Fresh Goods Friday 558 – The I’m Not Too Hot, YOU’RE Too Hot Edition

The current heatwave is both a treat and a challenge. Riding bikes in anything over 24°C seems more challenging in the UK than it does abroad. Our shops and cafes don’t have aircon cranked up to relieve us of the relentless sun, our houses are designed to trap as much heat as possible in them, and most of us aren’t used to heading out without a couple of layers on, so it’s a shock to the system being too hot before we’ve even turned a crank.

General advice is to exercise in the early and later hours of the day, do less, and follow all activities with ice cream.

If you’re bike shopping, here’s some really irrelevant information to not consider: The melting temperature of Titanium is 1668°C. For steel, it’s somewhere between 1400 – 1530°C depending on the grade of steel. A generic internet search for carbon melting point is 3550°C but there’s no indication of the layup, it could be a really thin layer. (And the goo that holds it together might have melted long before it…)

Elliot Brown / Singletrack 20th Anniversary Watch

• Price: £475 (with black rubber strap. Metal, leather and webbing straps also available)
• From: bit.ly/EBxSingletrack

We’ve got together with Elliot Brown watches to collaborate on a stylish watch to celebrate our 20th anniversary. There are plenty of hidden forum nods, and you’ll get your forum name engraved on the back. More details on the website – you only have a few weeks to register your interest.

Women’s Chrono Expert Halter Bib Shorts

• Price: £119.99
• From: ZyroFisher

These bib shorts have a formfitting breathable mesh upper body, reflective logos, a storage pocket and compression leg grippers. The elastic interface Chromo Expert chamois offers great saddle comfort, so great Amanda has got herself two pairs of these. We’ve decided to include body measurements on these because it can be so hard to find a truly well designed set of bibs when you’ve got Thunder Thighs.

Women’s New Road SS Jersey

• Price: £79.99
• From: ZyroFisher

Don’t be deterred by ‘Road’ in the name. It’s hot out there, and backpacks can be unbearable on shorter rides where you only need to carry a few spares and snacks. The 3 expandable cargo pockets are ideal for road, gravel, XC or short/local MTB loops. The full length front zip is handy for wild weed when you have bib shorts on, and the material is UPF50+ to keep you safe from the sun.

Women’s Chrono Expert Wind Vest

• Price: £59.99 £47.99
• From: ZyroFisher

Available in bright orange if you’re planning to wear this on the road, or black if visibility isn’t your concern. Super lightweight, packable, 2-way stretch, elasticated hem, back ventilation and a water-repellant coating make this windproof a great item to carry with you at all times for a bit of added weather protection.

Aldi Unisex Sliders

• Price: £3.99
• From: Aldi Middle Aisle

Ideal post-ride footwear for any weather. Be the envy of your friends with these Aldi branded sliders.

Hope F20 Pedals

• Price: £130
• From: Hopetech

There’s nothing new about these old favourite pedals, but if you’ve got a new bike with a new colour scheme then you might find yourself in need of these. Replaceable pins, aluminium CNCd bodies, and Cro Mo axles.

Hope Grip Doctors

• Price: £20
• From: Hopetech

If you have a tendency to scrape past walls, bail on jumps and let your bike fall to the floor, or any other acts of bike clumsiness, then you may well benefit from bar ends that are more burly than a rubber bumper. And, you can match them to your pedals. Whoop!

Terske and Lindarets Bolts And Tools

• Price: Lockring and Hex Tools £24.95 ea, Titanium Valves £44.95, Oil Slick Headset Spacers £24.95, coloured ultra-low Titanium bolts £12.95 for four
• From: Gone Biking Mad

A couple of handy tools and some titanium loveliness from Terske and Lindarets. The silver Hex tool and Rotor tool are of particular interest for riders looking to pare down their toolkits: the Hex tool has a 6mm and 8mm bit, while the Rotor tool will tighten the larger external lockring tools found on many rotors. The clever bit is that both use your thru-axle to provide the lever and leverage.

The Ti tubeless valves feature a straight bore to reduce sealant clogging and you won’t bend or shear them while flailing with your mini pump in the middle of nowhere. A valve tool is built into the metal valve cap too. And those low profile bolts come in silver, black and rainbow Ti and are great replacements if you need bottle (or other boss) bolts that won’t snag on luggage being slid into cages, or if you’re blanking off unused bosses. Plus, rainbows!

And that’s the end of Fresh Goods Friday for this week. We hope you’ve been enjoying some of the warm weather and avoiding the random thunderstorms (that are literally on/off, street by street here…)

We’re going to leave you with a bit of a classic early nineties club tune here. And the only one, to our knowledge, that mentions the equally classic (and wonderfully awful) fantasy film ‘Hawk The Slayer’…

You might as well have some Hawk, eh? 😉

Oh, and you’ve got until tomorrow to subscribe to Singletrack World magazine in order to get the next issue of the magazine delivered to your door. Do it now. It’s a good one!

Amanda Wishart

Art Director

Amanda is our resident pedaller, who loves the climbs as much as the descents. No genre of biking is turned down, though she is happiest when at the top of a mountain with a wild descent ahead of her. If you ever want a chat about concussion recovery, dealing with a Womb of Doom or how best to fuel an endurance XC race, she's the one to email.

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