Galibier Mistral Foul Weather Jacket Review

To be totally transparent from the off, I really like, own and very regularly use lots of Galibier kit including; shorts, tights, leg warmers, gloves, overshoes, a headband/bandana and a rain jacket. In fact they are responsible for my favourite lightweight gloves and their winter ones are pretty damn good too.

I find their products to be of good quality and durability at very affordable prices, although I feel they are sometimes let down by some strange aesthetic designs and decisions.

When I was looking for something a bit better at coping with the rain than the usual lightweight, waterproof but unbreathable rain jacket, they were my natural first choice.

From their website I discovered the Mistral being marketed as a foul weather jacket. This seemed to tick all the boxes in terms of breathability and triple-layer wet weather protection. Most comparable jackets were 2 or 3 times the £72 price, and the design of the Mistral promised “the wind, rain and cold protection of a jacket, but with the comfort of a jersey.”

Galibier state that the specially sourced fabric of their jacket was designed for use by the German military, and given the traditional quality of German Army materiel, (think MG42 or Panzerkampwagen V), this sounded like a ringing endorsement to me.

With their usual efficient delivery service the jacket was soon in my hands. The first thing I noticed was the packaging – the Mistral came very neatly and impressively folded into its own, perfectly serviceable Galibier musette and one of their buffs was included free for good measure.

Perhaps this latter addition was Galibier’s way of addressing one of my own slight gripes with the jacket, but more of that later.

The product itself looks very well made, double-stitched throughout and with the Galibier name prominently embroidered on the left hand breast – a big quality step up from the usual short-lived, less than durable transfers they typically use to brand their gear.

In minimalist black with a contrasting red cuffs, collar and zip and a matching red “skunk stripe” down the back, the design is neat, serviceable and looks the part, although it’s not especially distinctive in either cut or colour and is never going to engender any “I want one of those” product lust.

The material of the jacket is the interesting stuff, it does feel akin to pulling on a jersey, but the fabric is thicker, somewhat stiffly elastic and quite smooth and slick to the touch.

mistral-material-features-graphic — The triple membrane construction

There are 3 very deep pockets with reflective trim and mesh bottoms, presumably because the fabric is so waterproof water would pool in the pockets if they didn’t have an outlet.

These pockets are excellent – one of the best features of the jacket because although deep and wonderfully capacious, the taut elasticity of the fabric means they don’t lose their shape and hold everything safely and securely with very little bulging or movement. Ideal for winter rides where I tend to carry a few more tools, kit and spares.

rear-pocket — The pockets are just fabulous

Pulling on the jacket feels very much akin to pulling on a winter weight, race-fit jersey, and you do have to actively pull it on – it’s close cut, with no excess material to flap around in the wind. Once on it feels very warm, supportive and enfolding.

The jacket has what Galibier refer to as a diaphragm cut, quite short on the torso, so there’s no uncomfortable bunching up of loose material once you’re tucked into a riding position.

This had me somewhat self-consciously tugging the front down when I first tried the jacket on, but it comes into its own once you swing a leg over your bike. In contrast the tail is slightly dropped to give additional protection for your lower back.

The cut comes into its own once you’re on the bike

The sleeves appear long enough to cope with even my gibbon-like limbs with material to spare, so there’s no excuse for having any annoying gap between cuff and glove. As with the body the sleeves are quite close fitting and supportive – you will inevitably have to pull them inside out as you take the jacket off.

The inner cuff, in the contrasting red fleecy material, seals the sleeves effectively from the wind, but experience has taught me these cuffs are not made of the same water resistant material as the shell, and, if accidently exposed, will soak up and retain water like a sponge.

The zipper appears to be of good, robust quality and sits in front of a windproof “storm flap” of protective material. There’s also a neat “zip garage” built into the top of the collar, which would perhaps be a good idea, except I don’t think I’ll ever use it. This is because, (my one criticism of the cut of the jacket), I find the collar too tall, restrictive and uncomfortable so never zip it fully closed. I’ve often wondered if this is a recognised shortcoming and the reason Galibier supply a free buff with the jacket!

First impressions are overwhelmingly positive, so how does the jacket actually perform?

My first few rides in the Mistral are short commutes to work where I paired the jacket with just a thin base layer. To wear, the garment is supremely comfortable, so much so that you forget that you’re actually wearing it and I can’t think of a better endorsement than that.

It’s also impressively windproof and warm – almost too warm in any temperature over 11°c to 12°c especially, though not surprisingly, when climbing hills. It also pleasingly shrugged off any showers or light rain, and when caught in a sudden downpour I could see the water beading on the surface and running away without soaking through the fabric.

I’ve since comfortably worn the jacket with a double base layer in temperatures (taking the wind chill into account) of -1°c to -2°c, and feel it will cope with just about anything the British winter can throw at me just by regulating what I wear under it.

The jacket is also highly breathable, so even if I’ve worked up a sweat I’m confident this will eventually dissipate through the material so you’re not left with a cold, clammy and chilled feeling for the rest of the ride.

My one disappointment has been with how the Mistral performed when faced with heavy and persistent rain. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t expect the jacket to keep me totally dry throughout the ride, but I wasn’t expecting for it to surrender quite so meekly and quickly.

To be fair I think you’d struggle to find more testing conditions than the very heavy, very persistent rain we faced on our club run of 7^th November. A list of the Strava titles my companions used to label their rides may give some indication of what we faced; “Biblical Rainfall,” “Ou Est Mon Bateau?” “The Life Aquatic” and “Yo, Noah, Where Art Thou?” being just a few selections.

By the time I reached our meeting point after about an hour of riding into the downpour I could already feel cold water slowly creeping through the jacket, especially down the arms and back.

Now Galibier are perfectly honest and don’t claim that the Mistral is 100% waterproof, in fact there website clearly states that “The softshell is highly water resistant, but due to the superior body stretch of the material, the seams cannot be internally taped, so in a downpour, the rain will eventually get through.”

This being the case it makes me wonder why they then inserted the contrasting red skunk stripe down the back of the jacket, effectively adding two full length, unprotected seams to one of the most exposed areas and sacrificing functionality for aesthetics.

After another couple of hours of prolonged, unrelenting driving rain and high pressure road spray, the Mistral was pretty much soaked through and everything under it was decidedly damp. The jacket was surprisingly heavy when I took it off in the café to try and let my inner layers dry out a little, and not particularly comfortable to pull on again when it was time to leave. Despite this however it did serve its primary function – keeping me warm throughout the ride.

In conclusion then, the Galibier Mistral is a well-made, very competitively priced and supremely comfortable winter jacket. Although it isn’t going to keep you dry in the most demanding of conditions it should be able to cope with all but the heaviest rainfall and, no matter what, will remain windproof and keep you reasonably warm.

The Mistral jacket, not quite as waterproof as I would have liked, but fast becoming an essential piece of winter kit

I’m happy enough with its water-resistant properties enough to forgo carrying a separate waterproof, although I would probably look for a different solution or additional protection if I’m likely to face prolonged and very heavy rain throughout a ride.

Its versatility has meant that I’ve pretty much abandoned all other winter jackets in favour of my Mistral and I guess that means I’ll soon find out how durable it is too.

Mistral foul weather jacket – £72.00 from Galibier (www.galibier.cc)

<<Click Here>>

All photos from galibier.cc

The Texas Chainring Massacre and the Road to Cheesecake.

Club Run, Saturday 31^st October, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 107 km/66 miles with 884 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 4 hours 07 minutes

Group size: 30 riders with no FNG’s

Weather in a word or two: Astonishingly mild.

Main topic of conversation at the start: As I rolled up to the meeting place the BFG told me I looked like Fausto Coppi. Normally I would have been insufferably pleased at such a compliment as surely no rider has ever looked as elegant as the languid and composed Il Campionissimo. In this instance however it just made me question the BFG’s suspect eyesight.

My suspicion’s regarding his lack of ocular acuity were further confirmed when he told me he spent most of last Sunday’s club run admiring another riders leg warmers, which he thought were the acme of form-fitting apparel and style, perfectly moulded to the riders physique and showing every bulging muscle and sinew. He was just about to ask where he could buy a pair of leg warmers just like them, when the Prof pointed out he was actually looking at the legs of one of the black guys who was only wearing shorts.

The BFG then went on to tell me that in his world torque wrenches and washers were all redundant, information the Offshore Safety Directive Regulator may be interested in.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop:

The Red Max kept us royally entertained, first with the tales of last Sunday’s club run when an encounter with a local Tri-Club led to a bit of competitive drag racing that blew the two groups apart and caused chaos down Berwick Hill, or as Zippy commented near the road to the Cheese Cake. He did correct himself and obviously meant the Cheese Farm, but I like the thought of a road to Cheese Cake so much that I’ve pinched it.

Red Max then moved on to his ultra-competitive, turbo-training sessions with the Monkey Butler Boy (aka Red Max Junior) which have seemingly become a source of marital discord. These used to be played out across dual turbo’s set up in front of the TV, with the protagonists vying to see who can pedal fastest while simultaneously trying to frag each other online in Call of Duty. Unfortunately a liberal coating of oil to a new chain led to the last contest spraying an arc of oil from chainset to ceiling, like the spray of blood in a bad slasher movie.

