You could try a 165mm crank on your front foot George, that will effectively move your COG 10mm further back. Two offset headset cups will move your forks 4-5mm forward too if you speak to the right people. SPDs and put the cleats right at the front of the shoes could help too.

You now it’s not the bike that’s causing you to go over the are though right? How is FW looking?

There’s one on eBay for £100 at the moment. That add is definitely to buy the lot, could be a good investment if you have the storage space and means to collect, but you might struggle to sell them all if you needed a quick return on your cash.

I’d love a couple if there was another 200 people that wanted in.

CRC have some Giros half price. I have the blue one, it’s great.

I wouldn’t buy the shorts, even the smalls are too big for me! But for £15 I’ll probably find a belt for them rather than send them back as you can’t buy shorts for £15 anywhere else and I don’t like spending money on stuff I’m just going to trash. The jacket and fleece-jacket thing I bought are both great though.

From Nan Bield you can easily ride most of the way to the top of High Street. If you do that, don’t do the descent down Riggindale Crag, although the first 100m is great, the rest is largely unrideable or grass. Kidsty Pike looks better, but I’ve not done it?

I’m moving to Durham sometime between now and October, will be after some input into some local trails at some point. Some evening blasts for my single speed would be perfect!

Ciaran Path is one of my all time favourite trails. It’s one where a Dropper is extremely useful though.

I read it, it seemed to be building up to say something, but just ended. Girls on bikes are cool though.

Nope. The Carbon 456 can, but not the regular one.

My stuff that arrived yesterday is great. I reckon one of the problems they have is that online you can’t tell which of their jackets are ultra lightweight pac in pocket things and which are padded winter jackets or anywhere in between.

My shorts are too big too though, so they’re going back.

Update: Freeborn are going to keep me in axles for the rest of the year then send me a new Rune frame when they become available towards the end of the year. The new Rune will run bearings instead of bushes. Proper chuffed, can’t praise Feeeborn highly enough.

Yeah, the bits of the Challenge that aren’t the normal trail are the footpath at the top and some bits run in the opposite way to normal, so not really accessible for you at during a weekend. Generally what’s in the forest is either fire road or the MTB trails, there’s not very much other stuff unless you leave the forest.

If you do the South Loop climb, when you get to the top you can hack through some undergrowth in the direction of Grisedale Pike onto the ridge and up onto the summit. From the top, right and onto Hobcarton End is a great descent back into Whinlatter, or you can go straight and bear left down to Coledale Hause, then left again into Coledale and Braithwaite. This is proper awesome rock descent. If you want more, head up Newlands as far as Stonethwaite, turn right up the old mining track, then right onto the top of Barrow. The descent off Barrow back to Braithwaite is really fast and fun.

HTH.

Dare2be have a sale on at the moment, I have one of theirs that’s at £20 at the moment, it’s a great bit of kit.

I got one on eBay from Hong Kong for £110 recently, it was reduced because although it was in English, a few symbols are still in Chinese apparently. I’ve not noticed any, think it’s things like Heading etc that I don’t use. I’m sure I could flash it with the GB firmware to sort it if necessary. So I’d check eBay.

Also, check what sensors come with each one you look at, some don’t have the heart rate strap, others come with the cadence sensor too.

No shit! Road cycling is far more dangerous than mountain biking, would much rather crash my mountain bike than my road bike!

I’ve run a bike with two seat posts, I had to go into a bike shop and have them try a few to get one the right size. I cut the head off the larger one and then cut a slot so it would clamp up, like I imagine you’re going to do.

I didn’t die.

I have the Canyon combined jobby, it’s great bit of kit.

Yeah, nice one. Two pairs of shorts, jacket and soft-shell thing sorted.

Do it.

Inflation has obviously played a part, but we got absolutely done over when things kicked off in 2008 as the pound sank against the Yen and the Dollar. Have Shimano prices been affected by the tsunami in Japan last year does anyone know?

I’m interested in forks, tyres, frame, brakes, stem+bars in roughly that order. Everything else I’m not arsed about, it generally all works and will wear out anyway.

Why has he put a set of cranks in that position?

If you run into problems, a second hand Magura HS 33 is a much better option than leaving it with v-brakes.

Yeah, move it back a week so it doesn’t clash with the Strathpuffer thing (or the Stockton Cycling Festival that I’ve already entered) would love to do an 8 hour race that’s not too far from me! Cheers.

