I hate using the term “LOL” in forums and general web based activity, but that did actualy make me laugh out loud in a few places!

Generally YES as long as the parts still have some life left in them and you can be bothered to strip it all done and list it?

The other half bought a Garmin Dakota, one of the early ones, about 4 years ago. It’s awesome, we haven’t looked back since.

We spent a week biking in the Lakes using just this piece of kit. Downloading routes of the internet and riding other peoples trails. Niether of us had any experience of riding in the Lakes so being able to go out and ride at a decent pace all day without getting the map out at every junction was an absolute god send. I don’t even recall getting significantly lost.

Theyre also nice on a road bike, opens up the lanscape a bit as you can never ride off your map! You can adopt a “well lets see whats down there” attitude without worrying about it, instead of doing your rehearsed loop all the time.

If you’re a technophobe it may not be so easy. You need to use alternaticve software to plan your route and then export this to the unit. It’s too small and fiddly to plot a route on the unit itself, certainly on a Garmin.

The other option is to use someone elses route off a navigation/GPS site. This can then mean converting formats to get the one your specific unit requires. Again a bit fiddly and you end up flicking between sites to convert files on the web.

However the rewards are def worth it and I now have a wealth of rides on my pc I can call on at anytime, and also the understanding to use anyones route, anywhere in the UK! Thats a lot of riding and has to be the future of MTB.

Also being able to used AA batteries is an adavantage, especially if you dont have a OS map to back yourself up (not reccomended) Please use this approach with care if you are out somewhere remote!!

Happy trails 😀

+1 for Duck.

Did this one year, left it in the oven and went cycling in the Malverns for the morning. Got home to some cripsy slow roasted lovliness, and I was actually hungry, as I hadn’t been eating Qulaity Street and peanuts all morning! 😀

Gentlemen,
I think more care needs to put into the humble biscuit. Surely worthy of a set of rules all to itself?

Delicious & varied cheese is highly commendable, but don’t ruin it with cheap or stale biccies!!

I suggest
i) Sweet variety, Digestive or Hovis
ii) Seeeded vaiety, sesame or poppy seeds
iii) Something more traditional but crumbly & creamy

It’s great to have both if you have the option. You kinda need one to appreciate the other if that makes sense. Curry is great but I wouldn’t want to eat it everyday, scanario, I also like Thai, but which is best….

HT is more enjoyable for short twisty blasting singletrack, FS for the rocky steep all day epics. Sure they are also capable of doing both, just not so much fun…….and isn’t that what it’s all about after all!

I’ve been riding a Blur LT for 5 years or so, it does everything very, very well from XC to the Alps.

The Yeti 575 has a carbon rear end, I’d steer clear of that myself, just my opinion.

As said above, you can get a used Blur for good money in the classifieds. I will unfortunately be letting mine go soon, sad day, but if you are in the market for a large BLT in anodised Orange, give me a shout. It’s been well loved!

And Motorsport and Sailing, dont let her forget that!

Oh yeah, that sounds like a good deal. Needles to say I won’t be renewing with Orange 👿

Orange is going up 4.34% to existing customers. Really tempted to tell them to stick it, or perhaps just pluck a percentage out of the air and tell them I want to pay that much less?!

Thats seems to be what they have done, let me guess small print in the contract, blah blah……

I know it’s a trivial amount, it’s just the principle of the thing!

Type R, fun, bullet proof, cheap, paractical and my squeeeze 32mpg’s out of it. One of the best 6 speed gear box’s of it’s day and still up there. You do have to nail it to 6000 rpm to go anywhere though, so unless you have some quiet roads near you it may not be the best.

Older 350Z would have buckets of low down grunt, but does also has a massive strut brace right through the boot (well useful for bikes)

Get a cheap Scooby and keep the rest of the money back for the fuel bill! 😆

Golf is a good all round car, that is why it is the best selling car in Europe period! Something like a Subaru or Evo is going to be seriously BAD on fuel. Just look at the sort of money they are going for right now, thats a big clue.

