And if you go the otherway, onto Dale Head, there’s a great descent there that runs all the way to Cat Bells. I miss being in the Lakes 🙁

Great Gable to Styhead to Borrowdale is pretty mint. Park at the mine, skirt around Green Gable and hike onto Great Gable. Massive descent then whinch up Honister Pass to finish. If you want it a bit longer I can highly recommend starting with Warnscale Bottom and adding Scarth Gap then over Haystacks to get back on course.

Exactly, as said earlier it is comparatively cheap when you bear in mind that the shifter is Di2.

I suspect that there simply isn’t an easy way to do this with mechanical shifters for packaging reasons, which is why this has come out as Di2 only.

That said, the price of the Di2 shifters seems out of whack to me, considering that the two mechanical buttons must be far cheaper to construct and fit into a shifter than the mechanical versions, the shifters should be a lot cheaper and then this should be a much cheaper package.

Why not just buy a Crossmark?

I rode up the Struggle on Saturday, saw three cars, no issues. The descent off the top you’re held up by the cars, so no hassle either. You do hold people up when you get into the bottom though, but what can you do?

Hardknott and Wrynose passes are harder I think, but the Struggle is probably in third place.

Amazing. The best bit is not running for a month after doing a 50 minute 10k!

So basically that Giro was ideal prep for the Tour for Wiggins, hard racing without having to do a full 3 weeks. Not good news for Froome, great news for the public. Tour might kick-off in the way it looked like it might last year.

I’d do it that way me. It’s worth pushing up towards Esk Hause and descending to Stockley Bridge from higher up though, it’s really really good.

I’ve got one spare too if you want it.

I’m not too arsed about insurance off the property to be honest, I’m comfortable with that risk as I can manage it and it would only be one or two bikes max that went.

I need to weigh up the risks v the cost if quotemehappy are likely to be problematic as the next quote up is too expensive really. Likelihood of theft is very low compared with the average and it wouldn’t really matter if they weren’t all replaced as I have more than I need really. Just need to make a decision quickly as I need the insurance in place before we can buy the place on Friday.

Are bike specific policies still generally about 10% of the replacement cost?

From the FAQ:

The question
Are bicycles covered under home insurance?

The answer
Yes –while they’re in your home or outbuildings (not in the garden), they are covered under the contents section.

We offer pedal cycle options which will cover all the cycles in your household for theft, accidental loss or damage, including incidents occurring away from your home, if secured to an immovable object, anywhere in the world.

You should choose a sum insured which is high enough to cover your most expensive bike and each of your bikes will be automatically covered up to this limit. This is optional with all cover levels.

I’ve run the 2.4″ RQs on everything, including DH. They’re great all-round tires. I would run the 2.4″ at the rear, unless it doesn’t fit. As a example, the 2.4″ fits great on a 456C, doesn’t fit a Banshee Spitfire or a Transition TransAM, but only because there’s not enough mud clearance. The 2.4″ also won’t fit a Bomber 44 fork as it’s too close to the arch.

Just got some Hans Dampfs on a bike and these seem very good too, stiffer side walls, similar grip, but not as big as the RQ2.4s.

Plenty of modern stuff won’t take a taper, especially steel hardtails. But that aside, lots of people don’t ride ‘modern’ stuff and it restricts the use of low-stack anglesets.

I’ve got 5 20mm wheels, only one is convertable. That kit costs a tenner, so even if all the wheels were convertable it would be an extra £50+ to allow compatibility.

RS ahve told us for years that 20mm is stiffer and better, so why are they changing their mind for a 160mm fork that’s designed to be stiff?

Sounds great in principle. Except for two minor minor tiny little details:

1. Tapered steerer only.
2. 15mm only.

That must rule out a significant chunk of the market, especially as it has largely been RS pushing 20mm forks for trail riding. I’ve pretty much got all 20mm wheels and won’t be buying any forks that mean I need to replace wheels too as the forks are pricey enough.

I don’t have mail I don’t think, nothing in Junk either. Did you substitute ‘username’ for my username in the email address?

Thanks!

Please might you fire that .gpx in my direction too?

I drive past Farleton a lot as it’s between here and my Parents house and it would be good to have a stop-off-and-ride option!

username@mail2web.com

Thanks!

Forehead and stem for me. I too try to avoid it, but sometimes there are big drainage ditches.

Oh right, I’ll try riding a bit faster then, thanks for the tip.

Does it?

Yeah, I very rarely get full travel on any of my bikes, apart from the rigid one. You bottom out when you get things completely wrong and need rescuing, if you bottom on a regular ride then your bike is a wallowy mess. Full travel on 150mm+ forks will pitch you forwards a good bit too, which sin’t really conducive to rapid progress.

