The other half made a fair observation whilst I was panning it during playback yesterday.

‘remember that easily pleased and stupid people are a target audience too’

Shut me right up.

it was £1199 for the Rival 1 version.

crickey that’s a steal at £1199!
I’ll be smashing one on my CC if/when it comes down to that price again in my size

Dang, I’m rather taken by that space chicken. Any idea what price they were reduced to last week?

‘Brixit’

Any hefty chaps riding the 150mm Brand-X?

I’d like to buy one over the 125mm version but worried that my ‘power’ coupled with the longer shaft will affect the reliability for the worse.

Spesh Command Post has been my pick of the bunch so far. It’s a mechanical action which seems inherently more reliable than hydraulic/valve actuation.

Will be picking up a brand X as a spare soon as the price is great and reviews largely great too.

Ardent 2.4 Fr 2.25 R works nice for me, keen to try the Ground Control and XR4s though

Which is exactly where the welding failed on my Calibre..

Cheers OP.
Just picked up 2 full sets of MT Trail pads for £12. Bargain considering the fronts require 4 pads each.

Last year the potato masher went missing, we still haven’t found it and now we’ve bought a new one. Weird.

This is freaking me out. WHO STEALS A POTATO MASHER?!

When I was a lad I used to frequently tell my parents about the see-through man in their bedroom that used to wave at me and drink cups of tea.

Years later they told me how much it had freaked them out as they purchased the house after the former male occupant committed suicide.
My pretty much straight laced mum also told us once of some other very weird events that took place in the same room.

As a skint teenager I once broke into an abandoned boarded-up hut in the middle of the night with a friend in an effort to get some warmth as we walked miles home from a night out in sub-zero temperatures.
As the sun rose we found loads of torn up photographs and old cuttings etc scattered all around the several rooms. Then whilst talking to my pal in the middle of the biggest room we both saw a random shadow pass across the walls – then my mate started rubbing his shoulder, turned pale and bolted straight back out of the small opening we had squeezed in through.
I sh!t a brick and burst out after him – to this day he swears blind that he felt something grab his shoulder.

I do love a good ghost yarn. I’d love to see a scrap of credible evidence captured, but im now firmly in the science camp in my boring middle aged years.

Make sure you use the appropriate rotors, i’ve found them to be excellent.

Have had several OTB near misses on descents whilst getting used to them, i’m loving having this much power on tap.

Noooo!! Is GT really that bad?! I only really picked up my PS4Pro to play that (haven’t bought a copy yet)

I remember being incredibly disappointed with the last version they released on PS3 (funny enough, the main reason I bought a PS3)

It’s been donkeys years since I played a genuinely great driving sim

TV arrives tomorrow… and it’s big. Real big.

Kurt Vile is bloody great.

I’d have had at least one King Gizzard album in there.

And Orc from Thee Oh Sees

Clubby – neat idea there, have you removed your cranks very often with those fitted? I’d have concerns over the threads possibly strippping on removal

Snails?! Great till they go all hermy and spawn a million clones amongst the stinkweed..

OP – I was a keen fish keeper as a lad and spent many an hour keeping on top of maintenance, or at least trying to. I came to realise that it’s no mean feat keeping essentially what’s is a tiny micro-environment in conditions fit for fishy happiness. Unless you’re fully prepared for regular checking of many various levels of chemical pollution, and you know your nitrate from your nitrite – then it’s simply unfair on the poor finned friends. They quickly succumb to all sorts of nasty conditions, and watching your favourite pet ulcerate or suffer a case of dropsy is no fun.

Any progress on this? Saw one in the flesh the other day and it stopped me in my tracks. Quite the looker

Why’d they drop 853 though :(

<iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z440-NfFuyY&#8221; frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

ARRGghhhh!

Boom Boom!

that seems a decent offer too Drac, thanks. The soundbar will certainly spice up viewing on the bedroom Tv

Seriously tempted by the Forerunner 235..
Was dead set on a Vivioactive GPS but the Garmin looks sexier. Someone tell me the Forerunner is the vastly superior model please!
Im looking for easy syncing with Strava (and comfort whilst riding ideally).

See, how can I order a MU7000 now knowing that I could’ve had that deal?
Darn it

Haven’t been able to get through ST2. I just don’t enjoy the monster, with his stupid mouth head. And 11, she’s lost all her mystery.
Put me in the meh camp please.

I’ve read one too many reviews on Hope lacking in ultimate power for me to take them seriously unfortunately.
I haven’t really tested my 4-pot MT to its limit yet and I’ll be disappointed if it fades on a hard descent, but so far so good.

I admit that at first I found them less responsive than I’m used to (most brakes feel like this to me after riding Shimano), but when I applied more lever to the front brake I had a genuine near OTB incident.