To compound the issue, Mrs. Max returned home one night to find Max and the Monkey Butler Boy sitting in the middle of the living room floor with Max’s dirty bike spread out in pieces all around them. Max couldn’t quite understand what the furore was all about, as he phlegmatically suggested, “It wasn’t as if we were watching hardcore porn while she was out.” Needless to say bikes and bikers are now banned from the living room.

With OGL being absent we looked to Grover for oberleutnant and enforcer duties. He was late appearing in the café queue, perhaps as he was outside inspecting bikes and taking down the names of all those without mudguards.

We idly wondered if other cycling clubs were run like the Cosa Nostra, with an all-powerful Capo, but didn’t talk about it too loudly in case we woke up to find a sawn-off set of handlebars sharing the bed with us.

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

And so it’s time put away bright shiny carbon things and coax the reluctant and recalcitrant Peugeot winter bike out of “le sulk”. I feel that half the battle with continuing to ride throughout the winter is not to have a bike that you hate so much you can’t bring yourself to swing a leg over it, that’s just putting one more barrier in the way of riding – as if the rain, wind, freezing cold, ice, dark, pot-holed and filthy, crappy roads aren’t disincentive enough. (Remind me again why I do this?)

So we’ve entered a period of entente cordiale where I’m trying to make the Peugeot feel loved and wanted, after all it’s going to be a long few months where I rely on it. On Saturday for example we celebrated the birthday of Philippe de Vitry, French composer, poet, and theorist and breakfasted on pain au raisin and warm brioche. Meanwhile Alizée, Mylene Farmer, The Dø, and Yelle have all been on heavy rotation on the iPod.

(In keeping with the Gallic theme, on Friday night I watched The Returned – it’s started a bit slow and it’s not quite up to the standards of the first series yet, but it does still feature super-creepy kid Victor, who bears a striking resemblance to Alberto Contador.)

victor contador — Alberto Contador as creepy revenant Victor in The Returned and Swann Nambotin (yes, really) as Alberto Contador in the new Steak Out movie. (Sorry).

I’ve even tried to curry favour with the Peugeot through lavish, hopeful gifts– gone are the no-name brakes for something with a bit more stopping power and I’ve recently bought a new pair of shiny Cinelli bar end plugs and some Schwalbe Durano tyres. I haven’t fitted the tyres yet but hope will prove as puncture resistant as the Gatorskin Ultra’s are have been, while providing a little more grip.

Le Peugeot, Waiting for the Winter – as the (rather fabulous) Popguns once sang.

So that’s it – we’re all geared up for winter and good to go. Now let’s see what the weather’s going to throw at us…

If today is an example though, I think we’ll be all right. Heavy rain throughout Friday left the roads wet and with lots of surface water everywhere, but the day was mild, generally still and pleasant.

Fausto Coppi not only epitomised grace and elegance on the bike, but could keep the peloton in stitches with his famous preying mantis impersonation. — Fausto Coppi not only epitomised grace and elegance on the bike, but kept the peloton in stitches with his famous preying mantis impersonation.

The kit was pretty much the same as last week, long sleeve jersey, base layer, shorts leg warmers and long-fingered gloves. The only difference was I swapped the Belgian booties for waterproof shoe covers. Yet again I was surprised to see a number still out in their shorts. Brave, foolish, or just considerably younger than I am, I guess.

OGL, G-Dawg and a few others were up in Jockland for the Braveheart Dinner and with Crazy Legs suffering from sustained, serious jet lag it was left to Red Max and Taffy Steve to lead us out into the unknown. A good group of 30 lads and lasses pushed off, clipped in and took the road out west.

Our regular lane out into the countryside was awash with debris; gravel, leaves, hedge trimmings and who knows what else, and sure enough we had only left it a couple of mile behind when Shoeless pulled over with a puncture. We rolled past as he stopped to make repairs, and turned off the main route, ironically on the road to Cheese Cake.

I was sitting comfortably perched on the crossbar, chatting with Taffy Steve while we waited and just happened to mention that I was surprised we only had the one puncture as I idly stabbed a thumb into my front tyre. This turned out to be a big mistake as the tyre was suspiciously squishy and would have given a ride I could only describe as plush.

Whipping out a new tube I set to work, and I was still wrestling to replace a particularly recalcitrant tyre by the time Shoeless rejoined. Zardoz then took pity on my effete weakness (damn, I broke a nail as well) and utilised his “pincers of steel” fingers to neatly and effortlessly pop the tyre back onto the rim for me.

I declined Crazy Legs’s kind offer of a lend of his molto piccolo, Blackburn Airstick and used Taffy Steves mighty frame pump to give my upper body an intense workout, harder than any of the pedalling I done up to that point. (Following the Crazy Legs tradition, I popped my track pump onto the tyre when I got home to discover my considerable and most strenuous efforts had driven a massive, awe inspiring 50 psi into the tyre.)

Under way again we passed the landed gentry, striding out intent on slaughtering the local wildlife. Usually this takes the form of a hunt – all horse faced people on, well, horse-faced horses (what did you expect?). This week however it was a shooting party, all goofy tweed jackets, baggy, three quarter-length “trizers”, flat caps and shiny Purdey’s, strolling down the middle of the road and out to “bag a grice or two.” They seemed unconscionably cheerful about what they were doing.

What, what, Old Boy - I can't shoot grice in these trizers. (With apologies to Steve Bell) — “What, what, Old Boy – I can’t shoot grice in these trizers.” (With apologies to Steve Bell)

We split at the junction to the Quarry, with a few of the racing snakes heading for a long, fast descent and then a corresponding long haul back uphill. I noticed the FNG from last week got sucked in by the Siren Song of the Racing Snakes and went with them. I silently wished him luck.

Split made, the pace was pushed higher and higher and I sat on Zardoz’s wheel as he dragged us up toward the front. With the group heading for the “Snake Bends” route to the café (not favourable terrain for me) I decided to blast the Quarry Climb instead, and hit the front on the last steep ramp, managing to pull clear and hang on with my nose in front as we crested and swung right. I even managed to net a Strava PR of 4:41 for the climb.

As we hit a long drag, followed by a few fast descents I again found myself on the front negotiating a particularly hazardous, gravel-strewn corner. I drove on through a couple of junctions and more slight rises that all felt like major cols and hung out front until the road levelled and Red Max led the charge past me and down to the Snake Bends. Great fun.

Another puny weakling from the waist up struggles to force more than 50 psi into a tyre.

On the ride home Shoeless and I commiserated together about having to repair punctures in front of everyone and amidst all the sharp intakes of breath, head-shaking, tutting and “You don’t do it like that” comments. Still, it’s character forming … isn’t it?

So far, so good…

YTD Totals: 5,322 km/ 3,260 miles with 60,139 metres of climbing.

Random Rambles and Esoteric Observations # 4 – Planet X vs. Rapha – The Throwdown

A very personal viewpoint…

Trying to find some clever way of segmenting buying behaviour within the cycling market for a colleague developing a new business concept, I half-jokingly suggested we could measure attitudes to spending on a scale where one end was represented by Rapha and the other end Planet X.

Then the more I thought about it, the more I realised that perhaps my mad idea held more than a grain of truth, and the two brands do in fact occupy completely opposite ends of the price spectrum.

Rapha is a brand that so desperately wants to be seen as niche and elitist that it almost hurts, and I suspect the overblown prices are very much part of its appeal to a certain type of customer. While I don’t doubt its products are high quality, well-designed and built to last, I do have trouble believing they are 7 or 8 times better than the competition, which is what some of the pricing implies.

Planet X on the other hand trumpets no nonsense prices and its website and stores are replete with some astonishing deals. In fact they first came to my attention through one of their clearance sales, when I picked up a pair of my favourite Vittoria Corsa tyres for £9.99 each instead of the rrp of £49.99. Everyone loves a bargain, right?

But it’s not just the product and price positioning that sets Rapha and Planet X apart, they also seem fundamentally different on many other levels.

Take the brand names for a start: Rapha sounds like a somewhat louche, semi-successful, minor British film star. One of those slightly posh, thespian gentlemen with limited acting ability, who carefully manage to just about play themselves for most roles and manage to retain celebrity B-list status only by dint of constant tabloid headlines earned for all the wrong reasons.

On the other hand, where do you begin with Planet X? It’s a corny, half-baked, creaky, black and white Sci-Fi movie that wants to achieve “so bad it’s good” cult status and cool, but is just ultimately cheesy and unremittingly nerdy.

Whenever I see the Planet X logo I automatically make this unfortunate association…

Rapha borrows heavily (some would say steals cynically and unashamedly) from the iconic heritage of vintage, continental cycling, the epic pain and suffering of cycling’s classic races and hardmen racers, all shot in black and white: straining bodies, serious faces and nary a smile to be seen. It’s such an overly-serious, po-faced approach – where’s the fun and the joy that’s so inherent to cycling?

