I just felt the urge to show off my mountain bike.

Great thread, thanks OP and all contributors.

oops, I take my previous post back. Terrible sense of humour fail. Sorry guys

Blimey – I didn’t expect to see so much interest in a photo.

It is a real pic – no greenscreen or socks;one of our club members took it last Monday whan we were riding from Liphook. I was in the middle of a 75 miler and had started at 0700 that morning, hence the legwarmers.

The skis give me 1mph every time I get on them and are a handy place to hang the tent – the sleeping bag is usually hanging out behind the seatpost.

No panniers.

The bike is my way of getting things done – last summer I rode it down to Morzine, did the Passport du Soleil and had a great week riding the lifts and Morzine trails with my South Downs mountain bike club friends.
I had just ridden up to the Lakes (met Steve Makin on the way)and then done Garburn pass, Walner scar and messed about in Grizedale woods and TC. We also popped into Cannock Chase and whizzed round that on the way home.

Santa Crux Tallboy – just over 5 years old and an awesome machine that I have fettled to suit me. I appreciate it may not suit all tastes, just have fun riding whatever takes your fancy!

Never been a roadie – I just took up biking because I heard about the Trans Rockies and fancied doing it, and then heard about the Tour Divide whilst thumbing a lift out of Fairbanks – fancied doing that too.

Bib shorts over the shirt because if you are out riding all day, at some point you will need to do an impression of a bear and, do I need to spell it out?

The SDWx4 may be the daftest idea yet, but somebody has to get it done.

I’ll be carrying a SPOT, so you can track me, and if anybody feels the urge to come and keep me company they will be most welcome if they bring ice cream in the day and hot soup at night(though I must do the gates myself).

Thanks for the interest – it is a piccie i am proud of.

Good effort doing SDWx4, that’s a long way and a lot of hills!

Are you stopping for a cream tea in Alfriston each time?

Good luck with the SDW. For what it’s worth, chapeau (if you’ll allow a roadie term 😉 ) for adapting a bike to exactly what you want it for and riding it just so. I’m a great believer in form following function.

Out of interest, did you take spare tyres to Morzine to swap when you got there?

TiRed, sorry for delay…. been riding.
I rode down on some plastic wheels built by Strada (with a dynamo hub). They gave me a set of Spotted Cat tyres which are great on the road and dry hardpack. In the wet, I couldn’t manage them.

The plastic whels are awesome and will be on the Tallboy for the x4 along with a set of SB8’s.

I swapped onto some old ali wheels and some tubeless Bronsons for the week in Morzine.

Well done. That is some tough riding. The piss taking is like when you get people who have just bought a £3k road bike then see some guy on a beat up steel road bike with a carridice saddle bag, take the piss then find out he is doing 1200km audax. Get her done!

I’ll be carrying a SPOT, so you can track me

How do we do that? I’d be interested to see how it’s going.

Well, that’s you lot told ;-P

sorry for delay…. been riding

😀

Keep it up fella, good work.

Has he airbrushed his thigh gap?

Oh Nooooo

Sorry Rob, had to be done
🙂

If anybody feels like being a blue dot junkie over the next bank holiday, paste this link, grab a pack of bikkies and watch. Better still, grab your bike and come and find me.

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0gEppCB0bKu3eM1WtLx5spZzUQoo0vFCL

It will only be live for the duration of the event and for 24 hours afterwards.

Rob

Well, the weather held and we got it done. 400 SDW miles in 55 hours. Happy bunny. And now a full happy bunny, having spent the last few days catching up on food.

Ace 🙂

Good effort sir ,that’s an excellent average speed 🙂

Wow. It’s like everything I said about this forum yesterday.

In one thread.

Well done STW. 😆

Keen to know where and how often you used the Tri Bars, when you have time that is, keep eating !

Skis got used on all ‘hard packed smooth’ trails and the tiny bits of flat such as the top of Cocking and Heyshott down. There are loads of little places to get on them for a minute or two at a time and they can even get used on gentle ups such as the long concrete drive near the A27.

Would not consider doing anything like this again without them as you can hide from the wind and get in a higher gear and grab a mile or hour for free when on them.

Strangely there are no pics of me on them as I would always be on the brakes slowing for a pitstop when I saw the crew.

Serious respect Rob.
I was out on the SDW riding my cross bike on the Sunday (90 miles) and was hoping to run into you at some point. It’s such a beautiful place to ride isn’t it? So wild looking when the clouds started rushing over the ridge-line as the weather closed in during the afternoon.

Your story has inspired me to continue pushing my endurance and take on rides of increasing epicness. I will certainly be putting tri bars on my long distance machine when I build one, makes tons of sense. (Some suspension would be nice too! The descent into Jevington on a cross bike was pure misery.)

Love the reason for the bibs over the shirt. Practicality trumping style.

Mate that is a pic to hang above the fireplace!

Well, you don’t look at the mantelpiece whilst you’re stoking the fire, so a safe place then.

Chexk out some of the tri-bars made by USE (Exposure Lights), they do some amazing stuff as well as lights!

top bombin’ well done!