Keen fisherman here.

Love my river fishing and will happily fish for anything but I prefer more mobile techniques be that lure fishing, trotting or stalking.

I did a lot of fly fishing on the chalk streams of Normandy when I lived there, fished the l’iton, l’arve and the la risle mainly. Used to catch well on the dirty duster or klinkhammers fished as search patterns but my biggest fish always used to fall to nymphs.

Boxers also have no tails don’t they? Think that’s another important method of communication.

Boxers should have full tails as it’s illegal to dock a dog’s tail for cosmetic reasons and has been for a long while now.

Ours doesn’t like Boxers (the dog type, not the sporting type)

As someone who has grown up with Boxers (the dog type, not the sporting type) and been an owner for the bulk of my adult life I can confirm that a lot of dogs, grey hounds in particular, dislike the Boxer breed. Much like with the black dog other dogs find the Boxers flat face difficult to read.

Little and often is the key.

At that kind of distance, depending upon pace, I’d be eating every 30-45 minutes. I eat roughly 20g of carbs per ‘meal’ which is a single sis gel or four jelly babies.

All depends on the time of year. I don’t ride inside so do a lot of shorter training rides in the winter as I find it keeps the motivation to ride high and leaves me in good shape to enjoy the warmer months where I do more longer unstructured fun rides.

So far this year I’ve done 151 rides for a distance of 5018 km or an average of 33.23 km per ride.

Guess I’m the odd one out.

I run 42cm bars hood to hood with a wee flair to 44 cm on the drops. I spend a lot of time on the hoods and anything wider and twisting my hands and wrists to get them inline with my shoulders and it get uncomfortable.

Ordered on the 1st, delivery date of the 2nd and still not been collected yet by DPD.

That was a handy and timely PSA. My winter gravel bike’s wheels are pretty shot, seized nipples and dented rims, so I’ve just picked up a new pair of wheels for a most excellent price.

I tested positive on Tuesday, it was my first time and TBH I was beginning to wondering if I’d ever catch it.

Felt dreadful on Tuesday and slowly ran through the list of major symptoms experiencing them all apart from loss of taste. By today, Saturday, I’m back to normal.

Merlin mostly as I live fairly locally

Hard to see what Russia has left to counter this.

Do we think they will resort to nukes? Have bio or chemical weapons been kind of downgraded by the US make sure clear threats if nukes are used?

Don’t they have form for chemical weapons in Syria?
Posted 36 minutes ago

I doubt Russia will resort to nukes or chemical weapons as they’ll not win the war for Russia, would certainly lose all support Russia has from any allies and would probably result in Nato countries if not Nato itself actively getting involved.

I’ve read somewhere that the US/Nato have been talking via back channels with Russia about retaliation if Russia uses nukes and that they’re left the threats purposely ambiguous. I’ve also read, on twitter so it could be pure lies, that Nato has threatened to sink the Black Sea fleet and destroy Russia’s navy bases using Nato air power if Russia use nukes.

Any idea on the stubby finger front?

Have you adjusted the reach of the brake levers?

Good quality thermals

As long as the saddle is 147mm wide or above and has a cut out my bottom is comfortable.

I have three bikes with three different saddles, one of which is a Fizik Tempo Argo

Crossed midday Tue. The roads flowed smoothly on the way down, infact the M2 was really quiet. The tunnel terminal was very busy so no chance of an earlier train, slight delay of around 30 minutes but honestly no problem.

And is there a local seamstress who does repairs who could easily do that for you.

Local seamstress repaired a pair of bib shorts for me

For intense rides I want sugar. I tend to buy what ever jelly sweets that are on special at Tesco and rotate them with bits of fruit so things like bananas, dates etc. I also buy pouches of stewed fruit, they normally marketed for kids, as they have a longer shelf life than real fruit so are useful for unplanned rides.

Just me or does it feel like Russia are going to grind out a victory across Ukraine in the long term?

Interesting thread on twitter

Never played civ6 but did play 1&2 extensively.

