5 foot 11 here riding a MK1 17″ by 22″TT

sounds like you want the same as i did, mine is great for a couple of hours blast in the peaks or at trail centres (150mm forks, short stem) but is also great fun on the odd small scale DH track.

Climbs ok but i’d want adjustable forks if i was going to ride it uphill a lot

i just bought the size of the proto i rode in the alps and it’s done me great

stunning

Scotland really is shit

bastards :(

pails into insignificance in comparison to John and Gregg’s bromance

GET A ROOM

it’s like some BBC exec has said ‘your manbitchy x-factor-esque brutality is turning off our female audience, lets try and have the odd tender moment yeah’?

Ladybower Inn, Bamford

The bull. Foolow

Cheshire Cheese, Hope (not the one in castleton)

E’s for example are very safe 13 deaths to million of pills taken

The figure i seem to recall is less than 10 per million users

and the deaths are generally related to overheating/over hydration and (very few) contaminates, the first two generally preventable by ‘responsible’ consumption.

I know people who are casual users of Heroine and Crack Cocaine, they seem to be perfectly able to hold down a job (although in an industry where drug use is generally endemic)

I also know people who followed the typical ‘gateway’ drug path from clubbing back in the day and are now complete wasters or dead.

I’d love to trust myself enough to try some of these stronger drugs but I consider myself to have a very weak tolerance to addiction.

Junkyard

mrmwright you have confuised class and arrogance again

probably, i was born in oxford anyway :|

Lancashirians can’t do a posh accent

it simply doesn’t work. My (Bury born) wife can’t do it and her brother, despite thinking himself posh and moving far too close to that there london for comfort, just sounds silly.

Yorkshire folks on the other hand, having been born with a degree of class built in can do posh accents, they just choose not to

i’d never ever tire of beating his pallid face to a pulp with the severed arm of maggy thatcher

head into town, you know those bushes round the back of argos that smell of wee and are full of empty DVD security boxes, you’ll find loads of them scattered around on the floor.

They’ll be free and you’ll be recycling too.

pah

wannabe

give me http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjGnC7HDMnc anyday

not just on a rope

we invented the technique of donuts on the neck of a wine bottle

you can get two on and your nose stops them falling off when you swig

some say you can’t buy class……..

…….but you can get Krispy Kreme ring donuts in sparkly pink and purple frosting

50/50 fairey liqid and water mix applied liberally to rim before fitting tyre

Plockton is rather pleasant and you can get train/drive to Skye

Mallaig is a dive in my experience

Tobermory is good for families

Parts of the Moidart peninsular (SW of MAllaig) are fantastic and the railway isn’t too far away

shorten chain by a few links, see if that helps

inspect chainrings for warping, burrs, bent teeth

Especially poke-worthy characters like footballers.

and elfinsafety

But a technical analysis of pulse detonation wave engines suggests that engines operating at the thrust levels associated with military aircraft would operate between 100 and 200 Hertz (pulses per second). While doppler shifting may reconcile this value with the reported 50-60 Hertz pulsation, it is more difficult to reconcile this with the reports of a 1 Hertz pulsation.

It is also difficult to reconcile a pulse rate of 100-200 Hertz with the observed donut-on-a-rope contrails. The association of these contrails with a PDWE would seem to be predicated on the observation that each “donut” is a product of a single pulse detonation. Based on published photographs, the “donuts” appear to be approximately 100 meters apart. Assuming a detonation pulse rate of 100 Hertz, this would imply a velocity of 10 kilometers per second, roughly Mach 36 which is 1½ times orbital velocity. While it is asserted that the Aurora spyplane is a high-speed vehicle, this is at least four times faster than the speeds normally associated with this aircraft.

8000 mph = 3 576.32 meters per second

say the pulses are 100Hz, the pulses would be 36 meters apart, that picture looks like a lot more than 36m no?

