It was pissing down rain this morning but out of solidarity for those who suffered so much during the Paris-Brest-Paris I decided to ride anyway. That and the fact that VictimOfNoel is 367km ahead of me and Sneaky Steve is snapping at my heels in the yearly mileage totals.
I enjoy the 2.3km 120m climb up Bonnett Hill, it's a hard start to the morning but I need the hill training. My biggest fear has always been that on the return journey my lights would somehow fail. Today's been a good day for addressing fears.
Since I broke a spoke in my back wheel on the weekend I've been running my old six-speed wheels with singles. Because I don't want to carry spare singles and spare tubes, I've abandoned the generator hub and have been using an old Nightstick halogen lamp. On the ascent tonight, just as I left the street lamps of suburbia and entered the deep dark bush section of the ride the bugger started to fade, so I switched it off and climbed under the starlight.
It didn't do any good - by the time I got to the top the fucker was dead flat. There's nothing like descending a steep and hairy 2km descent in total darkness, with only the starlight reflecting off the double yellow lines to guide you. And not much starlight at that. It was a case of picking a speed I was happy to crash at. Somehow I made it down safe, but it's not an experience I want to repeat. Perhaps I was premature dissing the Ayup lights...
4,276km so far this year.
Rene Herse Introduces TPU Tubes
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We’re beyond excited to introduce the new Rene Herse TPU tubes. They take
the performance of our tires to the next level. Why tubes? Tubeless is
great for ...
14 hours ago