Probably 75% of the time on politics threads… generally when the chief sealion turns up 😂

I feel your pain – I cracked a rib earlier in year (ran out of skill on the mountain bike). Unfortunately I get fairly bad hay fever… Early part of summer was most amusing. Sneezing fits with a cracked rib aren’t great 😆

Callie the Cocker (unless I’ve screwed up inserting the pic…)

Put the effort in and they’re fantastic dogs! And probably a bit of a nightmare if you don’t….

The All4 Countryman is a totally different thing!

I’ve just handed the PHEV version back after running one for four and a half years as a company car. It was perfectly ok and captured ‘some’ of the feeling of a mini but I’d recommend you test drive one – way better for longer journey’s but nowhere near the ‘fun’ to drive. However you can fit five people in and the boot is an acceptable size 🤣

That reminds me – It’s Cockermouth show at the weekend. I’ll check out the toilets and report back!

Although at £10 a ticket I’m expecting something special…🤣

We’ve had an R53 Cooper S since new (i.e. Gen 1 with a supercharger rather than the turbocharged gen 2 and 3’s). It’s 20 years old next month.

We like it… Although my son is about to start learning to drive – so I’m not 100% sure how long the (original) clutch will last…

My friend has a gen 2 Cooper S (so the age the OP asked about) – she loves it and objectively it is a ‘better’ (and faster) car than ours however the turbo does make a it a different ‘feeling’ car…

I do like Farage describing Coutts as ‘prejudiced and nasty’ 😂

Timing of the story was quite fortuitous for the tories too.

We could have been talking about a minibus full of tories bringing the house into disrepute (including my MP) or the migrant bill battles. But instead the BBC becomes the story. Must just have been a coincidence.

Fair play to the people who won’t vote for Starmer. I voted for Labour under Corbyn in the last two GE’s because it was more important to me to stop the tories than be 100% happy. Clearly I’m ideologically compromised though (as a scumbag centralist).

Hopefully people voting green/monster raving loony party or whatever won’t allow the tories in.

I despise brexiteers too – but I’d simply rather have labour government than a tory one so I just have to put up with nonsensical ‘make Brexit work’ comments in the hope that we’ll get tangible benefits when labour are actually in a position to change anything.

Maybe I’m naive but for me I’d rather have a labour government with Starmer in charge then a tory one with a random headbanger.

@jimfrandisco ITV4 highlights normally don’t seem to appear until after 10PM on ITVX.

@nbt – I’m pretty confident it won’t last!!!

haha – I am top of the STW velogames league!!!

Bask in my awesomeness – and now I feel really bad for all the riders I picked who will now inevitably crash out tomorrow…🤣

At least the Met should now be able to tell whether or not it was party 🤣

Apparently its wasn’t clear enough from the still pictures…

Dubbing doesn’t bother me – but I’m ‘watching’ on the turbo during Zwift sessions and my eyesight is too rubbish to read the subtitles without glasses 🤣🤣🤣

Loads of the bastards up in the Lakes. I think I’m some kind of magnet (they leave my wife alone!!!). Grrr.

Yes – but don’t ride in groups and I avoid the rain where possible 😁

I live in the Lakes so ride plenty of rough steep roads.

I’m not a Luddite though – my CX and mountain bikes have discs – I just personally don’t see the need for them on the road bike (Campag levers/Bontrager Speed Limit callipers/Swiss Stop pads).

Intense aren’t the only ones – I still have vaguely fond memories of my Tomac Revolver…

Boris probably thinks it is a paying gig!!!

**** still trying to play the victim card in his resignation statement.

‘Forced out’ by Harriet Harman. Wow – that must really burn 😂

I wondered where the swear words were and then realised – Rob Warner interview 😂😂😂

Another vote for Howies here.
32R fit is perfect for me and in my experience they last for years.

I hope none of you are childminders…

My parents in law have a similar size van and are similar age. They drive it all over over UK and France!!! As poly said it keeps them active!
The only caveat being they’ve driven vans all their lives so its not like they’ve had to learn something new in their late 70’s but rather just kept ‘in practice’.

On the plus side the ‘hatred’ towards Tory voters seems to be balanced by a similar sentiment towards the ‘centralists’ 😂

Swiss Stop – I use them with Bontrager Speed Limit callipers on an alloy Hunt wheel set.
My riding is in the lakes – so steep descents and pretty dodgy roads – they’ve been great with reasonable longevity too!

