@SBrock +1

The thing is, IME Shimano are just a bit of a lottery. Some BBs last forever while others just fall apart and die. I don’t wallow in mud, my riding is generally in the dry (i.e. Suffolk – a function of location and lack of rain) and when it does get muddy it isn’t that bad.

I was rather hoping (excuse pun) that Hope would be more consistent plus you can replace the bearings.

I never got on with the Swift steel forks at all but they were the old style ones and were too tall. I am currently using On One Carbon and they are fantastic. I suppose it really comes down to whatever floats your boat!

I agree with cynic-al, those forks need to be a different colour on that bike! 🙂

It has to be a ‘delivery’ of postmen.

@takisawa2

Bit of dillema recently…Swift / Pace RC129 or a Niner SIR9…
The Niner won, & its lovely. Big outlay for me & (daft as it seems) a few restless moments weighing them all up. Still wonder if I did the right thing, but the Niner is really ticking every box I set out.

I ended up with the Swift and the Sir9. I like the Sir9 but find the Swift is so much more ‘alive’ that it is my automatic ‘go to’ bike.

Mistake purchases…. Voodoo Wanga and Cotic Soul, never got on with either. I think it is a wheel size thing, I was going off mountain bikes altogether, slowly but surely until I discovered wagon wheels and have been sold on them ever since.

Can’t say I disagree. His idea was that visual cues would be introduced such as litter blowing etc so you would see why you missed…if you did.

Wind does play a significant effect on accuracy over long distances. Whether it would on the sort of gun used in the games is maybe a moot point. 🙂

Hmmm….fair point mintimperial. I’ll have to find out.

I’d buy a Swift…in fact I have. The thing is, if you want something more exotic than steel….

I find off road sportives are a bit of a hoot. Same sort of race atmosphere, much less rampant testosterone (elbows on corners, yellow at you to move over etc), feed stations and a lower cost. OK so it is only one lap but it tends to be a big one!

I saw a large cat last summer. I was out rabbit shooting, hidden up in the long grass, sizing up some rabbits (no sniggering in the back there) which were well upwind of me. As I was preparing to take a shot I heard a noise from about 10 yards or so upwind. I slowly raised my head to have a peep and there was an exceptionally large cat looking back at me. I don’t know who was more surprised but he shot off away from me. It was the size of a small Labrador, chestnut brown with dark bands on its face. There were dark (vertical) stripes on the back and flanks and the tail was hooped. TBH it was the tail that got me; I have had many moggies, including some frankly oversized Toms but none had a tail as long nor as bushy as this one.

When I got back I traced someone who has an interest in ‘big cats’, he s attached to the local wildlife and conservation trust. Anyway, he said there have been several reported sightings of large cats in Suffolk over the last few years. The best guess is that there was an escaped ‘big cat’ which took up residence in or around Ipswich (poor choice IMO). Somehow it cross bred with the feral population and has been spreading out along the railway network (easy meals – lots of bunnies). As the incidence of these cats gets further away from the source, they seem to be getting smaller and smaller. Either that, or there have been more reliable sightings. Anyway, my report was consistent with a report from a month earlier from the East of Bury St Edmunds (I live a few miles to the West).

At least in Suffolk, I am convinced there are big cats but experience shows they might not be as big as all that! The way they are going, if you don’t see one soon, they’ll have become miniatures!

Thanks all. Been having trouble with t’interweb (still am) so haven’t been able to get back to thank you for your input. I have gone for the fully tricked out iMac in the end.

+1 for the turbo tyre. I have a Conti one and it works fine, quiet, it doesn’t overheat and it is fine, it is just a bit tough to get on for some reason.

Wasn’t the quilt one ‘Live at Roxy and elsewhere’ or was it Tinseltown? Damn….I’ll have to go and drag them both out now 🙂

I’m not one of those audio buffs so this might be a load of tosh. A friend of mine bought a pair of those speakers for his son before he went off to uni. The plan was to use them with his iPod dock.

He seems to be very happy with them and my mate pinches them off his son when he comes home so he can hook them up to his pc.

I have one of those Docks, I also have a properly expensive one too. The Cambridge Audio one sounds less refined but perfectly ok.

I’d say the combo should work well.

No one has mentioned Thing Fish yet! 🙂 Strange album, definitely one the ladies hate.

Of the Ruben and the Jets album, Zappa said it was the only way they could get airtime on the radio. Stations would only play popular stuff so they came up with their own take on it.

