Could there be a way to extend the benefits of a ride? Words Hannah PHOTOGRAPHY Amanda
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Issue 143 Kitchen: Charlie’s New Wave Hipster Starters
Just as mountain bikes keep evolving, so does food. There was a time when a prawn cocktail would impress people with its juicy shellfish piled high on lettuce with a nice tangy Marie Rosé sauce, and now it seems … well… somewhat ‘canti’.
Issue 143: Things that are important on a bike, in order.
Benji is here to persuade you not to spend lots of money, except where you should. Words: Benji This feature is intended to be a helpful guide – or reminder – to invest in some things more than others. This often involves spending money on…
Issue 143 Last Word: Clothing Optional
Should Hannah be allowed to make equipment choices, or is the outcome inevitable? Words Hannah I have been here before. That time it resulted in a flight through the air long enough to contemplate my poor equipment choices (bikini, sandals and baseball cap) before landing…
Issue 142 Column: Mirror Mirror
Anders struggles to match aspiration to reality. Words & Illustrations Anders Engberg This is not fun. The thought has dug in, made itself comfortable and is not going anywhere. My local trail is treating me with a warm, dappled light that finds its way through…
Issue 142 Singletrack Kitchen: Chipps’ Stag Breakfast
When Chipps got married last year, inevitably there was a stag gathering in the mountains with bikes. Much to everyone’s relief it was a rather civilised affair with lots of good wine, many cheeses, and acoustic music from Chipps’s personal troubadour ‘Jazzy Brian’. No one got shaved or tied to…
Issue 142: Last Word | My Ride Pal
Hannah has found a new friend to ride with.I have a new ride buddy. I’ve known him all his life and when he was younger he rode quite a lot, but somehow life got in the way and he’s only quite recently got into mountain…
Singletrack Issue 141 – The Joy of Flex
Welcome to Benji, our new Technical Content Manager. He has opinions and he’s not afraid to share them. As the person who’s just been hired to be In Charge Of All Things Tech at Singletrackworld I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but… I don’t know…
Last Word: Information Threshold
Rhys blinds Amanda with science, but she’s busy looking at the sun. I’m sitting in the passenger seat of the van, watching the rolling hills wake up to the morning sun. The frosty cover from the night before is melting before my eyes, revealing golden…
Catch My Drift? Singletrack Magazine Issue 131
With Barney Marsh In which your intrepid reporter attempts to get to the bottom of certain mountain biking vernacular using the ancient arts of Flannelling and Hand Waving. This feature was first published in issue 129 of Singletrack magazine. It has been selected as a…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 129 : One Last Run
Tim Oates looks at why you should never give in to that one extra run after you’ve stopped for the day. Words Tim Oates If I get out early in the morning, ride straight out of the car park and have a huge crash-and-burn, it’s…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 129 | Ode to climbs
Self-confessed climb-lover Rich Rothwell reckons that you’re missing out on half the fun if you don’t learn to love the ups as much as the downs. Words Rich Rothwell
Singletrack Issue 129 | Game Plan
Do you have the wrong plans? Or is planning itself the thing that’s wrong? Words | Hannah My life is currently full of the wrong sort of plans. In any given day in any week in the year ahead, I could give you a pretty…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 128 | Column – Jason Miles
Winter lard is coming! Protect yourself! Jason steps back from moaning about everything for a change to deliver a bit of inspirational fitness speak. It’s the start of winter – a time when most of us probably ride our bikes less and possibly eat just…
Singletrack Issue 127 | Five Minutes With: Damien Nosella, Production Privee
Andi catches up with Damien from Production Privée, the enigmatic Andorran bike and component company. Words & Photography Andi
Singletrack Issue 127 | The Last Word | Accidental Punch-Up
Sometimes alcohol and high spirits can get in the way of a race to the point that some people let themselves down a little. So much so that we’ve toned this one down, to hide the guilty. Words Chipps
Singletrack Issue 127 | The Helmet of Unhappiness
Jason Miles takes a good long look at himself. With his eyes half shut…
Singletrack Issue 126 | Hello, my name is Jason and I’m a big scaredy-cat
Jason steps out of his comfort zone and under a combine harvester. Or something like that. In a week or so, I’m going to be starting a bike race and I’m getting really nervous. Nervous like I was the first few times I did a…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 126 – The Last Word
Red. Rocks. Hannah takes a mountain biker’s pilgrimage. Words & Photography Hannah
Singletrack Magazine Issue 125 | With great power comes great grumpiness
Jason Miles has a run-in with the powers that are supposed to be helping him. A few weeks ago a mountain bike race happened in a park just outside Manchester. I’d organised it. It took a long time to get everything sorted out, mainly because…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 125 | The Last Word
Swapping cars for handlebars By Mark Alker Mark swaps heated car seats and sunroof for a bike saddle and the open air in a move to become a daily bike commuter. In April I handed back the keys to my car to the guy from…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 123 : Jason Miles
Jason Miles Just when you think you know it all Jason unwittingly becomes the local expert in a cycling sport he knows nothing about. I may have mentioned that I live in a small town in an almost forgotten, rugged corner of Scotland. It’s quite…
Singletrack Issue 122: Charlie The Bikemonger – The Highland Heist
You know what? Bikepacking can really change you. Around ten years ago I cycled with my two great friends Crashy Simon and Beardy Martin from the south coast of England to Aviemore in the Scottish Highlands, so we could race the Single Speed World Champs.…
Singletrack Issue 121: Shakespeare’s Sister
‘All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players’. How your ride will play out – whether it results in comedy, tragedy or historic triumph – will depend on your cast of players. Let us head to the casting couch and…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 120 | Last Word: The same sort of different.