Yes – now this is like the Eurovision of my childhood!

Just got home from work and my wife has put up a load of union flags at the bottom of our drive 🤣

I’m struggling to be bothered though as she also bought a Coronation Colin the Caterpillar cake! I’ll take my wins where I can and I’ll enjoy my extra day off next week.

I’ll br riding my bike or walking the dog during the actual coronation tomorrow but fair play to those who want to celebrate. I’ll just be doing something else.

Discs on my mountain bikes and cross bike but calliper brakes on my road bike.

Don’t see the need (and expense) for discs on my road bike. I ride in the lakes so plenty of steep downs…

However – I only ever ride the road bike solo and frankly avoid wet weather so if you like to ride in groups and the wet, I can see why you would want to stick with discs.

Canyon Lux / Trail has a very ‘classic’ profile. One of the reasons I bought one!

Had a Turner Flux before – loved that bike and the ‘industrial’ look of it but a very different look to the Canyon.

Thanks Klunk – just when we getting the pitchforks nicely sharp.

I’ve one supposedly arriving at end of month. Looks like most of our company fleet will be CX60’s at this rate!
Price increases removed BMW/Volvo/Audi from our company car list… Luckily I like Mazda’s 😀
Colleagues who already have theirs seem really impressed so far. They’re pretty quick and boot is reasonably large. Back seat space is the only slight drawback given the sheer size of the things!!!
They’re also a ‘proper’ four wheel drive (with a rear wheel bias) i.e the electric motor drives through a shared gearbox rather than electric motors driving the rear wheels and a petrol motor driving the front. Which means a 2500kg tow limit which is pretty good for a PHEV. Tow bar is an expensive option though…

The Mirror is leading with an interesting expenses story about Suella… Unfortunately most of the other papers are loving the ‘war on woke’ BS.

The high fast charger costs do count against you here.

In my case, my current company car (Countryman) and next one (Mazda CX60) are PHEV’s. I only charge at home thereby using electrical power for short journeys. Long business journeys use the petrol engine (obviously with some regeneration) but then use HMRC rates dependent on petrol engine size.
Yes my BIK is significantly higher than a pure EV but you don’t ‘lose’ out on fuel costs for work mileage.
To cheer yourself up, you might want to look at the maths for say a Mazda CX60 (12% BIK) vs your EV car. Maybe the offset in terms of what you will pay extra using motorway charging will still be fine when you consider the overall BIK saving?
Alternatively, are you forced to have an EV car? Is there still time to cancel order and maybe look at a PHEV?

Probably just head up to Whinlatter trail centre.

Four passes is defo a fair bit of hike-a-bike. Although forecast tomorrow looks awesome up here!!!

Genuinely looking forward to seeing @daveylad’s voter fraud info.

I’ve mistakenly thought it was tory bullshit but I’m sure davey will put my mind at rest.

R53 Cooper S would be my shout here – Ours is 20 years old this year (had it since new) and it still makes me smile when I drive it.

Supercharger makes a lovely noise – they’re not super quick but certainly not slow. Pretty much the closest ‘feeling’ car to my old mini estate I’ve driven.

A 100hp Fiat Panda felt good too! R53 is quicker though.

Nice piece by Adam Boulting:

https://news.sky.com/story/adam-boulton-the-growing-list-of-presenticians-as-lines-blur-between-broadcast-news-and-campaigning-politicians-12829885

Neatly makes the point about the sheer number of right wing ‘presenticians’ on TV. And yet Lineker is castigated for a tweet.

Tory snowflakes.

Aye – bloody centralists 🤣🤣🤣

https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/i-am-gary-lineker-i-am-the-centrist-christ-20230311232665

They should put that on a big red bus – ‘Why don’t we give France £500M’ 🤣

No doubt tomorrows newspapers will be crowing about Gary Lineker taking a MoTD time out instead.

Culture war is really all they have left. Jenkinson’s (Workington) latest tirade is against local police stickering up a police car.

https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/23339146.cumbria-police-defend-decision-add-lgbtq-positive-livery-car/

This is same MP who decided locals were swapping food vouchers for drugs (with no evidence).

It’ll be ‘interesting’ to see how well it plays in the red wall.