It’s called a “Locker Loop” and was a design feature on Oxford-style shirts that also had button-down collars. Presumably so you didn’t crease the collar when hanging it up… It’s an American Ivy League thang…

I got this far…

You’ve just had sex so I assume you are on fairly intimate terms. Even if you have an acid fanjo and his sperm is nine tenths itching powder, surely you can use the bathroom at the same time? You can wash your fanjo in the bath and he can scrub his cock in the sink.

…before I had to go on Amazon and order a new keyboard!

As a Gizzy regular, I would have loved to have seen him doing that… He certainly wouldn’t have ridden another meter until that tube was back in his rucksac.

Clearly a very inexperienced rider – what sort of numpty punctures on Hully Gully???

I like the Pro (now branded as Shimano) neoprene overshoes – I’ve had 3 winters out of my pair and they’re still perfect.

Tights-wise – I tend to use padded as if it’s cold enough to need 2 layers, it’s not going to be warm enough to strip down to shorts!

I use the Assos Bonka tights, very expensive but warm as toast down to -10°. Anything warmer and I tend to use Endura Roubaix bib knicks (the majority of my riding).

If you like the Nanoflex (they are brilliant), try the Castelli Gabba rain jersey. Coupled with the armwarmers, a good baselayer and a gillet, you’ve got a top layer that’s perfect for the majority of winter riding in the UK, ie. 5-10° and wet/changeable.

Dude, you reversed into a deckchair…

Brian Cookson took a Strava KOM off me just outside Preston… He was doing 60mph uphill… 🙄

Do you think this could derail his bid for the presidency?

Nothing else makes you car/van/mancave/kitchen smell so nice… Compare it to Dolce & Gabana’s finest aftershaves and it appears to be excellent value, even at full price.

I find it to be an excellent water displacer, teflon lubricator and polish… Exactly what it says on the tin.

Modern bar profiles are far comfier than the big old loops used in the past. I have 3T Ergonovas on all my race bikes, they’re very short from the tops to the hoods, so if you’re comfy on the hoods, the drops don’t seem too far away.

I spent 20 years riding 99% of the time on the hoods but since starting using modern compact bars, I’ve been far more comfortable on the drops.

I find Lancaster to have a bit of a small town mentality. Although it’s a big Uni town, the Uni campus is a few miles south and is quite self contained so the City doesn’t have a “Uni Town” atmosphere at all. Decide for yourself if that’s a good or bad thing!
Lots of nice little pubs/bars/bistros, but very much a “same old faces” sort of place.

Has Junkyard ever actually been to Lancashire??? Clitheroe is little more than a village… It’s lovely, and it’s home to the Ribble Valley Borough Council, but apart from that, it’s about as far removed from a “city” (in the cultural sense of the word) as you could possibly get!

And Grimsargh is basically a suburb of Preston, it’s 15 mins on a bus every 10 minutes!

🙄

Another recommendation for Longridge area, I’ve rolled gently down the hill into Grimsargh now but still work in Longridge. As others have said, some of the finest riding around (if you like wild muddy fell rides) and the road biking is sublime – Trough of Bowland, Settle, N Yorks Moors and South Lakes all within reach on a road bike, plus the flat lands of the Fylde where I chain gang.

You say you like to be near a city? Preston is really the only thing remotely city-like in Lancs and it’s a 15 min drive. Manchester and Liverpool are 40 mins away.

It’s a smashing place to live! 😀

I’ll be covering the floor with a vinyl material – I have a client that supplies them for horse box interiors so I’m sure they’ll have an off cut that’s big enough.

If I go for 2 x track systems, they can be arranged so one bike faces forward, one faces backwards, which takes up a lot less room, so there will be space for other stuff. And I’m thinking about finding some way of attaching spare wheels from the roof…

A friend with a Transporter made a sliding shelf/floor bed that slides right out for easier mounting/unmounting of bikes… Something like that might be awesome…

Thanks Dom, very kind of you… Email sent.

I’ve already been looking at a pair of side bars and roof rails, I think it’ll finish the outside off nicely…

I’ve just picked one of these up… Frapped it up in the office to see if it would push me round on an office chair…

It sent papers everywhere and stripped a load of paint off the wall… Can’t fault the power. Grrrrrrr

The first doctor was clearly an idiot. Why didn’t he just suggest taking the saddle off his existing bike, would have saved him having to build an asshole cancer specific bike and send begging letters to Chris, Phil, Paul et al…

Other than that, was anyone else reminded of Christopher Walken regaling the young Bruce Willis about “Carrying that uncomfortable hunk o’ metal up my ass for 2 whole years…”?

I live in fear of succumbing to a social anxiety… It’s ruining my life.

Buzz them off with clippers first, shave in the shower, baby oil them afterwards… Laaaaaaaavely x

I didn’t know you were female, shib

I’m not. But I sure do got a purdy mouth!

Sleeping with your friends is a bit bizarre IMO, if you’re close enough to be friends and the sex is OK (or better) why not a more traditional relationship even if it’s casual ?

In my experience, and with the benefit of hindsight, women seem to offer to be FWBs as a, ahem, back door entry into a relationship with someone that might not be interested normally.

Or, as has happened in a couple of cases with myself, a way to justify a liaison with someone that would normally be off their radar, or not considered on their radar by their peers – in my case, early twenties girls going for a late 30s guy.

Never did understand that sordid, used feeling… Is it just a chick thing?

I’ve had a few of these since becoming single 5 years ago. Mostly younger women that I know through work, or non-social situations – definitely one of the advantages of being single in your 30s. They’ve always been instigated by the woman, and ground rules put in place first.
I’d say all except one ended because they got emotionally involved. The other – and the most enjoyable – ended because she moved back to Australia, but even she was starting to get a bit clingy.
She also had a few female FWBs, so it was a win-win situation for me, and I didn’t end up with several bottles of shampoo in my shower… (and no, that’s not a euphemism.)

