Mine came with a bladder too.
Great little pack

Slightly off topic, but all you guys using white spirit, diesel etc. … what do you do with the contaminated liquid afterwards?

we drove Calais to Montpellier over that weekend last year – most of it on the Saturday.
Worst bit was Lyon (maybe an hour delay), but that’s always a bit dodgy, south of Lyon the traffic was much heavier with changover-day traffic coming & going from the south coast resorts, but certainly not bad enough to change my holiday plans around.

Going again on Friday so hoping it will be just as good this year!

Cheers Countzero

Quick update for those not members of the Swinley FB page – looks like there will be a memorial ride on Aug 9th.
I won’t post a link as it’s a closed group – probably worth joining the group if you’re interested in attending, so you’ll see any updates or changes to the plan.

There’s also a book of condolence at the Lookout.

The outpouring of condolence and sympathy on the Swinley FB page has been really touching, many comments from people who never met the guy, but felt his loss as a kindred spirit. I’ve often ridden Swinley solo & stopped to chat to many people, who knows, I may have even spoken to Mark. It makes me realise what a great bunch of people MTBers are (on the whole!).

Andylc – do you mean Nainster’s link above? That was an older incident from last year where a guy died from a heart attack.
Today’s incident was result of a crash

Ah sorry, closed FB group.

Appears the guy was riding solo & hit a tree on Red 25 – for those not familiar with Swinley it’s not a technically difficult section but very fast & jumpy.
Sounds like a group of riders following gave CPR & handed over to paramedics but unfortunately he couldn’t be saved.

I’ll certainly be taking that section a lot slower next tine around.

Edited to fix the link hopefully.

Boy 11, only with friends and under strict understanding that the privilege will be withdrawn if he’s anywhere other than where he told us he was going (ie if he goes to the park to play football, he’d better not be roaming the streets)

wonder if that bullseye on the windscreen means it hit someone and was then dumped and reported stolen?

looks more like damage from the inflatable bags inside trying to burst their way out through the roof!

Any landlords had to try and get deposit back from DPS without co-operation of the ex-tenant?
I have the form but it needs to be witnessed by a solicitor, wondering how much they might charge me for this!

Tenant cleared off owing rent, left 2 rooms full of crappy furniture for me to dispose of, everything filthy and looks like he was subletting to a bunch of ‘blokes with vans’ to quote the neighbour. It’s not always the tenant who get the shitty end of the deal – plenty of bad tenants out there (about 50% in my experience)

Sorry for the slight hi-jack!

It’s by far the tamest trail centre I’ve ridden

You’ve never been to Swinley then. Or Sherwood Pines. Or Dalby. Or Thetford.

FoD ain’t the Alps but the 2 XC loops are good, fast fun. I did an uplift day earlier this year on the DH sections – my 140mm Cube FS was by far the smallest travel bike I saw on those trails and I had by far the least amount of body armour of any rider on the buses.

If your Inbred has a dropper you might make it out alive!

I’ve just bought a pair of Race Face Triggers (need to retire my Humvee’s). On the plus side they have 2 zipping hip pockets which I really wanted (and a lot of shorts don’t seem to have) and they feel well made, but they also feel really thin & I’m wondering if they’ll be too cold for autumn/spring use, even with a liner.

if the bag doesn’t turn up, we should have a STW whipround as suggested above
I’m in for that.

Me too. Keep us posted.

Well done mate, you did a good thing tonight.
Hope someone like you us around if I ever need help on the trails.

Shitter about the bag, but what goes around etc…… something good will come your way,

I use them & as said already they are very easy to use.
Only issue I’ve come across is that because the clamp holds the top/bottom of the downtube I have to remove the cable guides from my Cube Stereo as the rear brake & deraillieur are routed along the top of this tube. I can then move them to the side so the clamp can directly contact the tube.

It’s a bit if a faff but less hassle than losing the bike off the roof or damaging the cables!

hb70 – the most important skill in relation to crashing, is learning to recount the incident to you family/mates without it sounding like you’re 3years old and just had your stabilisers removed!

funkhouser – which Jedi course were you looking at? I’ve been thinking about his jumps and drops one. Got a bit of an injury niggle at the mo, so might not be available soon enough for you.

While I’ve every confidence that the NHS will give me excellent initial care
No, they won’t

In my experience, they will.

I’m really on the fence with the OP’s question. I have private care through work for the family (but let’s not kid outselves it’s a free perk… the tax liabitility is significant) but it’s been useless in our recent medical history.

They used a ‘pre-existing condition’ clause to avoid covering a muscular issue my daughter had. Long story but i was extremely agrieved – their definition of pre-existing could seemingly be applied to virtually any mediacal condition…

Me: I’ve had a heart attack. Can you help?
Them: sorry, you ate a cream cake 14 years ago, which began the process of clogging your arteries, so when you took out cover 10 years ago, the condition already existed

(I may be exaggerating to make the point..)
Anyway, now sorted via NHS.

Same daughter also had a serious (life threatening) asthma attack early this year – I cannot praise the NHS highly enough for the treatment she’s received, including treatment on the day & ongoing by the only consultant specialising in paediatric respiratory conditions in the UK.
I can’t see how this cvould possiblity have been any better under private care (OK the walls of the hospital ward might have been more recently painted…)

On the flip side, I used the private care for investigation into cardiac arythmia a couple of years ago & doubt I would have been seen as quickly on the NHS (although I probably would have seen the same consultant)

Cheers Sandwich – YGM.

