As the suns out again I’m heading out for a ride in a bit, with a mate, ending at the pub. Truly living the dream.

We’ve just been away for the weekend to the Lakes, so I’ll just put my bike back together after getting its component parts out of the back of the car.

Except I won’t be because that ‘Oh FFS?!!’ moment today was the realisation that my back thru-axle is actually sat on the top of a drystone wall near Keswick.

Arse!

Fire away with your similar moments of stupidity…

Didn’t affect me as such, but I do remember that feeling when my mate took his bike out of his van, with the forks I’d just serviced for him, and I spotted the crown was back to front.

Turning up to a ride in Wales with only one pedal fitted (ride abandoned, went Chrismtas shopping instead)

Turning up to a ride in the Hope Valley and realising the front wheel was still at home (the lovely guys at 18 bikes knew us as regulars and loaned us a wheel, even changing rotor to the right size)

Similar – down the local pump track with my son, park up pull the bikes out the car. “Where’s my front wheel?” I watched him carry it back into the garage while I was loading the car up and it just didn’t register.
Not as bad as the time my parents drove me down to Southsea Skatepark and I forgot my skateboard. Last week that was :’-) (about 1976 really and still remember how dopey I felt)

More screaming realisation of my own stupidity, but finally got caught by the bike on roof bars / low height barrier nightmare a few weeks ago. Luckily the mega pot-holes under the barrier meant I was crawling at less than walking speed and got away relatively lightly, but still cost me a carbon wheel rim, bars and the Thule 598 bike carrier was totaled.

Seatpost and saddle left on the wall outside my house… discovered missing the next morning as we built up bikes to ride at Dalbeattie. Must have been over twenty years ago, but still plays on my mind. Dropper posts have saved us from that.

Always but you axles back in your frame/fork when removing a wheel. Always.

Myself and three friends at Milarrochy bay on Lomond. Tent is a huge affair, canvas. Come in a big bag, thick wooden poles separate.

Poles….. poles, where are the **** poles…. Oh Bollocks 😯 I was made to sleep under the canvas on the beach. They got the van.

Turning up to a ride in the Hope Valley and realising the front wheel was still at home (the lovely guys at 18 bikes knew us as regulars and loaned us a wheel, even changing rotor to the right size)

I was with you that day NBT and remember it well 😀

Out on a ride with a group, half way up a climb my rear shifter made a funny sort of noise and refused to, well, shift.

So, ignoring the warnings of my companions that it would be a bad idea, I decided to take the shifter apart. I mean what can go wrong there? It’s not like there’s loads of tiny bots and springs and stuff.

Flipped the bike over so it was on the bars/saddle, carefully put something under the shifter in case anything dropped out (didn’t want to lose anything in the grass, see, clever), and proceeded to take the shifter apart. Once it was in pieces, someone made the point that I had, in fact, dismantled the working, front, shifter…

Lunch packaging on the car passenger seat, stop for fuel and chuck it in the garage bin. 100 miles down the road, where’s my sunglasses gone. Bye bye £100 Oakleys, idiot!

I had, in fact, dismantled the working, front, shifter…

Gave me a LOL.

There was this one time I went to Wales for a riding weekend and left my lower headset bearing on the floor of my garage, having just swapped the fork over.

Still rode it and kept pace with the group on the descents. Steering felt a bit funny though.

I put the uppers of a pair of lyrics on the wrong way around one time and rode the bike on a shake-down ride. I’m not sure if this is possible to do on most forks, or even how I managed it, but it means riding with the fork raked backwards (and any adjustment knobs swapped over). Didn’t notice what was wrong for a few miles.

I once wrote off two tubular tyres and cracked a rear rim in a CX race. Not necessarily stupid – anyone can case a rock, but when it’s spray-painted neon yellow and you’ve gone purposefully off the racing line to hit it…

The first time on a camping holiday with a roof-box fitted. Went for a day trip with it still on and drove into a multi storey car park that was just a teeny bit too low! Had to do a full circuit of the car park with it scraping the car park roof.

In my youth (some time ago) putting in a bmx bottom bracket with a vice, managed to also squeeze both chainstays, putting a dent in each side of my brand new frame.
Needn’t have worried, S&M next gen dirt bike. Built like a tank.