This is a mythological version of cycling as it never was, all suffering and gladiatorial combat – and to me it’s so obviously a parody and fake in its own right that I’m surprised it’s still being parodied by others – and all without even the slightest whiff of irony.

Planet X on the other hand is all gruff, straight talking, down to earth stuff. A spade will always be a spade, never a lovingly hand-crafted, ergonomically designed earth shearing, turning and excavation tool, forged from high impact, low carbon tensile steel with a close-grained, oiled and carefully pollarded English yew shaft that’s been lovingly nurtured to maturity in the ancient and Royal Forest of Dean. Phew! And breathe. Planet X is the Ronseal of the cycling world – doing exactly what it says on the tin.

Rapha colours are unremittingly flat and dull, relying heavily on over liberal and much imitated use of black (as the new white, brown, grey, orange, black etc. – just delete as appropriate). They are minimalist to the point of bland. Their signature; the single, contrasting coloured band on the sleeve, leg or whatever, no longer looks clever to me (was it ever?) – just strangely unimaginative and rather tired looking. Your mileage, of course, may vary.

Planet X designs on the other hand have none of the studied cool of Rapha and tend toward the garish and over-the-top – check out their Carnac team kit and bikes as a prime example.

Once stalwarts of the British pro scene via the RaphaCondor outfit, Rapha have moved up to the big time and are now the kit providers of choice to the elite of the elite pro teams, the one with allegedly the biggest budget in the peloton, and a team that is perhaps as divisive as the Rapha brand itself.

You don’t have to stray too far into the troll infested backwoods of the Internet to find that Sky are unremittingly seen as the bad guys, sucking the soul out of cycling through (shock! horror!) meticulous planning, innovative methods, spending as much budget as they can prise out of sponsors hands, employing the most talented riders, structured training, organisation, attention to detail and riding to their strengths, (all ladled with lashings of dark, innuendo about cheating and drug-taking.)

Rapha themselves have managed to take one of the duller team kits in the pro ranks and somehow make it even more boring and bland, (or understated, cool and minimalist, depending on your own point of view.) Oh, and then they’ve added those shudderingly hideous national flags to the sleeve cuffs for good measure … well, only one sleeve cuff, obviously.

There may be people out there who like this - but I'm not one of them. — There may be people out there who like this – but I’m not one of them.

Planet X on the other hand are unheralded sponsors of a host of domestic, young, up-and-coming, teams and individuals, kids, men and women, all flying pretty much under the radar, all in real need of support. They appear to do this with the sole intent of nurturing the grass-roots of the sport, although, if they’re really clever, perhaps they might be able to squeeze some small marketing return out of their investment.

Rapha are the perfect, text book example of how to build a premium, niche brand and as a marketing man I should be much, much more appreciative of their tight control over product and image and how they’ve created a brand with a real and enduring cachet. Their heritage may be at best overstated and at worst manufactured – but it’s obviously working for them and their target market.

There’s a lot to admire about Rapha – they are a relatively young, dynamically growing, internationally recognised and highly successful British brand that is seen as world leading and is much loved and valued by the only people who actually matter – their customers. I’m sure on many levels their devotees (Raphalites in my jargon) enjoy the scorn of their detractors as much as the product and brand image they are actually buying into.

From the outside Planet X sometimes appear a bit disorganised and all over the shop, willing to jump at any opportunity and conveying the wiles and opportunism of a wheeler-dealer market trader, a Del Boy made good? They appear content to be seen as bumbling along with no particular destination in mind and without any kind of blueprint for world domination.

It’s difficult to imagine anyone actually coveting a Planet X product, and if they do the value for money pricing means it’s an itch that’s fairly easily scratched. Many, many people however will be more than happy to buy and use and endorse their products wholeheartedly.

Both companies have owners who profess a love of cycling, but for Simon Mottram of Rapha it’s the pure and unalloyed love of road racing. His avowed aim is to promote the sport he loves, and he wants it to be as big as football. It’s an interesting point of view, but I’m not sure it’s remotely attainable, or more importantly, even the least bit desirable.

“I think road cycling is the most beautiful sport in the world, and the toughest sport in the world, and I think it should be the biggest sport in the world. I think more people should do cycling than watch football.” **(Photo from Cycling Weekly)**

I also struggle to forgive him his man-crush on Marco Pantani, who Mottram sees as a tragic icon of style(!) and the epitome of cool, while I just think of him as a fragile, ungainly, rocket-fuelled cheat, deserving as much approbation as a certain gentleman from Texas.

On the other side of the coin, Planet X is owned and run by Dave Loughran. A bit of a mongrel in terms of cycling background, first and foremost a triathlete, and then a mountain biker who has dabbled in dirt bikes, mountain bikes, fixies, or anything else that’ll turn a profit. By all accounts Loughran is an abrasive, hard-nosed, salesman and a bit of a wheeler-dealer who admires Mike Ashley of all people.

This is a man with (judging purely from what I’ve read, you understand) so many traits I don’t admire that I can’t say I have an interest in meeting him and I certainly can’t imagine myself ever working for him. Despite this he’s made a good impression on me (ironically in an excellent article written by Jack Thurston in Rapha’s “corporate” magazine Rouleur) and I’m really interested in seeing what he does next. It was while being interviewed for this article that, almost in an aside about business growth really stuck and resonated with me.

I can remember way back in my university days trying to write a Marketing Communications assignment and weave into it the universal truths of Nietzche’s writings and the startling insight of W B Yeats poetry, wrapped around a lengthy discourse on the largely unreported hijacking, total control and manipulation of the free press by the military during the American invasion of Grenada. (Pretentious. Moi? Look there’s only so much you can write about J.K. Galbraith, Drucker or Kotler without becoming deathly boring to yourself and, surely your tutors too…)

Around this time I unerringly stumbled across a lecture by E.P. Thompson which either coloured my thinking, or simply gave life to already ingrained beliefs. Thompson argued that the establishment controls the frame of reference in which all the political discourse takes place and stifles true debate so that, for example, it becomes a very narrow argument about which political party can best deliver economic growth and never an exploration of whether the blind pursuit of growth is actually necessary, or in the best interests of the country and its populace.

He likened this to a car, “bumming down the motorway with an accelerator pedal, but no steering … we rush on, faster or slower, but can’t take exits, go somewhere else, or even stop and turnaround.”

In 30 years of working for and on behalf of dozens, if not hundreds of businesses, both massive and micro, corporate conglomerates to Mom & Pop family-run affairs, I’ve seen the same single-minded, determined obsession with growth and never yet encountered an organisation that strayed far from the strategy of making as much money and profit as humanly (and occasionally inhumanely) possible.

Every business and many other types of organisation too, seem to have a default setting that says they have to measure themselves purely on financial performance. Year on year they set themselves bigger and bigger growth targets, regardless of whether this is necessary or actually in their best interests, regardless of the mental and physical well-being of the workers and the management and ignoring if this will actually improve what they deliver to their customers.

Now, many, many years later I’ve actually found a successful business man with a different view and judging from the articles, growth for growth’s sake also seems to be a bit of a bugbear for Loughran too.

He’s quoted talking about the plans to sell off his company, “All I’ve had for the last three years is ‘what’s our growth plan’: growth, growth, growth, how are we striving for growth? Growth became a number. We grew phenomenally in the last year and it became a pressure cooker of: ‘How do we build 300 bikes a week, how do we build 350, how do we build 400?’ It was all because my management team was driving for a buy-out and they had to show to all the vulture capitalists a £10, £15, £20, £25 million success story”.

And then he capped it all with this piece of what sounded like very heartfelt, hard-won wisdom. “We can build 300 bikes a week now and everyone can have a great life and the mechanics don’t have any pressure and we can have good availability. If we strove for 500 bikes a week we wouldn’t have the supply chain, everybody would hate each other, it wouldn’t be a nice company.” (My emphasis).

He then went on to talk about setting up an employee share ownership system that will eventually mean the company is co-owned by staff and an independent trust set up to safeguard the workforce. Sounds great – I’ll be watching.

And there you have it, a very rambling discourse on why I’m more interested in what Mr. Loughran does next, rather than Mr. Mottram’s next step toward world-domination. It’s also one reason why I’m more X-traterrestrial than a Raphalite – you see it isn’t just because I’m as tight as a wallaby’s sphincter.

Slip Slidin’ Away

Club Run, Saturday 24^th October, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 113 km/70 miles with 1,021 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 4 hours 19 minutes

Group size: 26 riders with 1 FNG

Weather in a word or two: Chilly and blustery.

Main topic of conversation at the start: The Prof turned up on one of his vintage, small-wheeled convert-a-bikes, a pre-war, iron model that had somehow survived the cull of frying pans and railings in the drive for scrap metal to build more Spitfires.

This model came replete with a chainring the size of a Frisbee and after being repeatedly asked what size it was the Prof had to resort to counting its teeth. This kept him (and all his fingers and toes) occupied for a good 5 minutes.

