Great morning's mountain biking in the Pentlands!

Baz just fails on a particularly steep little climb.

Clive daren't look to his right!

Look at that view, this is why we do it!

A fellow biker we met with the prize for the blingest tyres of the day!

The weather forecast at 5.30 a.m. this morning said "a light dusting of snow on the hills", and that's exactly what it turned out to be, (accurate for once!). I seemed to have most mishaps (of a minor nature) this morning on one of the descents when I seemed to hit every muddy hole on the track, but no damage was done. We managed a respectable 30 miles this morning with a few new tracks flung in on the return to make things interesting. I think the fitness is slowly returning (hopefully). 

P####d off with punctures

That's 5 bloody thorns in my tyres I've had this week after two night rides! The hedge cutters have been on the go again with their machines that scatter hawthorn far and wide in search, it seems, of my tyres, for even though I try to stay as far away as possible from the source of said thorns, the little buggers still manage to locate them, grrrrrrrr........................it's costing me a small fortune in patches.

A mixture of ice and mud in the Pentlands

Baz and Clive enjoy the view of Glencorse resevsoir.

A 6 am start again this morning and just a hint of frost lower down but once we climbed higher into the Pentlands we came across ice here and there, it makes biking more interesting especially in the dark! Instead of going round Black Hill today we cut back a track we'd never been on before and encountered quite a bit of mud as well as some hairy narrow tracks with a steep fall away to the side, no injuries to report though but a fair bit of mud deposited on my back garden when we washed the bikes after we'd finished!
25 miles today and the majority of that was off road and reasonably hard going, I weighed myself after we'd finished and discovered I'd lost 1 and 1/2 pounds since last week. A few weeks to go before I'm back at my fighting weight then!

All new parts performing well!

A 17 miler on Wednesday night and an 11 miler tonight and everything seems tickety boo that I replaced. What a difference when there's no chain suck or chain slip! A few minor adjustments to the new gear cable will probably be needed but apart from that, hopefully no more money should be spent for a month or two..............(touches very large piece of wood)

Painful but necessary!

I'd hoped in vain that I'd manage through the winter without changing all my drive gear on the bike but Sunday's ride was enough to convince me that the time had come to bite the bullet and hit the credit card. So onto the net and a quick look about for the best deal and in no time at all the deed was done....ouch!! On Tuesday morning the postman knocked with a package which was quickly concealed from the other half (she doesn't understand how much chain slip can affect one's confidence) and last night the cassette, front chain rings, refurbished bottom bracket, I did that myself, and new chain went on. Result from a quick spin round the block seems OK, but a more serious ride tonight will be better at finding out any more problems. Oh I forgot, I changed the back inner gear cable too, as well as fixing the sender on the bike computer.........surely cant be anything else to go wrong........

Back out on the bikes again!

After an absence of about 7 weeks due to snow, ice and everything else the weather could throw at us we managed back out this morning. A late start for us, 6 am, but we were finding our feet again and weren't too sure about fitness as well! It was chucking down rain when we left and blowing a hooly as well so we kept clear of any exposed mountain stuff (good excuse!) and did a mainly road run. Surprisingly we managed 30 miles without too many aches and pains though we did come across some ice on one bit of off road track.I don't know about my two riding buddies, but I've put on a good few pounds lately so here's hoping this weather isn't going back to snow and ice again 

Snowed off .......again!!

After 2 rides through the week when the snow had almost disappeared we were hit with another 5 inches on Friday night/Saturday morning. This has ruined all chances of much riding this week as the new snow is on top of quite a bit of ice in places and I fancy my collar bone in its present condition rather than in several pieces. The Strathpuffer is next weekend and we've not entered this year, just as well because the preparation this past 2 months has been practically nil.

First ride of 2011 (a bit feeble mind you!)

At last a bike ride! Wasn't much to write home about but the first, even though it was crumby, since the end of November due to:- too much snow for weeks, holidays away from the bike, heavy cold, back which felt it could seize up at any time and finally in Clive's case a perforated ear drum brought on by the dreaded heavy cold!
We maybe didn't go very far, but it was good to get out again and in Clive's case today, fall off several times on the ice (no damage to Clive or the ice). We'll do another short ride tomorrow to see how things go and then weather permitting it's all systems go, well sort of anyway!
Bits of the track are still a bit dicey with frozen snow and ice, see piccy above.