229 rides
477 hours
4,859 miles (turbo rides in the number and hours)
83k vertical

Almost all mountain bike but a lot of that on the road

Whyte 29c and Syntace P6 flex post. HT with surprising comfort.

Always wanted a 2012 Ti Mariachi – last of the vertical dropouts.

Drop me an e mail (profile) for photos of the Curtis.

It’s great!

And I have a Spearfish waiting to be built.

My job is to all intents and purposes copywriting – must get life and not obsess about detail………

So are 29er owners a bunch of illiterates who can’t read past a title or pushy bastards who can’t resist an opportunity to post off topic pictures of their clown wheels?

Age related pedantry is a bitch.

I think you might find it hard.

For me mile munching =

Standard BSA BB or PF30 to fit adaptors for standard BB

2x bottle bottle brackets

Vertical dropouts

Geo – you probably don’t want particularly fast so 69.5 HA or less.

Seat post – used to think 27.2 but I have a feeling my Syntace 30.9 shockpost is more comfortable than my 27.2 one.

FWIW I couldn’t find a Ti frame to meet my requirements so built a steel Curtis to my design. It weighs 400g more than an equivalent Ti frame. I’m happy with that.

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So it would appear to answer the OP – not many.

Is it me, or does that Turner have a very high BB?

Doesn’t feel like it but it certainly looks like it!

Flux – just about to get new bearings

Flux Cannock by adshools[/url], on Flickr

Thanks – some interesting ideas but as I said it’s for skills and skills while breathing out my *$se not trying to do race specific training other than wanting to get off concrete.

I really think powermeters is one piece of kit where you need to do your customer service research.

Ouch – might go even slower…..

Cheers – looks like I’ll continue to go for it on Stickler, hold something in reserve for the motorway, have fun in the more natural woody bits and explore Crowthorne.

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Skills and skills while breathing out my *$se.

I don’t recognise much of Swinley in the Gorricks…. maybe a bit of tanktraps and deerstalker/labyrinth but the bermed concrete isn’t representative is it?

I’m aiming for half on my XC bike on the road and harmonious family relations.

I built one last year for winter duties – what a bike. Now I’m more into XC I’ve built up a Curtis29er and the Soul is moving on but I will keep the Simple.

In STW stylee I will quote the theory I have learned recently rather than give you the benefit of any true experience (or success)

Anaerobic fitness is more quickly gained and lost – 3-4 weeks

Aerobic fitnees takes time to build up but is therefore lost more slowly – 3 months

It’s possible to peak too early/overtrain

Really good XC racers or people doing short max efforts have a really good aerobic base

Taking the above into account some way of building your base fitness before heading into speed phases is a sound idea (you can build the speed in less time and closer to race season but you can’t do that with the base). How you do it is open to your own interpretation of the myriad things you will hear. In my case I’m making use of my 16-20mile commute to get quality (power meter) Z2 miles in. If you do enough and intersperse with something more unstructured and longer at the weekends you will find they become quite tiring.

Take care your training doesn’t become more important than race performance – I’m in danger of this!

Coming from the road version I was expecting great things from the Endura MT500 but I found them to be pretty crap for MTB. The toes kept on popping off the front of my shoes, they moved around a bit so wrecked my cranks (well superficialy scuffed hell out of them) and the underside got holes in them nearly instantly.

Personaly I’d save for winter boots which work, are less hassle and will be paid for by the replacement of worn out overboots.

Just stripped the ‘pads’ from my rear brake. Fragments of spring, one backing and shrapnel of the other were all that remained. Had just started on the piston 😯

4.5 laps

3x partial 750ml Torq
1x torq energy bar
6x torq gels

What size Simple do you want?

If you can handle the cost, I don’t think there’s a better tyre for wet rock grip with decent rolling resistance than the black chili Trail King. Much stickier than Schwalbe Trailstar.

This x many.

Monster of a tyre. Astonishing grip.

Rather stupidly did a full practice lap which gave me an idea of what was to come but took an hour 😯

Started in grand vets. Felt pretty strong until I got near hypothermic, changed, started my bonus 4th lap but had to bin it 20mins in with no rear brake and not able to touch the front. 9th in grand vets.

Strangely rather enjoyed it. Front tyre was a Continental Trail King which was amazing. Saw a few punctures – seemed to be Schwalbes.

If I tell you my new battery went you will see from ^^ that it lasted 16 hours.

Merlin will replace but say they have had a spate of battery issues since the latest firmware release (coincides with wet weather?)

My Stages battery went y’day after 20hrs from new. Calibrated, worked ok for 20mins then died.

Replaced battery, seal is red and all was dry. Updated firmware and crossing fingers.

Connecting via bluetooth to my bike made me laugh – whoever would have thought it.

Similar to my commute though Oxfordshire is slightly less muddy and without the central reservation.

I use tubeless casualties that won’t mend but are fine with tubes (I run Stans in the tubes). Currently Ron front Ralph rear which are both snakeskin, work well and to all intents and purposes free.

^ heads to next day tyres website for Beavers….

As you get older are increasingly few things you can do for the first time (that you want to!)

You only get one first XC race – take that feeling of incipient terror and treasure it!

Sounds encouraging so far.

How about those climbs you have to do seated for rear wheel traction?

Was thinking 32:19 to start with

Check the geo. I was interested in a Canyon HT carbon frame but realised it was very short in the TT.

I use Stans in my tubes on my MTB trainer for predominantly road miles with the odd bit of off road to avoid rat runs etc. They’ve sealed a couple of punctures.

Using tubes allows me to use MTB tyres that have unfixable tubeless punctures. As I ran Schwalbe I have a lifetime supply of those.

There’s a polish/german e bay outfit called bikestacja that does DT enduro wheels.

DT350 hubs
DT comps
DT wide eyeletted rims (533)

total weight a not light 2kg but quality is bang on and they work out at £150 plus a small amount for postage. I’m really pleased with mine.

3hr supervets for me cos I’m super*

*over 50

I’m 50 starting 2nd year of mtb racing and went Stages a month ago. Until I get issues I think it’s a great system.

Training is harder – there’s no escaping the truth of wattage! I reckon I spend 25% more time in the correct power zone that I would have backed off on HR alone. I’m starting to get through brake pads from braking downhill and pedalling against resistance to keep in zone.

I’m really not looking forward to intervals. I realise I used to run my HR up to or beyond the desired zone then slack until it came back down.

OP, speak to Gary, he may be able to replace

Cheers I will. Bike is all I wanted.

Talk about sod’s law – I’ve done that descent about 20 times on my Soul but the rock had to wait until today to leap into my wheel.

How would hexamine compare against these hitech solutions? Filthy dirty stuff but a great smell and easy to pack a couple of tabs, foldy thing and metal mug?

I don’t bother trying to sell on here!

Race 29er in – like so much the Soul I use for training is being changed to a 29er too

Didn’t that Kinesis get a review from Birkradar that talked about harshness and twitchiness?