Delusional – I said they could be the best. We will indeed see in a year, the World Cup is being held in a NZ winter, it is a large number of games in a short time, injuries happen, it is impossible to say who will perform for those 5 or 6 games and who will fail.

As for the England football reference, Wales have two Grand Slams in recent times, England have won nothing for 40 years. When Wales turn up they are a great side. Their front 5 is solid, they have talent coming through in the back row and Henson changes the whole shape of their backline and massively improves the shape of their defence. They have been struggling at 10-12 ever since he flaked out, after all his problems the players will welcome him back with open arms so what does that say about his place and importance in the squad?!

Phillps
Biggar/Jones
Williams
Henson
Roberts
Halfpenny
Byrne

Thats a great backline, Aussies, Kiwis and maybe the French might get close to it but there is a game breaker in pretty much every position in that Welsh lineup.

Henson & Roberts may well be the best centre partnership at the World Cup. In fact, Wales could have the best set of backs at the World Cup.

Its an extra inch or two on either side of the bars, unless you are riding in very tight trees it won't make much difference. They really come into their own on rough descents, it requires less force on the bars to keep the front wheel where you want it.

Real Cycles have some very good offers on Meta 5 framekits if you are interested in the Commencal. You could build a Meta 5 with a Merlin groupset and some decent wheels for under £2k.

Lovely bike, you must be a happy man! I only got 1 ride on my Mythic before Ae Enduro and she was reet, I'm sure you'll be grand.

That must be the trail to Loriaz that I read about, described as tough on foot, don't fancy it with an SX Trail over my shoulder.

Geetee you are right, that is a great trail on Flegere. It is difficult to capture the hiking trails properly in a single picture – there is so much vertical drop that you can get a huge variety of terrain in one trail – there are tracks like that Flegere on all over the valley.

I bought direct from Propel over the phone, paid around lunchtime, arrived the next morning. It was a bit lucky because I was watching them on UK Bike Store for a while and only rang Propel when UK Bike Store went out of stock. They are running down stock and have some black Hyper 3s which are slight cosmetic seconds going for £65.

PSA, Propel are clearing stock of the Wingnut stuff, I got a Hyper 3 with a big discount!

Incredible pictures! I'm looking forward to Morzine next week but you can't beat the feeling of gettng away from it all on deserted trails. There is still a fair bit of snow at the backside of Le Tour.

Seriously?!

They spent the entire first half kicking the legs off Robben every time he got the ball. His opposite number was subbed off because he was one more challenge away from a second yellow card, and was lucky not to be off already. They had a man sent off for stamping. Juan shouldn't even have started the game after an obvious deliberate handball in the last game.

Brilliant game, can't say I'm sad to see the back of Brazil, they must have the dirtiest back 4 in the competition. Kaka dived in the box, the ball went up the far end, Robben got hacked down for the umpteenth time in the game and the Brazilians all started crowding the ref claiming it was a dive.

Good riddens!

SFB, do all these little tiny internet victories over strangers ever really make you happy?

What does it matter what people put up on Youtube?!

It all seems to go hand in hand with the 6" all mountain, trail centre riding, body armour wearing cock-fest that is the public face of Mountain Biking (TM) we see today.

You must be disgusted that so many terrible people have entered the sport and given it a bad name.

Can't say I ever forgot that. If you don't accept that fact, then don't ride a bike.

Anyway, I like people wearing too much armour. Nothing like screaming past someone on their 6" trail bike, in a Met Parachute and full pressure suit whilst on a 23lb XC race bike, road helmet, and full-on jayboy lycra. Preferable whilst airborn. Makes me feel like a real man.

There are probably underlying psychological reasons why you don't feel like a real man all the time.

You could probably get a decent Hilux for that money.

Good luck to everyone that is trying this. I'll definitely be giving it a crack at some point to see how it affects me.

Its a bit sad that there are a couple of clowns that can't stay out of the thread and mind their own business.

There have been a few threads recently which you could search back for. I'll be kicking about and am happy to show you some trails or mark a map.

They might just close the scheme to new applications but I would be astonished if they tried to make everyone pay up in one go. Osbourne mentioned several times in the budget that they aren't going to overspend on administration where there isn't big money to be recovered.

I did a couple of runs of very tight switchbacks last summer with a French guy, he would brake into a nicely balanced endo, then just line the back end up exactly where he wanted it and shoot off, it looked pretty smooth.

I tweaked mine again last weekend – my tear was running parallel to the edge of the cartilage, they stitched it but it still gives occasional hassle, way more than the ACL itself.

The more time you can spend off your feet the better, especially if its already inflamed. I have been RICEing mine all week, it has responded very quickly and I've gone from a pronounced limp to walking pretty normally. If you can do some light stretching it will help loosen up the muscles which are probably tense from trying to protect the injury.