He then took to covetously stroking his very worn, super-smooth saddle, and then the saddle of the bike next to him to compare the two. Unfortunately this bikes rider, our FNG, was sitting on his saddle at the time and I had to explain this wasn’t some weird, North East cycle club hazing, or initiation routine involving the fondling of each new guy’s posterior.

Taffy Steve, having wrapped his titanium love-child up in cotton wool and settled it down for a long hibernation, used some of the ire generated by having to ride his thrice-cursed winter bike to curse me in turn for gambling with the weather and having the audacity to turn up on Reg.

In my defence I explained my Peugeot winter bike had just given a very Gallic shrug and said, “Non.” He reminded me what happened last year when I pushed riding the good bike too long, and trashed it sliding out on a corner and taking him down with me.

Good point? Yes.

Prescient? Hmm, maybe.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: Taffy Steve was extolling the virtues of the Rolo and Toblerone tray bake. I was expecting something that looked like a 3D Playstation controller, with little pyramids and spheres emerging like an exotic countline Venus out of a sea of chocolate, (□Δ○Δ○□), but it was flat and kind of dull, so I passed.

Discussing the case of a couple of local Sport and Psychology students who’d become seriously ill after OD’ing on massive quantities of self-administered caffeine, Ether suggested some very simple rules for experiments that even a Sport and Psychology student might be able to comprehend:

Step 1. Test on small furry critter. If adverse effects occur, stop.

Step 2. Test on a friend. If adverse effects occur, stop.

Step 3. If all previous indicators are positive, perhaps there may be a case for self-administered testing. If a positive outcome is indicated, make sure you understand how to calculate and measure out the right quantities, or have someone on hand (your Mum, maybe or another responsible adult) to help. Taking a small dose of caffeine to sharpen the mind enough to measure out the correct quantities is perhaps not recommended.

OGL stopped by to tell us that as the clocks were going back one hour to account for the rather strangely titled “UK Daylight Saving Time,” then club run times would also change. Sunday Club Runs will now meet up at 09.30 for a 09.30 start, although the time for Saturday runs will continue to be 09.00, obviously for a 09.15 start. Huh?

I await with great interest the miraculous change in cyclist behaviour that’s going to see our Sunday runs’ meet up at 09.30 and be anywhere near ready to roll out any time before 09.44.

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

I managed to commute by bike on four out of five days in a vain attempt to try and make up for missing the club run last week. With my ratbag MTB in the LBS for a desperately needed service, this was mainly achieved astride the Peugeot winter bike, although it did include a novel, but ultimately unsuccessful experiment with a single-speed hack that turned into an uphill duathlon when the chain kept slipping off under pressure.

My self-imposed duathlon had nothing to recommend it.

Having eagerly watched the weather forecasts change on a daily basis, Saturday dawned, cold, blustery and grey, with the threat of a few chilly showers, but without the likelihood of any prolonged rain. A gamble then, but having had enough of the Peugeot for one week I felt I was owed one last blast on the carbon steed.

Perhaps more by luck than good judgement I got the clothing right for once; long sleeved base layer and jersey, shorts, leg warmers, thick socks, Belgian booties and long-fingered gloves. I even defied the weather gods and decided against packing a waterproof for that “just in case” scenario.

This week in the People’s Republic of Yorkshire, what the locals like to refer to as “Gods Own Country” –along with, oh at least a dozen other places that I know of dotted around the globe – (they may be the “chosen” of God, but they get no prizes for originality) – the venerable Toshi San is busy looking for a new club after bitter internecine fighting and a bloody coup of senior members ripped his old one apart.

One group he trialled uses its Faecesbook page to not only update ride information, but provide weather forecasts and recommendations about what to wear! Toshi San was somewhat bemused by this, declaring that he’s been able to dress himself since his schooldays and grown lads and lasses shouldn’t need to be told what to wear.

If he’d turned up at our meeting point he might well have reconsidered, there were at least 3 or 4 riders still in shorts, with legs marbled like corned beef, several more with bare hands tucked firmly into armpits, while the Prof wore a rain-jacket which he later admitted kept him constantly on the threshold of over-heating.

It was then a fairly decent turnout of 24 lads and lasses, several blatantly defying the elements, who pushed off, clipped in and headed out, with a couple of late comers tagging onto the back of our line as we rolled away.

These included the luckless Dabman, still less than sanguine about riding in a group after suffering a broken collar bone when he was brought off by another rider during our last “Man Down” incident. This had closely followed his recovery from a broken wrist when he went over on the ice on a winter run out. He later admitted he’d just come out for a confidence-building, solo ride, but saw us leaving and decided he might as well tag along anyway.

I slotted in alongside one of the university students who I didn’t recognise as a Saturday club run regular and got chatting to him about Amsterdam, Copenhagen, postgraduate law degrees (as you do) and (inevitably) the weather. Somewhere along the line he mentioned he was a little concerned about a mismatched rear tyre that didn’t seem to be affording him much grip.

The ride was visited by a few short lived light rain showers, that didn’t really dampen our enjoyment, but did just enough to make the road surfaces slimy and slippery. Rounding a fairly innocuous corner my companion was just telling me he could feel his rear wheel stepping-out on the bend when there was a clatter, a thud and a thump as three or four riders in a line behind us all went down.

I turned around to find several bikes strewn across the road and Ovis curled up around his wrist which had taken the brunt of his fall. I did a quick double-check – but thankfully there was no stray farmyard livestock around him needing to be cornered and corralled. I recovered his bike for him, to find both brake levers now pointing sharply inward like the converging guns on a fighter, giving him point harmonisation at about 30 metres from his front wheel, or an enemy bogie.

I was also somewhat concerned to see Dab Man had assumed an all too familiar position, sitting to one side of the road with his bike abandoned on the other and sporting a much muddied and streaked shoulder on an otherwise clean white jersey. He assured me he was ok and was at pains to explain that (again) it wasn’t his fault.

Luckily all of the damage seemed fairly superficial, although I suspect there may be a few sore bodies later on as a consequence of all the unbridled man-meets-road action. We managed to bang Ovis’s brake levers back around to give his bike some semblance of normality, and he wiped the blood from his brow, pocketed his smashed specs and pressed bravely on.

Not surprisingly at the split all those who had hit the deck opted for the shorter, more direct route to the café, along with the unlikely accompaniment of the Red Max. This had me wondering if the once irrepressible Red Max is starting to feel threatened by the improving strength and form of the Monkey Butler Boy, a.k.a. Red Max Junior. Dare I suggest he cut short his ride because he wanted to keep a little extra something back for their planned jaunt out together on Sunday?

As if relieved and reprieved from escaping the crash, the remainder of the group pressed on at some pace, occasionally splintering and reforming across a number of climbs and descents. At one point beZ skipped lightly past me on a hill and wondered aloud if I’d started a slightly worrying trend for wearing Belgian national colours.

belgians — Watch out, here come the Belgians!

Enough people then rode up to ask me if I’d gone down in the crash that I began to feel equal parts paranoia and survivors guilt. Maybe it was just wishful thinking on their part?

As I crested the Quarry Climb I could feel the rear wheel losing traction as I rocked out of the saddle, so eased off and decided instead to save a little for the last climb up to the Snake Bends. I tucked in behind the leaders as we swept down to the T-junction, then on the first rise after the turn I jumped over Keel, and left him behind as I pounded onwards, trying to to keep the momentum going on the long drag up to the next junction.

As I closed on the junction however Taffy Steve cruised effortlessly up alongside on the thrice-cursed winter bike, with a, “Is that it?” quizzical look and I realised I hadn’t dropped anyone and it wasn’t going to be my day.

Together with Taffy Steve we fruitlessly tried chasing G-Dawg down through the side lanes, while others took the more direct route to the café, the pressing need for cake outweighing the unpleasantness of battling with the high-speed traffic along the main road.

On leaving the café I dropped to the back of the first group on the road home, occasionally chatting with a still chipper, if slightly begrimed Dabman and Cushty. We were wondering where the rest of the group were, how much of a handicap they’d given us and just where exactly they would catch and overtake us.

It was actually later than we thought when an express driven by Shoeless and G-Dawg steamed past. I swung onto the back of this train and rode it through to my turn off, where I was dumped ungraciously into a stiff headwind for the lone grind home.

Hmm, winter bikes only next week? (Maybe.)

YTD Totals: 5,322 km/ 3,260 miles with 60,139 metres of climbing.

Ghostface Killah

Club Run and Hill Climb, Saturday 3^rd October, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 89 km/55 miles with 924 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 3 hours 46 minutes

Group size: No more than 20 –2 FNG’s

Weather in a word or two: Extremely chilly

Main topic of conversation at the start: Crazy Legs gives voice to what I suspect all the regulars are thinking – how much we hate this day. No matter how good you’re feeling, I’m not sure anyone actually looks forward to the hill climb and its attendant hurt.

He then suggested we have a whip around to hire a Portaloo for the start of the hill climb. I countered by saying what we really need is a patio heater. The general consensus was we were both wrong and what we actually need is both a Portaloo and a patio heater.

