Its very pretty, and cruising down the South Downs Way into Eastbourne at sunset and having chips on the beach is a great way to finish.

The biggest reason you should do it though, is Alfriston Village Stores. One of the few shops on the SDW, and some of the best cakes & pasties around.

I put mine in a sink full of water when I got it, it didn’t really work underwater, and the sound was a bit funny at first, but no ill effects whatsoever. Most impressed.

I had to turn the karate chop thing on in Moto gestures, or settings or suchlike.

Other phone manufacturers could learn a thing or two from the textured back as well. I’d say its a fingerprint sensor away from perfection, but then it’d cost more. It probably should cost more anyway.

Going from a sony Z1, I find the screen a bit low res, but otherwise its great.

Nobody has mentioned that its waterproof yet either, which is pretty big for such a cheap phone. Chuck in jersey pocket, fret not when it starts raining.

I also really like the double karate chop to turn on the flashlight feature.

Shoes & helmet are quite easy to overlook when packing.

Some extra zip ties & something to cut the ends off are useful for number attachment.

I got absolutely trolleyed on the Hogs Back tour, well recommended. +1 for the Wadworth tour as well.

The Harveys brewery tour in Lewes is almost impossible to get on, which is a shame, and none of the other ones around Brighton are much cop.

You could do the Real Ale Train as well. Lots of good bivvying near the start/end point.

Sounds a good plan.

Less is more with stag do’s, you’ll need to allow plenty of time for gathering people, and as said, people are happy just drinking and getting to know each other.

Figure out what its going to cost, add a bit for contingency (you can always buy a round with it, but having to keep asking for money will get annoying), and get everyone to pay you, giving them a time limit. A few will probably pull out or go quiet at that point, but at least you then know how many you’re catering for, and you shouldn’t end up too out of pocket.

You can get a bus from sea level to the top of Teide, a couple of thousand metres up, for under 10 Euro’s, and they have space for bikes in the bottom of the bus. Not sure what the trails are like as we went walking up there, but I was very jealous of the people who got to ride back down. All the people using that bus had downhill-y kind of bikes, but they may have just been overbiked.

Even on a road bike it was stunning, you end up a thousand metres above the clouds and descend from a lunar type surface, through beautiful forests, all the way down to cheap beer on the beach.

Lithion 2 convert here as well, amazing for the money.

GP 4 Seasons have slightly more grip, but cost 3 times as much, and when they start puncturing towards the end of their life you have to replace them or they’ll keep puncturing. Worth the premium if you’ve got the cash, if not the Lithions are great and cheap enough to keep a few spares.

Another happy RX100(ii) user here. Glad I went for the Mk2 as its worth it for the wifi alone, means you can upload to your phone, use snapseed, need to turn your computer on, unless you want to shoot in raw anyway.

Definitely don’t get an RX100 thinking you can stick it in a jersey pocket, its too bulky and heavy, and would break both you and the camera if you crashed.

I use a Lezyne pod caddy saddle bag (medium sized), with some foam I cut into shape as inserts, works very well indeed and is easy to access. Its a hard case saddle bag so should provide some reasonable protection.

They definitely aren’t the Karrimor of old, their old pannier bags are legendary.

However, I’ve owned some similar looking waterproof shoes that were £26, and they have been very good. Stiff but sturdy sole and they are taking much longer to kill than i thought, and they’ve stayed waterproof against all odds. I’d happily buy another pair.

Went from 32 round to 34 oval on a singlespeed and it wasn’t any harder to get up hills. Does seem to help with not stalling at that tricky point during the pedal stroke on steep grindy climbs. I’ve not bothered for my geared bikes, but for SS’ing they’re ace.

I couldn’t feel the difference at all after putting it on, but if you ride along one legged up a slight incline, its a surprisingly pronounced effect, though of course you’ll look like a tit.

I like my Fenix 2, but I find it a bit too bulky for Mountain Biking, so I end up chucking it in a bag. Its good for road cycling where you don’t have to worry having Garmin mounts on different bikes. Ultimately they are multisport watches, I find it a great running watch, and I like being able to concoct a workout (intervals etc) and send it to the watch and go out and do it.

If you just want it to record rides, its definitely overkill. The fenix 3 looks pretty cool though, so if you just want it because its a cool gadget, why not, people pay more for Apple watches.

Well that was a good read, shame the youtube video doesn’t work now, for maximum entertainment value.

BrightonMTB are a great group, who are usually really good for newbies, and some of their members do some great trail maintenance (although others claim the trails as all their own work, which makes me laugh).