+1 for Bongo Fury.

Ruben and the Jets is pretty easy to listen to but only if you like Doo Wop!

Zoot Allures and Ship Arriving too late maybe, Shut Up is pretty good too.

I started with Apostrophe late in ’74 and never looked back.

I have always found the Weasels album a bit tough to listen to along with Jazz From Hell etc. He definitely went through a more ‘commercial’ period with Joe’s Garage, You are what you is etc. so maybe they are the best places to start as the good folks say.

Today it has mostly been…..sunny but not very warm…no cold but not warm either.

Their serving sizes are for sparrows.

Some mean person filled my chest full of marshmallow the other night :(. The family are lucky…I have lost my voice too but I do spend all night coughing which is driving my long suffering wife mad!

Falling down the stairs and breaking my arm
Playing in the garden
My Great Uncle dying 🙁
Battenburg
marshmallows
A big, black cat
Reading all my dad’s old books from the 1930s.
Lots of furniture, not much room
the smell of gas (I’d never seen a gas oven anywhere else)
A cupboard full of candles, cement, old bars of soap and stuff (you never know when there might be another war!)
Relatives everywhere…all the time….uncles, aunts, cousins
Did I mention, lots of cake?

I had one of the steel ones a couple of years ago and couldn’t get on with it t all. The head tube was too steep for me and I shifted it as soon as I could. OTOH a mate got one at the same time and seems to ride nothing else. If this isn’t a recommendation for trying before you buy I don’t know what is! 🙂

I don’t suppose they’re going to get rich

They aren’t doing it for charity. Do the maths entry fee x entries paid = gross take, That isn’t all going to be swallowed up in costs. It isn’t the only event they do all year.

I’m not begrudging Paul and Frank earning a living but they aren’t doing too badly out of it.

Salsa Moto Pros for me too. Luvverly!

I’m watching Dr Alice, mmmmm

Another sport already split into its niches

Wait until you start airgunning…more niches and sub niches than you can shake a stick at!

OP earlier this morning 8)

I wish it was that easy Graham. Our local transmitter is pants, we even get pixellation on the main TV now. The Humax is unwatchable. I thought there was a fault with the box and contacted the reseller. They swapped it out immediately with a brand new one but it is still no good. Apparently, our transmitter is working at about 30% normal strength and it isn’t going to get any better for many months.The engineers said there was nothing they could do except recommend we sit back and wait until the signal strength improves. Other transmitters are pants atm too. 🙁

Really enjoyed it. Got away in the first group, got slightly damp after the feed stop but beat the rain back My Garmin said 3hrs 54. No idea if that is respectable or not, my excuse (it it isn’t) is that I was riding a rigid (Swift).

Some sections were damned hard and I nearly slowed to a halt once or twice.

Do they post times?

Will be back for next year.

I used bikehike, converted to .tcx and downloaded straight to the Garmin. It recognised it immediately and gave me the option of ‘Do the course’ which the .gpx file didn’t.

Got there in the end! 🙂

Cheers chaps!

XP Installation is legit.

I’ll do a scan as soon as I can.

Thanks for the advice y’all! 🙂

(sorry about the trans-Atlantic colloquialism just used it for a change…..)

ta!

SP3 here i come.

Thanks!

Just buy one and worry about it later.

If you hate the On One colours just get some sun glasses or just ride in the dark! 🙂

Hmm, there’s always the Air 9 Scandium to complement the Swift….

Just sort of fancy a Niner.

I have a Swift and love it. Just fancied something slightly different to go with it, maybe I should keep thinking`?

I’d like to get back into racing but mainly these days it seems to be off road sportives or 12 hour rides. The Swift is pretty much ideal for that sort of thing so maybe, short, fast stuff and of course, trying to stuff my riding mates into the ground! 🙂 (as if…….)

Many times (we’re talking >15 times) when I was younger. Recently…… i.e. in the last 10 years, about once. I read them to my son from cover to cover as bedtime stories when he was about 10….

Strangely enough I can’t be arsed to pick them up any more. 😉

Thanks guys…..

I remember coming out of a pub in Hounslow (Poll Tax Riot iirc) and walking straight into the middle of it. A swift about turn and we legged it to safety.

What was it like? Frightening actually……

I love real ale too but I haven’t got a pub near enough to go to…. my fixie has drops, don’t do this fakenger shit! 😉