A couple of FNG’s, or more accurately an FNG couple, exiled from Sarf Larnden, spotted Reg and we had a good chat about the original Holdsworth shop in Putney, which was their LBS and they remember as being loaded with a cornucopia of memorabilia from the mighty Holdsworth-Campagnolo pro team.

The store closed in October 2013 after 86 years, according to my interlocutor’s because it was located in some prime real estate that the owner’s family sadly wanted to cash in on. Although Reg’s carbon frame was probably mass produced by a faceless squad of minions in an ultra-high-tech, utterly sterile, Far East factory, I like to think it has some spiritual connection and shares just a little bit of heritage with this illustrious and successful British bike brand.

Fallout from last week’s plethora of punctures saw Crazy Legs check the pressure in his repaired tyre on returning home – to reveal a massive 20psi. This was despite his and Red Max’s efforts with both the molto piccolo and Max’s uber-pump. Some discussion was had about Szell’s spectacular blowout and whether it was caused by the inner tube trying to squeeze out between tyre casing and dangerously worn rims.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: Hill Climb day is the only time we use this particular café, and then we all turn up coughing and spluttering with climbers cough^1., like a consumptive poet dying of TB. We often wonder what the staff make of us and whether they think we’re the most unfit cycling club in existence, or are perhaps sponsored by Rothmans and contractually obliged to smoke 40 a day.

Zardoz told me he was out again on Wednesday with the Retired Gentleman’s Combative Cycling Club, when the conversation rolled around to Il Lombardia, and someone asked where the race was and received the very obvious and undoubtedly correct answer: Lombardy. Then there were blank stares and silence all around as everyone realised they didn’t quite know where Lombardy actually was.

Apparently the Cyclone Sportive and associated events which OGL organises may be without a headline sponsor this year, as negotiations with Virgin Money to renew seem to have reached something of an impasse. I must admit OGL seemed remarkably sanguine about the whole thing.

Coffee, and the supposition that Britain has the worst tasting coffee, with the highest caffeine content. Discuss.

Ride Profile (Hill Climb highlighted)

The Waffle:

Hope you’re sitting comfortably, this could be a long one …

We’re into October and all the portents are pointing assuredly toward this being the start of winter. Il Lombardia or to use this classics most poetic title, la classica delle foglie morte, closed out the pro season on Sunday^2., and as if on cue all the leaves at home are suddenly turning golden and starting to sift down.

Darkness is beginning to slowly steal away precious minutes of daylight at both ends of the day and the weather is developing a distinctive chilly bite to it. And if all this wasn’t enough, the final indicator that we’re at the back end of the cycling year is that the traditional British hill climb season is now in full swing.

Fabulous Lombardy poster from the Handmade Cyclist

Not to be outdone, this weekend was our turn to pander to our worst masochistic, self-harming instincts, with a tilt at the club hill climb. The chosen arena for our self-flagellation is Prospect Hill, near Corbridge in the Tyne Valley. The climb is about 1.5km long at a 7% incline, with a maximum of 15.5% and runs through 9 bends, several of which are almost tight enough to be classed as hairpins.

The forecast for the day was an early mist that would eventually burn off, but with temperatures subsequently depressed and unlikely to claw their way up into double figures. My breakfast and ride preparations are interrupted by about half a dozen trips to the toilet. Nerves? Possibly.

Knowing it’s going to be chilly out, compounded by the lengthy wait hanging around for a start slot, I choose a base layer, club jersey, arm and knee warmers, long gloves and a windproof jacket over the top of everything. I’m attempting to walk the razor-fine line between not overheating on the ride to the hill and trying to stay reasonably warm once I get there. I’m somewhat shocked to find how surprisingly capacious my club jersey has become.

After last week’s mega turn out, the numbers at the meeting point are disappointingly low, even though they’re bolstered by a few of the racing snakes, who don’t usually deign to ride with us mere mortals, but have been lured out by the thrill of competition.

Several notable absentees can be explained by conflicting events, G-Dawg and the Prof are doing the Kielder Run-Bike-Run, while Red Max and the Monkey Butler Boy are tackling the Autumn Wooler Wheel Sportive, but where’s everyone else?

Even with the juniors making their own way to the climb, numbers are significantly down on previous years, and several of those at the meeting point are just out for a normal ride and have no interest in seeing if they can cough out their own lungs by riding as fast as possible up a hill, just to turn around and come back down again. Oh well, at least it should help get things over with fairly quickly.

The temperature dropped even further as we swept down into the bottom of the Tyne Valley to follow the road upstream, and as we approached the start we could see the hillside above us shrouded in a dense grey blanket of wetly-dripping mist.

A rival club was holding their own “chrono escalada” up the other side of the hill, but thankfully they’re early starters (and probably punctual too!) They were just about done and dusted by the time we rolled up, avoiding the potentially catastrophic (if comic) opportunity for two, charging, heads-down and rapidly converging riders lunging for the same line and colliding in an explosion of flailing limbs and carbon fragments.

As we milled around, horribly messing up the signing on process and allocation of numbers in the disorganised chaos that only cyclists seem capable of achieving, the cold really started to bite. We stood around shivering, with fumbling fingers occasionally bypassing jersey material to pin numbers directly through benumbed, frozen flesh, but at least they were well secured and not likely to flap in the wind.

Rab Dee offered me some of his home made energy bar, which is reportedly so dense it absorbs light. It didn’t seem to be the sort of extra weight I should be taking on board before hauling ass up a steep hill, so I politely declined.

Then, in a break with tradition, instead of being snooty and snotty and whingeing at us for having the temerity to use the public road outside their homes, one of the local households decided to embrace the annual invasion of slightly mad cyclists, and sent out a sacrificial daughter with a tray of freshly baked brownies. Not only did they taste great, they were actually still hot, and several groups of cyclists formed a huddle around them trying to warm their hands.

I discussed tactics for the climb with a horrendously hung over Son of G-Dawg, who blasphemously suggested starting on the inner ring. Luckily his Pa wasn’t around to hear, but it seemed the sensible decision anyway, as there’s less to go wrong if you’re not dropping from the big to smaller chainring under pressure.

A bit of riding around to … I was going to say warm up, but I think “not feel quite so cold” is closer to reality, and then it’s time to strip both myself and bike as I jettisoned water bottle and tool tub, sunglasses, gloves and finally, and with great reluctance, my jacket.

It was good to see one of our semi-FNG’s, Avatar: The Last Air Bender lining up directly in front of me, ready to hurl himself recklessly at the hill in his first ever club competition. I’m not sure he realised when he rocked up this morning that we would be doing the hill climb, so he gets extra kudos for not backing out. Chapeau!

I only have time to note that one of the young kids is set to follow me, then I’m on the line ready to start, not really concentrating and feeling quite disassociated from the entire process. The timekeeper tells me 30 seconds, and I lift my foot, clip in and settle. 15 seconds. Breathe deep. The 10 second countdown starts, I tense, the hand comes down and I’m off.

I quickly roll up a decent cadence, reach a bend and sweep around it to attack the first ramp, cresting it and pushing on toward the second bend and probably the steepest part of the course. The first slopes however have sapped just a little too much speed, the gear is too big and I’m now losing momentum and dying dismally.

The next section is a real struggle as impetus drops sharply and I’m forced out of the saddle to grind away to the accompaniment of my cleat creaking horribly on the pedal. Or at least I think it’s my cleat, it could just as easily be one of my ancient, fragile knees humming discordantly as it vibrates under the pressure in an audible warning that it’s about to explode.

An awful moment appears to attenuate into long, torturous minutes, and I can’t help gratefully thinking that unless the kid behind me is one of our outrageously talented youngsters, I should at least manage not to be caught by him. Gradually the slope eases, and I’m able to flop down heavily in the saddle and roll the chain up a couple of gears.

I try to find a rhythm now, and maintain the pace, but can’t go any faster without jumping out of the saddle and stamping hard on the pedals, and this burns up oxygen quicker than I can suck it down.

As if still influenced by last week’s blood moon, I’m in full Laurens Ten Dam “werewolf” mode now, mouth agape and thrashing like a basking shark stranded on a beach and with great strings of snot and slobber, spit and drool pouring from my mouth and nose and eyes. My chest is heaving like over-worked, over-extended bellows, sucking in huge lungful’s of the freezing, burning, damp and clammy air. And it’s not enough.

Full Ten Dam mode — Full Ten Dam werewolf mode

I round another bend. All I can hear now is my rasping, too-quick panting that seems to be in wild syncopation with my thudding, banging heart. Is it natural to try and breathe so damn fast? As the bend straightens I almost plough into the back of a couple of ramblers walking blithely up the middle of the road, studiously and very deliberately ignoring each one of the gasping, labouring cyclists who have had to haul themselves around this unexpected impediment.

I swerve wide to the right to pass them, and almost immediately have to dive to the left as a huge 4 x 4 sweeps past, heading downhill with headlights blazing in the gloom. Everything is hurting now and I can’t distinguish individual areas of pain as I try to raise my speed.

