excellent video

Recent convert to Mackies crisps….lovely!

The Salt n Vinnegar and Scotch Bonnet being the two highlights

NOMNOMNOMNOM

Some achievement. An hour at that pace is bloody difficult, 2 hours i could never imagine doing….But 12!

I just dont have the mental toughness for that even if i had the fitness!

Quebrantahuesos in Spain is supposed to be really good and well organised, that is top of my list to do next year if i can do a Euro sportive.

Has free beer at the end too!

I am not particularly skilled so technically i find it quite a bit harder than the red in a couple of places particularly towards the end. With the red i can do all the features, dont really need to think about anything but with black there are bits like the rock garden at the start of the wormhole that i really struggle on (and that is now turning into a mental issue as well as a lack of skills one as i’m now scared of a big pointy sharp rock here that looks to be where my head would be falling if i have an off here!).

I like it though it is usually very quiet so the times i have ridden it i havent seen or heard anyone else on the black so it gives you a feeling of being a bit out on your lonesome, unlike the red where you are never far from someone else.

I dont think the resubscribe trick works anymore 🙁

PAYPAL5 was giving £5 off £50 if you paid by paypal. It was also working for other payment methods too

looks good thanks for the heads up

I havent done much hill walking but Ben Lomond is very popular and not too difficult if taken from the Rowardennan side. Arrochar i think will be good too but i’ve only ever had the bike there rather than walked.

+1 for Crab Shakk, really good.

Also the Wee Curry Shop is really good too. Mother India is run by the same family and is also excellent (particularly the one on Westminster Terrace)

If you want ‘Scottish’ food then the Ubiquitius Chip on Ashton Lane or Number 16 on Byers Road are pretty good

For things to do then depends if you like art galleries and museums. If in the centre then goma (modern art gallery) is worth a visit. Sometimes the Lighthouse is depending what exhibition they have on. A tour of the art school is good, lovely building. There is also a small museum of religion next to the Cathedral (which is itself worth a visit) The biggest museum is in the west end at Kelvingrove and close by to this at Glasgow University is the Hunterian – there is a museum bit, which is closed at the moment for building work and also an art gallery in a different building. The museum of transport has recently opened fairly close by, but i’ve not been yet to see what it is like. All the museums and galleries are free.

Yeah it was today, started of a bit rainy but otherwise a great day for it.

There was a really nice descent shortly before getting to Boot – think the climb started turning out of Ulpha which was a difficult climb up to the moor for a section then down, fast, sweepy and very enjoyable.

From what i heard someone had a crash coming down Wrynose, think he done his collarbone.

So after riding it my conclusion is that it is bastarding hard

Was a pretty hilly 50 miles before hand but even with fresh legs i would have struggled big time. First section was hard (102% of what i thought was my max HR) – had to dab here – i seriously thought i was going to crap myself with the effort put in and was looking for the nearest bush or rock to hide behind. Fortunately didnt, soon as i stopped the feeling went. Starting up again was tricky The middle section is gradual enough to get a bit of recovery. The last third though…****. It is intimidating looking up seeing the cars coming down ahead, psychologically found it slightly less hard than the first section though – knew the top was soon and could take the hairpin then big effort to the next hairpin, go round the flatish bit then another big effort. Very difficult…overall found it harder than l’alpe d’huez and ventoux which ive managed to struggle up without putting a foot down (although i was fitter and lighter when i did them so maybe not a fair comparision)

The descent over the other side wasn’t much fun at all too busy with cars and very steep.

Humvees are my time to lay off the pies shorts – soon as i start putting on any sort of weight the damn popper wont stay closed more than a couple of minutes (despite the shorts fitting fine elsewhere) whereas when i’m in shape they remain closed through the ride!

Picture doesnt really capture it as good as the video, but Marco Tardelli scoring the winner in the 1982 world cup final then running and crying

There is the old quote from Cameron “We smashed the place up and Boris set fire to the toilets.”

looks like i’ll be taking the bike with the compact + 27 cassette. And hope the road stays clear. At those sorts of gradients if you stop then just wont be able to get going again

+1 for Osso. Like a cafe / coffee shop during the day then a restaurant at night

The delicatessan one down the other end of the high street is decent too…cant remember the name though, Colemans or something like that

Bugger…was hoping that wasn’t the case and it was all due to a punishing ride before!

