ooOOoo, I reckon I’m pretty strong, but I’ve got used to spinning if need be, so I’m certain I wouldn’t be annoyed by that…

I definitely want a FS, just to have a completely different experience really. Like I said, I’ve never had one before, so why not?

I use some 26″ x 2.0″ and they’re brill. Comfy and fat, and with a reasonable PSI they’re quite nippy once you get them up to speed. What bike are you putting them on?

But does 140mm take away all the fun, or am I looking at it the wrong way round?

Spoon, why do you think 1×10 compromises too much? I’m interested as I’ve not used gears for a long time now, so would like to hear the opinions of people that have used the more modern stuff.

he could do with sorting the drainage on his lawn.

😀

I’ve never used it, and quite frankly, after being dragged to see the film about Facebook by my girlfriend, and after hearing all the ‘friend’ induced rubbish people put up with, I’m glad I don’t use it. Maybe I’m just a recluse. Bah.

Someone on that thread mentioned a Edinburgh-Peebles off road cycle route, has that been built, or is it in planning?

Flashes, I’ve got a 1×1 in 16″ I’m selling soon, my email is in my profile.

Good job my Surly takes 3.0″ tyres. Bring on the snow this year, please pretty please!

I constantly find myself tidying up the local supermarket, lining up the tin labels and picking the ones I want from the back so as not to mess up the pattern. I also line up my food on the conveyor belt so there’s no gaps.

I drive my girlfriend insane by making neat piles of everything we own that’s not put away. I don’t organise it logically or anything, I just line it up in a pile, biggest stuff at the bottom.

I switch all the sockets off in the kitchen before I go to bed, and my girlfriends has to physically restrain me if I hear a flatmate use an electrical thing in the kitchen when I’m already in bed. Oh dear.

Oh no. I hate Britain so much, it really is crap in so many ways. And it seems that everyday a whole new way to be crap is discovered, exploited and put in place ready to shaft everyone but the rich in time for the new financial year.

I work as a support worker for adults with learning disabilities. A bit different from social workers obviously, but I do work with them often. All I’ll say is: probably not the best time to get into a really demanding job that requires loads of work, loads of beaucracy, and loads hoping your service won’t be cut. Go for it if you really want to though.

I sort of hope that the numbers of people doing this sort of work will fall and fall, and then the wider public/local authorities will realise how hard and how important it is and the remuneration will improve.

I’ll be heading as far from Glasgow as I can cycle tomorrow.

I’m looking at the EX9 too, the 2011 model with the 142mm through axle. Anyone have any opinions about the press fit BB, or know if you can fit a chain device for 1×10?

No one will attack us because we will be a cool hippy country.

That would be amazing. Hippies are great.

Elfin, as so often, you’re bang on. Carbon’s right: Let’s scrap the lot and make a statement to the world that war is pointless and messy. And then stop annoying other countries so they don’t hate us.

I live in the South side so I’ll keep me eyes peeled. I hope it’s found.

I’ve spent today building up my Alfine dyno into a wheel. Obviously no idea yet how well it works, but I’m very excited. To hijack along the same theme, anyone got opinions about a good LED to hook up to it? I was thinking the Supernova, but any other ideas?

I think the flat pedal Renaissance has something to do with the xc/trail side of mountain biking increasingly looking at the freeride and dh world rather than the road. We’re seeing roadie stuff like QRs disappearing. We’re seeing seattubes and headtubes getting fatter, angles slackening and more emphasis on going down than up. Maybe it’s just fashion, I don’t know, but it’s definitely happening.

Are you Americans?

Honestly I think some people on here talk about cars as much as bikes.

+1 crazy-legs

Hopefully it’ll mostly be proper cold and not just drizzle. But who can tell? “You’ll have to wait and see,” as my Ma used to say.

I fully expect many, many bike shops to go out of business in the future. I’m in two minds about this.

I never use bike shops. I buy my parts online and fit them myself, I buy the tools I need and read up on how to use them. This has worked really well for me and I have some reasonable skills now and I’ve never screwed anything up really, I just take my time and do things methodically.

But.

