Category: fixed gear
THE DIRTY REIVER 2019
These days if you haven’t tackled the Dirty Reiver can you even call yourself a UK gravel rider? The Dirty Reiver has become a gravel season opener here and a tough benchmark to measure how favourable the winter months have been to fitness. If you have been hiding inside from the grimness of winter the Dirty Reiver is going to quickly remind you of all those missed training rides. Even the diligent winter riders will find the 130km cut off to be very tempting, an opportunity to end the suffering by cutting the route short to find sanctuary and beer at the event village early. The full 200km demands some serious grit and determination from riders.
Continue reading “THE DIRTY REIVER 2019”EURO FIXED GEAR ODYSSEY BIKE CHECK
One of the things I like about bikepacking is that each setup is unique to the rider. Each person will have different requirements or preferences which are ultimately reflected in their kit. Shaped by experience, setups become dialled in and what works for one person might seem ridiculous to another. There is no rule book to tell you that a setup is perfect other than the conclusion of the ride and even then there are always new lessons learned for the next trip. Even on an adventure where two similar riders tackle the same route on the same bike there are is so much scope for different approaches. This could not be any better demonstrated than by the setups that Stu and I ran for a 1000+ mile fixed tour across Europe which saw us covering the wide range of terrain and surfaces that span between Barcelona and Rome.
Continue reading “EURO FIXED GEAR ODYSSEY BIKE CHECK”SNOW DAY!
I went for a gravel ride with Euan Camlin, Andrew Cullen and Christo Gallagher. We had planned out a route but when we saw that it had snowed over night we decided to scrap our plan, make things up as we go along and the ride worked out even better.
Continue reading “SNOW DAY!”EAST LOTHIAN ROUGH STUFF
As per Rich’s birthday tradition we go for a loop of the East Lothian Rough Stuff Audax gravel route. Some swoopy trails, standard pie stop and a top shelf selection of Rich stories.
Continue reading “EAST LOTHIAN ROUGH STUFF”GRAVEL RIDE TO AN ABANDONED SAWMILL
Matt and I went on a Huckleberry Finn gravel adventure through some old railway tunnels and find an abandoned sawmill hidden in the woods.
Continue reading “GRAVEL RIDE TO AN ABANDONED SAWMILL”RAPHA FESTIVE 500 SUPER LOOPER VIDEO
IS THE STOVE ON – OVER PHAWHOPE BOTHY MICROADVENTURE
The echo chamber of our group chat had tricked us again. With the woes of our Gameshope miss-adventure now in the past the idea of getting out for the first bothy adventure of 2019 had got us excited.
Continue reading “IS THE STOVE ON – OVER PHAWHOPE BOTHY MICROADVENTURE”RAPHA FESTIVE 500 SUPER LOOPER 2018
Since 2010 cycling trendsters Rapha have been throwing the Festive 500 gauntlet down and challenging all to ride 500km between Christmas Eve and New Years Eve. On paper this seems like a fairly straight forward challenge, broken down it’s only 62.5km for 8 days. With a bit of commitment this shouldn’t cause much of an issue for your standard club rider. A few rides with your normal group and a couple of solo missions and the milage will come easily. But it isnt that straight forward.
Continue reading “RAPHA FESTIVE 500 SUPER LOOPER 2018”TYPE 2 IS COMING – GAMESHOPE BOTHY MICROADVENTURE
The days of recent may have been doing their best to eek out every last bit of good weather but the tell tale signs are starting to show. There is no doubt that winter has already began.
Continue reading “TYPE 2 IS COMING – GAMESHOPE BOTHY MICROADVENTURE”
MOSTLY BY BIKE 