Bleeding a brake and wondering why nothing is happening. That’ll be because the syringes are connected to different brakes.
I’ve done this more than once 🙄

I turned up to a ride having unloaded the bikes from a weekend away with mrs me, promptly reloaded my bike for a ride with the mates and driven there only to discover I’d reloaded my thru axled 29er frame and her qr rear 26inch wheels. Bugger.

I bought a set of brakes from Germany last year. Fitted the front brake first and cut the nice long hose down to the perfect length, bled and working perfectly. Got the left hand rear brake out of the box to see the very short hose fitted to it. Johnny Foreigner and their back to front brakes meant I had to order a replacement hose and also had the pain of trying to buy some fittings to put the old brakes back as well as the joy of threading the brake hose through the internal routing one more time when the hose arrived.

Arrived in Newtonmore after a 6 hour drive with bikes locked on the bike rack. No key. Had to borrow a hacksaw from the only shop open, spent half an hour cutting through chain, then had to buy a new lock in Aviemore the next day.
At least we had wheels/axles/seats etc and could ride at Laggan, burnside etc.!

Left a brand new pair of raichlle Murren boots (well, one days scrambling old) in the jacksonville car park below the Buachaille. Policemen from Glencoe village popped by to have a look as it was on his way home but they were gone.

I have many examples of my own idiocy. It hurts remembering them all!

@northwind anything you can think of….?

Wow.. remembering now, I teavelled to Scotland and realised about two hours into the drive to the ferry that I had no SPD shoes with me

I’ve got loads of bike related ones but yesterday I reversed my car into a lamp post.

I’m still pissed off about it. Haven’t even added up the financial consequences yet.

That moment when the stubborn chainring bolt finally gives way and you realise you forgot to position the allen key with your knuckles pointing away from the chainring…

Stupidity with bikes:
I once drove 2 hours to Kielder forest to ride, only to find I’d not brought the bike’s wheels.
I also once drove 2 hours to Necastleton forest only to realise that the little plug in one of the hayes reservoirs had been knocked out when putting the bike in the boot, allowing all the brake fluid to escape into the car.

With work:
I once mixed up an HR database schema and accidentally updated everyone in a NHS trust’s prod AD environment with their home address and telephone number, rather than their work address and extension. Somehow I didn’t end up on the front of Computer Weekly.

2 weeks after starting a job as junior IT administrator, a friend sent me an email. Unbeknownst to me, the mail server had no virus protection and the client computer’s was not set to scan mail. 4 days it took to clean that up.

And today: I ticked one checkbox and accidentally provisioned 13069 user accounts in the customer’s active directory. Thankfully, it was just in dev.

but yesterday I reversed my car into a lamp post

Did that with a concrete wall once. Wasn’t in the lightest of moods that day.

Also reversed a hire car into a bollard while my wife and the receptionist from the hotel were watching (and failing to alert me; my wife because she had faith that I was aware of it, the receptionist because she presumably wanted some entertainment). Unfortunately I’d turned down excess cover when collecting the car so this meant I was facing a large bill. Soured the holiday a bit; as it turned out, needlessly so, because when I got back I found I had excess cover on my travel policy anyway. Doh.

That moment when the stubborn chainring bolt finally gives way and you realise you forgot to position the allen key with your knuckles pointing away from the chainring…

I did exactly that a couple of weeks ago, it’s only just about healed up now

I’ve left a thru-axle in a layby after the one time I did the Passportes du Soleil. I blame being absolutely jiggered because we were hauling to get to the end before all the lifts shut as I’d got us on the wrong chairlift about an hour before.  🙄 Double idiot.

Also, brake bleeding without a block in the caliper. Popped a piston out, took ages to realise while thinking ‘these brakes take a surprisingly large volume of fluid!’

Packed up the car for a trip to FoD with the kids – their bikes in the car, mine on the roof. Thought I’d save some cash and instead of buying everyone lunch at the cafe, pop into Sainsburys and grab some sandwiches…central Cheltenham middle of the day, what can go wrong…10 minutes later there’s just the remains of the rack hanging off the roof.

My daughter was just pleased I hadn’t yet fitted her shotgun seat & it was safely inside.

I’d been working in Liverpool at the Uni and I had managed to wangle the afternoon free for a couple of laps of Gisburn on the way back North East, and get this it was dry and sunny unlike the three other times I had visited.