Nice one Scapegoat – just emailed you.

Bump for the evening crowd…

Just outside St Albans, Hertfordshire

Cheers Sandwich, inner only, outers looked OK (and were a weird pink &white glittery colour, so Might look a bit odd if I just changed one!)

Others – yeah, your probably right but doubt I’ll have time to go into town & was hoping to fix it up for her next weekend.

Sounds a bit like the 2 most likely outcomes are:
1) you agree to their expectations of shared costs, which opens you up to the possibility of a big bill at some point in the future
or..
2) you stand your ground and risk falling out with the neighbours (if not full scale hostilities, then at least some bad will)

Neither of those is really a winning situation for you.

Personally (& if possible) I’d look at freeing up space in your bike shed to store the bike & make the whole situation go away

Cheers Guys, BB tool it must be.
Much bigger than my normal lock ring tool.

Seriously. What the hell is wrong with people spending their own money?

^ this! is exactly what I’ve been thinking while reading a lot of comments on this thread.

Here’s mine – Mondraker Podium carbon. Bought frame/drive train/forks off classifieds, rest from my spares pile. Frame is 17″ and fitted him well at 11.

Fitted a nice short stem (well, actually I made him do that, and fit the wheels and tyres – basic stuff but they have to start somewhere!)

It’s built up into a nice light bike, but he struggles a bit with the front mech – probably needs a service but I’m tempted to go 1x
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I just got a warranty replacement and it does this, exactly as you describe. I’m assuming they wouldn’t have sent me a faulty item as a replacement for the original faulty item, so hoping as iainc said, it’s normal.

I don’t understand about 90% of that ^

However, don’t allotments normally have a ‘no livestock’ rule?

Yep, basically seems that whenever I stop working, I immediately get ill.
Spent all of Christmas in bed, not had a day off since then until Good Friday, then came down on the Saturday with another effing cold-from-hell.

Is this an actual thing? Getting ill as soon as you start to relax?

allthegear – Member
He’s still a twatty rapist*

That’s a bold statement, considering you have absolutely no idea whether he’s guilty of the crime he’s been accused of.

you own/have responsibility for the fence on the left of your garden if you’re standing with you back to your property

certainly true for our current and previous houses, not sure if it’s always the case though.

squealer, thanks for the offer but doubt it will be planned, more a case of grabbing some time when the opportunity arises.

The whole area N/NE looks promising – Haugh Wood and beyond. Whaddaya reckon?

Fieldy, that’s great news, I remember your original post.

Had your insurance already paid out? Just wondering how these things work – would have expected it would belong to them if they had, or did you come to some arrangement with them?

Cheers

main car park is 4 quid for the day (I think – never used it)

yep, £2 for 4 hours, £4 for the day.

You’ll be fine round the blue, just keep an ear open for faster riders & move over when you can. I’ve riden round with my lad at a fairly slow pace on busy weekend mornings and never had any problems – in fact most folk are pretty friendly.

My stealth is with Fisher now for exactly the same reason.
Found out today they are replacing it. Hopefully in time for the FoD uplift day I’vegot booked next week.

Edit: re. Scraggy’s comment, my LBS sent it back on my behalf even though the bike it came on wasn’t bought from them. I’m paying them to remove/refit so at least they’re getting a little business from it, plus a load of goodwill (cheers to the guys at Addiktion Cycles in St Albans – very friendly, knowledgable & professional. Highly recommended).

I demo’d a bunch of bikes at the end of last year including the Aeris, Remedy 9, Kona Process……
Would have gone for the Trek except I couldn’t afford it, but was the best handling bike.
Aeris was next on the list, although if I’m honest I was a bit worried about resale value on a small niche manufacturer, as I rely on my bikes holding reasonable value so I can afford to trade up every couple of years.

Anyhow… a Cube Stereo 140 carbon came up at a price I couldn’t refuse (29er, rather than 650b), but
I bloody love it so far.

If I was you I’d get your leg over a Remedy 9 and take that as the benchmark

+1 for Gorges du Verdon. Start at the lake in the picture posted above and drive the road to Castellane. Stunning views, allow plenty of time for stops to take photos and paddle in the (slower parts of) the river.
Castellane is a nice place for a spot of lunch too, markets twice a week, although probably not big enough to make the drive just for that. Climb up to the church on the cliff top overlooking the town if you fancy the challenge – doable with small children but will be slow going.

I found Cannes and Nice very busy and a nightmare to park (make sure you remove any roofboxes / bars etc if you’ve got a big car as most car parks are <2m in height).
Much preferred Saint Tropez (could spend all day looking at the boats), and Villefranche-sur-mer is a beautiful little place between Nice and Monaco.

Monaco is great for a day trip – walk the circuit, check out the cars (and general chaos) in casino square etc.

Have fun!

Now ebay have sent me a bill for £60 for the sale!

this happened to me recently – ebay’s idea of giving me a refund was actually to give me a credit on my account. So you get the money back, but you can only spend it with ebay. WTF?

EDIT: I went down the ‘agreed with the buyer to cancel the sale’ route, rather than the ‘non-payment’ route, as I beleived it was a genuine error on their part. Probs should have just gone straight for non payment in hindsight.

STRAAAAAAVVVAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!
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