Obviously recovery time will depend on the severity of the injury and the level of rest you give it, supports aren't much cop for meniscus injuries other than providing a bit of compression. I don't really run on mine any more but I do a bit of circuit training, once they get to a certain point you just have to accept that you'll get more milage out of it by managing the injury and minimising the impacts on the meniscus.

Congratulations, should be a great holiday.

Did you win a course with Insted?

If so they are a legitimate business and have been teaching English in the Chamonix valley for a number of years. They seem to specialise in lovely young ladies and gents who are trying to justify a season or extended vacation but I've heard the courses are very good too.

The Specialized MTB one I have was about £50, its decent enough. I'm just not great at dealing with loads of heat so I thought it might be a cheap way to keep cool. I could always just take the lid off on the climbs but that is a whole other can of worms…

As a few people above have already said, they can be a little bit sterile in terms of handling. I had a quick spin in one and it did feel slightly wooden. Everybody complains about snatchy brakes in VAG products, but you get used to them very quickly. If you want something small and quick with 4WD, and you don't want a jap import you are pretty short of options, the S3 will be a great mile-muncher on all those NZ A-roads and they are a very nice all-round motor.

We used to ski Courmayeur loads when the lifts were closed in Chamonix, so there might be the opportunity to take the bus through the tunnel if its really grim.

At this time of year there is no base in most places, the ground temps will be higher and the sun is very strong so anything that does fall will melt like the proverbial snow off a ditch.

The road isn't too bad, after all it is easier than gaining the same amount of height on fire roads or singletrack. I didn't mean to exaggerate the climb, I was just surprised to see a local downhiller kid pedalling his bike up any kind of hill, never mind that one. It is actually quite a nice climb, the views back over Col de Montets and away over into Switzerland get steadily better as you gain the height.

I took a quick look at a hiking routes book recently (Mont Blanc Wanderings, Nat Jennings, I think), as far as I remember it said that the path from Loriaz was a bit of a scramble to hike, so that might not be the exact trail you are looking for.

I was coming down from the dam on the road bike last summer and I saw a guy winching a big full susser up the road, there must be something worth descending up there because the climb is tight enough on a road bike in the summer sun.

The Spitfire could be very slightly slacker than you want at the front, but its very close to what you've described. With two shock positions and a range of options for lower headset cups you would be able to fiddle about until you got it the way you wanted it. You might not be miles off your target weight either, mine is 30lbs with flats, without trying too hard at all.

Monkeyfiend that is correct, as long as the scheme does not discriminate between employees.

Yeah Freeborn for the Spitfire, if you follow the links through their site theres loads of information about the design and the build options. Mine is 30lbs ish with a set of 32 Talas, SLX group, Pro2/Flows tubed 2.35 Maxxis, Wellgo Mags.

Take a look at the Mythic Spitfire, some great deals on them with Fox or Rockshox forks.

If you have a couple of drivers I would be inclined to drive it in shifts overnight, it is incredibly easy to eat up the miles driving at night compared to during the day in bright sunshine with more traffic.

If I was breaking the journey I would still do at least 3 or 4 hours on the Friday night when it is quiet, if you can get as far as Auxerre on the A6 then you will have a nice easy drive on the Saturday. We got into Calais early on a Saturday morning last year and the roads in the North of France were very busy. Traffic, queues at tolls etc probably added an hour to the driving time, and a fair bit of stress. We came back through there at night on the way home and couldn't believe the difference.

High5 Protein Recovery, strawberry flavour, 3 scoops in a pint of milk.

I would go for a 20" to be honest, running a short stem. I am a wee bit taller than you but I still felt a bit cramped on the 18". If you are using Talas anyway you can sharpen up the handling by running them at 120 on the flat.

I'd be sceptical about Creatine, it really seems to be for bulking up although I'm sure there are specific uses for endurance sport.

Protein supplements are good for a recovery drink if you have been working hard, taking them as a routine can just add calories if you aren't training enough.

If you are getting keen on working on your fitness the biggest difference you can make will be how much you train, and what you do. If you take a more structured approach, set yourself some goals and do a couple of interval/gym/circuits sessions, or just start gradually increasing milage, then you will start to figure out more about diet, recovery and rest as you go along.

Its a personal choice, if you are worried about how or why other people are doing things then you need to find something more interesting to do yourself.

Aren't you just crazy?! I bet you just crack yourself up.

I think protein shakes have their place, I don't gain muscle very easily and I have become noticeably stronger since I started adding the High5 powder to pints of milk after training. I have noticed that I crave it worst after weights/plyometrics/circuits or an interval session, wheras I tend to be happy with plain milk and more carbs after a long steady run.

I have a set of Crests on the way, they will not be having an easy life, I'll report back if they break. I went for them because I wanted to have one set of wheels that were as light as possible, and I already have the Flows.