Only had a very quick play on a full Jones bike at the old Kielder 100. Looked shiny, didn’t get to do anything other than a quick car park lap so can’t comment on ride quality.

Had a set of Loop bars on my SS 29er for a while though, to be honest I didn’t get on with them. The sweep was just a bit too much for me and I never felt as comfortable on them as I did when I switched back to a normal flat bar on that bike. Wouldn’t derive a excellent/good/poor/rubbish scale from that, but they just didn’t work for me. Other people’s experiences may vary.

HitFilm Express is very good, very powerful, not too hard to learn and free for the basics. You pay for additional transition packages/add-ons, but the basic free package is still fairly comprehensive.

5thElefant – Member
Unit. Totally gender neutral and impossible to cause offense.

Unless you’re calling her a C-Unit…

Rocky Mountain Element?
New one should be out later this year:

Away from lone trees.
Forest is fine, as long as you’re not the tallest thing about and nothing’s going to come down on your head in the wind.

I’ve put out the signage on chunks of it over the past couple of years – basically, what bikebouy said. I’ve felt rattled to hell on sections on 35c CX-Kings, about right on most stuff on 40c Gravel Roads, and over-tyred and draggy on 2.25 Ardents on different bikes. There’s a lot of variety in the route, so no one thing will ever be ‘perfect’, but I’d say 28’s would lead to a loss of feeling in various extremities and a chunk of time trying to hold on to your teeth.

Oh, and no tyre works well through ‘Bog Trotters’, save perhaps a fat bike one.

I’ll see you there though, I’ll be the short beardy chap marshalling somewhere on the route again.

Presto supermarkets.

I end up on the ‘cross bike for winter – from a mildly pimped Giant Defy to a mildly pimped Cotic X. Needs some lighter wheels, though, that’s next on the list.

Near Orasaigh, South Uist

(Okay, it’s not me and my bike, but it’s two friends and their bikes, and I’d ridden with them then run up to the top of Orasaigh itself to get the pic!)

Hunts?
HUNT 50 Carbon Wide Aero Wheelset

I use a few on different bikes, two Topeak, one BiKase, but my favourite for fit and looks is a Krieg one. Velcro strapping seems to fit better on the bikes I have than the clippy ones. It’s a good size, fits a 29er tube, CO2 cylinder and head, patch kit, tyre levers, multitool and split link, and looks less boring than most because it has The Cat In The Hat on the outside:)

Krieg USA – Super Strong Cycling Saddle Packs – 10 Custom Designs

Riders at The Heb adventure race on the beach near South Boisdale, South Uist

I’ve a variety of stoves that get used at different times:
Alpkit Brukit – works alright, bit big for bikepacking, grand for a quick hill-top brew.
Hi-Gear Blaze Ti – Tiny dinky ti stove, goes in a Ti mug with a 125 canister, works well. Dunno if they still do them, was a cheapy from Go Outdoors.
Esbit Kaffeekocher – Very nice hexamine-fuelled mini coffee machine. Shiny stainless steel, mainly a novelty but very cool first thing in the morning.
Trangia Triangle with Evernew ti meths burner – The most used of my stoves, brilliant thing with a fairly effective windshield. Needs a little wire adapter to get the burner to sit right, but it’s compact and weighs not very much.

RIP Prince.

A couple of years ago I got a “we have a parcel for you” note on my birthday. I didn’t know what it was our who it was from, and had to wait nearly a whole week until I could go get it, anticipation building all the time.

When I finally got there it was a free washing powder scoop the wife had sent off for weeks ago. Gutted…

A mate was just about bouncing when he got a ‘we have a parcel for you’ note, expecting it to be the brand new shiny iPhone he’d got on his insurance after dropping his old, knackered one and it getting run over. Ran all the way to the sorting office the next morning, clutching the card feverishly, big grin all over his sappy mush.

Imagine his disappointment when it turned out to be a sample pack of Tena Men that some callous soul had ordered for him…

Not bad thinking, just keep an eye on what’s deemed ‘mandatory’. The current kit list states spare thermal top and headlamp as well as the bits you’ve mentioned. I’d disagree with aracer about using CX on the machair, but I know we’ve both raced up there before so it’s totally personal opinion and choice.

If you go to Leeds in the morning, Sheffield in the afternoon, Hull for tea then Whitby for a fish supper, you’ve not been to the Yorkshires have you?

Well, you’ve been to the four Ridings, or more accurately, three s**tholes and Whitby.

Had homemade naan bread pizza for tea.
Drinking a little glass of Basil Handleys bourbon
Not listening to owt, but reading a photography book.

