You’re over thinking this. Scottish roads are either dissintegrating into gravel or juat been surface dressed WITH gravel.

This ^^^

Roads round here (Galloway) are shocking. There are plenty of cracking fire roads that you can link up with sections of rapidly disintegrating tarmac roads. Grab an OS Explorer map and fill yer boots.

Because my sodding phone likes to guess what I am trying to type… Edited now!

Oddly, I find it completely the other way around – Prizm trail I’m not that excited about compared to Prizm road, which i think are excellent. But the photochromic lens are really very good and do for 90% of my riding so I rarely use anything other than them.

For running I only use glasses if it is really bright so would choose the prizm road over trail.

in the Amazon, I had a mosquito bite me through my shirt

In Scotland I had a cleg bite me through my cycling shorts, wee buggers.

The ticks are pretty bad at the moment in SW Scotland. I’ve regularly had to stop so I can flick them off my legs after running through any sort of ground cover. Found some in the car too after we’d got off the hill at work the other day. It’ll be worse once the bracken is fully out. Thankfully the dog has been treated.

I have an older style Flux, can pick them up very cheaply (I got mine off a WTD ad in the classifieds here). They’re great bikes.

Ah-ha – just found a KCNC one that looks like it’ll do the job.

My grandfather flew Spitfires during the war out of Leuchars. He was shot down over Norway in 1942 by a FW190 whilst hunting for the Scharnhorst. He was an incredible man with some amazing stories about flying and surviving as POW. Here he is just before departing Leuchars on a mission:

And here he is returning in 2010 where he met with the Battle of Britain memorial flight crew and happily chatted about Spitfires all day:

He was a real life war hero (not that he’d ever want to be described as such!) and a true gentleman. I’ve got a piece of the fuselage from his downed spit (some Norwegian divers found it in the late 60’s at the bottom of a fjord) which is one of my most prized possessions.

I’m preparing my part of an ES chapter for a wind farm app right this minute! I’m only involved in one part of the process and not the selection of sites but providing support to the developer once the site has been chosen but would happily talk you through it if you like. Mail in profile.

Godspeed you black emperor are essential listening.

What sort of balance do you strike between running and riding over the course of a training block?

Those tri-adventure things look good but unfortunately are a wee bit far from me!

Lots of good natural stuff at Mabie that’s perfectly ridable on an XC bike. Dalbeattie is closer to Mabie than Mabie is to Ae (if you follow) so if I was going to do two I’d do that.

We have a dog and 2 cats. We’ve had the cats for well over a decade, rescue cats so their exact age isn’t known but probably close to 15 now. We got the dog last summer. That was interesting… Was open warfare for a while, the pup loved chasing them. But the male cat gave the dog a few swift kickings and they seem to have settled into a reasonable relationship now. Even share a bed if it’s cold enough or the stove is on and all animosity is forgotten at feeding time. The dog does still try to chase them occasionally but the cats have a clever trick. they bolt out the cat flap, dog tries to follow but can only fit her head out the cat flap. The cat waits outside for the dog’s head to appear and then unleashes hell. The dumb mutt still hasn’t twigged!

As an architect I’d say yes!

But in all seriousness a good architect will help you realise your ambitions for the project and potentially save you time and money in the process. Bodging it as you go along could cost you both. It’s worth spending a bit for some professional advice sometimes!

On here! In hindsight asking for strangers who wanted to meet up in the woods at night might come across as odd to some folk…

Bleak Expectations has one of the best character descriptions.

“Mr. Gently Benevolent, who was, ironically, a complete bastard.”

I’ve really enjoyed trawling through the Chain Reaction episodes on Iplayer too. Some very interesting and very funny interviews on that.

it’s only the lonely camping the night before that I’m not looking forward to

Done a few solo events and the solo camping always turns out to be quite sociable!

I ride/run solo 90% of the time these days, well plus dog. Kids means I can’t stick to the structure of meeting up with a club at a prescribed time any more, I just have to grab what time I can.

There is a nice off road route that links between Mabie and Dalbeattie – though it does involve a long climb.

There’s a dairy near us that does a smoked brie which is really very good. I can eat a substantial amount of it in one sitting, to the point of feeling a little ill.

Scene with someone in a black cape kneeling with two of the Imperial Royal Guards at the side so a possible emperor/ vader scene

Aye, but I think he’s wearing a hood which makes me think that’s not the big man himself.