I reckon what happened was they put the wheel on right, but couldn’t get the disc in between the pistons so figured it must be on the wrong way.

Transition Spitfire? 127mm, fairly light, will take up to 160mm up front for man trails and can be set up pretty slack or not so slack. Mine is great!

Yeah, Whinlatter is better, but NFT is still good I reckon. I didn’t ride it for years because everyone on here always says that it’s crap and you should go to Whinlatter or ride the natural stuff instead. When I did end up giving it a blast I really enjoyed it, more of an xc race bike venue than a 160mm mountain-masher place though.

When I did the NFT I found it really really good. Maybe not one to pootle around but it comes alive at speed. Whinlatter is better though, but then I don’t think there is a better trail centre than Whinlatter.

All sorted, SFN was only half in (Due to location of saw cut) so did take a bit of a bashing, but nothing excessive. Only had to move it about 5mm as I could tell once the top flanges were in it would have enough purchase to do the bearings off. So much better looking without that daft inch of spacers above the stem!

I’ve asked about carbon steerers before and the recommendation at the time was to go with the manufacturers own bit of kit. The Kinesis one is pretty good though. I’d imagine you’ll have the manufacturer’s thing to match the fork rather than to match the headset.

Sorry, carbon forks with alu steerer. I’ve done SFNs loads of times, no issues with putting the bolt in and bashing it, that’s what I’d normally do.

My question was really how should I support the forks? Drop outs onto some carpet, put the wheel in to support the forks, or support under the arch with a block of wood or something else?

tttf, I have the next size up Crosslight 5T (57 I think) in the Black/blue. I decided that it’s too big for me and that although it’s ok for winter riding and touring, I need the next size down for CX. I’ve used it for about 500 miles between October and February, not been crashed or damaged, might have the odd very minor scuff here and there.

If you decide that yours is too small for you, I’d be more than up for swapping frames with you, just drop me a message.

I don’t like anything about the way it looks, you’re not the only one.

Those bolts sticking out must be a joke surely?

What’s the Montreal Convention? I’ve not signed up to that.

I’m not sure I am worried, I’ve just heard other people be worried about these things and was more wondering whether I should be worried. It’s also inevitable that my girlfriend will ask the insurance question and her bike is so brand new I haven’t even collected it from the shop yet, so I’ll need a good answer!

If I completely strip the bike it’ll be a bag of bits, rather than a bike, only the frame would be over the £350 limit on that link I think, that could work.

I’m not too fussed so long as the airline doesn’t have any daft exemptions for damage etc. I don’t see how they can given that it’s booked on as a bike, but I’ll check the Ts and Cs. I’ve got cardboard to reinforce the bags with too.

Yes, Samuel L Jackson is lined up to star in this movie.

Might as well go SS as well though if you’re going all old-skool simple.

Also, consider your frame when buying your rigid forks; those on-one forks above are about the longest 26″ forks money can buy, they’re still a good 3-4cm too short for my frame (Transition TransAM), so my BB is too low, my head angle is all over the shop and I whack pedals all the time. 29er forks are 3-5cm longer and I’ll be swapping to a set fo these shortly.

Has made me a better rider, don’t notice the forks most of the time, but they’re a pain in the arse over rough stuff and especially braking bumps. You just can’t slow the bike down over braking bumps as it’s just bouncing off them, so you have to scrub speed before the bumps to still make the corners. I blame the 160mm skill-compensator brigade.

I do need to fit a 2.4 up front and convert to tubeless so I can drop the pressures a bit though, that’ll help massively.

My Fury is awesome, it also has all the offset thingies though. I should probably have a ride of it at some point….

Your issue will be getting the old headset out……

I can highly recommend the descent off Great Gable to Styhead if you need to add a bit of length btw.

Sorry, just realised you wanted the other way. Not sure I’d do that the other way, Rossett Gill is mental hard, all big steps and stuff, depends how up for a challenge you are. I reckon there must be a good descent somewhere round the back of Pavey Ark though. Langstrath is a pain in the arse getting along on a bike, though I’m told if you stay to the right of the river there’s a better path. Stake Pass is a good descent, steppy, but not as mental as Rossett Gill, but just doing that would leave you a bit short on fun stuff as its two flat dull trails linked by a carry and a descent.