I certainly can’t remember any head injuries due to helmet failure back in the 80s

I’ve dealt with four in the last five years, all using crap Pro-Tec or Wildwater helmets, and more back beyond then. And a concussion to someone wearing a Rocker.

not even on “natural” rivers like the Trywerwyn, which I’ve navigated with my head nearest the river bed on occasion.

Likewise, and I holed a Pro-Tec flipping on Cafe Wave and swimming down to the raft egress. Fortunately the helmet took the brunt and I was dealt with a minor headache and a sore neck.

Having safety’d a bunch of slalom events, right up to Div 1/Prem, there were a lot of people in kit that I wouldn’t put a fresher into for a flatwater paddle, never mind for a slalom down Town Falls. While the cheaper plastic lids pass the BS/EN standard impact tests, I wouldn’t trust a helmet that I can flex the edges together without much effort…

Back on topic: Football, and the amount of money it attracts. Utterly does not compute.

Looking at the mandatory kit, I’d say a rucksack was a better shout, unless you’ve got a big bumbag! Even on the runs, you’ve got to have/carry headtorch, waterproofs, spare thermal, maps, first aid and survival bag as well as food and water.

Bike depends on what you’re comfortable on. The two big runs look to include a bit of bog yomping and next to nothing on trail – think open moorland. Rucksack’s a better idea than bumbag, a light 20-ish litre bag would hold mandatory kit, food and your trainers pretty easily.

Don’t know about the Hebridean Way section near Langas, but most will be grand on a hardtail. If you’ve got semi-slicks or something less draggy than a full knobbly you’ll be grand.

??

I have no idea what this is on about

Your mother got a wooden leg with a kickstand

It’s a slight misquote of a Pharcyde lyric, from the track ‘Ya Mama’. Should be “ya mama got a peg leg with a kickstand’ as opposed to the other verse “ya mama got wooden legs, but real feet”

90’s rap. Go figure.

Hiya Robbie, I’ll be there as the race photographer. Have raced the older Heb race and know the setup pretty well, what do you want to know?

Hence fast charging data block cables:

Ta-da![/url]

It’s 10am-1pm, so they wouldn’t be bored for that long ;)

If I ever get to the stage where I ‘need’ a travel mug I hope against hope that I have sufficient of my faculties intact to be able to end my life there and then.

I don’t ‘need’ them, but if I brew a pot of coffee of a morning and there’s some left over, it makes more sense to take it with me in an insulated container than leave it to go cold and waste it.

Also makes winter weekend mornings going kayaking a darn sight more pleasant – I can stand around fully kitted up and sup a nice warm brew while I watch hungover university freshers faff about endlessly getting dressed before we finally get on the river. The Forge mug can then sit in the bottle holder in my boat for if I get a bit chilly watching the inevitable million swims.

(I’m with you on chastising the “I’m no use without coffee” crew though. My response to a muppet at work saying that was “And what makes you think you’re any more useful with it?”…)

Think it was £15.

I’ve got two of the Camelbak Forge ones and they’re pretty damn good.

one massive cluster**** of a misguided experiment in social engineering, designed to benefit nobody but the bankers and bureaucrats.

Does that mean we’re getting rid of the Tory government as well then?

< lights blue touch paper, wanders off to stand well back… >

Rules in slalom in the UK (and maybe internationally, I don’t know!) say each competitor waits for the next person down to finish to act as a safety in case they swim. Always nice to see them stop and congratulate each other and all stick together though. Joe Clarke did ace, so close between the top 5 though!

For you Tommy, ze war is over!

True story – when my Grandad was taken as a prisoner of war during WWII, the German officer said that to him. As my Grandad’s name was Tommy, that confused him greatly.

Since it only does it on freewheeling I took it as a sign that I needed to pedal more.

Pulsing hum… Could be Portishead or Massive Attack, I think.

It’s novel at the moment. Give it a few weeks and it’ll be passé.

A poll in Rolling Stone apparently rated Miley Cyrus’ version of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ as the worst cover of all time… I’ve never listened to it, just in case.

While Johnny Cash did some great covers on The Man Comes Around, his version of ‘Bridge over Troubled Waters’ definitely isn’t one of them.

I wonder if (Yates) ‘ll ever get proper GC support at OBE? A team packed with stage winners, I doubt they’d ever be able to put personal ambitions aside.

Watching/listening to the ITV4 coverage yesterday they spent a good while talking to Matt White, the OBE DS, and he made a few comments about them “morphing into a GC team”. Between the Yates brothers and Esteban Chaves they’ve got potential high GC riders now so it may be that they do.

Hamburg’s pretty good, but cover the fair (Dom) as well.

“I got 50 Bentleys, in the West Indies”

It doesn’t matter…