Somebody needs to buy this guy a set of golf clubs!

Crit race at Preston last night, 22.5 miles in 50-ish mins, my average speed was 27mph.

It hurt. Average heart rate was 179bpm and I hit my 195 redline in the final sprint. Came 8th, so well chuffed in such a fast race and such a big field.

I think I’m ready to start winding down a bit for winter!

Great find. Can’t find much info about the artist though, when were these painted?

[edit]there’s an “About Me” section on his website… Any more info?

For me, the main benefit is being able to draw great big orange loops on Strava maps; to be able to cover 50, 60, 70 miles with nothing more than a couple of bottles of water.

This is what fascinated me about bikes when I was first allowed to ride to my friend’s house a mile from my house as a child and continues to fascinate me to this day.

The challenge of riding off road still fascinates me, but the sheer thrill of covering huge distances at speed is what keeps me coming back to road biking.

Oh, and it makes me fitter too… 😉

You’ll become more attractive to women, more successful in your chosen career and butterflies and baby birds will land on your outstretched finger, completely unprompted!

I thought I was wrong once, but I was mistaken…

Was someone planning to use a compact chainset on a roadbike? 😉

Or build a bigger base?

I don’t think I have the time to build a much bigger base – I don’t race anything over 50 miles and the majority are 30 mile crits, so I’m working on over threshold efforts during an hour race.

I’ve employed the services of a coach to oversee my winter training and pre-season for 2014 with a view to getting to Cat2, so I’ll be working on base over winter and a week in Majorca early spring…

On the flat 20mph is indeed a pretty easy pace. However as mentioned above, an AVERAGE speed of 20mph is a totally different ball game. It only takes one long set of lights and a couple of right turns to completely knacker your average speed even on a flat ride.

To put it into perspective, and again referring to the Ride London Century, on the flats, I tried not to drop below 27mph. The average speed was dragged down by having to slow to a walking pace up Leith Hill and Box Hill due to the amount of traffic and people that were actually walking!

Christ knows how these southerners would cope in the Pennines! 😉

Mitch, let me remind you…

I really can’t be bothered googling tenancy laws, but I’m fairly sure that your continued insistence on telling all and sundry on a public forum that you’re going to increase her rent, coupled with repeated insults regarding her looks, could land you in it.

So, I’ve challenged you to find me some laws that back up these wild claims you like to make. Any joy yet?

And while you’re googling, please can you find me a law that prevents me describing her as having a face that only a mother would love?

Que sera, sera…

Doris Day

And me! Hence why I’ll be forever a Cat 3… The lads I’m racing against are half my edge and 20kg lighter! Trying to hang on to their accelerations is pretty tough!

I’ve been called far worse in earlier posts wwaswas.

Jesus

If you think there are laws that prevent a landlord discussing things like this, then I think ‘idiot’ is quite a reasonable word for it.

However, I think the truth is worse than that. You probably know full well that you’re talking tripe, but you think that by throwing in posts like that, you might be able to sneak a point into the argument that has no basis in fact whatsoever.

Unfortunately, I, and many others that post on here, are very familiar with the law in this arena, so you’re insulting our intelligence by suggesting such!

Unless I should have signed some sort of Hippocratic oath to become a landlord that I wasn’t aware of… 🙄

I find sweetspot better for building base fitness – helps for bigger distances, but can be counterproductive for racing. I can see why it’s popular with TTers.

For racing there’s a need to really stretch that zone over threshold. This is what I’m working on at the moment as it’s essential in races to be able to stay longer at over-threshold pace. Horrible.

I really can’t be bothered googling tenancy laws, but I’m fairly sure that your continued insistence on telling all and sundry on a public forum that you’re going to increase her rent, coupled with repeated insults regarding her looks, could land you in it.

No, please Mitch, let’s have a look at these laws that prevent me from discussing my options in public? Idiot.

Oprah

a decent tenant

A woman that deliberately and calculatedly lied to trick a landlord into renting her a property that was clearly advertised as not accepting pets?

I’m not sure how that constitutes decent. She’s dishonest. The only reason she paid 6 months up front is because I insisted on the basis that she has no regular income. And, she’s got a face like a melted wellie!

(for the record, I’m a strong 9 out of 10.)

Bradley Cooper

Quoting averages though is pretty meaningless, there are too many variables for it to cross reference easily

I think – and correct me if I’m wrong – this is why people have supported their figures with information about the profile, weather, type of bike, whether they were solo etc. 🙄

So, apart from the obvious ‘pedal faster, use a higher gear’ policy, what’s the best way to up your speed?

I find a combination of sweet sport riding (just below threshold) mixed with over/under drills makes the biggest difference. Racing is a good substitute for over/unders during the summer months.

[caveat]it does largely depend on what you want to achieve though, and what sort of distances you want to see the improvements at.[/caveat]

Paying up front for cleaning is fair enough, getting rid of the dogs though is disproportionate and unlikely to happen.

When she rang me and admitted to lying, she said she’d been trying to rehouse 2 of the dogs prior to moving in, but hadn’t had any luck which is why she was forced to lie. So I asked her if she still intended to rehouse them, and she said she was.

So, either a) This is her intention in which case it’s perfectly reasonable for me to put a time limit on this to avoid unnecessary wear/tear/damage to my property;
or b) She has no intention of getting rid of them, in which case she’s still taking the piss out of me.

Yunki

That’s just you throwing your weight around.

And I wholeheartedly reserve the right to do just that when someone lies through their teeth to try and trick me. 😉

Chuck Norris