I have a Wippet with X-lite forks and a smattering of light bits, singlespeed so must be around 20lbs. Great bike and it’s fun to ride something completely different. Struggles on rock, but flies on anything else and will make a man of you. Might as well if there’s room in the garage.

I wouldn’t swap personally, but that’s just me. In fact I’m in the market for some more Lyriks, so let me know if you do sell….

What you’re doing sounds correct, perhaps the caliper moves slightly when you torque the bolts fully? If he normal method doesn’t work, you’ll have to adjust it manually by working out where it’s rubbing and moveing the caliper a bit to compensate.

I don’t see the point in one on my SS, stood up on the climbs and stood up going down, so I put the seat 3/4″ below optimum for climbing and then only sit down on the flat.

If I ride my XC bike I tend to leave the seat up as that’s what the bike is all about and if you’re racing you need to ride stuff without pratting about with your seat height.

I do need one on my Jekyll though as it’s got all the adjustment for the suspension on the bars, so it’s annoying to flick various levers and then still have to get off for the seatpost. So I’ll probably get a reverb in the near future.

I have 6 mountain bikes, so there’s no way they’re all getting one!

There was snow at Cragg Quarry last week before it snowed, I would expect that Lee would be under some snow now and it’s not really the sort of place you want to be riding in the snow I don’t think, too many hidden rocks!

Interested in the answer too as I’d like to ride one night this week without getting stuck in the snow.

It does get pretty windy here, but not today. If it was windy on the ridge you wouldn’t go up, but you can find out when you get there and still have a good and safe ride in the forest. Can’t think of too many routes like that, which is why that would have been a decent plan today.

Hello, I do know the area very well, I grew up here and was riding off the big stuff up here when I was 16. It’s a good route because you don’t have to commit to going up high until you know what the ground conditions are like. Once you’re at the top of the South loop you can fairly easily assess whether to carry on or not and bailing still gives you a great ride out. Most alternatives you’re either committed or abandoning and going back the way you came.

The climb to the summit is 30 minutes and fine if it’s not windy, you can find that out before you get to the narrow bit, so minimal risk. Once you’re on the top the descent is a good one to do under a bit of snow and you’re sheltered and away from any dangerous bits and you’re back in the forest in 15 minutes or so.

I wasn’t saying it was definitely on, but it’s a good route that lets you play things by ear. As it is most of the snow round my way has cleared today and it’s pretty calm, so it might have worked. I stayed in and watched the F1 though 🙁

I’ve (almost) got a former blacksmiths forge in my back garden, it’s as big as the house. Is going to make a great retreat for me once I’ve got the house fixed up and can crack on with it.

Planning to run water and gas out there so I can heat the place and setup a compact wetroom. Idea is to be able to come in from a ride covered in mud, straight into the wetroom to shower mud off clothes, off me and off the bike. Also thinking about casting some concrete worktops and setting up a section of the ceiling that winches down to floor level with the bikes, so they’re all hidden out of the way. Obviously extending my network out there and putting a PC in etc.

Unfortunately, I have to leave at least one of the garage spaces for car storage, but there should be plenty of space to use it as a film room and as somewhere to sit on the rollers too as well as for practical man stuff.

Don’t tell the girlfriend, but I’m more excited about this than the rest of the house!

Look on connect.garmin.com and use the Explore feature and I’m sure you’ll find lots of routes. I suspect lots of Kendal based riders get the ferry over and ride from there so you’ll probably find quite a few rides that start exactly there. Strava will also show you some stuff, but it’s a pain to get the routes off onto a GPS.

eg. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/281219298

Jump on the ferry to the other side of the Lake and you’re into some really good stuff straight away, you’re also one hill away from Grizedale Forest. Great place to ride, loads to do.

I’m around and riding tomorrow, not up for a huge effort, 2-3 hours pedaling time or so. I was thinking about just going to Whinlatter anyway as the trails are riding great and anything else is going to be unpredictable. Need to keep the altitude relatively low too which rules out a lot of stuff.

If it looks ok when your’e in the forest you can always crack on to the top of Grisedale Pike and do Hobcarton End, or the rocks in Coledale could work too, but best to see when you get there I reckon.

Anyone know what the Borrowdale Bash is looking like?

That last pic of the road is what I couldn’t get up yesterday. That was the only bit of the road that really had any significant drifts, the rest was pretty much clear.

At the top where the road goes left is where the car went off and is sat upside down against a tree with it’s roof caved in.