A3 is just a more prestigous Golf, same chassis, it is not much more fun to drive, infact I’d say it is a little less involving than a Golf. Unless you get an S3 but again youre into the crap fuel economy end of the market.

A good compromise is a sport diesel, good mpg, good performance. If you can ditch the 4WD it gives you a lot more options to play with.

I just chopped my Civc type R 😥 for a TDI Golf that has 170bhp, it’s comfy and I can get to Wales and back on a tank of gas.

Good sport diesels are the way forward in my opinion, I’d be looking at a 3.0L TDI A5 or the 2.0L if your not fussed about it being quick and a 320 or 330D BMW coupe if you’re happy to put some winter tyres on her.

Happy shopping

Mac is cool, Tegged’s bunkhouse, Reditreks, is a great place to stay. He’ll advise you on routes as he runs the local bike shop. Haven’t been for a while, assuming business is still good!? He’ll also probably ask if you want to ride with the posse from the shop too, lovely people.

Cli-max is good but short, for a mixed all day ride go to Nanty Aryan and do the continental loop. (jealous)!

Trail Addiction, good times. Don’t self guide, you’ll miss a lot! Just follow someone thats being doing it for along time, but don’t try to keep up with them!! 😯

I was considering chopping my Cotic Soul in for one of these lovelies. I haven’t ridden one though and with the Cotic being soooo good, I’m thinking it may be a bit of a disapointment!?

Don’t want to compromise snappy singletrack handling to save a pound or two.

Any thoughts?

I’ve been making the effort to explore more local trails lately. Time doesn’t always alow a long trip. Living in Essex it’s all a little flat

It’s sometimes suprising what is on your doorstep however, and there is something rewarding about riding a trail for the first time, even if it’s not the best in the world.

Try and leave the car at home more often I say, there might be some good stuff just down the road.

I tried following an MBR route around the North Downs one time. A right royal pain in the bum, stopping to get the map out at every path junction, there’s a lot! Deffo ruins the flow of a nice piece of singletrack, having someone that knows their way around is great if you have never been to the area before.

Lets face it, we wouldn’t think twice about spending £30 down the pub, in fact it would be a cheap night out. 😀

On the other hand there is great satisfaction in finding yourself a new piece of trail for the first time.

If people were happy to get the OS maps out and self navigate all day, would we have as many trail centres as we do??

I bought a Garmin Oregon 300 or 400? a few years ago. It’s a bloody good bit of kit in my opionion. Doesn’t do all the fancy training things the Edge does as I don’t use it with a HR monitor, but for downloading routes of the net and general navigating it’s great.

It really frees up your riding and you tend to explore more, which is a part of mountain biking I’d forgetten about. Plus its all stored to do again next time.

Only draw back is you need the SD card OS maps which can be costly, although I managed to find the whole of the South of England and Wales on this site for £60 used, of a kind fella.

Saves faffing with a map and compass and speeds up your riding, in my book I wouldn’t like to be without it, and not beacause I cant read a map 😀

Well if it really was a lottery / random pick it’s the first time I’ve ever gotten lucky! Didn’t even get V tickets this year.

Sorry to those that weren’t so lucky

Just off to buy a scratchcard and a Lotto ticket, perhaps things have changed….

The Mrs and I got MTB tickets for the mens event, so did several of my mates.

Makes me wonder if your postcode carried any weight on the decision as we’re all local to “Hilly” Essex.

Should be good fun!

See you in the beer tent 😀

Most airlines take them, price varies considerably. Could probably get them on free with BA. Swiss air wanted about £120 each way…..!

Worth noting most travel insurance policies will only cover upto about £250 for a single item of baggage, so your bikes need to be insured by other means, assuming they’re worth more than that. Home contents etc.

I’ve been kitesurfing for a good many years now and this place has always offered good value suits, might be worth a look if you haven’t already checked it?
Got my summer and winter suit from them and they’re still going strong.

http://www.wetsuitoutlet.co.uk/index.php?gclid=CI6a6bKxxqkCFVJTfAoda1mVUw

This goin to be contraversal and there is a lot of associated BS with it but also a fair few positive results. Have a search for P90X. I’m going to tackle it after getting back from a week in the alps.

