Somerset: dribbling.

Blame Aethelred the Unready, who ran away to Normandy and let the Danish king Sveyn Forkbeard take the English throne for a year in 1013, and then his son Edmund Ironside who lost the Battle of Ashingdon in 1016 to Sveyn's son Canute, yes that Canute.

After Canute and a couple of his sons had their turn as King, the Anglo-Saxon lineage was sort-of restored with Edward the Confessor, but his mother was actually from Norman stock. By that stage the royal house of Wessex was thoroughly entangled with the Normans and the great Earls of Wessex, East Anglia, Mercia and Northumbria (all established by Canute and with powerbases of their own) weren't happy about it, but the manouvering to get their candidate – Harold – onto the throne after Edward's death opened the door to the other two claimants, Harald Hardrada and William.

And the Pope was just taking the chance to back a winner… :wink:

The politics behind 1066 was quite messy… all stemming from Edward the Confessor who died without leaving a clear heir (a bad move in those days).

William (who as a Norman was actually descended from Viking stock) claimed that Harold (who also had Scandinavian ancestors – they were probably distant cousins) had pledged allegiance to him some years before, after being rescued from a shipwreck off Pontieu in northern France. William also had a tenous bloodline claim through his great aunt.

The wild card was Harald Hardrada, King of Norway, who had an even more tenous bloodline claim but was talked into invading by Tostig Godwinson (our Harold's brother). They were duly wiped out at Stamford Bridge, but the home team then lost at Hastings due to battle-weariness brought on by the overcrowded fixture list. Plus ca change.

So you could actually argue it was all just inter-Viking rivalry… :wink:

Im worried that bar mount might be less practical in case of mechanicals

I use a Tikka mini LED headtorch for sorting punctures/mechanicals and emergency backup. Main lights are on the bars.

Cracking shot of me there Pete (the top one) :-)

Thanks again to the locals for showing us around, it was a great day's riding (not to mention the pub stops…)

Laphroaig Quarter Cask (with tangfastics on the side).

Just adding my name to the list, I'll see you all at the ferry.

The cycle lanes on that stretch first appeared about ten years ago, but originally only about eighteen inches wide. They repainted them recently much wider and lifted the 20 limit that had been put on (back to 30).

As others have said it's a bottleneck on the main road – two buses going in opposite directions only have inches to spare – but the traffic's slowed down by the lights anyway. There was a good deal of derision locally when the lanes first appeared.

Ditto MSR Pocket Rocket, or a Coleman F1 Lite, very similar designs. And a foil windshield makes a huge difference – even a gentle breeze affects the flame badly (same for any stove).

The smallest size gas cartridge will give you about an hour's burn time, enough for a two day trip if you're careful.

You don't want to be faffing with petrol or paraffin stoves.

It was still a great effort – they broke away at the start of the stage and held out for 180km 8O

There's a GPS tracker & twitter updates here, dunno about video streams though.

Starting up Winsford hill and the break is still on.

Don't think we had any issues with them – still not cheap, but we did take over two pitches with tents, barbecue and over-excited children everywhere, plus every man and his dog coming down the road from Shipham for a cider and a chat. They do need to accommodate people just there for the day better though.

The lower numbers riding this year was actually a bonus, didn't get caught up in traffic anywhere near as much especially on the descents (I might just have been lucky).

So, does anyone know the bloke who got the stick in his arm..? 8O

thanks to the medics and Shipton MTB and their Pit Stop crew for looking after me

No problem :-) we were just relieved to see you back in one piece (more or less…)

friend who tried to ride over a cow that was lying across the trail in front of him

8O

Best I've managed is hooking a foot under a length of fence wire while riding between two old fenceposts – just like catching the arrester wire on a carrier landing. I did a sort of reverse superman while the bike kept going…

Heard the rumours of a course extension but nothing specific… will be checking it out this evening.

Conditions should be perfect, glorious down here yesterday/today.

Or instead of asking them to ask you for "retrospective permission", just mail them and "give them permission"

Perhaps he'd like them to show a minimal amount of common courtesy.

Always takes me a minute to remember which way round they go… :-)

Should make it clear my personal knowledge is the '06 model. Though actually mine is currently at 120mm travel, with a super-secret combination of nonstandard spacers… 8)

The 130mm travel setting uses two 30mm spacers but one of them is *already inside* the fork, on the plunger shaft inside the left (spring) leg. It sounds like you're adding a third one… :-)

The spring-side spacer has to be re-positioned, so you need to remove the plunger shaft by undoing the nut [1] at the bottom of the fork leg (catch the oil as it drains) and pushing the plunger assembly up through the stantion.