Feeling rather happy with myself I unloaded the bike from the van to remember that I’d been a good boy and cleaned the whole bike at home days before and fitted new brake pads…….at least I thought I had fitted them staring into the abyss of two empty….I can’t even type.

Years ago on my XC hardtail with V-brakes (probs 2002) I was heading through South West Scotland working and visited Mabie, it was throwing it down from the heavens but I wasn’t to be put off and turned to find that my waterproof was in fact my waterproof work 3/4 jacket. That was enough for me and so donning an oversize waterproof that literally brushed your ankles on the pedal strokes I took off through the woods like a dude.

Just this morning my good lady decided to take the dog out for a walk and locked herself in the porch, she hadn’t took a key because I was home and standing in the shower listening to her yell through the letterbox. She then thought to herself thats ok the back door is open I can come back in and get the key only to find that yes the door was still locked and apparently her brain was somewhere else as well.

once left a nice set of M frames in the loos at Nant yr arian.

I’ve spent a good half hour on a stubborn BB with a breaker bar only to realize that I was tightening
done that more than once, but moreso if the bike is upside down!

I feel that picture can’t be too far away now 🙂

Too many moments of idiocy to remember really, but one that does spring to mind was dumping the bikes in the heather a few years ago to hike up a Munro. I took the saddle and post with me to reduce the chance of the bike getting nicked and yes, you’ve guessed it, left them at the top when we stopped for a snack. Managed to get most the way down before realising and making the long trudge back up.

I’ve driven to Wales, Newcastleton and Dalbeatie only to have left the bike rack keys in the house on the other set of car keys.

I followed a Youtube video the first time I ever bled my SRAM brakes. I couldn’t work out why the fluid wouldn’t plunge from syringe on the lever through to the syringe on the calliper. It took me about 30 mins of swearing before I realised I was following a US video with the levers the wrong way round, I was trying to bleed back right lever and back brake.

More screaming realisation of my own stupidity, but finally got caught by the bike on roof bars / low height barrier nightmare a few weeks ago. Luckily the mega pot-holes under the barrier meant I was crawling at less than walking speed and got away relatively lightly, but still cost me a carbon wheel rim, bars and the Thule 598 bike carrier was totaled.

I’ve done this.
Twice.

More recently went away with wife’s ebike on roof and battery in the boot. Left key 225 miles away at home so she had no assistance the one time we went out together. Lucky the Kent coastal path is very flat. Shame about the headwind.

Setting up an all in one PC for my daughter. She had inherited it from her grandfather and I had set it up for him and used it many times at his place before we brought it home. Couldn’t get the thing to switch on at all. Tried other devices in the socket, tried a different socket, changed the fuse on the plug, all okay. Logged in to a different PC to bring up the online manual. I’d been trying to power it up with the CD ROM eject button, not the on/off switch. Utter fud.

Years ago, on a mates snowboard trip I volunteered to drive the hired people carrier despite never having driven anything LHD before. We stopped at a Maccy D’s in Bourg St Maurice and one of my pals asked if I wanted them to take over the driving, pointing out, “you were a bit close on the nearside going through that Peage, mate.” I fatally replied with “Nah, I reckon I’ve got my eye in now.”

Needless to say, I took the side out on a sturdy wooden width restrictor within ten minutes of setting off again.

I keep thinking I’ve left my water bottle at home on every bloody ride,only to realise I’ve left it on the bonnet….every single time

Got back to the van after a couple of laps of the Golfie at Innerleithen. Went to get the keys out and realised they were in my rucksack….that I’d left at the very top of the hill!

I also once drove 2 hours to Necastleton forest only to realise that the little plug in one of the hayes reservoirs had been knocked out when putting the bike in the boot, allowing all the brake fluid to escape into the car.

I have a similar story about the stupid plugs on Hayes brakes except this happened after my girlfriend and I flew to Vegas and drove to the Grand Canyon. Luckily only one plug fell out so she had one working brake for the ace singletrack right on the edge of the Canyon…

The couple of seconds between slipping with a small square nose file, and the pain arriving from me having punched it about a cm into the heel of my hand.

The couple of seconds between slipping with a small square nose file, and the pain arriving from me having punched it about a cm into the heel of my hand.

See also, when you cut your finger while chopping vegetables.