Or you end up paying someone £200 to dump your car in a steeet in Slough or West Drayton while you’re away!

https://www.sloughobserver.co.uk/news/20043454.cars-left-outside-businesses-near-heathrow-parking-chaos-continues/

What’s the situation with duty etc on these?

We have so many industries and fundamentals of life in the UK based on cheap and available energy.

The whole country, if not the western world have all taken energy for granted for a very, very long time. Now it’s not cheap and plentiful everyone’s going to get screwed.

It’s not like we’ve not been warned about our collective energy addiction and the potential for problems of seismic proportions. The only thing that’s changed is that it’s happened far quicker than anyone expected.

As usual it’s going to be those with the least money that will be hit hardest.

Those on pre-payment meters are by default on the highest Tarif and are going to see their average monthly energy bill rise to £714 😳

I don’t know about anything else but that surely brings into play the actual logistics of pre-paying that amount of money

As much as the media talk about it in general, these are going to be the people who are going to have to face the actual heat or eat dilemma.
We’re relatively well off but if we needed to find £700 a month through the winter months to cover hearing costs it wouldn’t be easy. For anyone unemployed or on minimum wage it will be impossible.

The very idea that those on pre-payment are charged more than those on monthly DD is utterly obscene. I’ve no idea of the numbers but I think it would be fair to say that the vast majority of pre-payment users are in the lower earnings categories and as such least able to pay.

Would it not be a reasonable thing that everyone pays the same unit charge whether they pay by monthly DD, pay on receipt of the bill or pre-payment? The gas or electric certainly doesn’t cost more as a result of the way users pay for it.

Lol @ fancy clothes horse.

I’m guessing that’s what they’re mainly used for if my sister is anything to go by.
She decided to buy one for her and her husband but didn’t realise how big they were so it’s stuck on the landing. After the initial novelty wore off and her posting photo’s on social media about how she’d burned off 100 calories in a “workout” It now sits in the corner as unloved as a lockdown puppy.

I’m no expert but Peloton sound like they’re done for. According to this, their valuation has dropped from £50billion at the start of the pandemic to £3.6billion now. I’m sure things like the £40 a month subscription for a fancy clothes horse Exercise bike will be one of the first things to go once money gets tight.

Do the bikes work with other things like Zwift? If not it’ll be a very expensive waste of space if Peloton fold.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/aug/25/peloton-losses-shares-plummet?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Nice, fully embracing yer inner tory there.

Nothing at all wrong with snapping up bargains if you can afford to. There’s nothing “inner Tory” about it!
I’m seriously thinking of holding back on my next bike purchase to see if any bargain second hand stuff pops up in the next few months.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/aug/22/gps-to-prescribe-walking-and-cycling-in-bid-to-ease-burden-on-nhs?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

They’re trialling it in a few areas.

With them both being sponsored riders I’d expect nothing but glowing reviews from them, especially Josh as I believe he was involved in the development of the ISO.

I was hoping for some more real life info about them.

It’s worth trying their online chat for assistance. I had a problem with the one in our last house, Nest couldn’t fix it after going through everything with me so they sent me a new one despite it being out of warranty.

Might be worth looking into, if it’s a sensible amount then it may be worth it.

How much is the early termination fee if you want to get out of the fixed rate if and go variable?

my 5x has developed some temperamental charger plug in issues

I had issues with this on my Fenix 6. I cleaned the charging port out with the end of a cocktail stick and removed a load of gunk. Worked much better after that.

I’ll have to take a look at port covers for the new one.

Also take a look at the Epix Gen 2. Same functionality as a Fenix, but with an AMOLED screen which is just lovely.

It was a tough choice whether to go with the Epix over the Fenix, part of me thought “sod it, I may as well spend the extra for the Epix” but common sense took over and I went for the Fenix. With hindsight I probably should have just went with the Epix but I’m more than happy with the Fenix.

I’ve got the Fenix 7 Solar.
Went back to the Garmin from an Apple Watch. The Apple Watch is a much better smart watch and had some great features clunking Apple Pay, none of which I used.
I prefer the Garmin as it’s a much better sport tracker.

When the shit hits the fan over the next 12 months rates will be on the way back down again for sure, may even go negative.

I think you’re the first person I’ve actually seen who’s suggested that rates will be dropping in the next year. Everyone else seems to think we’re going the other way.

Took a OTB handlebar to the groin at MK summer cross on Weds night though that hast left a lasting impression.

Ooof, that’s gonna smart a bit.

I had to miss all the summer series as I was working for every race. Gutted!

I’ll be singlespeeding as well for the Central rounds I do.
At least if I’m riding singlespeed it’s not too embarrassing when I get left behind by the rest of the field 😂

Next question is how on earth do you get CX fit in the space of six weeks?!

I used to like the single page opinion pieces that there were a couple of every month. Jason Miles did one for a bit and there were a few others too. Always the articles I read first.

This.
They were pretty much the only part of the magazine that I ever read.
There’s a lot to be said for articles by normal riders who can write about just riding bikes.

Thanks for the PSA, managed to get a few tops and a load of socks all for £50. Can’t complain at that.
Their delivery was quick as well, ordered yesterday afternoon and they were here by lunchtime today.

There’s good argument for public ownership of bus companies, the same may well be the case for rail companies as well but I’m not sure.

There’s a very good interview with Andy Burnham regarding the bus services in Manchester and how they were going about taking them back in to public control

https://www.cheerfulpodcast.com/rtbc-episodes/ticket-to-ride?rq=andy

The problem as I see it is, at what point would we stop with moving things back to public control? There’s justifiable arguments for doing it with power companies, water companies, transport companies, postal services, the list is endless. At what point do we stop? (Obviously, it’s never actually started yet!)

