Thanks all – just trying to decide if I needed to bother going to get cash or not!

The grass may/may not be greener elsewhere, but it’ll always be the same shade in the current garden.

Not true – sometimes you get a dog and it pisses all over it, turning it into a patchwork of different unpleasant shades. Works on both levels I reckon…

If she is truly interested in history as a subject, then she should crack on. If it’s a case of not really being sure and having to choose something to do at uni cos that’s what the smart kids do after school, then I’d tell her to wait. Go travelling, go do a season working in the alps, or go work a dead end job for a year until she’s fairly sure she knows what she wants to study. She’ll likely be far more motivated (and mature) and will get more out of the course.

I went to a chemistry degree at 17 and it was a fairly stupid decision on my part. I loved chemistry at school, but by about 2nd year I knew I wasn’t really interested and my motivation was sorely lacking. I managed to graduate, but it took about 3 years in the wilderness before I managed to point myself in the right direction and find something I wanted to do. I massively lucked out in that I didn’t have to pay fees for my undergrad, found a PhD course in something I was interested in (bioengineering) that was willing to take me, and managed to move from that into a job that i enjoy, but during those 3 wilderness years I seriously worried I’d end up in a job I hated til I died!

I think I’d probably lean towards a shorter bike as one of my criteria for the new bike is something more playful and poppy than my current bike (14 Heckler). Coming from an 09 Stumpy the Heckler was a lot more difficult to manual/wheelie/bunnyhop, which I think was partly due to being longer and partly being heavier. It’s great going downhill, but would like something that’ll help the uphills be a bit more fun too.

Oops, that should have been metres!

There was a route for it in this month’s mag – not done it myself but planning on soon!

Edale to cut gate would probably be around 60 km depending on what route you take with about 1500-1600 km of climbing. If doing Jacobs I’d go up to hollins cross then along rushup edge before roych, etc. I can actually ride up all that, while I’d just be pushing up chapel gate 😂.

Set myself 2 goals this year – go further than last year and do Cut Gate and Jacob’s in one ride. Currently ahead month vs month on the going further goal (130 km in distance and 9.2 km in elevation) and have been working the fitness up slowly to do the other one – it’ll be about a 75 km ride with ~2,200 m of climbing. I’ve done that distance before, but up until this year I hadn’t done more than 1,800 m climbing in one ride, so trying to be sensible about it. The annoying thing is that I was planning on doing it this month and now I’ve come down with a bloody cold, so hoping that buggers off before it destroys my fitness!

I’m not that serious about my goals, but I’ve really enjoyed pushing myself to go that little bit further – 2 years ago my average ride was about 30 km in the Peak, but now it’s probably ~50 km. More distance = more descents = more fun!

I agree with one of the comments underneath the vid:

That headline should read “Idiot cyclist falls off after hitting pedestrian in entirely avoidable collision”

It’s in my top 3 Peak descents, the view from fence where the footpath splits off is also one of my favorites.

Me too, plus, while they get in the way, the walkers all look at you like you’re a bit mad for going down it. Had a DofE group shrieking ‘OHMYGOD’ at me the other day as I went down, which always makes you feel rugged and manly *swoons* /sarcasm (no smileys on my PC).

Yeah, I’ve had a couple of these recently, just figured Strava was acting up.

From my perspective, it’s the 1×11 vs 1×12 on the Canyon Spectral – feels to me like 1×12 is going to be the new standard given the reviews for Eagle and the new XTR 12 speed. Nothing wrong with most of the E13 components, though I’ve no experience of their tyres and would probably want to change those out for Maxxis.

Though now I’ve looked at it again I’m swithering, it is a lot cheaper than the Canyon…

I think with the new XTR 12 speed as well people will hold off to see if it makes an appearance next year.

But possible that the 2018 YT drivetrain keeps bikers from buying?

That’s probably the factor that’s making me lean towards the Spectral at the moment, if they change it next year it might be a harder decision!

I suspect the one from Glossop is this one or a variation. Takes in a few of the best bits of the Peak including Jacobs and cut gate, but the last ~10-20k after cut gate back to Glossop is a bit shit. Locals might know of some better cheeky bits instead of that though 😃

Definitely give ‘natural’ trails a go if you mostly ride trail centres. As recommended above, the Vertebrate guides or the flattyres website are good sources for routes in the Peak or Lakes, I’d recommend a loop round Ladybower as a starter for 10. I use the OS maps app and download gpx files to follow on my phone for new routes, though reception isn’t always great so it might be worth buying the OS maps that come with a download code for offline use.

Agree with the points above RE Sydney vs Melbourne, been to both twice now and preferred Melbourne both times. Another thing to consider would be doing a surf trip – I did a week long one between Sydney and Byron Bay (can’t really remember where) in a national park and it was the highlight of my trip. Got to camp out on the beach and saw kangaroos, dolphins, and whales (and snakes), might be a good way of entertaining the kids for a few days if you can get a weekend trip? I was certainly knackered at the end of each day! Think the company was Surfaris.

