The Triban 3 at £300 seems to be very well regarded for the price so presumably the fitness 3 is decent too.

Seems to be an ever increasing problem 🙁

the worst thing is that there are a few roads around Glasgow where there has been really good jobs done on section (thinking along to fintry after going over the crow road but quite a few other places as well) where the job is finished to a high standard and the tarmac feels as good as you get on a nice spanish or french road…you know the type, you go along and there are no rattles from the bike the only noise being the whirring of the tyres and everything feels good in the world.

The bastards then come back a few weeks / months later and add the tar and chip to the great surface and have make the road unsafe and unpleasant to ride on. 🙁

Is the blogger girl not the sister of a poster on here?

I believe an ass whooping was being promised for any criticism of her 😀

I’m not going to comment on the merits or otherwise of people being banned as its not my forum but it always seemed to me that there was a certain amount of provocation and trolling towards tandem jeremy.

As far as im aware it didnt seem to bother him (I dont know though i have never discussed anything with him on here or elsewhere) and he was capable of defending himself but IMO such stuff makes for a worse forum ‘atmosphere’ than anything he posted. Even now he is banned there are still people having digs at him on other threads, that is poor show.

Doing that and having a name like **** is almost as good as the Bulgarian who fell over in the 400m hurdles – Vania Stambalova

Before all the drama about not trying in the 800m Steve Cram made it pretty obvious what he thought about Makhloufi when he won the 1500m semi.

Unfortunately the coverage on the bbc website doesn’t have the commentary but if i recall he pretty much came out and said he was doping!

Cycling has a horrendous reputation but the testing regime is far better than most other sports – it would be naive to think doping no longer exists but it is probably now on a much smaller scale and not at a transformative level capable of turning good/competitive athletes into dominant ones.

A few years ago Inverdale (or rather BBC lawyers acting on his behalf) threatened libel action against a website owner for comments made about him on an internet forum. So be careful what you say!

Michael Johnson and Ian Thorpe have been the BBC stars so far. Really pleased that Johnson has continued to stick with British TV as i thought after the disaster of channel 4s coverage of the world championships!

Hugh Porter was a disaster for the mens road race but he has been better on the track….not great but alot better. To be fair to him I think some the cycling events have quite difficult to commentate on because of the lack of informations – like time checks in the RR and also the lack of suitable replays available for key decisions like the Chinese DQ in the womens team sprint etc…its been very murky at times what exactly has been happening.

i dont have a tin handy as it wasnt my fence

The different strokes and distances make for different body compositions depending on the swimmer. Even for comparable distances (say 200 metres) you can generally tell who swims breastroke, backstroke and butterfly just looking at their muscle composition.

A butterfly and IM specialist like Phelps looks far more cut than the likes of Thorpe or Hackett (200, 400 and 800 metre freestyle swimmers) did at their peak…they had IMO the male equivalent body composition to someone like Adlington who swims the same event and distance.

the sustrans route to the south of Glasgow (basically from about Paisley to Kilbirnie (about 20 miles) going past Lochwinnoch or over to Port Glasgow (about 15 miles) is really good. Connects up various towns / villages with each other in a direct way and virtually all off road and it is good quality tarmac in much better state than the roads and is very popular as a result.

I was a national level player in water polo and chucked it because the hardships involved were not worth it due to Britain not being good enough to send a team to the Olympics. Most idiotic decision i’ve ever made!

To get to that level (GB not Olympics) was actually a fairly straight forward process – obviously i had to be a pretty decent swimmer but of those that were and who played waterpolo i’d estimate there would be a better than 1 in 20 chance of being involved at a national level – might not be a regular but invited to train considered as a reserve etc. That is across the whole of the sport at some clubs with good coaches it would be more like less than 1 in 10. I’m sure this will be similar to other minority sports.

The problem however is that the sports where it is possible to break into the ‘elite’ level in a domestic scene it is also extremely unlikely that you will also be good enough to qualify for the Olympics. A home Olympics is a bit different to normal because the amount of events with automatic (or at least easier) qualification for the hosts is greater.

Might be against the spirit of the rules but so is starting a track sprinter in the road race and pulling out after a couple of km so you can then have an extra rider to call upon if needed in the velodrome. Plus there is the whole doping situation with giving out a retrospective 2 year ban which allows your key rider to compete at the olympics!

that Phinney bet looks pretty good might have a piece of that

he has been training solely for this for the last few weeks, and he looked in pretty good shape during the road race, so a top 3 looks very possible

Depends how hard i am riding…a bimble or recovery ride then i’ll wear a waterproof jacket because i wont be sweating too much.