Bike shops can be wonderful places. It’s fantastic to be able to see and pick up a part or some clothes and have a chat about the options. They can be great communal places. Unfortunately, the prices, the choice, reliability and speed are not competitive in this internet age, and that is why I and many don’t use them anymore.

There was an article in the Guardian on Friday titled: “Sick of bike-shop sexists? The Cycle Show can help you…”

Anyone know if there is anywhere in Scotland that stocks Wingnut bags? I’d love to try one before buying, just as they look and must feel so different to normal bags.

Couple of months time and you’ll have some new tyres on there, and another pair in the shed, depending on conditions, you’ll have a selection of camelbacks (TJ friendly size to 30l bivvy kit bag for the trail centres) and some 800mm bars and vented rotors.

It’s a slippery slope, mark my words…

I was sort of thinking of just getting a pair of Mavic downhill rims, just in case I want to fun some truly massive tyres in the winter snows.

I’m not that keen on the Rigida’s, mainly because I don’t want a braking surface, disk only for that nice black look.. 😳

Mark B and Blade : thankyou Alex Rankin and Sprung!

Sorry, I’m not reading 4 pages of arcane stopping distance geekery… BUT:

😆 Funniest helmet cam vid ever? If someone I rode into threw their bike at me, I’d call them **** insane and then pedal off like a good un.

Second hand is clearly the answer here. Bolt through is the future, and you know it.

So what are the advantages of presta valves, ignoring the aspect that you can put one in any rim, as if schraders were the standard all rims would be predrilled to accept them?

I can’t quite understand what needs ‘developing’, or indeed, if the idea of ‘development’ on offer here is really a positive thing for mountain biking.

‘Development’ and ‘progress’ are such powerful words in our society, but too often the questions “what are we developing for, what is ‘progress’?” are simply not asked. Mountain biking in Scotland does not, in my mind, need ‘developing’. A conception of mountain biking as this club based racing sport has already damaged mountain biking, and cycling as a whole, to such an extreme degree that any moves by BC and the like are highly suspect in my view. BC, by promoting cycling as a racing sport has destroyed any chance of bicycles being part of the lives of the majority of ordinary people in this country.

What’s wrong with a Scottish mountain bike scene with no organisations, no trail centres or multi million pound venues, with no regulation or red tape, no races? What’s wrong with small individual scale friendship groups zipping around utilising the wonderful access rights we have in Scotland?

I have presta on my bike because I use UST. I don’t understand why presta was seemingly picked as the ‘standard’ valve type for mountain bikes. They are more fiddly in my experience, in mid winter with freezing hands it’s easy to bend the top of the valve.

Is it some sort of **** Mavic obsessive belief that Le Tour is the pinnacle of cycling and that MTBers should try to get as close to that ideal as possible? Mountain biking is finally starting to move away from crap roadie technology, with through axles, wide BBs and all that, why can’t we have decent valves as standard?

I really enjoyed those videos. They were really well made and beautifully shot. I especially liked that I sat and watched two men going uphill and I wasn’t bored – quite the opposite, I was riveted!

To my mind, those are some of my favourite mtb videos I’ve ever seen, really inspiring.

Surly Big Dummy with the bike attachment kit, a bike bag for easy train transport and a hefty dose of MTFU.

Maybe when nick went to tell her, he went into too much detail about rake and trail and bamboozled her.

Pretty essential for me. Riding gives me so much joy. It’s my only form of transport, and even just riding to the shops makes me smile and feel good. I’ll never stop riding unless my body breaks and I physically can’t any more.

Keep up.[/url]

I’ve got a Rab Momentum, and I love it. It breathes really well, is really simple and lightweight and I think looks good too. I’ve started enjoying the rain starting, because I love putting up the hood, tightening the toggles and feeling cocooned in dry safety. I hope that’s not weird.

Or get that new Salsa Mukluk, I’m pretty sure that can run normal 29er wheels with a spacer, along with the fat tyres front and rear. I’m sure the would be ace too though.

Just ignore any ‘right’ of way classification, they’re all bollocks anyway.

Exciting news, maybe decent transmissions are coming our way…