For bimbling around on part gravel / part tarmac commute, 35psi. For racing on muddy off camber courses, about 25psi.

Tubeless setup (Crest rims and regular CX tyres) and a skinny 5ft7 rider here.

Too many variables to say a precise PSI, but I highly recommend going tubeless and dropping a few psi if you want some grip on off camber muddy CX courses.

Can’t believe some of the PSIs above! I guess that is the price of running tubes.

Snakeskin racing ralph all year round here with no complaints.

Seemed to be £40 from UK stores.

Are you perhaps thinking of the German shops? Maybe I’ll go down that route.

Still grumpy about that much money for a tiny piece of metal. :evil:

So any cheaper alternatives to the Reverb button kit?

Snagged the button on my shorts a few days ago, and it snapped the little metal bar within the button clean in two. As I picked up the end of the button and the remote is otherwise in working order, I only need the metal bar part of the button, which is only available as part of the £42 kit!

I have suggested to Fisher that it is clearly a useless design if it can be snapped by a pair of shorts, but SRAM tech aren’t interested in dealing directly with me, and insist that if I want them to look at it, it needs to go back through a dealer. Would I be wasting my time sending it back via Merlin (who sold the Reverb to me)?

I previously ran Maxxis Raze folding and now Schwalbe Racing Ralph on Crest 29er rims with a dab of sealant. No real issue with either – relatively easy to inflate with a track pump. Only had flats when the sealant had been in for a good while and was either used or too dry (that was on the Raze which was very worn by that stage).

Will stick another RR on for next cross season (current one is a bit bald from tarmac commuting)

From that SDD list, the Amberley one was broken last month but the Cocking one was a god send. I was doing it East to West and managed to miss a couple before those.

I’m currently running 1×10 (39t front for muddy Scottish races, 11-32 at the rear) – rare that I spin out in a race, only when commuting on the road.

I find the chainline less than awesome though, and I’m considering going to 2×10 with 11-27 or whatever out the back.

How common is a front mech failure, and has anyone else found that the wide chain angles on 1×10 can be a bit of a pain? I wonder if this is contributing to my rather rapid chain wear and iffy shifting.

Scrolling past the predictable posts, a couple of suggestions:-

If there is a lot of play when clipped in but when you try to move the cage left and ride with your hands it seems fine, your cleats are worn. Bin ’em and get some new ones fitted.

A service kit is needed when the pedal cage isn’t spinning smoothly (the needle bearing has gone) or there is left to right play in the pedal (the bearings are worn). Service kit is easy to do yourself. Worth investing in a big chunky screwdriver to get the end caps off without trashing them.

I am now trying some new seals for the inner seal in the hope that they allow the inner bearings to last longer than with the normal CB ones. Just fitted the new seals last night so I’ll need to run them for a while and see how they get on.

Keen to go with the Shortys for a bit.

Anyone tried the Tektro[/url] clamp on the Genesis?

Toe overlap with my size 7s and 51cm frame here too. Not an issue now that I run 170mm cranks and have my cleats far forward though.

This just popped up in a search for me.

I asked Dom that question the other day. His reply was “RR29 got shelved whilst I was developing the new SYNC Ti MTB frames”.

I’m seriously looking at an FF29. It is a little heavy, but actually not massively more than my XCPro3, so it’s still the front runner. The Planet X Dirty Harry is silly light for similar money, but I’d have more faith in the longevity of the Kinesis, and their customer service.

Well thanks for all the tips and updates STW hive mind. Did it today in the end – had a cold at the start of the week, so decided to delay a day, and unfortunately missed the better weather yesterday. Didn’t have any real targets, so took it easyish at the start. Tired from 40mi onwards (tough headwind section shortly before that) so pleased enough with 11hrs.

Strong winds all day, sunny for about 20 minutes at the start but grey everywhere else (a flake or two of snow) and the sun finally re-emerged for 30 minutes just before sunset as I neared Winchester. Temps between -1 and +3 all day, so difficult to keep warm in the biting wind.

Rode it East to West to get some benefit from the wind, but as I was heading NW really, and it is a NE wind, it was a side wind as much as anything else. Still helpful in parts, and definitely better than the usual West to East though. Walkers going the other way were definitely having a worse time of it.

Trail is riding really well. Dry and dusty everywhere except for one muddy descent. I’d recommend getting out before it rains again!

Rubbish photos as I only had my phone (and even that turned itself off as the battery didn’t like the cold):

Loving these updates. Delayed my ride until Wednesday now for various reasons – hopefully another dry and sunny today won’t do any harm.