Then you might want to download freeciv

Use a CX bike for anything other than CX and you’ll be killed to death! Much like riding a trail bike for XC

IME

CX bikes don’t feel as planted as a road bike so you can’t corner as quick but I’m talking race speed quick not regular Joe quick.
CX bikes are slower than a road bike but not by very much and honestly if you’re not racing is it an issue? In my case I’m under a kmh slower at threashold on a CX bike.
CX bikes are stiff but then so are road bikes and 32mm tires are more comfortable than 25mm tires.
1x isn’t an issue on road presuming you’re not pedaling past 45-50kmh and don’t have an ideal cadence window of two rpm. The only time I notice it is when I’m trying to do intervals and need to hit a specific power window and then it’s only slightly more frustrating

CX bikes are faster on tame surfaces than a gravel bike
CX bikes feel nicer and faster on twisty stuff than a gravel bike
CX bikes don’t feel as nice descending steep techy stuff oddly I don’t notice much difference going up steep techy stuffy

During lock down I bought a Vitus Energie as a from the front door off road bike and winter roadie, it replaced a GT grade gravel bike that did the same job. I much prefer the Vitus

When I’ve had the same problem I’ve just added a bit of blue loctite to the thread of the retaining bolt and not worried about it.

Amberswood is in Hindley. If you put it into google maps it’ll show you better than I can explain. You can connect Amberwood wood with Bickershaw country park by going though Low Hall nature reserve and behind the prison.

Amberswood although very small is worth an explore if you’re passing

If you want hills I can suggest some.

I ride a road bike round Tarleton, Croston neck of the woods so can suggest quiet roads if that’s any help? You can get from Tarleton to Sollom and on to Bretherton via tarmac covered farm tracks that are traffic free but I don’t know a way from Bretherton to Wigan without going on road.

From Haigh getting to leigh is easy and completely off road, you can get onto the canal bank at Red rock and head toward Rabbit rocks, via Haigh hall or not, then Amberswood then Bickershaw country park then your pretty much at Penny flash.

If you want something quicker, all be it more boring, you can follow the canal down to Wigan from Red rock and then head from Wigan past Scotsman flash and onto Penny flash.

I don’t add toppings, I add bottoms. I stew up whatever fruit is old and going cheap at the local supermarket,normally I’ll add some spice to liven it up too, and then add porridge to the top.

I’ve got wide feet and find Northwave comfortable

Cleats?

Reading a forum on the internet with one eye closed so you can focus

Leave them bee, the colony will die in a few months and bumblebees are far from aggressive

Big advantage of the ordinary is that you can inject it through the valve. Race says not to do that although I never actually tried.

I’ve tried and race will not physical pass through the injector.

As I’ve found out to my cost Stan’s race certainly dries out a lot quicker than original, it certainly lasted longer than two weeks but not longer than two months. YMMV

When it comes to outdoor hobbies I struggle to find the motivation to leave the house when it’s raining but oddly don’t mind the rain if I’m already out when it starts raining.

I’d rather get soaked to the skin that ride on the turbo.

Is Putin sick

When I followed the Atkins diet I lost 16lb in the first three weeks, I did have a lot to loose though and a lot of it was water weight. I’ll be honest, the first two weeks where really rough as I suffered from complete lack of energy and was as moody as hell but the diet makes loosing weight easy as it completely kills your appetite so sticking to a calorie deficit is a walk in the park.

‘news’ on twitter

linky

I’ve only tried Swissstop and Sram pads, Sram where noisy where as the Swissstop pads where quiet.

I find in the UK slowing down by say 5-10 mph and slowly accelerating away from stops or out of corners makes the point, once they drop back I’ll drive normally again.

Last two sets of ‘wide’ road tyres where GP5000’s and like above I use them year round and honestly can’t fault them.

I would have thought a 28mm GP4000 would plump out wider than 30mm, perhaps that why not feeling much improvement in comfort with a 30mm tyre?

Put a drop of dry lube on the spring and locking mechanism

I’ve got a Novatec thru axle hub that converts to a 135mm QR wheel with a cheap conversion kit that takes all of a minute to fit, you might be able to find a rear wheel built on a Novatec hub?

Wiggle sell conversion kits to convert thru axle prime wheels to 135mm QR. I was lead to believe that Prime use rebranded Novatec hubs but don’t quote me on that.

I don’t really walk with duck feet but at rest my left foot likes to point outwards, if I run cleats perfectly straight then it gives me knee pain in my left leg although it takes a few hours of riding to come on. The easy fix, before they where inexplicably discontinued, was running Speedplay Frogs where the 15° float was sufficient to allow me to run the cleats straight but allow my foot to find the place it wants to be, I run Speedplays on the road bike. I was going to buy Time spd pedals due to the float but was give a pair of Look pedals and by pointing the cleat slightly so it point towards my big toe before tightening the bolts, I didn’t need a backing plate or anything special, I can ride multiple hours pain free.