[Cycling] Some Cornish Cycling.

The Beast Of Bude.

Managed to get 3 cycling rides in whilst staying at my parents in Bude, Cornwall.  Didnt take either of my bikes with me, and with my Dad using his new front sus/disc brake MTB, I was relegated to his old [and I mean old, 20+ year] Raleigh Mustang 'ATB' [love it].  Samuel called it the 'Strawberry Bike' because of the faded reddish colours, I called it the "Beast of Bude" due to its substantial bulk.  Dad had had it serviced by the local bike shop and it was actually OK to ride.  I hadnt ridden a non-sus mountain bike in years, and although it was heavy it was nice to be able to get some power down on the uphill without the wobble you get from the suspension on my usual off-roader.  A few things took a while to get used to; the brakes we a bit soft to say the least and the non-indexed gears were a throw-back too.  I fittied on my saddle-bag, bottle cage and mini-pump and took it out.

Ride 1: Wet, short trip.

It was raining a fair bit, so I took the bike out for a quick blast to see how she handled, just down the Stratton Road hill into Bude and out along Kings Hill to the Marhamchurch turning, then along the tracks by my aunts house to Stratton and back to my parents.  Bike held up, even though one of the tracks was basically a river of mud and rain, and I was trying to cycle up it following a lost sheep at the same time.  First time I had been out on a bike since before Mallorca, so my legs felt it after. Only 4.15 Miles in 22mins, including that long up hill off-road section.

Ride 2: Sunny amble with Dad.

Sunnier this time so Dad joined me for a ride out, which was handy as he showed me some new routes, cut throughs and the cycle path by the Canal/River I didn't know about. Was good. Down the road to Bude and meet up at the Crescent car park [I shot down the hill, he coasted], then along the cycle path beside the canal and river to Hele. From there we took the hills up into Marhamchurch and then along to Stratton and up from Stratton back to my parents house. A decent ride, nice and sunny too which helped. A total of 6.38 miles in 40mins, not bad for my Dad at all (was the longest distance he had covered on his bike).

Ride 3: Ride with Dad then quick blast.

Another nice afternoon so Dad and I went out again, this time a different route. Started off up in to Stratton and along a few lanes to get to Poughill without using the main roads, which was good to know for future reference. From Poughill we headed off towards Northcott, turning back towards Flexbury/Crookletts half way along. Then through Bude town centre and then along the canal cycle way to Kings Hills. Through the Kings Hills industrial estate and across the A39 to the lanes, and from there back to Statton. Dad then headed home and I took off for a blast. Down the Atlantic Highway (A39) to Hele, along the cycle route until Lower Upton. Up the hill from the canal to Upton and then along Marine Drive back to Bude. Managed to get up to 30mph down past Upton Meadows, no mean feat on that bike!  Back home up Stratton Road wasn't the best way to round it off, but a very satisfying ride of 11.51 miles in 1hour 5mins, the longest I had done in weeks. Good stuff.

Some nice riding down there, I've got to take my road bike next time as I really fancy a long ride up to Kilkhampton, then down following the A39 to Widemouth and back. Have to see how I can get it on the car...

[Cycling] Bank Holiday 22 Miler.

Nice weather means the road bike comes out.  And it was great cycling weather today - little bit of sun but also some cloud cover, warm air but also a nice breeze - excellent.

Went out without a planned route in mind, ended up going for a nice 22 miler; West Horndon to Thames Chase, up to North Ockendon, Bulphan, Dunton, Dunton Wyatts, Herongate, back to Bulphan on the A128 and then home to West Horndon. Almost bailed at the first pass of Bulphan as I developed a stitch on the climb at Thames Chase, but glad I carried on and took the climb at Dunton/Herongate well if a little slow.

Total mileage was 22.36 miles, in 1hour 22minutes, average speed of 16.22mph and top speed of (only) 32.11mph.  I need to work on my cadence down hill to boost that speed up.  I did manage to get some decent flat speeds, so happy with that.  Total climbs of 738ft and approx. 1k kCal burned, so a decent run.  I also tried out my Veho Muvi camera on this run.  I used the clamp from the Sports Pack to mount it on the stem of my Carrera Virtuoso, which annoyingly gave the camera too much "up" and I ended up with lots of shots of the blue sky and the road on the very bottom of the screen.  Never mind, I'll try mounting it on my helmet next time and see if that helps the angle, but also the judder/wobble from  the road.

I've edited the ride (well most of it, lost the last blast back from Bulphan as the card was full) down to 4 mins (so about x16 speed) and added some UNKLE over the top for your pleasure...

So apart from the angle, it seems to be rather good for the size and price.  Might have to get a bigger microSD card at some point though, but Im not sure there was more at 2 hours battery in it anyway.

[Cycling] First ride in 2 weeks, plus new tyres.

So, due to holidays, weather, punctures and a head cold I hadn't been out on either bike in almost 2 weeks.  Seeing as my 'phone conferences had finished early, I took a later lunch and tried a quick blast round one of my usual on-road/off-road routes.

It's a nice simple route up to and round Thorndon Country Park.  I certainly felt the fact I hadn't been out for 2 weeks, even had a stitch by the end.  Ended up doing 7.37 miles in 40mins 12secs, top speed was 28mph.  Not bad, but done that route faster before.

The interesting bit was the new tyres I ran on the MTB.  The Kenda tyres than came with the bike seemed to be puncture magnets, so I decided to get some new budget ones.  Plumped in the end for some Continental Mountain King 2.0s as they seems to tick all the boxes.  They were a decent price (£17 each at Halfords, probably could have got them a lot cheaper online but I needed wanted them there and then), nice and knobbly for off-road and could go to 65psi to decent road rolling.  Plus there some some good reviews online saying they were well suited to gravel tracks, trails and the like.

Had a bit of a problem getting them fitted - not the tyre's problem, just had a batch of bad Halfords inner tubes that decided to (a) deflate overnight continually and (b) explode at 30psi when pumping up.  Those things are LOUD when they go bang.  Anyway, I got them fitted and sorted.

They were rather nice to ride on.  Much less road noise than the Kenda ones, better traction at slow speeds on road too.  The one downside was that they felt rather skittish one the loose gravel, which is odd for a knobbly tyre like this.  Maybe having them at 65psi didnt help, I'll try then lower at 50 next time I try this route. They are good looking tyres too, if that matters to you, with a decent looking logo and lettering.  The 2" tyre was a bit less than the 2.2 I had with the Kendas but I didnt notice the difference at all once out and about.

Better get the road bike out over the weekend then I guess....