Did a Festive 50 this morning, took me nearly as long to plan an exactly 50km loop as it did to ride it!

Think that’ll do me until next year though. Good luck to all of you doing it properly.

Bill Bailey is funny, surprisingly non-sweary but maybe a bit too UK-centric (Tinselworm & Dandelion Mind)

Chris Rock and Dave Chappell are very American, rude and funny (really interesting stuff about race, drugs and sex) – full “specials” are on youtube

Jim Jefferies is worth it for his brilliant bit about gun control, but maybe not with the inlaws for the ruder/more distasteful stuff. (Similarly, definitely NOT Jim Norton – extremely explicit)

Billy Connelly if they can handle the accent (Live in New York for a fairly recent show)

Wonderful, and scary at the same time.

Thanks both. I opened up the damper and the oil level was perfect. Even though the XC32 is a mid-range fork I’m really impressed how well-constructed it is – the damper chamber was immaculate and the air spring and lower interiors were really quite clean given that I’ve done well over 3000km without giving the fork more than a quick clean.

Just have to see if it holds air after I’ve put it back together now!

That looks like a good day out! Enjoyed reading, thanks.

I must be missing something here, as I can’t imagine why anyone would use glue on Lego…

..that’s really going to bother me now. It makes me suspect that there’s a whole subworld of people doing un-needed things to Lego (bit like people who wash meat before cooking it)

I always thought Spec Captains had a really good edge you could lean on, not super fast though and I don’t think you can get ’em anymore.

Ground Control replaces the Captain. Bit rounder edge and much faster than it looks. I’ve had one (in Control casing) on the front for ages and I like it.

Why is a list of four things called the “big five” ?

70 does seem a little young to be getting a bit confused, but everyone’s different.

If your Dad is anything like mine, he’s going to keep on trying to do stuff same as always. My advice would be to just keep on “helping out” without completely taking over – eventually he’ll step back. You might need to help your Mum for some things as well. She’s going to have to start doing a load of things that your Dad always took care of. Good on you for stepping up when your parents need you.

Superstar are selling off Pacenti CL25 and TL28 wheelset for about £135 (with 20% code until the 18th)- no published weight but I’d guess at around 1800g. Been trying to talk myself out of a pair by reading reviews that say they dent easily (and ignoring the ones that say they’re fine :D )

Had a Vittoria AKA as a back tyre since the start of the summer – 29er in TNT casing (grey sidewalls).

Easy tubeless, seems to have pretty tough sidewalls (at least as good as Specialized control casing). Fast in the dry but not super grippy over damp smooth rocks/roots. 2.0 looks smaller than the 2.0 fast trak that it replaced. Weirdly what looks like two rows of knobs in the center are actually really small and sit on a raised strip – the knobs are almost gone leaving a nearly smooth continuous line in the middle.

No difference between older Geax branded tyres and newer Vittoria branded – the one I got has Vittoria printed on the side, but Geax on the moulding!

“Tactical Duty Kilt”….

OMG.
<scrolls down to colour and camo choices>

OMG. Stunning.

Bit late to the thread, but I’ve just learnt that the spoken intro to this

is Peter Fonda from a film called “The Wild Angels”

https://www.island.io/island/adam-ondra-flashes-in-rmnp

If you know anyone who lives in France then you can currently get a Superfly 6 for under £800

http://www.alltricks.com/mtb/bikes/trek-2015-hardtail-bike-29-superfly-6-blue-193-191990.html?id_country_selected=22

Had a quick search, and found indications that some studies have been done on relative disturbance to nesting birds causing by hiking and mountain biking but I failed to track down the studies themselves.

But there are loads of papers showing that dogs have a high impact on nesting birds! Eg http://www.jstor.org/stable/3783988?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

Pyga Stage, Ibis Ripley, Turner Czar, Pivot Mach429, Bianchi Methanol, Felt Edict ??

Done a tiny bit in the Jura to the southwest – really nice terrain for biking with lots of wooded valleys.

Looks like there’s a few FFC trails : http://www.grand-vert.org/imagesUp/cartes/2.pdf

Doing the eccentric exercises in the Saunders article linked to above helped my elbows get better quite quickly – feels like it’s actually making them worse but helps in a few weeks.

Over the longer term, since I turned 40 I’ve had to pay a lot more attention to complementary exercises. If I just climb all the time I get painful elbows and shoulders. I have to be doing a few sets of pushups in heavy training weeks to balance things out and stay pain-free.

This is of course anecdotal but it’s really only doing what we all know we should, and I’m climbing at the same standard as I was 20 years ago so I’m pretty happy with doing it.

Astonishing. I’d’ve stacked it on almost every single rock, tree and loose corner. I don’t even descend that fast on a road bike on open roads.

Inspirational too – makes me realise how much I could improve.

But one thing bothers me… how do you spit when wearing a full-face helmet??

Thanks all. Lots of love for Sony! Sounds like they’re not as fragile as I thought (but a bit over budget).

No-one tried the new Moto G?

ferrals – Member

how fast do you need to be going to get the drafting effect? You notice it with elite level xc racers too taking turns.

At the speeds they were going up the climb yesterday (about 20kmph) I think it’s around 12%, which is substantial. Yesterday the guys pulling on the front were visibly grimacing and drooling with the effort before their turn was over (both Movistar and Sky domestiques).