This wee video about Keirin racing in Japan is pretty good

http://www.nowness.com/day/2011/3/8/keirin-bike-racing

Has anyone in London (or elsewhere) been experiencing this? Just how bad is it?

I was living in Paris at the time of the riots there in 2005 – riots which started out in the suburbs of Paris then quickly spread elsewhere in the city and then around the country – hundreds of cars getting torched every night, mass rioting/looting and thousands of arrests. Quite shocking scenes on the TV every night. However i didnt actually see any of this personally, only thing noticeable was a few more vans of CRS sitting on the side streets.

So it was a bad situation which ended up looking much worse due to the rolling news coverage with looping videos (etc) which sensationalised it – the coverage made what was a bad situation look like the whole country was on the verge of descending into total lawlessness with complete civil breakdown.

swisstop green for me. they come with 4 pads so they work out not that much more expensive than other quality pads

Last night when i uploaded a ride it appeared on some Dutch persons account (everything else was as normal) Seems to be ok now though.

I remember having a race as a kid and trying to copy the Tour de France riders sprinting with their bikes wobbling from side to side…it was carnage. Only thing i remember after the pile up was seeing someones front wheel roll off down the road 😀

Only positive thing i can say about him is at least he is not the worst in his family

Open Paves have a great ride but they are expensive and wear pretty quick. i only got about 1500 miles out mine.

Doesn’t exactly qualify as epic but there is some surprisingly decent stuff up the Glennifer Braes if you know where to look. There is also clyde muirsheil park and the greenock cut / loch thom, but while that gives more sense of being in the countryside the riding isn’t as good.

bike hike is my prefered one too (although it often seems to disappear towards the end of the month, presumably due to hosting and bandwidth limits)

for an alternative i use bikeroutetoaster.com

I’ve been to the Glasgow one and it was a bit shit. Good numbers attending and great to see so many youngsters out on their bikes – the shitness came from the road closures being too small and unimaginative.

Think they are merging it into the pedal for scotland this year. If it had been the same format i’d still have gone and done a couple of laps then gone off on a normal sunday ride

i was a pro water polo player for a couple of years. By pro i mean getting accomodation, equipment and food etc paid for nothing extravagent! Sort of how i imagine prison to be like

yeah will keep cadence (and also virtual distance / speed) so long as you have the sensor unit on the chainstay

I cant compare to the old version or how hardwearing they are but i got the new ones a few months back and really like them, if i had to replace them tomorrow then i’d moan a bit about the prices but end up going with the milles again.

Castelli free aero are also good and a bit cheaper (or used to be, i just googled and noticed they are nearly double the price that i paid when i got mine) …not tried the Castelli body paint ones, they are pretty highly regarded.

awful events

went to bed and the death toll was 11 which is bad enough… woke up this morning and it was over 80 killed on the island alone 🙁

Cant really generalise on a such a small sample. Back in my swimming days then i was around alot of supremely fit female swimmers and there were no more lesbians amongst that lot than normal. However the female water polo team was a different story, this might just be a coincidence though.

anyway being teeny tiny is a huge advantage for going up hills

Is this it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IRjBqV_Vmw

the inner ring is pretty good too http://twitter.com/inrng

Groupetto safe, Cavendish deducted 20 points. Still in green but with a lead of 15 now

time limit was about 33 minutes

Groupetto had about 80 riders and finished about 2 minutes outside

info was from twitter – had tweetdeck open with some open searches – so when someone would mention groupetto or cavendish (etc) then those tweets would appear. very useful tool for getting information fast

Cav outside the time limit 🙁

Only 78 riders inside it

Apparently Rojas is in now

Great afternoon of viewing

Superb ride from Schleck…unfortunately reminded me of Landis, which is a real shame.

Chapeau to Voeckler and Evans too, no-one should be allowed to call Evans a wheelsucker again after today!

It depends where you are on the sizing chart – i was about 2 cm shorter than where the recommended large range began but they fitted me better better than the medium. However if i had the long leg version of the large then the leg would i suspect be too long, whereas if i had the long leg version of the medium it would be ok.

I dont like hurting people (and am also a coward for confrontation) so if i want to split up with someone i try to engineer it that they are the ones doing the dumping. One girl didnt take the months of hints…so i pretended to join the foreign legion, moved back home to my parents in Scotland and just stopped all contact overnight.

they are a bit shorter than some brands – not sean yates short though, more like about a cm shorter than my moa/nalini ones…so i think the long version would be too long for me, but it depends on your body size