Goes to show that in any group there will always be someone who is a bit of a tit. Thanks for using an internet forum for to sort out a questionable dispute between what should be friends, please keep it up.

You could just eat less.

If your IT infrastructure is that slack, you can probably get chrome onto your PC. Download a copy at home and save it dropbox or google drive, then download it on your PC at work and install it, it will let you install it without being an administrator. Should solve your woes, especially if it will let you install an ad blocker from the chrome web store.

I’ve used one on a carbon road bike, and its pretty good. I wouldn’t want to use fully loaded panniers on it, as it does swing about a bit when you get out of the saddle climbing. For some light credit card touring its good though.

I nearly bought one, but saw that there was lots of talk about accuracy on the Garmin forum (more whinging that STW, possibly), so I held off. They might have fixed it now though, might be worth some googling first, if accuracy is important to you.

I’ve owned both the rip off lights and the Lezyne versions.

The Lezyne lights are slightly better finished, and have the perfect default flashing modes, in that when you turn the front light on, it stays on steady, not quite the brightest mode. When you turn the rear on, one of the LED’s stays on constant, while the other 2 alternate, which I think makes for a perfect rear light, as did a lot of people I went out with.

However, I lost the front light (my fault entirely), and the battery on the rear light never lasted as long as it should, and got worse over time.

I picked up a few of the knockoff lights, as I figured at least I wouldn’t care so much if i lost them. They’re not so well finished, but they’ve survived some rain and the battery life seems reasonable, and consistent. They don’t have the charging indicator of the Lezynes, although I didn’t trust that anyway. The rubber band isn’t as well designed, and might not be as durable, but has been just fine so far. The flashing modes aren’t as good, but you’ll still be seen, which is all that really matters.

For a couple of backup lights that you don’t mind leaving on your bike outside the pub, the knockoffs are great.

The Basketmakers is a great central pub with decent food for both of you, or the Eagle across the road has great food too. Plenty of good restaurants around, but surely pubs win.

The bus drivers there have no problem taking your bike from the coast all the way to the top of the mountain, for under 10 Euro’s, rude not to.

The 500 does have a few other advantages over the 200, other than being able to record HR and customise fields.

The recording interval for the 500 is 1 second, whereas it is ‘smart’ on the 200, which leads to some big jumps between sampled points (you can see it on the strava comparison tool, where the 200 jumps along tracks in big steps, whereas better computers smoothly glide along).

The biggest advantage is probably being able to tell the time of day without having to pause the activity!

Breadcrumb navigation is faultless on the 200 though, it just works.

Sony RX100 Mark 1’s can be had second hand for £200. Small compact camera with full manual controls should you want it, as well as taking great photos in Auto mode.

Have used the streamliner rack, not terrible, but wobbles around a bit if you get out the saddle.

I’ve always been a fan on front panniers. Just get a nice fast road bike, replace the forks with a front fork that will take a rack and panniers, jobs a good’un.

PLanet X’s are great track bikes, plenty of very fast people win lots on them. Track racing isn’t about the bike though, if you’re fast, an old Langster will do the job.

Was there as well, I wish i hadn’t seen it, but it was hard to look away. It looked pretty obvious he wasn’t going to make it long before impact, and everything went into slow motion, then it looked like he might actually pull it back…… then a giant ball of flames.

It was a very surreal experience, and quite weird watching all the photographers checking their cameras straight away to see if they caught it. Considering some of the pictures people must have, there has been a reasonable amount of restraint.

Its currently chucking it down, just to make the clear up operation even grimmer. Emergency services did a fantastic job, must have been horrible for all involved.

I’m feeling lucky to have not been more involved, but I doubt I’m alone in having a deep feeling of unease, until knowing who all the fatalities are, especially knowing there were allegedly 2 cyclists involved. They wouldn’t have stood a chance crossing at that junction, which is well used by all the local cyclists.

A friend of mine flew from London to LA a few years ago, only to be denied entry, due to a speeding ticket he’d received some 20 years ago. He didn’t even get the option of paying it, he just had to come straight back home. We’ll never know whether he got more than just a speeding ticket, and wasn’t letting on.

As above, if you’re ever planning on returning to the country, probably worth just paying up.

Much better round here. Not only do all the trails show up, lots of them are named too.

The more OpenStreetMap is used by third parties, the better the ddata will get. If your area is missing map features, you could always put them in yourself, and help the community out, there are lots of ways of helping out:

http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Editing

The beauty of track cycling is that it isn’t always the fastest rider who wins. If you ride smart you can beat people fitter than you On the flip side, you’ll probably lose to a 14 year old girl at some point, but nobody will care.