Wider wheels on a road bike can produce lower overall wind resistance, but they’re not more aerodynamic on their own.

More of the spoke is hidden behind the tyre and the wider tyre smooths the flow of air onto the downtube. There could be benefits around the interaction of the air with the forks and calipers too.

Reading this thread you’d think there was armagedon going on up Whinlatter, but it’s really not all that bad up there. Looking at the news it’s much worse in other bits of the country. There’s no snow on my garden here and you can see the grass through a light covering of snow on the hills between here and Whinlatter.

I’d agree regarding people travelling from further afield as the roads seem worse away from Cumbria, but I think that’s something for individuals to make their own decisions on, not the organisers. Once the tree is gone from the A66 and the M6 at Shap is clear anyone that can get to the M6 can get there relatively easily at the moment.

Anyone been up the pass from the Keswick side at all? It was passable yesterday and there hasn’t been any more snow, though there could have been more drifting. I got the impression that it wasn’t as bad on the Keswick side, but didn’t have a look.

I did see a quad bike with a plough on the front up there yesterday and I’d expect what drifting there was on the road could be cleared relatively easily, the main car park had 4 inches drifted across the entrance and would be harder to clear and I don’t know what the fireroad carparking is like. A lot of the fire road I rode was clear because the wind was blowing snow into the trees, especially lower down.

I’d er towards the side of leaving the event on at the moment myself, but it’s due to snow again tonight isn’t it. If that happens it could well end up being cancelled at the last minute. Difficult call for the organisers.

For info, I was riding brand new Hans Dampfs today and they seemed pretty much perfect for the conditions. Chances are the conditions will change, if I do a few laps tomorrow it might be an ice rink for you by Sunday 🙂

I just remembered that I bailed on the challenge last year because I knew after the first climb I wasn’t going to finish because of the heat and that if I didn’t do the second climb I’d get home before the F1 started! I know that sounds pathetic, but I was in the middle of a bullshit redundancy thing and hadn’t slept properly for a few months and just felt awful.

Anyway it was pretty much the hottest day of the year last year about 25 degrees I think. Mental.

That sounds ok, I’ll see what the weather man says in the morning….

I grew up in Pardshaw over the hill out of Loweswater, but live in Durham and work in Manchester these days. I came up for the weekend as there was a new bike sat waiting for me at my parents’ house. I wouldn’t normally have gone out in weather like that but new bikes need to be ridden don’t they!

I can ride Loweswater from home, but I struggle to turn it into a decent length ride without either doing loads on the road, or going up that bog towards Floutern Tarn and then getting abused by walkers along the side of Crummock. Any ideas? Probably too much snow to go over Scarth Gap from Ennerdale.

I’ve just been for a ride round Whinlatter. The trail is riding absolutely fantastically, ground is frozen with half an inch of snow across the trail that’s giving tons of grip. One other set of tyre tracks have been round today and it was a great ride out considering the weather. All a bit Narnia really.

However, up around the top of the North Loop there’s quite a few bits that have drifted. I managed to ride most of it, so it’s not too bad, but the first bit off the fire road climb isn’t rideable.

I’ve no idea whether putting a load of bikes through it will turn it to ice or whether the grip will stay, I guess it depends on the temperature. Later on there’s some ice under the snow, but nothing too treacherous. Descents were fairly decent, but you needed to reign things in a bit as it was hard to feel the grip under the front end and if it had washed it was going to be a hard impact! I suspect there’ll be big queues on the technical descents as the roadies won’t know what to do with it 🙂

Putting a normal race field up it will be carnage on the slippier bits, though I’d guess the field will be much smaller so that will help. My guess is that if the weather stays like this is that it’ll still be fun but difficult to really race as there’ll be big queues on the singletrack. Still quite a bit of time to go though, so it could all change.

I’d guess the decision to go ahead or not will come down to the condition of the roads and parking rather than the trail and that if it goes ahead people will have to be a bit pragmatic when it comes to what they expect from the event.

I couldn’t get up the pass from the Lorton side and left my car at Spout Force and rode in from there, the pass is mostly fine apart from the steep bit after spout force where it’s drifted as well as being steep. My Focus had no chance.

Coming back down I was flagged down by a young couple whose car had gone off the road and was upside-down against a tree with the roof caved in! No idea how but they barely had a scratch on them, one sore elbow and one suspected concussion. SO they had to be ferried to the hospital. No idea what’s what on the Keswick side, but there were more tracks coming the from that way, so I suspect it’s better.

I might go back tomorrow as I’m struggling to think of anywhere to go that’s not going to be worse, though perhaps the Borrowdale Bash might be an option.

25mm, every day’s a school day!