Ahead of me in the mist and murk, almost always just disappearing around the next bend, I keep catching the occasional glimpse of another rider, my minute man, who’s craftily chosen a fog coloured jersey to blend in and not give me a distinct target to chase. Not fair.

I recognise I’m approaching the final section, and against all reason and the silent screaming of my body I click down one, then two gears and just push and hope. I think I’m still accelerating as I shoot over the line, then freewheel and finally remember I have to brake. Some 100 yards past the finish line I finally stop, but the pain doesn’t, and I slump over the crossbar, trying to control what feels like supernaturally fast panting.

To be read in your most hysterical Phil Liggett voice: “Just who is that rider coming up behind in the mist – because that looks like La Jante! That looks like Sur La Jante… it is, it’s Sur La Jante!”

After a few minutes I manage to get turned around and slouch my way to the finish, where Zardoz cheerfully informs me I look like a ghost and wonders aloud how I managed to so successfully drain all the blood from my face. I might have laughed, but was instantly consumed with my first bout of climbers cough.

Another year, another hill climb. So how did I do? I was 17^th out of 33 riders and 4^th out of the vets. Much more importantly, I posted a personal best time of 6 minutes and 16 seconds, 11 seconds better than the previous year.

In fact it’s pleasing to see the steady, if unspectacular progression I’ve made year on year. At 53 however I’m not looking forward to the inevitable day when age conspires to erode any improvements I can make through increased training, better equipment or smarter preparation, but at least for today I can feel I’m still winning the battle with time.

In the café I hang back to stand guard on the wallets, phones and helmets that get abandoned as a few go off to pay, and the first of our group splits and disappears up the road. I decide to take the more direct route home along the valley floor, rather than climbing out to the north and then dropping down again and strike out on my own.

I make good time on the flat, but every little incline hurts. At the bottom of the Heinous Hill I decide to postpone the inevitable a little longer and drop into the Pedalling Squares café to arrange a much overdue service for my ratbag mountain bike. Suitably fortified with one of their excellent espresso’s, the clamber up the hill and home turns out to be not quite as bad as I imagined it would be.

Footnote ^1.

During a hill climb, cyclists are breathing as hard as their lungs will allow, so hard in fact, that their airway gets eroded from the air passing through it. This erosion causes irritation in the airway which leads to the dreaded climbers cough (or in running parlance, “track hack”).

This irritation can cause the membranes to produce mucous for protection and lubrication, which can lead to phlegm in the cough, and may even break little capillaries in the airways causing the taste of blood, or a metallic taste in the mouth. Hmm, nice.

Footnote ^2.

The inaugural Abu Dhabi Tour doesn’t count – I’m willing to be proven wrong, but this just looks like a shameful, money-grubbing exercise by RCS and/or the UCI, and likely to be as dull, tedious and anodyne as all the other interminable Gulf Tours. I think a certain Mr. Cavendish is the only person who feels mass sprint finishes are the acme of cycle racing.

YTD Totals: 4,975 km/ 3,091 miles with 56,247 metres of climbing.

Vacillations and oscillations …

Club Run, Sunday 26^th July, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 99km/61 miles with 868 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 3 hours 47 minutes

Group size: 12 riders at the start. A few unfamiliar faces, but no FNG’s.

Weather in a word or two: Grand.

Main topic of conversation at the start: The TdF finale, and whether it had been a good race or not, including various reports of where (or, more accurately in which pub) people were watching the penultimate stage, perhaps explaining the low turnout on such a glorious morning…

OGL suggested one of our youngsters could put so much power through his downstroke that his frame was flexing and his pedal catching on the chainstay. Awesome. Alternatively, I think he could just be completely duck-toed and/or twisting his ankle when really putting the power down and it’s his shoes abrading the paintwork. Not so awesome.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: The vagaries of Italian sizing, and how buying Castelli is the only time I don’t feel like a wimpy-weakling and can get away with ordering an L or even XL. The Small and even Medium sizes are to be avoided at the risk of severe bruising, skin abrasions, internal bleeding and the unhealthy compression of vital organs. Not a good look, but perhaps suitably “aero?”

Bike porn – the number of shiny bikes on display provoked the usual degree of eye-roving wanderlust and new carbon-cravings.

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

Having just returned from a largely inactive holiday I was in urgent need of some cycling therapy as quickly as possible, and having missed the usual Saturday club run decided to try a rare Sunday morning foray. This proved to be with a much smaller, quieter and somewhat polarised group of lads and lasses, almost equally split between thrusting young things and grizzled old codgers; the club’s very own grognards. I’m more than comfortable staking a claim in the latter camp, so felt right at home.

We set out, pushed off and clipped in, hoping that for once the forecasts would exhibit a modicum of accuracy and we would be home and hosed long before the predicted rain swept in.

In comfortably warm temperatures and with only a relatively benign wind to contend with, I rode on the front for the first 40km or so, swapping news and views with Moose Bumps, while keeping the pace manageable and all the hard-riding young things in check behind me. In fact we only gave up the front when an OGL vacillation mid-way through a left-hand turn directed everyone off to the right instead … and we slipped quickly and effortlessly from first to last in the blink of an eye.

A quick charge up the Quarry climb brought me briefly to the front again, until we began the drive for the café and the thrusting young things, deciding the pace wasn’t quite fast enough, swept past to form a new, supercharged vanguard.

Obviously in a tribute to Red Max’s Forlorn Hope attack, the Cow Ranger then had a dig and strung us all out as we burned down to the Snake Corners. I was still hanging at the back as we slowed to cross the main road and then rolled down the lane. A right-hand turn spat us out onto the last small rise before the café and, with some shamelessly dumb riding up the wrong side of the white lines (don’t try this at home kids), I just managed to accelerate past all but one of the group on the short ramp to the last junction.

At the café, I was called into unexpected action to rescue the sacred, communal milk jug after it had been kidnapped and held hostage by a table full of cyclists from a rival club. This selfless act of heroism and skillful negotiation will no doubt earn me the life-long respect and possibly a small discount from the café’s grateful staff. Or more probably not.

A celebratory drink from the sacred communal milk jug — A celebratory drink from the sacred (and once again safe) communal milk jug

Uncomfortable in the face of the anticipated, but strangely delayed adulation, and not wanting to hang around too long and risk getting rained on, a handful of us saddled up and struck out, leaving behind those wanting to wallow in caffeine and cake indolence.

As we closed on the last few miles from our start point the Cow Ranger and the Plank kept trading blows and pushing the pace up, so once Mini Miss turned off I let them ride away, before settling down to meander my own way home.

Another hugely enjoyable ride and some much needed exercise to blow away the holiday indulgences and clear the noggin.

Hopefully normal service will be resumed next week. Until then, keep watching the skies…

YTD Totals: 3,760km/ 2,336 miles with 41,412 metres of climbing.

Jabbering babble and babbling jabber …

Club Run, 18^th July, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 85km/53 miles with 709 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 3 hours 9 minutes

Group size: 27 riders at the start. 2 FNG’s.

Weather in a word or two: Blustery.

Main topic of conversation at the start: The BFG has given up on his wooden rims which can warp faster than a Constitution-class starship and no amount of araldite, solder or exotic spoke weaving-patterns seemed to help them stay true. They’ve now been consigned to the Cheryl Cole: “nice to look at but serving no functional purpose” bin.

Despite his wooden wheel setback, BGF himself however continues to press boldly onward and kept me royally entertained with his tale of taking his latest vintage frame to Boots and press-ganging a bevy of beauty clinicians into helping find just the right shade of pearlised-blue nail-varnish to touch up a small scratch in the paintwork.

JC Peraud’s jersey, shorts and skin shredding crash at the TdF got a mention, especially his X-rated exposed crotch, which thankfully the TV pictures managed to cover with a pixelated-blur. I thought comments that the blurred area was “very small” to be quite mean-spirited.

We then had to disabuse one of our newer members from suggesting our rendezvous point was a lowly bus station – everyone should realise it’s nothing less than a truly magnificent Transport Interchange Centre.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: There was some suggestions that this very blog should only be available via the Darknet. Come on… it’s not that bad!

One of our newer riders commented that he was unaware other rides existed outside of our normal routes, was quite surprised to find that the whole of Northumberland was actually open to us and that our collective Garmin’s didn’t spontaneously combust once we turned away from the OGL approved rides.

In a reprise of the “blowin’ in the wind” club run, an exceptional limbo act into the gusting wind narrowly preserved a tray precariously loaded with coffee, cake and other goodies – earning a heartfelt round of applause from all assembled.

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

With OGL yet again in absentia, this time providing transport, DS, coaching, mechanic and soigneur services to a couple of our promising youngsters competing at the National Junior Road Race Championship, we were again given a little more freedom to pick our route and again seek out roads a little less travelled – and typically a bit hillier.

The weather was a mixed bag of sunny spells, showers, warm patches, icy cold blasts, overcast, then high broken clouds and blue skies, always changing from one corner to the next. The one constant throughout though was an ever present, strong and gusting wind that had us planning to frequently change lead riders from the off. Pre-planning? Surely a first for the club.