I, possibly quite sadly, find it incredibly interesting how we try to improve public transport and sustainable transport for the greater good. The differences to the lives of hundreds of thousands of people and the associated lifestyle improvements for them would be huge.

@kelvin I couldn’t agree more, it has huge benefits in so many ways but, as ever, it’ll struggle when it’s up against the “but my petrol isn’t subsidised” brigade. And as these are the people who, I’m guessing, vote for the current government it’ll never happen.

The other issue is, of course, that public transport probably couldn’t cope with a huge increase in numbers. Sure, it’ll still be easy to get a bus at 10 in the morning or 10 at night but they’d be absolutely mobbed around rush hour. At least until the weather turns bad then they’ll be back to the way things were.

As ever, I’ve no idea what the solution is.

Yes, it’s time to shake up public transport and yes, it’s a good idea from an environmental and personal finance point of view but…

It’ll never happen.

The Tories have shown absolutely no interest in helping the man/woman in the street and no doubt won’t until it’s nearly election time.

Some great posts here, and dare I say it a consensus (on STW? Are you sure…)? That by and large people value this place and would definitely miss it if it were gone.

The most interesting thing I’ve taken from this and the other forum thread about the current state of the magazine is that there seems to be a majority of people who simply aren’t interested in the magazine. Surely this is a massive problem for a company who’s business model is based around running a magazine and who keep saying that they’d never go to an online only model?

Other magazines do MTB magazines better than STW, in my opinion. Cranked is better quality but a bit dearer and Privateer was the same a few years back.

I wouldn’t miss the magazine as I never read it. I can access them through my sub but I find them to be incredibly dull in the most part.

I’m sure many of us would miss this place if it shut up shop but other forums/Facebook groups etc would soon fill the gap and normal service would resume.

I’ve been looking for the perfect smartwatch but found that it doesn’t exist.

Apple Watch and the likes are great for their smart functions and working with your phone but average sorts trackers.
Garmin watches are fantastic as exercise and training aids but average as a smartwatch.

You just need to decide which you want and go from there.

I’ve just given up with the Apple Watch and gone back to a Garmin as it suits my needs better (and I’ve got an Apple Watch Series 7 for sale if anyone’s interested!)

The other day armed protesters turned up outside an FBI office all tooled up and wearing these military vests and “oh my god, they’re serious” “they’ll take down the FBI” was banded about……….until it was pointed out that none of the people wearing vests actually had the armour plating in them, because they’re heavy and uncomfortable to wear. Not quite the “well regulated militia” they claim to be if they’re not even going to make their cosplay outfits accurate.

I saw an article the other day referring to these guys as the Gravy Seals 😂

Had a load of bits in my basket. £480 in total. Went to check out and it refused my payment and the basket went up to £1400!

The helmet I wanted is still at the lower price though so I’m happy with that.

You can’t make this stuff up.
I went around the village litter picking as the road was closed, five black bags of crap collected.
Next morning, greeted with this on the path I’d just cleared!

It’s bone dry in Oxfordshire, I can’t remember it raining at all for about two months.
A village up the road from us has no water as the reservoir that services them is dry. The water company are handing out bottled water there.

We’ve got 40% chance of rain forecast for Monday and Tuesday which will be welcome.

No doubt a few heavy showers this week will be all the evidence needed to convince the terminally stupid that climate change is nonsense and it’s just a normal summer 🤦🏼‍♂️

If it wasn’t for profligate use of resources we wouldn’t need a hosepipe ban.

I’d suggest that having a water network which loses something like 3.1 billion litres of water a day through leaks also has something to do with it.
But the water companies have made a shit load of profit so it’s all good!

I love the look of the mini velos.
I keep talking myself out of getting a Velo Orange Neutrino, I reckon it’d be a hoot to commute on.

Tesco might even put doors back on all their freezer units yhat are open to the atmosphere.
Crazy costs andd loads up the atmosphere with co2, which makes the world hotter, so the freezers have to work harder, producing more co2, making the world hotter and its self propelling circle of stupid

It’s up there with the shops which have the air-con on full lick in the middle of summer with the doors wide open.
The same places seem to also have the heating on flat out in the middle of winter as well with the same doors open.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/aug/10/obese-patients-weight-shamed-doctors-nurses?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Is it weight shaming when medical professionals do it or is it unwanted advice?

Followed your lead today and went out to have a clear-up in the village this morning.

The local council have the main road through the village closed as they’re installing traffic calming. The lack of traffic meant it was safe to go and clear the verges along the road in to the village. It annoys me every time I cycle home and have to pass the dumped litter.
Next stop is the other road in to the village. The council won’t let a community litter pick go along there as it’s a 50mph road so hopefully it’ll be ok with the current lack of traffic.

I think mine’s either 40:18 or 38:18, can’t remember.
Whichever I went with it seems to be enough to get through anything technical and can just make it up climbs. Not sure I’d like to try any proper climbs on it though 😂

Has anyone apart from DrP tried the Garmin Fenix 7 at all?
Is it any good?

Perfect, thanks for that.

Quick question about the GX AXS kit…

Does it play nicely with Shimano 12 speed MTB cassettes?

I’m looking at using AXS with an XT 10-45 cassette but don’t want to buy stuff if it’s not compatible.

Second hand Specialized Tricross Singlespeed, I’m not sure it’ll take 45’s but I’ve had 42’s on mine without any issues.

I’ve noticed a few of them pop up for sale lately on eBay and the likes.

Latest Classified Ads

People are going to freeze to death this winter. In Britain. In 2022.

And the terrifying thing is that the people in charge couldn’t give a **** about these people.

I’m genuinely saddened and embarrassed by this country.