Nice one, thanks for the repsonse’s. Kind of the conclusion we had come too. Hacksaw it is!

http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/gpsbabel/

Online version of Babel to convert pretty much any format 😉

There's a load of trails on here to, but they will need converting from .MMO or .TRL.

There seems to be alot of MBR epics etc. already here, not sure if its kept upto date though?

Thanks for the suggestions I'll check those out. Seems like there is maybe not one definitive site like I had hoped?

If I find any others I'll post a link.

Cheers

I bought a second hand Giant off the bay, which I use for commuting. It's not exotic, but their bike nice geometry and offer good value.

Horses for courses!

Get up early and go to Afan. If you have never been and live for singletrack, there is a Nirvana!

Wow, how many guys on here are veteran windsurfers? I guess it must be an age thing?
I have fond memories of my Bic Electric rock, for it's time it was super quick and super light, ace for popping airs and real nice to carve gybe, even duck gybe ocasionally. I guess that was around 1988?

Thinking back the first time I ever saw a mountain bike was when the guy form the local windsurfing shop turned up with one in the back of his van. He started riding around the small hills by the car park because, as usual, there was no wind.

I remember thinking, yeah that will never catch on, rich boyz toyz. I now ride a Santa Cruz Blur?!

In fact it just shows how times have changed. I had two local windsurfing shops, and lived in Nottingham, 150 miles form the coast. I wonder what those guys are doing now?

It sounds to me a few people on hear would benefit from a trip to Egypt and a weeks kitesurfing. Those memories can be re lived, except in 25 degree water and crystal lagoons, instead of 5mm of neoprene.

Egypt is amazing and can easliy be done a budget. I can't recommend it enough for the windsurfing / kiting (but the food is lousy).

There's still a few die hards out and around. South coast especially.

Kite surfing really killed windsurfing. Thats why there isn't a massive influx of people into the sport now.

The equipment is much lighter, the air is much bigger, you don't need a roof rack or a van and if your'e talented you can probably pick up the basics in 3-5 days. You also need a lot less wind, so get out more often.

Plus there is a big skate / wakeboard / snowboard cross over, so it appeals to the youth generation.

Learning intermediate techniquies such as how to gybe and waterstart a windsurf board probably takes 6 months if you are very talented………..I loved it, but Kitesurfing still kicks it's ass.

After 6 months, you'll be jumping over the local kitesurfers with a tweeked grab or an inverted roll! (not recommended for health & safety reasons)

Caher,

I reckon you should give it a crack, if it's not crazy expensive. The winds in Lanzarote can be a little fickle in October. Trade winds are at their most consistent in the summer, so be patient.

There's plenty of schools in the UK though if you need another couple of hours of tuition when you get back.

I just hope you live near a beach, otherwise there's going to be a lot of driving going on……….I used to drive 2.5 hours there and back to go kiting for the day.

Thankfuly its only 30 mins now!

We also have a British 5 x World Champion at the age of 21 too!

Check Arron's sight for some inspiration.

http://www.aaronhadlow.com/

A good kitesurf school won't allow you to get spanked, safety is a number one priority although it doesn't look like a safe sport! It's their livlihood and reputation at stake.

If you have flown powerkites on the land for sometime expect to progress quickly. If you can snowboard / wakeboard / skateboard or surf, things may come more easily. If you have a basic understanding of sailing this will also help.

You need to be farily confident in the water as there are quite alot of duckings in the beginning.

If you don't have any of these experiences or skills you may find yourself a bit frustrated and not get the chance to get up on a board. A lot of kit flying and body dragging in the water proceeds putting a board on your feet, so this will be the staple of an introdauction course

All in all though it's a frikin' blast. I highly recommend it to anyone. Be aware though the airtime is highly addictive and easy to acheive, so you may find the MTB gathering dust when the sun is out and the wind is blowing………. 😉

Second the Afan lodge call, it's a great place. There's a bar downstairs for Apres ride drinks. The fry up in the morning is killer and the staff are really helpful.