jamesb: Campag STIs are fine with the Tektros. However, if you’re using the Cotic wheelset, there’s no Campag freehub option so you’d need to source wheels elsewhere.

Just because you still like it/listen to it, doesn’t mean it hasn’t dated!

ST4 is 110mm rear with 120mm fork, could be ideal for your needs and it’s a wonderful singletrack riding bike and very involving.

Orange Crush

I do think fast travelling is both a blessing and curse. Yes walking everywhere is an epic ball ache. But then once you uncover a significant portion of the map, it just becomes a game of errand running at times as you just fast travel, talk to someone or collect something and then fast travel back and gain EXP for quest complete.

I liked Morrowinds concept of a transport system by riding those giant bugs, at least you could only fast travel to major towns and then trek out from there.

The Brechfa treble is also nice.

The key to the Afan one is to do it in an order where you have to finish to get back to the car. So Skyline or July, then start W2 from Whites, do Penhydd and then you have to finish W2 from the Wall. Halfway up the Penhydd climb you start to think “**** this” but by that point you’ve got to finish.

Yeah, although I was training for my debut 24 solo which I did this year in July…

Actually tell a lie, I always shortened Skyline and did July but it’s academic given I’ve done my 24 solo now.

Don’t bother with 3 unless you feel like you’re done with new vegas and want some more action.

There’s no plot confusion and from what I can tell New Vegas, despite being a smaller map has way more variety in plot outcomes. I’m discussing things with a colleague so far and it’s like we’re playing different games – side characters getting involved in completely different plot lines and we can’t even work out what decisions may have driven that. Very impressed.

Fall out 3 was good but I had no urge to replay.

Assuming Penhydd reopens one day – Afan is hard to beat. If you’ve got the legs, an all-of-afan ride is a wicked day out!

Urgh, causing a racket on the street right down below our office.

I have a lot of issues surrounding cuts to education and stuff but acting like a bunch of spoilt 15 year olds won’t achieve anything and hardly endears anyone to the cause.

Oh great, now the police are here, more noise!

Think relaxed job interview and you’ll be fine.

CX geo will be slacker. Frame probably won’t be up to it strength wise. Normal road wheels are generally ok unless you’re a really big bloke. Clearances might mean you won’t even get CX tyres on there. You’d need to budget for some cantis or mini v brakes too.

I think the cost involved in sorting the parts though would you mean you’ve answered your own questions, sell and buy a proper CX 2nd hand.

So alright on a cross bike then?

I don’t buy into this “so they can make money on it” rubbish. Surely they’re constantly playing with your money and profiting from it anyway. They don’t need to hang onto your transfers for 3 days in order to play on the stock market with it…

They can clog and freeze up, if you stay on top of knocking snow off your shoes before clipping in it’s ok. They can freeze up to the point where you’ll need to pee on them eventually if you want to clip in (a friend not me).

Crank brothers of all variety are very good in the snow. But snow is the one time I do acutally switch to flats.

DezB: looking at yours, people in glass houses… 😉

Hadn’t quite finished rebuilding it when I took this… Frame/fork poss for sale…

[/url]
IMG_1974[/url] by Gary_Lake[/url], on Flickr

I imagine this is more to do with it’s viability. I work over the road and it’s not the busiest of shops.

Would be sad to see it go as I like the evening stuff they put in the studio upstairs from time to time.

mrmo – the problem with your bike is that everything on it is half decent already. Big gains come when you have single items letting the whole thing down – crap wheelset or fork. When everything is pretty good, you can only end up shaving a small amount off every component. Hence why it becomes expensive.

Give up trying to lighten the bike, it sounds like you can’t afford to make a significant difference and a 26lb full susser is hardly unraceable. I came 4th in Oktoberfest 8 hr pairs and 14th at 24/12 racing solo on a 26lb full-susser this year – I could have done better but it would have been down to more training not a lighter bike.

