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In my teens I rode for a while for Velo Club Baracchi which still exists. I joined basically because they had a weekly 10 mile TT starting and finishing in the village I lived in. I rode a very basic off the shelf road bike with the only updates being Tri Bars and hooded brakes so that the cables did not get in the way of me moving to and from the tri bars. Hooded brakes were a bit new in those days!!!!!

I managed to find a picture of the bars on google.



The only other thing I did was put on 18mm tyres. Made the ride incredibly uncomfortable but for less than half an hours sprinting I was not a problem. I could not afford any decent upgrades so the tyres was one way I could hope to reduce my time without much expense.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

wow, I know what you mean about the hooded brakes.. when I got some of those I thought it was amazing. Although even today they're not standard for every manufacturer.

I've been browsing idly for indoor trainers.. looking at Tacx iFlow or Vortex... have to wait until next year. It is pretty difficult to get out when there's 5-6 inches of snow

Yeah, I got some Tacx rollers which ate excellent as I already find I pedal more smoothly. It's just the motivation that's hard when you know you can stop anytime you like and don't have to actually finish a ride.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Ahh but I would have a wife, 2 screaming kids and a barking dog upstairs, so that's sometimes a good incentive to finish the ride.. perhaps even make it a tad longer

So Dom has the Topeak RaceRocket HP, which Lezyne do you have? I have to buy one soon. You guys get so many punctures that you've scared me enough! Although in off road I've never ever had one (nice one, I just jinxed it I guess). I've even broke a chain, but no punctures yet

http://road.cc/content/review/57390-lezyne-tech-drive-hp-pump

It's brilliant. I know those that don't cycle much will think it a little odd getting excited about a pump but when you've ridden 100 miles on a boiling hot day and you puncture with 10 miles left to go, having a quality pump that gets the tyre up to pressure without having to put much effort in means more to me than any other fancy bit of kit I may have on my bike.

The fact it's fairly small, light and seems well made is also a bonus. I don't feel I'm dragging round a cumbersome bit of heavy metal everytime I go out.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

I have only had one off-road MTB puncture so far but I have on,y done a few hundred km this year. Luckily I didn't realise until I got home.. my MTB riding buddy has had about 4 or 5 MTB punctures in the same time period, but none since he changed three to Schwalbe Nobby Nics

Once you have changed a few inner tubes by the side of the road, its quite painless if you have the right equipment!

Its just one of those things.

So, schumie, I forgot, are you just getting in to road cycling?

Btw, I have the same comments about my top peak pump as asphalt does about his. Mine is attached to the side of the frame via a holder with a rubber strap. The holder is fixed to the frame using the bottle cage bolts (you can easily put a bottle cage over the top). It does not rattle at all either. Dunno how the lezyne is fixed?

Thanks guys. Prices are similar, I just need to look to weight/pumping ability (you know what I mean, how many pumps needed as Ashpalt mentioned). It's good that you can recommend some, I'd hate to buy something that I would regret on the side of the road.

Regarding my cycling, I'm more of the off-road type, I don't even have a road bike. Although I'm looking around for something like a second-hand Marin for £50 or so, with it's battle wounds, which not many many people will take a second look at. I'll put some slicks and make it my road bike, just to commute to work (I'm now about 5' from work, which is awesome). Don't want to be commuting in my expensive Cube.

Aahh I have a cube road bike... better known for their MTBs, I know. I have a Cube Streamer with Ultegra drive train and 105 brakes. My MTB is another German make: Ghost, with deore XT group set. Dunno why I went German...

Being an unusual shape, I found d it difficult getting a decent frame geometry (short legs you see), and the cube was much better than many others. The people in the canondale shop just looked at me, scratched their chins, whispered amongst themselves and shook their heads. very confidence boosting that is!!!

I live 35km from work, but I havent cycled before, even though there are cycle paths the whole way.. maybe next year

I saw a Cube road bike on the street the other day.


GORGEOUS.

If only it rides as good as it looks.

Ghosts look similar to Cubes, at least the few I've seen, similar colours. As if a copycat. I have no idea though, maybe they were there first, Cubes are relatively new as far as I know.

I honestly don't mind road cycling, but off road is a bit more challenging. Plus you don't run the risk of cars running over you. I don't mean anything too extreme like downhill, but there's enough country side here with uphills and straights and mud and grass that are fantastic. The scenery is better than the tarmac too!

oh and fit folding tyres if you want easier puncture repairs at the side of the road.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Yeah, the fact that it looked good, was a light aluminium frame (couldn't justify carbon) and good kit on it for a reasonable price compared to other brands, drew me to the Cube. Ghost are probably younger than Cube and they opened a brand new store in a renovated train station building on my way home for work, so I just had to go in, and the bikes were really cool - and I hadn't had a bike for 25 years!

I went only quite recently on my first "proper" 50km trip, but real off road. Usually I go on the myriad of cycle paths through the woods around here, but this was actual off the beaten track stuff. I went with a couple of other well-trained guys and I was absolutely knackered at the end,, nearly 1000 vertical metres. It was incredibly good fun though.

I like road biking though, because there are fewer variables and you can therefore see if you're improving and getting fitter in a measurable way, which in turn gives me the motivation to keep going (my initial aim was to lose weight, and I lost neraly 20kg this year)..

oooh, just been contacted by Galibier Velo to say I've won a pair of their super duper winter cycling gloves. Top job.