I’m not sure that pulse jets would form a contrail like the picture. The pulses are very fast, they’re not like some cartoon sonic boom!

i’m not sure my tired brain will do the maths but at 8000mph rapid pulses translate into pretty long distances

aren’t they triggered by impact? in which case if it was going to go off then this footage would have a decidedly different tone

still funny

Assuming MTBers stick to established paths

‘established paths’ become established motorways with heavy traffic, one of the advantages of Scotland’s access laws is that open access causes a reduction in the development of massive ‘highway’ footpaths like those evident in more populous and restricted areas. the means of erosion control necessary on very popular routes are very expensive.

I’m not sure any of that would apply on Cairngorm though, as has been said it’s unlikely it’ll end up with a massive increase in traffic.

we do, just no one joins it

pretty scary stuff

i’d imagine it’s pretty horrific on the ground, even more so when it gets to the poorer parts of the pacific

Does sticking to paths and advising people in the article at several points of the fragility of the area and stating that they should stick to the paths as I and my riding companions did constitute abuse?

glad of that Sanny, If I’d known you wrote the article I’d have assumed you would have covered this issue. Although who knows what evils those STW sub editors get up to……

A point brought up by shortbread_fanylion is the huge damage by bulldozed tracks that are being built all over Scotland with no planning permission required, destroying empty glens and sometimes pristine singletrack. I don’t hear as many objections to these as biking on the plateau.

different issue altogether, it’s an issue around the commercial use of the land (it is after all generally privately owned) and not leisure use.

ooooh just spotted this

£350 attempted transaction on nespresso.com, allerted by bank

i don’t feel so paranoid now.

Olly

have had a ride too, but at 6ft 4″, had to get off before i broke it, as it makes a wicked little 4X bike

annoying isn’t it, my wife’s Santacruz Juliana HT (they should still make them, fantastic frames) would be a great jump bike for me

it’s made of aluminium foil and wallpaper paste though so i’d snap it SO badly

which category do you fit into?

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/7.htm

thanks

it’s a subject close to my heart

it’s not my normal form though :wink:

there can be no all encompassing ‘fact’ about comparative levels of erosion as the variance in ground condition, flora+fauna, usage and traffic volume make every area unique in this respect.

The only approach is to exercise compassion and restraint in our (and that of all users of the countryside) choice of route. As part of this I see it as a responsibility of land owners, environmental bodies and the media to provide information as to these issues allowing us to make these judgements.

I will not pass judgement on the STW article as I have not read it, if it encourages riding in a very sensitive area such as the plateaux without pointing out it’s innate fragility then it is irresponsible.

The Scottish rights of access rely on a difficult balance between user stewardship of the land and the abuses by the few.

I mostly agree with TJ on this one, his nationalistic blinkering aside.

Sram X0

it’s a myth perpetuated by the lease hire companies

I think the fact that the majority of company cars are replaced every 3 years is an absolute travesty

mind you it keeps the market full of 3 year old cars that i can buy satisfied that the big whack of initial depreciation has been payed by someone else :-)

passat is on 190k now, still on first clutch

never cost us enough to justify getting rid of it, if it costs me more than £1500 at any point then it’ll go. until then it’s just a car that works. The cost of paying interest on a loan to buy a new car will outweigh the costs of keeping it on the road as far as i’m concerned

very sad indeed

I’m off on a 3 day tour in the borders on thursday as well

vaio

macbook pro spec, half the price

simples

Get your hands on ‘DJ Kicks – Kemistry and storm’

filthy

my SX absolutely rocked in the alps, sounds like the SX is more suited to what you describe

slacker, coil sprung, ISCG mounts

on the plus side my tickets for Decemberists have just shipped and i can afford to buy approximately 3 beers :-)

still too expensive

still 16:10 screens

still too few USB ports

did i mention the price?

i don’t really notice the difference between the effort of riding various bikes uphill, i just go slower if it’s heavier.

that said my 53lbs Demo 9 was something of a challenge to get up those canadian fire roads, you can only ride so slowly before you fall off.

On challenging climbs then the slacker head angles and longer travel will obviously make things a little trickier