Thanks for all the follow up responses. Will call the train company to see if it is do-able.

I’m planning East to West based on the wind forecast (as also suggested above). 5.20am train from Winchester gets me to Eastbourne after 8am. That fits within the rules for going in and out of Clapham Junction, but I wasn’t aware of the Brighton restrictions. Ugh!

With the clocks changing this weekend, I’m hoping that I’ll have just about enough daylight. If I can start in Eastbourne at 8.30am, that would give me 11 hours until sunset, and hopefully I could just then use a light for the last section if I’m taking longer.

Now if only I can get these darned trains to work out. Otherwise I’ll be in serious brownie point debt to my pregnant wife if I ask her for a lift from Winchester to Eastbourne at 6am!

Wow, lots of replies – thanks folks.

Sounds do-able if the current weather holds until early next week when I am hoping to ride. I had always intended to ride West to East, but I’m now intending to get a 6am train (well two really) from Winchester to Eastbourne, and finish in the holiday house we are staying in at Winchester.

The South Downs trains website doesn’t seem to suggest any issues with hopping on the relevant trains with a bike. Can anyone confirm if that is possible at 6.15am on a weekday (without a booking for me or the bike?)

Ah well, glad we headed the other way then. Sounds like I’ll continue to avoid the Nail Trail for the foreseeable future. Was such a nice piece of trail a few years back. :(

Great fun this morning, but hard work. We chose trails carefully – avoiding anything high and basically just playing around the edge of the Pentlands to avoid too much pushing.

Rode up the bottom section of Puke Hill and cut in to the woods on the right. Along there to the woods by the top of Torduff was good, as were the Clubbidean Woods. Poet’s riding well and the track southwards from the top of the Kirkgate was rideable. We turned right rather than left up to Maidens – the head wind and deeper snow up there would be tough I think. Around Harlaw level all pleasant, and nice to bump into a fellow STWer there Colin. ;)

Came VERY close to eating sheep s*** on the track from Easter Kinleith to Torphin though. Front wheel dug into a deep snow drift. Thankfully managed to get my hands out to brace the fall as a well placed pile of the smelly stuff rapidly approached. Take care out there folks!

I don’t know that the licence charge was actually enforced in practice in previous years.

I might not have been paying attention as I do have a BC licence, but I don’t recall being asked for details.

Based on previous years, no licence required. Short course rideable on CX or MTB.

800 lover here. Bought recently with OS maps. Price is fair if you get maps at the outset. For road use, you can get plenty of free maps as noted above. Very useful for big days out where you plot a route in advance and just want to get your head down and follow it.

Battery life is sufficient for most rides – following a route the other day, I was out for around 5hrs and still had well over 50% battery life left. It will drain more quickly if you are actively using it though (pressing the screen a lot, as opposed to just following the route and occasionally looking at stats).

I rode the course there last year – I understand that this year’s course is largely the same with a few tweaks.

Nothing terrifying or hugely technical, but it includes a short ride along the top of a wideish stone wall, a blast across some open grassy tracks, a section through the woods which got a bit churned up last year, some stiff climbs up short rocky firetrack sections, and some great swoopy bits (steep down and up chutes) which aren’t massively technical, but good fun.

It was very wet in the weeks preceding the 2012 race, but the course generally held up well, aside from a short muddy stint here and there. As above, there is some flint around, but I think a middle of the road tyre will generally be okay – I don’t recall seeing lots of punctures last year.

There was a more technical short bit taken out by the commissaires last year, but I didn’t see it. I think there is some talk of something similar being added back in this year.

Do you live locally? If you look on garmin connect you’ll find a GPS track from last year’s race, or I think you could probably get a tour round by the course organisers.

and i take it those needle bearing ones are the ones next to the retaining nut in that pic? just to clarify?

Yes. They will still be in the pedal body as they fit in so tightly they won’t fall out. You will need to tap them out with the metal bar. The Eggbeater 3 definitely has those needle bearings. The Eggbeater 2 and below have a yellow plastic bushing instead.

just a quickie though, mine only had 1 bearing in either pedal? what exactly is the needle in the bearing

You’re probably seeing the outer bearing which lies just behind the retaining nut.

The needle bearing is at the other end of the body – i.e it sits between the pedal body and the crank arm. If you squint inside the pedal body you should be able to see it. You get a little metal bar with the rebuild kit which you tap through to get that bearing out – it sits quite neatly so I can see why you would miss it.