No way – Quintana wants to make up time and Pinot wants the stage, that’s why their teams chased them down from 11 mins

As if by magic …

Ibis have gone back to threaded BBs (and sorted out their cable routing)

http://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/ibis-launches-two-new-ripley-29ers/

Only thing I know about Nantes is that you can go for a ride on this:

http://www.lesmachines-nantes.fr/en/

Most of my local ones have pretty boring names – it’s all “Montée” this and “Descente” that, or the name of landmarks.

I did set up one called “Cake or Death?” that goes towards a supermarket/boulangerie, and there’s “STW climb of near-certain discomfort” that was named during a discussion on here about changing segment names. Not very popular that one, no-one else has ridden it! Possibly put off by the 29% max gradient and the loose rocks.

Ouch! Sounds like it should heal up pretty well though.

I’m impressed that you managed to snap a pedal axle. Better that than a leg.

Just over the hill from where they have the MBRace in Megeve/Combloux. Not sure how many of the trails are open outside the race, but there’s a lot up there.

Took me a while to twig that Decathlon’s bike range “B’Twin” is named as it is so that when said with a French accent it sounds like “between”… as bikes go between your legs…

It’s his other leg.

Big slopers are ace, and it’s actually quite easy to make triangular volumes from offcuts (although they can push the climber out from the wall quite a bit which might not be ideal with your fence).

For clipping practise you can just screw a bolt hanger into any of the T-nuts and put a quickdraw on it – hangers only need to be fixed into the supporting structure if they’re going to take lead falls.

Recent bouldering comps I’ve done have pretty much been 90% problems with big holds/volumes/3D weirdness and 10% pulling on small holds, but Martins suggestion about going to a proper bouldering wall for that sort of thing is a good one, you’ll have trouble setting that kind of problem so it’s probably best to keep your wall simple.

At that angle a set of screw-on holds is great for feet, but look for some which aren’t positive. Some of the sets of screw-ons have very good edges that make them easy for the feet. Something like this is harder to use: http://www.jegrimpe.com/product_info.php?cPath=22_32&products_id=2552&osCsid=3030faeb76e97473a32470dcbdd558d2

If you need more advice then ukbouldering.com is a good place – various wall owners and people who know a lot about national and international comps post there (the atmosphere is a bit like here, it can be a bit tough for new people, but it’s essentially friendly!)

Nice wall.

As someone who dabbles in building and competitions, a couple of comments:

A kickboard (vertical section at the bottom) would give one or two extra moves at the start of problems – in your vid most problems start with a high step off the ground.

Similarly, in comps most problems are going to have two marked start footholds (and skipping one of them means an attempt is counted). Not sure if this is done in UK youth comps, but it certainly is in the european comps.

Not much variation in hold types – everything seems to be long moves on flat holds apart from the one yellow(?) hold that is cupped with the right hand. I guess some of this is due to wanting to have no chance of pinging off into the fence, but a few undercuts and pinches would mix it up. As your daughter set the problems herself, it’s probable that those long reaches from flat holds are the kinds of moves she’s good at (which is why she should be trying other kinds of hold orientation!)

Are kids supposed to do stamina/endurance training? Not sure, but if she’s doing routes and not just bouldering then you could set some superb circuits on that board – around, around, up, down, across. If she’s doing leading comps you could even get her doing clipping practise by trailing a short piece of rope and having a couple of quickdraws hanging from the board (or from a long sling from the top to replicate those difficult long clips that swing around).

I would have loved a board like that as a kid – it’s excellent (just don’t let her over-train!!)

Anyone know how these size up, ie Is the size of the 2.2 and 2.35 really that?

Quite a few reviews talk about how the Ikon has lots of volume, which I could do with after a recent Vittoria AKA 2.0 purchase (good rear tyre, but really quite small compared to the 2.0 FastTrak that it replaced)

I love stripping nearly naked in a cold, recently overused loo cubicle just after signing in for events.

The inevitable paucity of toilet paper only adds to the experience.

Chris, bouldering grades and sports grades can’t be compared as they’re not the same system!

French sports grades are not the same as Fontainebleau (“Font” or “French”) bouldering grades : A sport route graded F8a is usually going to have crux moves of about 7A (about V6 in the US bouldering system, and 6a or 6b in UK technical grades).

There isn’t a linear comparison between sport and bouldering grades, and there’s a huge variation in what makes routes hard – a route with loads of easy-ish moves could get the same grade as a route with one brick-hard move.

Salsa Bucksaw?

I find pad position and design to be a bit annoying – I find that shorts with seperate sections of different densities have to have the pad in exactly the right place for me, or I’m sitting on the edge of a section.

Unfortunately the only way to find out if the pad is in the right place is to do a long ride…

This makes it difficult to try out shorts. I suspect that the one-piece pad designs will be more comfortable for me, like the higher-end Decathlon pads or the older Assos pads, but I have a few pairs of not-quite-right shorts that I’ve got to wear out first!

If you’re looking for Medium size, Turner are offering Czar frames on their website for $1800 – might come in under budget with shipping and tax?

There was a thread here about someone who had experienced this problem – he’d ripped the wheel down through the bottom of his fork as I recall.

Ah, found it – it was his friend, but it looks like the photos aren’t up any more:
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/my-friend-had-a-problem-with-his-skewer