Pushing off and clipping in we instinctively avoided the Great North Road Cyclemaze, which has mutated yet again. It now appears to be designed to not only trap unwary cyclists, but also sacrifice befuddled pedestrians and unwitting, wide-eyed school children directly to the gods of the speeding motor vehicle. We await further developments of this sadistic urban planners wet dream, with very faint hope that it will eventually metamorphose into a sensible and safe means of negotiating the insatiable traffic.

The planned tribal cannibals have yet to be installed in the Great North Road Cyclemaze, but planners are confident they will be the final solution to ensuring that none who enters can escape.

I did my stint on the front pretty much from the start, and just for the benefit of those who have accused me of exaggerating my own efforts on these rides it’s worth noting that this was almost exclusively uphill, through a full-on, unrelenting headwind and at a pace that touched the terminal speeds of our typical late café sprint.

Meanwhile, in an alternative universe and much closer to reality, Crazy Legs drew my attention to the incessant chatter, guffaws of laughter and nonchalant whistling drifting continuously up from the bunch behind us – a sure-fire sign that despite my breathless toiling into the fierce headwind, no one else was having to work remotely hard enough behind me. Admitting defeat I swung over and let someone else have a go at a bit of ceaseless self-flagellation.

Well into the ride, we swooped down into the Tyne Valley like a pack of rampaging Huns, disrupting the genteel Saturday morning routines of the sleepy villages, only to disappear in a whirr of spinning freewheels and buzz of jabbering babble (or babbling jabber, depending on if we were approaching or passing) – escaping long before the watch beacons could be lit and church bells rung in warning.

Climbing back out of the valley brought us to the A69 dual carriageway, loaded with speeding cars and lorries, and giving us the opportunity to play real-life Frogger. (For those of us yet to reach pubescence, Frogger is a classic arcade game, a bit like Crossy Road but, way cooler, with better graphics, more engaging gameplay and not burdened by having an infantile name that a Nursery Class might discern as being a little too unsophisticated – even for them.)

frogger — Crossing the A69 – Frogger-style.

Having, eventually crossed the dual-carriageway safely we climbed, then climbed some more, on single-track roads with crumbling surfaces until finally escaping the valley. More miles rolled past, until we hit one of our usual routes and everyone got strung out on the Quarry climb.

At the top we turned right, straight into a fierce headwind, with no chance for recovery. The pace picked up as we burned for the café, then were whipped along by a tailwind at a pace so high it even precluded the Red Max’s traditional, Forlorn Hope attack.

In the final miles I pressed on somewhat distanced from the front group and unable to close the gap, pulling a string of other riders behind me. Easing and sitting up to take the twisting bends was a relief and a chance to catch my breath before rolling into the café.

A totally relaxed run from the café and shortened ride all around got me home in good time to head off on the family holiday. Mission accomplished.

YTD Totals: 3,661km/ 2,275 miles with 40,544 metres of climbing.

The pipes, the pipes were calling …

Club Run, 11^th July, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 113km/70 miles with 1,045 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 4 hours 19 minutes

Group size: 29 riders at the start. 1 FNG.

Weather in a word or two: Good.

Main topic of conversation at the start: The BFG was out on his wooden rims again and gave us a brief description of his intensive wheel care regime which includes liberal applications of linseed oil using the fresh fleece of a newly slaughtered lamb, an act that can only be conducted after dancing naked around the shed counter-clockwise three times when Mars is in the ascendant. Lovely though they look, I can’t help thinking there’s a reason wooden rims haven’t really caught on.

BFG insisted the linseed oil burns off under braking, producing a lovely aromatic scent. Hmm, well I suppose it could explain the strange odour that wafts around in his wake.

OGL turned up in fabulously baggy shorts on a Mountain Bike that (according to him) wasn’t actually a Mountain Bike. We disowned him anyway, just out of principle. Apparently he was off to some club function so wouldn’t be joining us on the ride. Oh yes, we were off the leash…

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: Apparently orange socks are now the de rigueur match with our club jerseys and have helped our racers gain something of an, ahem, “bad ass” reputation. As a dyed in the wool traditionalist and all-round curmudgeon I’m of course horrified that anyone would even consider wearing anything other than white socks, so yet another trend is (thankfully in this case) almost certain to pass me by.

The Prof, who had proudly managed to control in his insistent urinary urges for once, related how he felt ostracised from the club for having the audacity to turn up wearing white shoes, but unless he was talking about a period pre-1980 when white shoes were a rarity and the sign of a spiv, I think he must have simply misunderstood. Maybe it had more to do with his bike? Or him?

There then followed a seemingly endless litany of all the recent racing crashes, with consequences both painful and eye-wateringly expensive. The conclusion from this seemed to be if you’re going to race don’t use your best bike!

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

With a complete free rein we agreed to head off and tackle a somewhat longer, hillier ride across a route we hadn’t travelled for well over a year, enjoying the most of our temporary freedom and some surprisingly good weather. I shouldn’t be surprised, it is July after all, but I couldn’t help feeling profoundly lucky.

Route decided and under the joint leadership of Crazy Legs and G-Dawg we pushed off, clipped in and set out. Most of us even managed to avoid getting lured into the Great North Road Cyclemaze, which continues to mutate and become ever more dangerous and baffling to the unwary with each passing week.

The pace was good, the weather better and the ride very convivial as we pushed out into the countryside, whirring along in a surprisingly ordered bunch.

As we dropped down into the Wansbeck valley I was riding along chatting with Crazy Legs when our ears were assaulted by the unmistakable sound of bagpipes droning lustily from a house in the middle of nowhere. (Mind you, if you are going to play the bagpipes it probably makes sense to first find a house in the middle of nowhere.)

Once we were assured the Scottish Nationalist Party hadn’t resurrected the Border Reivers and had managed to calm the nationalistic proclivities and dancing hearts of our adopted Scottish brethren, we were able to push on. They’d caused enough excitement for the day anyway, simply by having one of their number unveil possibly the whitest legs that have ever existed this side of an over-worked albino wool fuller with vitiligo.

No, I don't understand it either. — No, I don’t understand it either.

The next, very abrupt right-hand turn robbed us of all momentum and dumped us at the bottom of what is colourfully (if rather fancifully) described on Strava as the Mur de Mitford, a short, brutal climb, that begins immediately after the turn and will always catch out the unwary. Remembering my own travails with the hill which include rounding the corner in the big ring and having to grind up in agonisingly slow-motion with my knees threatening to explode in a welter of blood and gristle, as well as one time pulling my cleats clean out of the pedals and collapsing in a whimpering heap at the side of the road, I dropped onto the inner ring in anticipation.

wile-e-coyote-e1330462601163 — The first law of cartoon physics: gravity doesn’t work until you look down.

As soon as we hit the climb the surprised, the less prepared and the usual gravity-hating pluggers began to lose momentum and wallow across the road in disorder. Crazy Legs darted up the outside and as I tried to follow I was pressed into the gutter by the wobblers and my rear wheel began to slip furiously on the dead leaves, collected gravel and other detritus there. Remembering the first law of cartoon physics (gravity doesn’t work until you look down) I refused to acknowledge there was a problem, and after what seemed an agonisingly drawn out moment of teetering on the brink, the tyre finally bit and I was catapulted unsteadily out of the pack to chase Crazy Legs and G-Dawg over the crest.

A long drive into the wind was followed by more climbing as we dragged ourselves through the Trench and then up and along to Rothley Crossroads. As the road tipped down on the run up to Middleton Bank I started to drift towards the back of the group to pace myself up the steeper bottom ramps of the climb. Clearing these I clicked down and started picking up the pace, passing other riders as the incline eased, I built momentum as I closed on G-Dawg toward the top.

A small group reformed after the climb and started the long chase to try and reel in a few flyers. I sat on the front and pulled until the inevitable Forlorn Hope attack from the Red Max whistled past and the pursuit strung everyone out.

I used the rolling climb out from Milestone Wood to close the gap and pull level with the leaders as the Red Max faded, but in a rare show of strength Bandana was up there, obviously feeling frisky and sensibly not giving up any wheels for me to slot in. For a while I rode along hanging out and exposed to the wind before easing up and drifting back to drop in behind Goose as we rounded the corner onto the last series of climbs to the café.

With Cowin’ Bovril dying horribly ahead of us I let Goose pull me around him, and then shamelessly mugged him on the last rise in time to see the distant final sprint with Crazy Legs claiming a rare victory over G-Dawg.

Tired, dripping with sweat and strangely euphoric we bundled breathlessly into the café en masse. Captain Black was then accosted by a grey-haired shrew who complained that we were far too happy, too loud, much too healthy and had rudely interrupted her exquisitely civilised little tea party. Seriously? What a miserable old harridan. Needless to say the Captain just shrugged and didn’t feel any great need to pass the message on, or do anything to dampen our high spirits. It’s probably just as well as we’d only have got louder.

Boisterous horseplay in the cafe. — Boisterous horseplay at the cafe.

Somehow we ended up with greater numbers coming back from the café than had set out, and as the front group forced the pace and split the group apart I hung back for a more restrained ride until my turn-off, when I struck out alone for home.