You admit you’re not as fit as last year, why aren’t you riding as much? Address this. If it’s because you hate riding in bad weather, spend the cash on things more likely to make you go out. Goretex shorts, some overshoes or Goretex boots, some crud catchers. Hate maintaining your good bike and wearing stuff out, get a dirt worker to help clean the bike trailside, or invest in a cheap singlespeed hack MTB or something. If you find your local trails boring, spend the cash on going and riding somewhere new and reinvigorate your interest.

Spending £500+ to knock 2lb off your bike is ultimately going to be disappointing.

Ton: key thing is to take it easy though, and find out for sure what you’ve actually got. My condition kind of enforced it as despite having been training for a 24-solo, for most of those 2 months I couldn’t do the 3 flights of stairs to my apartment without stopping for a rest.

But it’s been about 5 months now and I managed 4th in Oktoberfest 8 hr pairs too so all is good! 😀

Ton: I had a sort of similar thing this spring, Viral induced Pericarditis.

At 27 years of age, it’s a slightly surreal experience phoning 999 thinking you’re having a heart attack!

Bad news is it took 2 months and lot of meds to clear. The good news is I raced 24/12 a month after I recovered and have been fine since.

710 and 50/60mm here. I’m pretty wheels on the ground too.

Yorkshire or Twinings Pure Assam if feeling posh.

yeah good point Gary – nothing worse than being beaten into the start of a good ST descent by a competitve, fit but technically lame rider in events!

Very reason I made a point of getting a bit faster up the hills a while back… 😮

Being first to the top means first down the descent unimpeded. Very serious business that.

We get one a week phone up asking us to build them ‘facebook’ for about £2k…

🙄

We took it out to help with pushchair and various baby shopping bits.

I was first concerned when reading about one pushchair being slated for being too heavy, yet another, a full kilo heavier, was applauded for being lightweight.

Very poor and disappointing.

Reviews were either very old or inconsistent and few and far between.

Posted on the wrong forum too – pretty good rant actually! 🙂

I can sort of feel his pain. It’s only 11 months old and Marin and Whyte offer lifetime on bearings.

avdave2: been told a couple of weeks…

Rift Zone is going to be a little heavy for racing, I raced a Rift Zone prototype with a spec halfway between the XC7 and XC8 and it was 26.5lbs without pedals. I think the XC8 is going to be 25.5lbs at best.

avdave2: You are right though. It’s deffo 100mm trail bike, not race bike. It’s as hard as nails and up for anything any 5 inch bike is up for – like the MV it seems to ride like a bike one category up – MV always felt as tough as a 140mm bike and the Rift Zone feels as tough a 120mm bike.

I didn’t have a chance to set it up correctly as I had to stick some air in the shock and start racing but I think it’s got real potential. Lighter alternative to an ST4 kind of thing IMO.

Few words at the end of my race report.

Yeah, that’s a little step up from “Home made”, guy clearly knows what he’s doing…

Ok despite everything I said above, me and Scott managed 4th in 8 hr pairs and were snapping on the heels of 3rd all the way through.

Fantastic race!!

Something like a Cotic Soda with sliding dropouts and XX44 head tube.

Well yes yes, but seeing as he’s suffered badly from injury and overtraining much of the season and he’s been racing this week in Spain, we kind agreed we’d just go and race this one for a laugh, was more my point… 😛

Be ace if we podiumed but don’t see it happening, certainly not with me anyway 😉

Male Pairs 8 hour with Scott Cornish, racing as Cyclist No.1/Team Syncros.

Just riding for a laugh, both of us are endurance riders rather than whippets so not expecting to be all that competitive but will be giving it our all.

Will be riding the new Marin Rift Zone if it turns up from ATB in time/someone else hasn’t bagged it in for review first.

On One 456 Summer Season but I’d hardly call it bad, just the worst of a very good bunch…

I think 07/08 were identical only 08 got a supposedly better shock tune from Mojo.

09 got geometry changes, mainly slacker head angle. 09 also got the skinnier profile down tube.