A slightly lighter/bouncier bike is hardly going to change your riding that much.

Not if a bike gives you the confidence to try new things or helps you discover a new way of riding, or even just gets you out significantly more and speeds up your progression, which are then skills transferable to riding other bikes…

The South West has the highest waterbills in the country on account of maintaining all the lovely beaches we have, this was in the news so it musy be true as well.

Can you please not come down this way and use our beaches, thanks. We pay to keep them nice, you don't.

😉

*cliche alert*

Orange 5

Yeah, I'm a Brechfa fan. I think you could bore of it easily but for occasional 'stay off the brakes as long as you dare' high speed fun, it's hard to beat.

Red and Black have a waymarked connector so you can do an Afan style W2 figure of 8. It's only about 40km but it's a lot of climbing but a rewarding ride. Then nip round the blue 🙂

2011 Alpine 160s with tapered headtubes…

Yeah agreed! I thought it was a little slow in places, I felt they focused too much on talking about the Danny Mac youtube video. But the finish made up for it.

Loved Rob's 7ds segment at the start – really fancy doing the 7stanes challenge one day!

How far is a lap?

It was a joke, obviously lost…

It should have the square section chain stays if it's a 2010. Interesting that the Shimano crankset solved the chainsuck!

The thinking singletrack-riders bike IMO. If you're all about just hammering little twisty ribbons of dirt as fast as possible, great bike!

Mat: you deemed this guy fit enough to do the job when you hired him, why not continue with that trend and actually take his advice?

I use Modx, it's not well known and web people could argue till the cows come home whether one platform is better or not. But if you worked with me you'd get a better end product with my platform of choice than if you tried to force me to use wordpress because of a couple of people you know had an opinion on it.

Simon, speaking of Deullers – any news? Thinking maybe Five not Patriot now.

Dakine Apex is great but getting on for £100. Seems to be the way of these things now…

If you're getting a TDCi Ford check the Diesel Particulate Filter. Every three 3 years or 36k miles it's expected to need doing and it's about £400 for what is essentially "maintenance"

Ford TDCi bought at 50k miles and had a fair bit go wrong in the first year and was costly to sort, but seems to have settled down in the second year.

Might have been just unlucky but wish I'd bought German and just accepted higher mileage and age.

In all seriousness though, I do fail to understand how much people hate the energy section.

Massive fireroad descents that lead you to massive fireroad climbs are the sort of things I hate…

Moaningtrackworld™

No it is Energy.

Air, check!

Happily wear Altura Attacks all through the winter, not hot and sweaty at all. I did the second 12 hours of 24-12 in them not even bothering to take them off when the sun came out on Sunday.

Yeah Si, pretty much ready to ride again – bit of pain and numbness in my palms still which is a little worrying.

Na first Saturday of the Month, so next weekend.

Rich, did you see 'my' 19 at the weekend?

Yummy

Already running a Seca 1400 here. At 24-12 I was running it on low and did the whole night on the one battery pack, treated myself to the occasional section on the full 1400.

What impresses me with the L&Ms is not so much the power but how clean the beam pattern is.

Lot of £££ though.

They're great, limits are more the amount of punishment you can take rather than ability. I'd happily do Afan on one…

Twinsix

Mr Woppit, if you wanted a 100mm of travel maybe you should have bought a 100mm bike?

'08 Five around 160psi here, 12st kitted up. There's nothing wrong with getting full travel if you're not bottoming harshly. A good setup with the Five is to run it a little soft because it firms up under pedalling. It sounds fundamentally wrong but it's actually one of the reasons the Five is so good.

Molgrips, I disagree with the propedal statement, that's not what it's for at all IMO. It's a platform and if you're getting full travel too easily propedal won't help as you'll be going through the platform anyway!

Yeah, F1 needs to be made more dangerous again… 🙄

I think it's amazing Kubica walked away from this and only missed a handful of races.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3250358019013026485#

Knob of butter in the pan and rest when you're done cooking.

What Jock said.

PP: what year iO? My '09 iO 17" was that weight (26.5) with front suspension (32 float) and no other spec changes, it's not super light but your claimed weight seems a touch out… With the rigid fork I had it at 25lbs.

Sounds like you were a more sane man than me – still hurt so much!

BWD: yeah, when you get used to seeing the same people each lap it gets amazingly distressing when you stop seeing them, it's like it becomes part of your routine…

This was how 24-12 was for me: http://www.cyclistno1.co.uk/blog/amateur-mtb-marathon-gary-rode-24.htm

And cracking pic from Joolze, was actually making a little hip jump out of this but I've not quite taken off when the shutter went…

Half jacket prescription here. They will steam up, I think the vented lenses help but not sure you can get prescription and vented on the jaw bones.

Joolze, found one other but not overly pleased with it (not a reflection on your abilities, I just look a bit of a goon in it). I've ordered photo number 17, digital format, when can I expect it?

Am I ok to use it for press purposes now that I've purchased it – it will be a not for profit publication and I raised £724 for CLIC doing the race…

Darren, you had a great race, looking at the times I think I had you until literally the last couple of laps! I could have snuck one more in as I came round at 11:50 but I was ready to cry by then LOL!

See you at the 24 Solo champs next year? 😉

Darren: so that was you I was racing all weekend, well done mate! I thought I was going to get the better of you in the end but looks like you had me properly by the end instead. I was in pieces from 6am but didn't let on 😉

No.17 on the Whyte E-120 btw…

You even beat me in the fundraising stakes and all you bugger – £700 here…

RE: the moving over – despite a 14th finish in the 24 hr solo I was getting close to 2 hr laps my Sunday mid morning – moving over was automatic by then 😆

Joolzed: hope there's more to come, bit gutted that there's only one of me despite the fact I was soloing… (no 17)

On a positive note, it's the first official event photo I've had that's actually a decent shot!