In addition to the points above, also factor in that it can be a massive pain in the arse to get into/out of Manchester if the traffic gods conspire against you (which they frequently do). It’s taken me longer to get from the M62 to my house than it has to get from Birmingham to the M62 in the past! I’d second staying in a Premier Inn somewhere off the M6 if you aren’t planning on being in Manchester for anything other than a stopover.

Worth checking flybys on Strava if anyone was recording and sending messages to anyone on a similar route?

Last time it happened I was able to scoot down to 18 bikes and get a replacement and keep riding, but they didn’t have any in stock yesterday. Unfortunately the smash happened at pretty much the furthest point from the car, hence my muttering to myself on the 10k walk back that I wasn’t bloody well doing this again 😂. Have ordered a 2nd one and will probably keep it in the car, though if I’m doing any long out and backs I might stick it in my pack.

In my defence, yesterday’s smash came when I had the choice of 2 ruts on a fairly steep section or trying to hop out of the rut i was already in onto a higher line. Couldn’t see what was in the one I chose til I was already committed, unfortunately it was a fairly securely planted fence post type thing (no idea what it was doing there) at just the right place to smack my mech 🙄😂.

Shimano. On the plus side, I haven’t needed to buy new jockey wheels in a while!

Singulator ain’t a bad idea as a rescue option! Mech wouldn’t have worked for that, it snapped at the pivot point where the spring joins every time.

I’ve tried that but the chain is too slack on one cog and too tight on the other, so it ends up wandering up the cassette and making horrible noises. This then causes the front ring to start to loosen off 😂.

I can hear both!

If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you’re the asshole.

I lucked out and saw it on my ride this morning, was just getting my stuff ready and heard a drone then saw it through a pretty small gap in the trees. Then as I was working my way round to Derwent edge it did another pass and got to see it in all its glory! Proper made me smile 😀.

I tend to combine the cut gate route from here with some bits of the Ladybower loop – usually just going on to Hope Cross rather than going down to Hope.

I bought one recently as I reckoned I needed 2 weeks to get set up on both ends (only ride once a week) and I’m planning on changing bikes next year, so the difference between hiring and buying wasn’t too big. I found it really helpful as, while I know what the settings do on suspension, I find it really difficult to tell what the problem I’m having with the suspension actually is. Only resulted in small tweaks to my setup, but the rear feels much better now, still working on the front.

As has been said, you’ll get different recommendations depending on the trail you ride – I found it best to set mine up based on the roughest trail I was riding, though it doesn’t really have any jumps so it’ll be interesting to see what it suggests somewhere like BPW.

If you’re renting I’d recommend having a read through this (very long) thread beforehand – I read through it after having some issues setting up my fork (air trapped in lowers) and picked up a few nuggets that were quite useful, so might help you get the most out of it!

We’re both with BC so have cover through them – the bike looks fine other than the mech tbh so it’s not likely to be a large amount.

If it’s not a 0% card and you don’t want to use the savings it might be worth speaking to a bank about consolidating the CC and loan in one single loan, you’ll almost certainly get a better overall interest rate that way.

Not tried the SS ones but had a works one and wouldn’t get another. Bearings went graunchy very quickly and the cups were so soft that when I took it off my bike they cut up so badly that it was unusable

Agree with this on the Works. The top cup is also really tight to get the bearings into, to the point I have to use a headset press to get them in, and play has recently developed between the bottom cup and the bearing. Hoping replacing the bearing will sort it, but I doubt it. Wouldn’t buy another.

I’m having similar thoughts myself, the others on my list are the YT Jeffsy and the Whyte T130 – just not sure whether I’ll miss the extra 30 mm of travel if I give it up! Probably just a comfort blanket tbh though…

Try going 203mm / 180mm with the deores first.

Makes quite a difference to the power and feel. I don’t feel the need to charge mine for anything now.

Did that with mine and confirm it helps! They still get spongy on occasion though, and seem to need bled 3-4 times per year which is pretty annoying.

Surprisingly, he didn’t get the role in the end!

I think possibly it was because the answer was related to him having children, as they primarily moved back for family support/schooling. And fair enough, you’re not allowed to ask about kids etc, but I wasn’t to know that was the reason!

Wasn’t me, was a candidate I interviewed who responded with “I don’t think you’re allowed to ask me that” – I said he could feel free not to answer it but he went on to anyway. Not really a big deal, but it made me wonder if it was true or not – in my mind it was a reasonable question.

<span style=”font-size: 0.8rem;”>Don’t think I’d say anything like that in an interview unless it was something I was certain they weren’t allowed to ask me!  </span>

Are any of these any good for navigation? Been thinking about one for a while as a backup to paper maps for those times where you end up in and out of your pack constantly because you’re not sure if you’ve missed a turn or not!

Should have used divining rods, would have taken you straight to it.

I like that. Always had a hankering for a Tonka truck type thing but as I’m 5’7″ i think it might look like I have short man syndrome 😂

Depends what the issue is really, if it’s just that the bearings are shagged then you should be fine as long as you get the right ones. Only issue I had in doing mine was getting the plastic seal out, which required either a tool or the right sized bolt, so if you’re not doing that it should be easy enough. Full replacement didn’t fix the play in mine though!