I need new gloves as well.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

lol well done...! I bought a pair of bib shorts from them but haven't had a chance to wear them in anger yet. I have a feeling they're gonna be a little too small, but we'll see. I get cold fingertips with my gloves, so I was looking for a pair of thin gloves to go underneath. Unfortunately Lidl have sold out - they cost 4€ I saw a cool pair of gloves yesterday in a massive cycling store I found in Frankfurt (I could have spent hours in there!), which were thin gloves with mittens over the top, but with the index finger and thumb free to move separately - good for changing gears - and the index finger was conductive so you can operate touch screens with your glove on. Excellent idea! My current gloves are a bit to bulky, so changing up gears is a bit tricky (Ultegra).

I only found this place in Frankfurt because I was looking for Tacx Test Centres. I phoned them up in advance, but when we got there, the trainer wasn't connected to a PC, which annoyed me.. I mean, I know what a bog standard turbo trainer looks like..

I've got my wife complaining about the idea of spending a few hundred Euros on a useful bit of kit, when today she phoned me up having received a bill for 500€ for a plastic teeth guard thing (forgot the english name) to stop her grinding her teeth at night!!! I pointed out that most people check the cost before buying something *sniff*. Plus, the day after it arrived, the dog ate it

How? That's nice!

Your dog must be one cool dog!

Which shop in Frankfurt? My girlfriend was staying there for a few months and I visited a lot, I probably missed this shop

my dog is not cool. not one iota. I don't think the poor creature has a brain at all. It likes anything stinky though, so dirty snot-rags, ear-plugs, anything like that are a real turn-on!

The shop is Stadler:
http://www.zweirad-stadler.com/standorte/frankfurt.html

They tweeted a caption comp yesterday and me and someone else we're the winners.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Regarding cold fingertips, my advice is a 5 - 10 quid pair of silk gloves to wear under whatever gloves you wear whilst out on cold days. Works brilliantly. eBay is full of cheap pairs.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Yeap, sounds like a cool dog!

Thanks for this, I'll try it next time I'm around there.

Nice. I saw the winter lined gloves they have, they seem quite good. They're on sale too, for £16, not bad if the quality is that good

I'll let you know about the gloves once I've got them.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Unbelievable......

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/536061/mary-bowers-lorry-driver-cleared-of-dangerous-driving.html

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Sad sad story

Yes, Sports Personality and Coach of the year.

Think I'll have another energy gel to celebrate!

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

That's unbelievable, how can the courts be so lenient? What else did the guy have to do to go from careless to dangerous?!

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Ooh went to see and test a Tacx i-Genius turbo-trainer at the weekend... was pleasantly surprised at how good and entertaining it was.. I went in a bit skeptical, but it surpassed my expectations. I'm now drooling. Not that I can afford the i-Genius, but an i-Vortex would suffice. Please Santa..

I just bought a bladder myself. A 2 litre one. Never had one, always wanted to try them!

Also bought a Crank Bros multi tool, for a gift. Though I'm thinking of keeping it!

Bladder arrived, so excited.

But will have to wait. My cycling mate broke his arm. Bummer

How far do you ride to need 2Ltr's of fluid? Sorry Schumie, round here, if some people go for a walk they use em Fashion eh!

To be fair, though, I may have to try one in the summer as my current frame doesn't even have space or mountings for s 500ml bottle

Don't forget the blue tyre to kill the noise, a must for a dedicated setup. I use a Tracx Flow.... 1-2 hrs varied max or short high intensity, never felt the need for laptop virtual connection

Hope you've been a good boy for Santa

2 L is the maximum, you don't have to top it! I'm planning to do a London-Brighton maybe this year, so that will be handy!

Youre right for the walk, I have seen them used for hiking. My friends that tried it have never used bottles again. So I thought why not!

What frame do you have? What kind of bike?

Yeah, tyre will be sorted. The Flow would be fine for me too, but I like anything which distracts me from the fact I'm sitting in my cellar! I like analysing stuff too, so being able to record and analyse performance data (not that I have any particular objective or training program) would be cool. It would also be cool to ride routes which I used to ride with my dad when I was younger and still lived in the UK. My brother's a keen (and very decent) bike rider and he lives in NZ, so it would be fun to ride his training routes or race stage routes too. I'm not hard-core enough to convince myself to listen to music whilst on a turbo-trainer for hours. Having said that, I'm hard-core enough to go out 2-3 times a week in the evenings in the freezing bloody cold I could also go for a ride on the turbo when I'm at home on babysitting duty..

It's a Marin. The problem is the top and down tube are both swept in (ground clearance and ballsack clearance), and with the suspension mech in there to the best you can do is a side cage and a 'stumpy' bottle.

Never used one but I always worry that having a bladder on your back will cause you to get a very hot and sweaty back.

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!

Nice! I'll let you know when I use it, if it is worth it or not

I always have a backpack, so the bladder inside it won't do much difference.

I hope at least!

yeah, put a plastic liner inside your rucksack and fill it with water Simples.

well, I decided to try some interval training in a bid to improve my fat-burning and endurance. I made my first attempt yesterday in the crazy wind. It was supposed to be a simple workout of 3x8 mins at 80% perceived effort (heavy labored breathing but just under "muscle burning" level) with 5 mins rest in between, as part of a 90 minute (~45km) ride. I had no idea 8 minutes could seem so long. I also don't have a heart-rate monitor or power meter, so I only have this "perceived level" to go by. Anyway, with a strong side-wind, I managed about 42kph average for the first stint. Into the strong head-wind I managed about 27kph on the next (a bunch of seagulls next to me took off and had a negative ground speed so they gave up and turned round) about about 36kph on the last, again with a strong side-wind and slightly up-hill.

So I was rather annoyed when I screwed up with my Garmin and didn't actually record the data during the intervals So I now only having my aching legs to prove I did it.

Anyone else tried interval training and noticed any effect?

Sir Wiggo. Says he'll only use the title at home and in the Peleton! lol

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Oh and Bernie, National flags should be raised not flipped. Sort it!