paris

French Economic Austerity and er… the impact on Cycling

By on October 2, 2012 in cycling

I was furiously blogging away today – ‘Warming up on a turbo’  in the morning. The French austerity budget for my economics blog in the afternoon. What a life. Everything was going very well. Except my astute cycling readers may have wondered what the French national debt has to do with improving your cycling fitness. […]

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turbo

How Not to Warm up on a Turbo

By on October 2, 2012 in articles, cycling

For several years, I’ve had a turbo trainer quietly rusting away in the garage / shed. It’s one of those things that as a cyclist you feel you ought to buy – even if you’re not quite sure of the point. (I mean everyone spends hours on the turbo during winter don’t they? ) It’s […]

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hill climb trek

Hill Climb Bike

By on October 2, 2012 in bikes, tejvan

New Hill Climb bike is Trek Madone 6.9 For 2011 hill climb season, the weight of the bike was 6.7 Kgs. However, with some modifications this year, I’ve reduced it to 5.8 kgs (12.78 pounds) Trek Madone SSL Frame Shimano Dura Ace Groupset Front wheel – AX Lightness rim – tune hub (350g) Rear wheel […]

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car-bike

Average Speeds of Cars and Bikes

By on October 1, 2012 in cycling

One of the biggest motivations for transport choice is simply – which is fastest? When the train came along, you could suddenly travel from London to Bristol in four hours – rather than a couple of days travel by stage coach. No matter how much people complained about trains (and they did even in the […]

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rob-goughs-bike

Streatley Hill Climb

By on September 30, 2012 in hill climbs

After Leith Hill  (btw: I uploaded a youtube video of race on that page) on Saturday, Sunday morning was quite a different kind of hill – Streatley hill near Goring. Short and steep, this is fairly close in difficulty to the Rake, (Nat champs 2012). Despite doing very well in longer climbs earlier this season, […]

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leith-hill

Leith Hill – Kingston Wheelers CC

By on September 29, 2012 in hill climbs, tejvan

  I ended up doing the last four hill climbs on a time trial bike, so it was nice to get a proper ‘good old fashioned’ 4 minute hill. I could put my time trial bike in the loft, and get my hill climb bike ready. I stripped it down my road bike as much […]

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Sidetracked from the Rake

By on September 28, 2012 in cycling, tejvan

The intention for this month was to focus entirely on preparation for the Rake. Sprint intervals, eyeballs out, practising on steep 25% gradients. But, I got a bit sidetracked last week by the idea of trying to break the Guinness World Record for maximum climbing distance in 24 hours.  – which is  20,000 metres in […]

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Winnats Pass

Winnats Pass

By on September 28, 2012 in cycling, hill climbs

Monday and Tuesday has seen over a months rain fall. The rain has been coming down pretty non-stop and quite a few roads up north are flooded. My main contribution to my cycling fitness has been to order some rollers. I’m quite excited to give it a go, hopefully, I won’t end up on the […]

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queue-cyclists-

Bad Newspaper Articles on Cyclists

By on September 28, 2012 in cycling

It seems every  month (or every week if you read the Daily Mail) there is some comment piece in a newspaper along the lines of: “I don’t mind cyclists – I watched a bit of it on the Olympics. But, really cyclists a bunch of smug, lycra clad tofu nosed urban terrorists who drive my […]

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tune

Tune Saddles

By on September 27, 2012 in cycling

In search for the lightest hill climb bike, I’ve been spending silly money on silly saddles. I’ve ended up with an 85 gram (actual saddle) which is surprisingly comfortable, given it is the width of a wafer thin mint (just one more wafer thin mint, Sir? (1) I started off buying a Tune Concorde saddle. […]

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The Secret Race – Tyler Hamilton and Daniel Coyle Review

By on September 27, 2012 in cycling

In 2003, Tyler Hamilton, a former teammate of Lance Armstrong,  finished 4th in the Tour de France – despite having a broken collarbone. It was one of the most gutsy rides in the history of the sport. He was widely regarded as a nice guy, a great athlete with a supreme capacity to endure pain. […]

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