Was that Forest Whitaker doing Ghost Dog in space? Looks pretty interesting, it’s only April though, a long time to wait for the film itself. When, if at all, will we see Vader?

You’ll be fine. Anyone down wind from you however…

Done numerous bivi’s along the SDW (usually all within a drunken cycle of the pub) but by far the best spot we ever found was just past Ditchling Beacon on the north side of the Downs. Nice and flat with plenty of shelter from the main path and cracking views.

Instead of barrelling straight to Skye across the bridge I’d suggest stopping here:

Glenelg Inn[/url]

Then getting the wee ferry over to Skye the next day from just up the road, it’s a nice spot to stop with good views of the island and the inn has a good atmosphere with live music and what not.

Loch Lomond ticks all the boxes. It’s easy to get to, plenty of pubs and the scenery is stunning. There’s Ben Lomond to go play on too.

Not only is it the wrong side of the safe they could also damage the trusses lifting them like that. Tight sods are just trying to avoid getting a crane in. I’d ask them to stop.

EDIT Beaten by ahwhiles, buggerit.

Race Kings are fantastic, they grip surprisingly well in a lot of circumstances I’d wouldn’t have expected them too.

When training we naturally focus on the primary muscle groups – those that let us do the activity we are training for. But we also need to train the secondary muscle groups – those that maintain alignment and posture.

That’s it nailed.

I used to suffer from pretty nasty cramp in my thighs and calves. I’d get it at night after riding, would jump out of bed with one leg locked solid only for the other one to go and I’d end up on the floor in agony! It must have looked amusing from the outside. It got better as I got fitter and as I improved my core and balanced out my exercise so I wasn’t just working one set of muscles riding. Now I hardly ever get cramp (other than my feet weirdly). Last time I did was in my calf a day or so after running a marathon which I put down to being a little bit fecked.

I’ve got a very long drop from the top of the landing to the bottom of the hall.

Huck it!!

Fizik used to do a white tape that wasn’t cork and you could wipe clean, I had it on my road bike for years, it looked pretty good the whole time. Can’t remember what it was called unfortunately!

fasthaggis YGM.

I think the price is good for those tents, it’s about £100 less than some competitors!

If you have an IT and data background have you thought about GIS software? It’s used in thousands of different applications across a variety of different sectors. I come from a design/CAD background and have moved into GIS and I have to say I quite enjoy it. Lots to learn, it’s incredibly powerful software. And I still get to produce pretty drawings in the form of maps.

Is it just me or did the ghosts not look as good as they did in the originals? I get the feeling I’ve seen it all before, certainly didn’t look like it’s worth a trip to the moving picture house.

My folks had a very old one, it looked great but towards the end the electrics went (especially the windows, randomly opening whilst driving along!) and no amount of visits to the Audi garage could fix it, it was damp inside the car too for some reason. Still handled great and was fun to drive but it was getting 25mpg on a good day. Eventually it went to the scrap yard as it was riddled with rust.

Ever tried yoga? Can help to balance out muscles, improve flexibility and core strength.

Some of the worst midges I have ever experienced was at the Kielder 100 in 2010. The early feed stations weren’t for us…

There are loads of different factors that will affect just how bad the wee buggers are it can be hard to predict what they’ll be like. They also seem to prefer some people over others. I’d not worry about it too much, it’s not like we all flee south in the summer! As long as you’re moving they’re not too bad. If you’re going somewhere you know they can be bad I’d take long sleeves for when you stop and a midge net. They hate cigar smoke by the way!

As a local it’s easy to be disappointed by a lack of progress

Just be glad Mabie or Dalbeattie aren’t your local haunts!

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

A lot of my favourites have already been covered. Julie Fowlis has an amazing voice, if you like that then Karen Matheson has to be on the list too.

I do like The Duke Spirit, Liela Moss has a great voice. And for turning it up to 11 you can’t beat Sleater Kinney.

Granite Kitchen in Dalbeattie is pretty good for lunch. Luigi’s Italian for dinner but it’s a good idea to book as it gets busy at the weekend. If you like seafood the Steamboat Inn in Carsethorn is a good place for a pub lunch. Laurie Arms in the Haugh tends to have decent beer. All better than the Anchor I reckon!

There’s a new playground at the car park for the walking trails in the forest that the kids love.

Attractions wise the main one is the scenery! So fingers crossed for the weather! Was cracking over the weekend.