Haven’t noticed the any lever flex myself, but the ‘carbo-tech’ (plastic) bodies don’t really look as sharp as other offerings. Despite that, I think they look quite good fitted. The Trail levers look and feel ace though.

Found out. They’re great.

Complete opposite to grabby Shimano, bucket loads of gradual modulation, which suits me just fine.
The front 4 pot is silly powerful and the levers are indeed the proper 1-2 finger jobbies and feel really good. The 2 pot / 4 pot combo does seem to actually compliment the brake bias well.

Seems like a no brainier to me. Deffo well worth a look if you fancy something non-Shimano flavoured.
Don’t get me wrong, I think Shimano make excellent brakes and I’ve loved my XTs – but I feel like I’ve instantly gained more control with the MT trails.

So what would a kit list look like?

Tow bar
Electric kit
Tow mount bike carrier
Electric/light board
?

Starting to look pricy

Good shout. Must try and get more sleep.
As of today am re-eliminating coke zero. I’m sure that bastard is keeping me fat.

Johndoh – Ican count on one hand the amount of beers I’ve had this year.. I don’t mind living without it but I’d sure like to be able to let my hair down on a Friday night.
I decided to go hardcore this year though as I wanted no slips back into bad habits.

Good points.
No, sleep has been getting progressively worse recently.

I try to leave at least one day between treadmill sessions or cut the distance down if doing successive ones, but ideally I’d like to get into a ‘3 miles before work every single day’ habit..

No fruit this year. No white or other refined carbs – no spuds etc.
Minimal root vegetables.

On the plus side – fitness definitely improving!

No idea on BMI.
Suffice to say I’m at least 3st away from target weight..

And granted, there’s always a risk that I’m underestimating my intake – but with an average day consisting of nothing for breakfast, chicken or ham or falafel salad with 2 boiled eggs for lunch – and a tea of meatballs or grilled chicken/cheese plus cauliflower rice I’m struggling to believe I’m eating enough to maintain.

Granted, nuts and cheese snacking intake may have risen since exercising more. But that’s all good fats, right?.. (I’ve just answered my own question haven’t I).

Oh yeah, diet drinks. Are they perhaps tricking a false insulin response?

Yes I’m older than I was before, hitting 40 soon – but just how little does a fairly fat bloke need to eat to shift the remainder?..

Agreed, I’m still reluctant to let go of my ‘theres another 800 calories burnt’ mantra after a session. However, I do believe in metabolism improvement post exercise.

I’m supposedly able to eat at least 3000cal per day just to maintain my current weight, and I rarely venture over an approximate 2000-2500. Add exercise into the mix and im becoming bemused.

Samsung perform well with regards to lag for gaming, and if your believe the hype – they are suppposed to provide something like 90% of all panels to other ‘manufacturers’.
I’ve tended to enjoy Sony styling and reliability and the Bravia processing, yet I’m lead to believe their customer support is dire in the event of any issues (Samsung allegedly being the best).
I did get to play with the OS on a large LG screen yesterday and it was pleasingly lag free and intuitive..

FFS. I’m back at square one aren’t I..
Doesn’t anyone just go with What Hi-Fi award winners anymore?

When the apocalypse does come, I do wonder what the current generation of tech heads are going to do after Skynet brings down internet/wi-fi Comms.

“Ok Google, tell me how long to brush my teeth for”
“Google?”
“GOOGLE?!”

Que millions of zombies wondering the streets staring at their handsets searching for a sign..

Me, I shall conquer the bleak wilderness with my grade-A post-it note memory recollection skills.

Thanks for all the recommendations folks.

Other than being 55″, I think I’m leaning towards the MU7000 series unit.
We sit square on to TV position so I don’t think viewing angles will be an issue, plus seemingly lowest lag in class should transfer well to PS4 Pro gaming.

Wow, a few sub 6:30 STW pullers, impressive.

Just logged in to my ancient C2 profile to check my PBs..

500m – 1:30.9
2k – 6:58.5
5k – 18:17.8
10k – 37:52.3
HM – 1:25:46.3

Not bad for a chubster

I’ll check after my next big drop off and let you know Andy..

Lowey – good on you, id be interested to know what you think of it after you’ve had a good ride

No one going to post their PB then?..

Agreed, and if you like jumping/hooning etc it would probably be a better choice.

But the Ti29er suits my bimbling quick blast/all day rides nicely – and I love the internal dropper routing and thru axle.

It also feels mighty stable at speed, I equalled a strava PB on my fastest downhill section without trying – felt in control the whole time.
It’s apparently based on Mattakuskil(?) geometry, which is a well liked frame.

Should add that it has a surprisingly sure footed front end – I came from a gas pipe Kona Unit 29er which I liked a lot, but the Ti 29er has a a stiffer front end.
My previous experience of Ti frames was noodly to say the least, but the 44mm HT and tubing diameters seem to be just the ticket on this frame.

Sure is pretty tho..