Until next week…

YTD Totals: 3,518km/ 2,186 miles with 39,024 metres of climbing.

Random Ephemera Part#1 – in celebration of the wit & wisdom of the online cycling fraternity

When Keats proposed his epitaph should be, “Here lies one whose name was writ in water” he was perhaps prescient in seeing an age where electronic media would prove to be even more transient than the printed page.

While trawling this interweb-thing I’ll often stumble across some pithy put-down, well-crafted description, or just plain-evil, barbed comment that will have me spluttering coffee across my keyboard in delight.

This is my poor attempt to extend the life of this ephemera just a gnat’s breath longer. Here are some of my favourites.

[By the way, if anyone can help I’m still searching for a review I once saw of a reassuringly expensive Rapha wallet, illustrated with a suitable grainy photo of said item spilling open to reveal credit cards, keys, an iPhone and a pristine £10 note. In the comments section some wag had pondered whether the tenner was there for emergencies in case the Raphalite had to soil his fingers replacing a slipped chain and needed something to wipe them clean on.]

A marvellously low-brow interview with Victoria Pendleton in FHM (what else would you expect from FHM?) included the line: “Some of the girls I race against are quite masculine and have very low voices and facial hair…”

To which one message board wit quipped, “That’s odd. Some of the guys I race against are quite feminine, have squeaky voices and no hair anywhere. That’s the topsy-turvy world of cycling for you.”

Then there’s this classic from the Master himself, Doc Hutch in a piece from Cycling Weekly. “In the same era, the British time triallist would lighten his bike with a Black and Decker, drilling holes in bars, stems, frames, brakes, chainsets, and all the rest. He could thus remove two per cent of the weight and 99 per cent of the structural integrity. At full race pace his machine would whistle like a recorder concerto and flex like a wet dishcloth.”

The Rapha Pro Team Cross jersey. Decide for yourself.

Finally, GavinT posted a simple question under a review of the Rapha Pro Team Cross Jersey: “Do they do one in men’s colours?”

Stems, scrotums and the melancholy winking dog ride…

Club Run, 27^th June, 2015

My Ride (according to Strava)

Total Distance: 104km/65 miles with 1,047 metres of climbing

Ride Time: 4 hours 0 minutes

Group size: 33 including at least 4 FNG’s.

Weather in a word or two: Almost perfect.

Main topic of conversation at the start: Every rider who normally turns up early (i.e. on time) made a point of checking their watches in stunned disbelief as they rode in to find a sizeable crowd of fellow cyclists already gathered and waiting for the off. Before 9.00! Good weather does strange things to people. The majority were even willing to risk their ultra-posh, water-soluble good bikes on what promised to be an exceedingly pleasant day.

OGL spotted an old Cinelli stem on BFG’s new/vintage bike(?) and cheerfully recounted how he had ripped open his scrotum on one during a crash at a track meet. Needless to say that’s one set of scars no one wants to see during the next “show us yours” bragging contest.

Main topic of conversation at the coffee stop: The continuing, philosophical elucidation of the circumstances in which a dog is prone to winking, or smiling, and its propensity to do so, often believed to occur in direct correlation to its need to conduct intensive self-ablutions of a most intimate nature.

The revelation that the world can be divided into those who’ve ever listened to Pink Floyd and those ageing, but still heroic, punk-inspired brethren who feel their soul would just shrivel up and die if they thought a copy of Dark Side of the Moon had ever crossed the threshold into the purest sanctity of their homes.

Remembering laughably bad Top Gear/Dad- rock as epitomised by Toto, REO Speedwagon, Boston, Europe, Foreigner, Journey, Styx, Heart, Berlin. (Shudder).

[The ensuing, Berlin inspired Top Gun verdict was a unanimous whitewash – the Grumman F14 Tomcat: 6, Miss Kelly McGilliss: Nil]

The awkwardness of being mercilessly pwned and ending up as an ultra-embarrassing impediment to your own children, while trying to co-op their favourite online FPS’s.

Ride Profile

The Waffle:

33 brave lads and lasses pushed off, clipped in and set out in perfect weather, warm temperatures, high broken clouds and plenty of sunshine, only occasionally marred by a sometimes challenging breeze. Once again we carefully negotiated the labyrinthine, Heath Robinson death-traps of the new, Great North Road Cycle Way, where Taffy Steve amused himself by twanging the “Rommelspargel” candy-striped poles, to see if he could get them to bang together like some immense Newton’s Cradle.

Having successfully emerged unscathed from our very own version of Yungas Road, I thought we were in the clear when directly in front of me one of Cowin’ Bovril’s tyres detonated with a sound like a Paveway bomb exploding. Luckily I don’t wear a heart monitor as I think the resulting spike might have frazzled it for good.

“Hmm, I suspect someone may have punctured.” Another Engine stated dryly, coasting nonchalantly past.

For some reason the rest of us then felt the need to ride another quarter of a mile to the overpass before stopping to wait for Cowin’ Bovril to repair the damage and catch up. Oh well, at least we got to watch the cars pile past as we languished in their therapeutic exhaust fumes.

Out into the country and more open roads we sped, with a regular rotation of riders at the front as the wind was proving somewhat more of an impediment than expected. I caught up with The Red Max who declared he was having un jour sans. The consensus then seemed to be his Forlorn Hope effort would likely be restricted to a 3 mile instead of 5 mile sprint.

We were well into the ride proper when warning shouts of “runner” floated up from the front, closely followed by “dog”. Sure enough, as we all moved to the left of the road a girl jogged lithely past on the right. I looked up, empty road. Looked again, still empty. Finally, and trailing her by about 200 yards, her dog (I assumed it was hers, and not just crazy bad at stalking) lolloped past, almost tripping over its own tongue and panting like the soundtrack to a bad 70’s porn film.

Crazy Legs seemed surprised the dog hadn’t attacked him on sight (I think he feels he’s irresistible to all mammals,) but I countered that the dog was happy and appeared to be smiling at him. This led to a rather long and convoluted discussion of whether dogs can actually smile. Or wink. A discussion we carried on throughout the café stop, much to the bafflement and bemusement of everyone else around us.

The group split, with the amblers being promised one of OGL’s magical mystery tours down farm tracks, through gates and across cattle grids, while carefully negotiating flocks of sheep, herds of cows and their assorted effluvia.

The longer ride hadn’t gone far when we were halted by another puncture, poised at the foot of Middleton Bank, and I found myself at the back as we finally got rolling again and began the climb. It was from this vantage point that I first noticed one of our FNG’s, a Dapper Dan in perfectly fitting, laurel green Café du Cyclist jersey, simple black shorts, retro looking shoes and the most outrageous long socks. He just utterly nailed the look as if he’d been born to it, oozing class and effortless style, and even managing to carry off the socks. The bastard. To cap it all he then capered effortlessly up the climb, and I watched the gap between us slowly widening, even as I was slipping past a long stream of grunting gutter pigs dragging themselves up the outer edge of the road.

One of Dapper Dan's spiritual forebears — One of Dapper Dan’s spiritual forebears

There was a general regrouping as we hammered our way on toward the café, then Crazy Legs kicked up the pace even more and strung everyone out with a massive pull on the front. We hurtled through a road junction, whipping past the amblers who were just emerging wide-eyed and shell-shocked, but otherwise unscathed from their journey into the darkest rural-wilds.

Our group carried its speed through a left and then right switchback before hitting a couple of short, sharp ramps. The Red Max roared up the first, but then sputtered and died as the second incline bit. Having been the first to jump onto his wheel, I swooped around him with a despairing “Noooooo!” and found myself out in front much too early for either my own self-preservation or carefully cultivated wheel-sucking tendencies. (Well, he did warn me he was having a bad day).

With nowhere to hide I kept going, surging over the crest to pelt full-gas down the descent onto the final climb. As we rounded the dog-leg onto the last series of dips and rises G-Dawg and Son of G-Dawg zipped away engaged in their own private battle. A bit further on and Dapper Dan whirred past, and then … nothing … no one else was challenging. I think at this point Shouty was comfortably camped on my rear wheel, but for whatever reason she took pity on an old man and stayed there as we pushed on to the café.

With the amblers still trailing someway behind we had were able to nab first place in the queue and we were on to our refills before they eventually rolled in. An incident free run for home then capped a hugely enjoyable ride.

Until next week…

YTD Totals: 3,189km/ 1,981 miles with 35,422 metres of climbing.

Sur La Jante

The Chronicles, Confessions and Idle Musings of a Club Cyclist

Tag: cycling jersey

Galibier Mistral Foul Weather Jacket Review

The Texas Chainring Massacre and the Road to Cheesecake.

Random Rambles and Esoteric Observations # 4 – Planet X vs. Rapha – The Throwdown

Slip Slidin’ Away

Ghostface Killah

Vacillations and oscillations …

Jabbering babble and babbling jabber …

The pipes, the pipes were calling …

Random Ephemera Part#1 – in celebration of the wit & wisdom of the online cycling fraternity

Stems, scrotums and the melancholy winking dog ride…