Take the spacer off, and put it back on top of the spring just before re-installing the topcap. (Remember to refill with oil…)

On the right leg (damper side) you just undo the topcap and clip the second spacer onto the top of the shaft.

No need to take the lowers off.

[1] That nut can be a pain to remove (and re-tighten later) as it's prone to spinning around taking the plunger shaft with it – in which case you need to re-assemble the upper and apply some preload or tie the crown down to the fork brace. The force through the spring holds the plunger in position and stops it spinning round.

is being able to afford a 50k car something to aspire to?

Being able to afford one, well yes.

But actually owning one? No, definitely not.

What Jolsa said – totally flat except for getting onto/off the Portway flyover (the spaghetti junction bit) and a short rise around the back of Castle Park.

Course map here…

JCVD. A neat ironic take on a "real" action movie.

@ Mr Agreeable: that pic reminds me, a few years ago I had the chance to complete a set of Konas in red, green and blue: all three primary colours :-)

Repeat after me:

Left-hand-pedal-has-a-left-hand-thread.

Left-hand-pedal-has-a-left-hand-thread.

Left-hand-pedal-has-a-left-hand-thread.

Left-hand-pedal-has-a-left-hand-thread.

… and the bottom bracket goes the other way.

Easy :-)

coffeeking: it's a DSP with two synchronised on-board DACs for generating digital modulation in walkie-talkies. And some code hacked together one lunch hour…

chvck: strangely similiar… I designed a system to analyse engine noise and extract the rev count, used behind a fancy graphic on the TV coverage of a certain high profile motorsport… :-)

walking or riding alongside built paths causes erosion alongside them

Depends how far off the path you go – on Dollywagon the best line uses an old grassy zig-zag three or four hundred yards away.

Of course you don't know this, as you've not actually been there have you TJ…? :wink:

To those complaining about pitching being a recent innovation, it's been standard practice in the Lakes for thirty years – I've been fellwalking/climbing there for longer than that and in the '90s I knew a number of people who worked on the repair gangs. In the last few years there's been a trend away from pitching and more use of "soil inversion" using mechanical diggers eg. the Skiddaw path, and the Wythburn path up Helvellyn. This produces a more bike-friendly surface but also makes more of a mess and it doesn't work on really steep slopes.

If you're really interested here's a PDF on path management from the National Park authority.

From the wiki article…

"As of 2008, there are at least two cases in which people have set their houses on fire practicing ear candling, one of which resulted in death."

8O

"Megrahi's conviction was a shocker. No material evidence was presented linking him to the bombing, let alone any evidence that he put the bomb on the plane or that he handled any explosives."

From this piece in the Independent.

My old '03 Kikapu catching the low winter sunlight on Skiddaw:

Lovely light, nimble bike. Still got the frame… maybe I'll rebuild it sometime :-)

Sounds good, added to the diary :-)

(…wots a Purbeck anyway? Do they bite?)

BEST PUB STOP IN THE WORLD in the Purbecks

If we'd stopped off at the Crown you might have changed your mind on that :wink:

By the way Pete [boring question alert] what sort of camera bag was that you were using?

Another vote of thanks to Buzz for ably discharging the duties of Glorious Leader (and MrsP for the muffins!)

the camera hides the terrified look on my face

Not half as terrified as PeterPoddy looked after committing to that same roll-in and finding ADH at the bottom helpfully clearing rocks away 8O :D

Nitromors is the toxic gunge of choice for paintstripping.

In case it's not obvious… it's a messy job, best done outdoors!

Love my soda :-)

not sure what I should ride and need someone who doesn't know me to tell me what to do

Good grief man, pull yourself together.

Just pick an opinion at random and then defend it to the death, like everyone else round here :wink:

judderman, is it a regular ride? Every Thursday 6:30pm?

Can't speak for the Crown lot but we're out as well on Thursdays, from the Miner's Arms in Shipham at 8:00pm sharp, offcomers welcome :-)

I'll be along on Sunday Buzz as long as my back's okay. I seem to have wrenched it taking a fridge to the recycling this morning…

U-bend section in your power lead. Traps sticky electrons from dodgy mains supplies so they don't clog up your power amp. Need to purge or replace it every week though.

after big weekends away on the bike I come home 2kg lighter

Most of that is just water loss.

Fat holds 9 calories per gram: it's not easy to generate an 18,000 calorie energy deficit over a weekend…