Three short stories from Hannah’s recent trip to the USA that demonstrate the reach of the bike and the unspoken bond shared by those who ride them.
Don’t call it a heatwave, just call it summer: From Singletrack issue 120
Chipps has vowed to only ride if it’s sunny. Unfortunately, this means he’s not stopped since early May. From Singletrack issue 120
Singletrack Issue 119: Ride Less, Be Happier
Adam concocts a recipe for happiness. Like a public bathroom mirror I am covered in the handprints of strangers, but I have also been doing a lot of reflecting. Reflecting on a snowy and wet winter with limited opportunities for adventure, and how these limited…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 118: A Glamorous Job
Jason Miles tells us a few home truths about the indignities of 24 hour racing. The physical battle doesn’t end at the finish line. On reflection, rounding off a cycling weekend by sitting in a hot bath shivering uncontrollably and shouting for my wife to…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 117: Joe Parkin
Less Measuring, More Doing Joe Parkin has the secret of getting fit and he’s willing to share it with you. Spoiler alert: it involves riding your bike. Adults are idiots. Seriously. We go to amazing lengths to take the fun out of everything we do.…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 117: In The Beginning
Olly Townsend recounts how his earliest experience of mountain biking could quite easily have been his last… Even though this photo was taken nearly 30 years ago, the emotion conveyed in my facial expression seems to have burned its way indelibly into my soul. That…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 117: Last Word
last word: That time I got mistaken for a bear. Charlie the Bikemonger shares a little too much. Again. Back in the early days of singlespeeding, after bar ends, but before 10-speed (if you had gears, that was), I was minding my own business… well…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 116: Column – Life Cycle Of A Riding Spot
Antony de Heveningham charts the rise and fall of that secret riding spot in the woods near you. The following is based on a true story, and is a tragedy, told in 11 chapters. Illustrations Amanda Discovery. A new location is scouted and ridden. Potential…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 115: 100 Years Later
Words Steffi Marth Photography Nathan Hughes Riding in the footsteps of the Austrian, Italian and Swiss mountain heroes of the First World War. 1915, The Stelvio Pass, Italy.
Singletrack Magazine Issue 115: Augmentation
The shape of things to come Jason Miles predicts the future of bikes and riders after gorging on too many ginger biscuits and sci-fi films. Can mountain bikes get any better than they are right now? We all know that manufacturers have to keep making…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 115: Trail Knifes
Words & Photography Chipps For this issue’s look at the non-bike essentials that make us tick, Chipps considers a few non-bike tools that can be essential for improvisation in the hills, as well as for slicing cheese. While bike tools can cope with most foreseeable…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 115: Just Get Out There
Words & Photography Charlie the Bikemonger Charlie the Bikemonger urges you toward adventure. Even if it’s a sunburned, punctured, dehydrated, drunken, euphoric adventure in Arizona. Especially if it is. This spring, I got back from a few days bikepacking on the Arizona Trail. It’s an…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 115: Last Word
Mediocrity Words Ian Bailey Ian Bailey has a confession. He wants to tell you something that’s been weighing on his mind. I’m mediocre. There, I’ve said it, that’s a relief; finally, publicly, accepting my limitations is mildly therapeutic. I don’t have to share this nugget…
Singletrack Magazine Issue 114: Grand Finale
Taking a holiday from being a mountain bike guide, Ian Bailey goes mountain biking in Italy and lets another guide take the strain. He also lets his sense of self-preservation have some time off too. Words Ian Bailey Photography Ian and friends Right this second…
Singletrack Magazine issue 114: (Hand) Made In China
Chipps follows the path of an Asian-made bike from concept sketch to mountainside testing. Words and photography Chipps I’ve always wanted to follow the development of a product from first-sketch to final product, but it’s easier said than done. Many companies are rightly wary about…
Singletrack Magazine issue 114:The Black Fuel
Words & photography Rob Crayons Last issue, Chipps filled his crystal tumbler and took us through five of his top armchair whiskies. This time we look to Rob Crayons and his pick of coffees for fuelling our rides. Coffee isn’t just a hot beverage needed…
Singletrack Issue 1 – Singleminded
Words by Steve Delacruz Picture by Seb Rogers First published April 2001 Singletrack. There isn’t a single word in a mountain biker’s vocabulary that evokes as many memories or passion as this one. Ask any mountain biker in any part of the world about their…
Singletrack Issue 1 – Fall Girl
by Myra VanInwegen Mountain biking is risky. Unless you try only the tamest trails and walk even the smallest dropoffs, you will crash. Of course, not all crashes result in major injuries. Most result in nothing worse that dirty clothes, small cuts, scrapes and bruises.…
Singletrack Issue 1 – Should I stay or should I grow?
There was a Howies advert once with a tag-line that read: “There are more people alive today than have ever died, being alone is going to get harder.” We’d all like to see our sport get more recognition wouldn’t we? We think it’s great seeing…
Singletrack Issue 1 – Dostoyevsky’s Bicycle
By Ben Boney M. Books about bicycling are hard to find. I don’t mean ride guides, maintenance manuals, or ‘how to ’handbooks. I mean good books, books that really capture the spirit of life’s greatest distraction, books with a bit of weight to them, some…