Here is a pic with the needle bearings shown. I bet when you get them out, some of the little needles are dislodged.

mine are the 3 ones? i think about £90? i dont think anything was in there but i wasnt in the greatest light to see through the pedal TBH

In that case, I’d put my money on the needle bearing falling apart. I have Eggbeater 3s, and I’ve had the needles inside of the bearing come loose and therefore jam in between the axle and the rest of the needle bearing, preventing it from properly spinning.

A rebuild kit should see you right. As the needle bearings (the inner bearing) seem to fail first in my pedals, I’m considering just replacing them with the bushing you get in the Eggbeater 2 kit in future to see if that lasts longer.

Also – quick tip when servicing them – make sure you use a really big screwdriver on the end caps. They get chewed up pretty easily if you use a regular flat bladed screwdriver.

If it’s a t-shirt you want rather than a cycling top, Morvelo do some technical “dri-release” t-shirts. About £20 if you shop around.

Canal paths round here are better than the roads.

Road bikes will handle more than you think. Biggest problem is punctures IMHO, but offroad, holes in the path tend to be more rounded that craters in roads, so often not too big an issue.

did it come cheap from the ebay shop?

Deal with them, it’s their responsibility. However any should be able to….

Cheaper than normal, but still brand new. I could deal with them but it seems a bit pointless sending it to the other end of the country to go to Fisher if I could have sent it directly. Ho hum.

Might have a word with my friendly LBS then, although was hoping to avoid that as it isn’t very fair to them.

I did it in a day last year, albeit, it was a day with a relentless headwind, about 0 degrees and snowing in parts, so I used the road a bit to short cut some sections. Started out nicely, but I was being battered with hail/snow showers at regular intervals in the second half. A nice big day out with good scenery but no real interest in the riding – lots of firetrack etc. No doubt I’d have enjoyed it more in better conditions and with the usual prevailing south westerly.

I have the GPS plots below if they might be of interest, although I used a lot of road in the second half (I was cold, wet and thought I was running late for my train home, although ended up being rather early). The first half is fairly accurate to the route. There is a bit of a detour off Loch Laggan too I think, due to forestry work at the time.

Bear in mind that it is not signposted, so a Garmin 800 or similar might be useful unless you want to check a map periodically.

Let me know if you want any more info.

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I’ve had the lizard skins dsp on the CX bike and really like it. Pretty hard wearing and comfy.

I’ve done the rear glass on my 4S – it was a doddle. Just make sure you get the right screwdriver – some iPhones need a tiny pentalobe driver. I suspect the front is a bit trickier.

The answer the OP, I don’t have a custom one (bit spendy for me at the moment), but I do have two spoons and a knife, including a Surface edition (black with a nice blue base). No decent photos but the Surface is currently on my BFe (will probably end up on the CX bike or hardtail which are black/blue and blue/white respectively).

No anti virus here for years on OS X and no complaints. I wouldn’t bother unless you read about an increase on issues becoming more common in future.

Ah right, come to think I may have seen them there too. Also Dixons own Currys I thought Currys bought Dixons out.

Dixons, Currys and PC World are all brands under the Dixons Retail group (used to be DSG, i.e Dixons Stores Group). The Dixons name is now used for airports stores and online only, after their stores were rebranded Currys.

If you are in the area it is fine for a quick blast, although I wouldn’t go out of your way. Short trail with a nice jumpy section near the end (lots of small doubles and table tops). You can do part loops quite easily as it is a sort of a figure of 8. No facilities nearby other than a toilet block.

I haven’t been for a year or two so can’t comment on current conditions.

I saw a useful chart on wikipedia certainly suggsets that the 70D is next in line for an update.

But where will you buy it from?? Jacobs went last year and Jessops this year, no high street camera shops left.

Calumet[/url]?

Came across this on a search.

Are you wanting to sell the EA70? I might be in the market for a 350mm 2 bolt EA70 for my CX bike. Drop me an email if you want to sell mur10.

Tollah, I can easily send the gpx files by email from my garmin connect site. I’ll get on that this evening…

This extends the Water of Leith with some CX-able Pentlands tracks. My route finishes near my house, but you would just continue down the hill to pick up the Water of Leith path back towards town.

This version uses some back roads a bit to avoid the muddy puddles, but you could add in some extra off road trails here and there.

This should also be useful for the Water of Leith to Balerno and back. Pleasant enough of the CX bike and you can turn round sooner if you need to shorten it.

You can see the obvious spot in Balerno where I popped out onto the road. That would make a nice turn around spot for about 1h30 of riding.