Baws out ride then usually my regular gear plus a gilet and arm warmers or a windproof top. I still take a pocket waterproof jacket though incase i need to stop for whatever reason, can quickly get cold and miserable even in summer trying to fix a puncture in the pouring rain.

Forget whatever is popular at the moment and will look ridiculous in 2 weeks time and wear something really classy and timeless

Brother Eldridge led the way with his designs, still looks as fresh today as it did 40 years ago.

Thanks for the info will give it a go and hope for the best

regularly.

actually last time i went to glentress i fell off in the car park before i’d even started on the trails 😀

excellent

some good (free and legal too!) downloads here that covers 30 years of hip hop @

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/history-of-hip-hop-mix

No acknowledgement to the rapha email for me

btw does the UCI weight limit on bikes apply to the Olympics?

where’s the photo from ??

Pinched it from another forum 😀 It is from today though as there was some footage on C4 News of him going for a ride

Finished today. To be honest i’m glad its over, today was good as i could just do a normal long ride but the midweek nights and having to do loops to get the maximum elevation in the shortest time/distance got a bit tedious after a while. Wish i had some proper mountains to go up!

Do you need to do anything now or are you automatically entered into the prize draw?

Only 4000 odd for me.

Had a bit of a brown chamois moment during some hill repeats this afternoon – i thought i was just feeling a bit sluggish but it was due to my brake pad rubbing slightly on the rim. It eventually caused the rim to heat up and the tube to pop. Fortunately it was the rear one so could keep control but not the most pleasant thing to happen at 40 mph! 😯

I’ve enjoyed the plot and drama have been pretty good but some of the writing has been awful – the dialogue, the plot devices, couple of the characters and so on. That has frustrated me a bit because the ingredients are there for a good series it just seems to be lacking a bit in the execution.

Generally speaking Eastern Europeans, Scandinavians, Southern Europeans, South Americans and South East Asians all seem better. Actually most countries seem to have better looking women than is the case in the UK, it is a shocking state of affairs and something must be done about it.

Same goes for the men too if ever a nation was hit with a collective ugly stick it is here. 🙁

Dont have any pictures but i put on some the lizard skins yellow tape at the weekend. Its nice and grippy and comfortable, but i get the feeling after a couple of rides that the yellow is going to be almost as bad as white for showing up the dirt

As for having yellow tape – I dont have a Porte, a Rogers and a Froome to pace me up all the KOM segments i lead on Strava which surely puts my achievements on an even higher level than the current tour leader. I also dont wear black socks and have a pair of shorts that fit properly so I look more pro too. 😀

their 2013 road bikes have come down in price in some areas -Can now get a tarmac for £1200 whereas the cheapest tarmac last year was about £1600 i think (better groupset though). Hopefully will be the same for their mtb range too outside the halo models.

Dont know if its the same guy (presumably it is!) but there is a guy on bikeradar who has a diet like that…durranrider or something like that

McDonalds is very popular in France – its their second largest market after the US.

However generally their diet is much better. I cant quantify it with any evidence but my experience is that in the UK people seem to eat alot more processed and junk food in the home (and as snacks between meals) than is the case in France.

Sounds like a tough one particularly if the weather is hot, when i went up it was roasting and i couldnt have done it 3 times never mind 6 times.

btw does he know there is a 4th ascent?

i tried the specialized bar phat tape which came with pads and it was an improvement so have just kept the pads on whenever i’ve changed tape. I never really have any issues with hand comfort – admittedly i never really suffered from it in the past either, its just a bit more comfortable now!

His junior and neo pro results were good and he is now developing into the rider that many have been predicting for the last two years. Its not like he has appeared from nowhere with a massive jump in performance levels, just being bloody good shouldnt necessarily arouse suspicions

I wear it…i’m out in public wearing lycra its not like i will look like more of a tool by having htc highroad or euskatel written on my top!

I dont tend to wear the shorts though never found them as comfortable as a good quality pair.

Was there on saturday and it was awesome night.

I was too young to see them first time round – they had already split up when i started listening to them so i have no idea how it compared to back at their peak. However compared to the hundreds of other bands ive seen over the years saturday night was up there with some of the very best.

Body is aching now though was right down the front and ended up on the deck during made of stone with someone standing on my legs and then falling ontop in slow motion 🙁

Havent seen it yet but Amores Perros is one of my favourite films

The title music from Control Machete is one of the most bad ass pieces of soundtrack music too.

Sad news, my condolences

Rest in Peace