If your lack of fitness is a problem in the accreditation sessions, they’re not running the sessions right. Go have fun, if you like it, its a great way to get fit.

Some sandwiches and a bag of salted cashew nuts (as long as you have access to water) works well for me, gels for emergencies only.

I was tempted by the fenix 3, but there seem to be lots of reports of it under-reporting distances, and having dodgy GPS accuracy, especially in wooded areas. Garmin forums seem to be full of much angrier people than STW.

MTBers should be best placed to answer, anyone had such problems, or care to share a link to any forested runs or rides?

50×15 (87ish inch gear) fixed, and I usually don’t get above 35mph down a hill, 38 at a slightly scary push. Perfect for bashing along at 22mph on the flat.

Just switched from 32:16, to 32:17, on the (26er) SS mtb, and although the hills are more enjoyable now, I’ve been surprised at the hit on top speed when cruising back on the road.

50*15 fixed here. Perfect for rolling 30 mile rides in the winter, which seem to help fitness no end. The furthest I’ve used it for is 50 miles, after which I tried to go up Ditchling Beacon (only just doable ordinarily), and my knees just said no. If you’re going to do longer rides using a bigger gear, build up to it, and try not to have any big hills near the end of the ride, I’d suggest.

They are just like the BMX’s of youth, whatever gear you pick will end up feeling like the perfect gear most of the time, if you ride it enough.

I used to drink French Blend,it was black and maroon, now they’ve changed it to silver, still the best one I’d say. It confused me more than it should have done.

This could be really handy at Mountain mayhem, or any other team race.

“I just passed the 3/4 of a lap mark, get to the start line, I’ll be really angry if I have to come and drag your arse out of the tent again”

I’ve done about 4,000 miles on one of those Axiom front racks, with 2 fully loaded large panniers, and have been pretty impressed. Only roads and canal towpaths, but its been good. If you use some padding and electrical tape around the fork, and get the adaptor nice and tight, they won’t swing into anything. Make sure you do a trial run at home before you go touring, to check they are properly attached, and take a 10mm spanner so you can tighten the fastenings if needed.

If you’re just doing casual touring anywhere fairly civilised, it does the job very well. If you’re going more remote, or mega long distance, go for something steel so you could get it welded if it breaks.

As nobody has said it yet…

Massive Attack – Blue Lines

So much more than just Unfinished Sympathy, as attested to by the fact I often get ‘the big wheel, keeps on turning’ stuck in my head while grinding up a hill on a singlespeed 29’er.

Dull as dishwater for road racing, agreed, but there aren’t many places you can let people race track bikes. There is always some great racing there, relatively few accidents, and it has been a breeding ground for some promising young cycling talent. If you’re not racing, its also quite nice to sit in the evening sun, having a beer, and watching it all unfold, even if it is rarely warm enough to do so.

The fatality at Portsmouth was what triggered the British Cyclings Review. They came up with a massive list of things that need to be fixed before they will sanction racing again there. Things that should have been done like making sure the back of bolts aren’t sticking out on the track side, to trickier things like making sure the tarmac abuts the fence without gaps, and making sure there are no step changes in the fence, which is tricky when the outside of the track isn’t level.

The easiest thing would be to rebuild the fence inside the current fence, but that would probably be phohibitively expensive. Whatever repairs will be done will probably have to wait until spring, as this isn’t the weather for it, hence the lack of pressure at the moment I guess.

It would be a shame to lose such a great facility, they do wonders for local kids, and the adult racing provides a great dose of cheap weekly racing, without the egos you get at road races (and the cake is only 50p a slice). On the other hand, it will cost a lot of money to fix a facility that generates hardly any income, at a time the Council is facing massive cuts. It doesn’t help that British Cycling won’t compromise, as some of the things they have asked for are petty, but expensive to fix. Understandable though if they are going to sanction kids races there.

The will to get it sorted seems to be there, chances are it will get fixed this summer, with a bit of disruption to racing

You can’t buy a carbon 27.0mm seatpost any more, which is annoying, you can get alloy posts though, so they aren’t obsolete yet.

I’ve just finished this, which is about the last placed riders at the Tour De France. Its a very well written book, and he talks to, and about, some interesting riders. There are some great insights into bits of the Tour De France, that are often missed, or covered up.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/cycling/book-of-the-week-lanterne-rouge–the-last-man-in-the-tour-de-france-by-max-leonard-9271327.html