂
Any photos of the canyon bottles mounted on a bike please?
@lister I’m going to try it on several small frames this weekend so I’ll update the story with photos. I have a friend with no room for a bottle on a small Banshee Rune, she’s my first stop…
@Amanda Could you add osme comparisons next to a regular bottle as well please. Looks like with all the holes in the mount it might actually clear the pigback on my shock!
Thanks for the reminder – I’d forgotten to put beer in the fridge for tonight’s ride! That was a close one.
@amanda I am now. Thanks for asking. FGF has become an integral part of my Friday routine.
@nixie Sure!
@slimshady What time exactly would you like FGF next week? We’re here for you. We can do it.
Interested in that bottle setup looking forward to the extra photos.
@nixie Ive got an Eject setup – without pump it stands 50mm proud of downtube and including bottles is 225mm long, compared to standing 90mm proud with a regular bottle and cage (which with my 800 bottle was 250 long). Hope that helps!
I would like to see a mint sauce style cartoon done by Amanda for the the magazine
@Amanda, I’m on UTC-3, and I’ve always wondered why you here at Singletrack tend to post most of the content around your local noon time.
I do also work with lots of folks on UTC-5, so as I stated -a little bit too effusively I might admit- I’ve come to have FGF as a signal of the arrival of the weekend. Given we’ve been on lockdown for over three months down here, and without any waivers to ride, the joy of finding FGF along with my breakfast is all I have now of those joyful weekends saddling up to countless miles on my local trails *pulls out the tiniest violin in the world*. Then I’d go read a few more articles here -I absolutely LOVE how natural and involved you and the rest of the staff make every piece, and ultimately top up my good humor with a dose of schadenfreude from The Register’s “On Call”.
Then I’m ready for whatever any fellow from India, USA or Poland throws at me, and that good humor lasts even through Saturday’d morning, when I come back here to skim through whatever I didn’t catch up during the work week.
Sorry for the long cry, but we’re going back to full lockdown from July 1 through July 17 here in Argentina, and the trails are starting to look as far away from me as Mordor looked to Frodo and Sam at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring.
Is it me or is Marin’s paint layout still ‘challenging’ on the eyes?
I say that as a Marin owner….
@slimshady FGF is often noonish if we’ve had to finish it off on a Friday morning 🙂 that’s how long it takes for everyone to wake up and write words! We try and have a breakfast time story for people waking up in the UK too. Lots of other stories are timed according to embargoes, so we don’t get any say over when they go up. Sorry to hear you’re going back into lockdown. Hope we keep providing some entertainment to see you through (I’ll give Amanda a nudge and see if she can’t have a few more adventures. Things seem to happen to her every time she leaves the house!)